Sunday, February 1, 2015

Week 3 Assignments

Summary of upcoming deadlines

Feb. 2: CodeAcademy exercises must all be finished.
Feb. 7: Storify assignment
Feb. 9: Livetweet assignment
Feb. 11: Liveblog assignment
Feb. 14: Scavenger hunt assignment

For the next three classes, we're going to finish up with social and blogging basics.

  • On Monday we're going to talk about livetweeting and liveblogging and what they are good for, and we'll practice livetweeting that day.
  • On Wednesday, we'll do a brief liveblogging practice and then talk about Storify, a social media storytelling tool. In the following week after that, you'll be required to try all three to get some practice at it (and I'd encourage you to make one of these something you do with a Brown & White multimedia requirement for the first half of the semester).
  • The following week, we'll be doing a social media scavenger hunt with classes in other parts of the U.S. to practice live reporting.


Storify assignment

Due by the end of the day on Feb. 7

We will practice Storify on Wednesday so you get the basics. For this assignment I want you to use Storify to summarize a news event using social tools. It could be breaking news or a topic of big interest during a given news cycle.

  • The main criteria for what you choose is it should be something where discussion is contained to a day so you're not choosing content over the spread of a week.
  • I'd like you to produce this Storify within a day of the news event day. This format works well when you're using it in the moment, not way after the fact.
  • Requirements: Should have a healthy diversity of visual and text content, social media, blogs, and links. I don't want you to load up on one format.
  • Tip: You can use this for the Brown & White, but it might also be useful for your curation topic if you don't have a B&W option. It can't count as one of your two weekly posts, but it might make a nice extra post worth tweeting out.

To turn this in: Embed it on the class blog and write a 150-word recap of the experience with an original post on this blog. Once you decided on a story, what challenges did you face? What kinds of stories work well with Storify? Are there certain news stories that don't work well with this format?


Livetweet assignment

Due by the end of the day on Feb. 9

After practicing once in class, you'll need to pick an event of some sort and livetweet the experience. It could be a news event, a press conference, something on television, whatever you want. Again, if it works for a B&W coverage event, great. If not, again, maybe consider doing something in conjunction with your curation assignment.

  • I'd like you to pick something others are livetweeting or at least talking about. Something on TV or an event you're attending in person are obvious candidates. The reason is I'd like you to use hashtags others are using in order to participate with them, use Tweetdeck columns to monitor that discussion. 
  • Try to retweet the obvious things others are talking about. Don't reinvent the wheel. Focus on what unique voice you can add to the discussion, retweet the rest!

One tip: warn your followers beforehand you're doing this so they don't unfollow you out of frustration. Invite them to mute you for an hour.

To turn this in: Embed three of your favorite tweets and write a 150-word recap of the experience with an original post on this blog. How hard was it to do this if you were doing it for the first time? Do you think you tweeted too much or too little? What do you think is a good balance between retweeting and original posting?


Liveblog assignment

Due by the end of the day on Feb. 11

Similar to the livetweet assignment, after practicing once in class you'll need to liveblog some sort of experience (real life or television). In this case I'm going to give you two options: liveblog it for a B&W assignment or liveblog it for your curation assignment (as stated in class, this is in addition to your regular two posts with the goal of giving you extra content). You'll need to cover whatever it is in real time.

  • With liveblogging, you're not worried about Twitter curation.
  • Create your liveblog post so that you have a URL.
  • Announce on Twitter you're liveblogging the event, note the time it starts, and include the link to the page.
  • Liveblog start to finish
  • If you're covering an event live, I'd like you to post two original photos during the liveblog. If you're doing something on TV, I want to see a couple links to something on the web that relate to what's going on.
  • After the event is over, again tweet you just liveblogged, recap any news shared, and include the link.

To turn this in: Share the link on your blog (use your HTML skills to embed it in a paragraph rather than pasting the URL!). What was the process like? Now that you've livetweeted something too, how are those two formats different? Why would you use one over the other? Do you have a preference?

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