1
24
Jan

iPhones in the Heartland

Central Nebraskans (and other smaller cities in the country often forgotten by the Tech world) are wondering if they should get an iPhone now that it will soon be available through Verizon. Articles like this from Arstechnica and this from Shelly Palmer can be confusing to those of us still clinging to Blackberries because iPhones have never been an option for us.

My coworker, who is anxiously awaiting the Verizon iPhone and declined to get a Droid in anticipation of the Verizon iPhone, was thrown by Palmer’s blog post particularly because she talks about the cost of switching from AT&T and the fact that Apple will likely announce a spanky new phone later this year. He’s worried about tying himself to a 2-year contract for the phone now if something faster and better will be on the way in just a few months.

This is what annoys me a little about the flurry of posts touting the pros and cons of the new Verizon iPhone – no one takes into consideration the fact that things are different out here in the flyover states. Unless we live in Lincoln or Omaha, Nebraska, we’ve never had access to iPhones at all.

Thank goodness for the Droid!

So should anyone around my part of the world have the same fears about theViPhone as my coworker, I’ll tell you what I told him: If your current Verizon contract is due for an upgrade, go ahead and get the new iPhone. Yes, you’ll have to buy the phone still, but it’s pretty spiffy and you won’t regret it. As far as speed and knowing that 4G speed is becoming the norm – in more populated areas first of course – it will likely be a while before that lightning fast LTE or 4G hits Grand Island, Nebraska so to me, the 2-year contract thing isn’t a big deal. In 2 years, there will likely be an even better iPhone coming out. Besides, Verizon’s 3G network is pretty fast and unless you are a super power-user, you’re not likely to care much. But the one thing that makes getting the ViPhone worth it, in my mind, is the wi-fi hotspot capability.

That alone is pretty fantastic. I don’t have a smartphone at all – I rely on my iPod Touch 4 and the Verizon Mi-Fi. I use it for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, email, Evernote, games, paying for my mochas, texting, and with some jiggery-pokery, a phone. Rarely do I actually use it as an iPod, funnily enough. With wi-fi becoming so available, even here in the sticks, in time I don’t even think I’ll need the mi-fi anymore.

So, my recommendation based on what I know about living in the land that tech sites forgot, and based on being quite a gadget whore, I say it’s ok for you undecided Nebraskans to go ahead and get yourself the new Verizon iPhone when it’s unleashed. You’ll love it.

[For the record, I have nothing against Droids and would be perfectly happy with one if I didn't love my iPod Touch so much.]

1
15
Dec

Newsroom changes for the good

I’m really pleased right now. I will admit that for a few months, I had begun to despair because my newsroom stopped responding to change. I watched as other news services in the area clutched their smartphones with glee and began to outstrip us when it came to live tweeting news as it happens.

I won’t go into all of the red tape reasons we were dragging our heels because it doesn’t matter anymore. We no longer have a videographer. Now we have a mobile web reporter. Essentially, we turned our videographer into our reporter for the web. Do you have any idea how much I’ve wanted such a person in the newsroom? Not only that, but we worked out a way to get him a Droid X, taught him how to turn it into a wifi hotspot and now he can get out there, shoot photos and video and write a story for the web in his car, pop me a text and I can get it edited, photos/video added and have something online before any other news service around here can say, “I didn’t know about that.”

What this means for The Independent is we’ll have a fresh, regularly updated website all day long.I’m so excited I could spit.

Our new mobile web reporter has some learning to do, mind you. I want him to not rely on his expensive video camera all the time that requires a lot of editing/producing time and just grab some video with the Droid for a story that we can put in as plain old raw video. People click that stuff. They don’t need something slick and produced with transitions and title tags all the time. I want him to open up his UStream app and air it live while I embed that into a story and direct readers to it from Facebook and Twitter.

But he’s still learning how the phone works, and for now he’s doing a good job of getting out to stories we might not always cover because we’re shorthanded (like most newsrooms I know.) He needs to be able to find stories on his own now, but he’ll learn that too.  We’ll get there, and I’m so excited about this.

Not only that, I had a meeting last week regarding our direction with Social Media, which is my forté. I am not going to talk much about it just yet, but I will just say that my publisher is *extremely* taken with what the Journal Register is up to….

5
9
Nov

Newsroom travels back in time

My newsroom feels like it’s gone back in time about two years when I was really struggling to get everyone on board with social media stuff. I can’t remember the last time someone grabbed our spiffy Zi8 to grab some video of a breaking story, or hell, I can’t remember when I last had regular news updates for the web without asking for them or finding them myself.

We had a brief period of excitement when it looked like we might be able to finagle a couple of Droids for newsroom use and I had visions of live tweets from pressers and games and breaking stories. I had fantasies of reporters who finally had that big old light bulb go off when they saw how much their work is enhanced by using a Droid and how effective Twitter is at communication.

Well that got squashed pretty quickly in corporate red tape and well, we have no droids and my newsroom is once again too busy getting their stories in for print (and web, often as an afterthought) to fuss with Twitter. I’m back at square one and it’s killing me pretty good. I just don’t know if I can handle starting at the bottom of the hill again. I’m like the Sisyphus of Social Media. And in the meantime, I see our competitors leaving us in the dust because they’ve embraced it.

Let me just say here that I believe the staff here is phenomenally talented at what they do, and have been doing for years. They’ve got experience, great contacts in the community, they’re creative and they are some of the best. I just wish I could find a way that isn’t patronizing or insulting to reach them and switch on that light bulb so that they see what I’m trying to give them is another way to enhance their work, their careers, and at the same time, make a lot of it easier. I want to help, but instead I feel sometimes that I’m seen as a brick wall they can’t be bothered to climb.

Having said that, we still need a solution to the problem of regularly updated content for the web. We still need to be using Twitter and Facebook and Storify and every tool we can get our hands on to make my newspaper THE place to get your local news.

To that end, we’ve been kicking around the idea of just sending me out with the reporters to do that stuff. It makes sense in a, “Why didn’t we think of that before?” kind of way.  We’re not going to change minds in the newsroom by constantly hammering away at them. Ever been lectured by a parent? Ever tuned them out while they lectured? That’s what happens in a newsroom – well mine at least. So let’s just do it ourselves. I’ve been live-tweeting stuff for years. I can juggle my iPhone, various apps (hello AudioBoo!), cameras and finesse wi-fi in the strangest places. So let’s stop moaning about a newsroom that doesn’t “get it” and just show them. They can still whip out their pencils and digital recorders and write their stories when they get back, and meanwhile, I’ll have continual updates going out instantly, and then Storify them when *I* get back.

I will either piss off my comrades, or they will get to see how this stuff works in action and maybe have a light bulb moment.