Digital Journalism Practice
Skills for now and the future
Summary
“A comprehensive resource for anyone wanting a career in journalism in the digital age... this book will help aspiring journalists build - and future-proof - their careers.” — Rosie Taylor, Journalist and Founder of Get Featured Media Consultancy
“This is an excellent and necessary book that I would happily recommend to students.” — Gavin Allen, Senior Lecturer, Cardiff University School of Journalism, Media and Communication (JOMEC)
Breaking new ground in the teaching and learning of digital journalism practice, this book lays out the enduring principles of social media and online reporting. The authors’ approach focuses on prevailing story formats, core skills, audience insights and future proofing through innovation. This practical handbook contains step-by-step instructions on how to create your own social videos, multimedia native content, live blogs, podcasts and much more. Tips from industry professionals and how-to guides are supplied throughout, with exercises that lead you through the application of your new-found skills and understanding. Planners, workflows and storyboard templates ensure you tailor your report to the right media, format and platform. You will also learn about issues related to working in a digital space, such as online safety and how to harness the power, but avoid the pitfalls, of artificial intelligence.
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- List of Exercises
- List of Figures
- List of Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Definition of ‘digital journalism’
- Evolution of digital journalism
- Preparing future digital journalists
- The active audience
- Critical context
- How to use this book
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 1 Digital video
- Social short videos
- What is a social short?
- Story selection
- Summary
- Storytelling
- Summary
- Production
- Filming
- Audio
- Editing
- Captions
- Recap
- Selecting your story
- Telling your story
- Making the video
- Creating from TV footage
- Dissemination
- Summary
- Video explainers
- What is a video explainer?
- Story selection
- Storytelling
- Summary
- Production
- Presentation
- Research
- Narration
- Storyboarding
- Other types of digital video
- TikTok
- Story choice
- Storytelling
- Presentation
- Audio
- Tone of voice
- Reach
- Shorts and Reels
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 2 Social storytelling
- Formats
- Image and text
- Production
- Video clip and text
- Production
- Multimedia and text
- Production
- Stories
- Production
- Social cards
- Production
- Funny stuff
- Format choice
- Story selection
- Story structure
- Dissemination
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 3 Online
- Writing for online
- Understanding the online audience
- Structure of an online news article
- Writing effective headlines
- Keywords and SEO
- Clickbait headlines
- Summary paragraph
- Writing style
- Multimedia web pages
- What is a multimedia web page?
- Elements of a multimedia webpage
- Storytelling
- Multimedia planner
- Production
- Interactivity
- Online polls
- Interactive maps
- Quizzes
- Comments
- Live blogs
- What is a live blog?
- Story selection
- Production
- Listicles
- What is a listicle?
- Story selection
- Production
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 4 Digital audio
- Simple audio clips for social media
- Visualisation of audio
- Waveforms
- Audio cards
- Filming audio broadcast and interviews
- Captions and graphics
- ‘Sound on’
- Podcasting
- What is a podcast?
- News podcasts
- Storytelling
- Production
- To script or not to script?
- Gathering audio
- Recording
- Editing
- Dissemination
- Social audio
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 5 Understanding audience data
- Social media users
- Demographics
- Editorial impact
- Analytics
- Website analytics
- Social media analytics
- Video analytics
- Understanding algorithms
- Critical issues
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 6 Journalism skills for the digital age
- News sense
- Interviewing
- Summary
- Writing
- Mobile filming
- Setting up your smartphone
- Assembling your mojo kit
- Filming sequences
- Filming interviews
- Shooting for social
- Video editing
- Social listening
- Data visualisation
- Production
- Data visualisation apps
- Graphic design
- Fact checking
- What is being done?
- What can you do?
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 7 Working safely online
- What is online harm?
- Your presence online
- Managing your relationship with social media
- Contacting people on social media
- Safeguarding yourself and others
- Protecting your data
- Dealing with abuse
- Responding
- Reporting abuse
- Dealing with trauma
- How can you prepare and support your audience?
- Support and resources
- References and recommended reading
- Chapter 8 Future Proofing
- Innovation: New digital formats
- Coping with constant change
- Don’t sweat the small(er) stuff
- Resilience
- AI in the newsroom
- Emergence of AI
- AI for finding news
- AI for distributing news
- AI for producing news
- AI issues and ethics
- Opportunities of AI
- References and further reading
- Index
Exercises
Exercise 1.1: Analyse social shorts to understand their characteristics
Exercise 1.2: Make your own social short
Exercise 1.3: Design a social short from a TV report
Exercise 1.4: Follow the three steps to creating a video explainer
Exercise 2.1: Familiarise yourselves with social storytelling, starting at home
Exercise 2.2: Follow the steps to create your own native journalism
Exercise 3.1: Practice your headline writing and test them out
Exercise 3.2: Now write both a headline and summary of a story
Exercise 3.3: Write a complete online news story
Exercise 3.4: Analyse a multimedia news story to understand its characteristics
Exercise 3.5: Make a multimedia online news story
Exercise 3.6: Analyse a live blog as it’s being created
Exercise 3.7: Write a live blog on a news event of your choosing
Exercise 3.8: Create a listicle based on a news story
Exercise 4.1: Practise your audio recording skills by doing an interview
Exercise 4.2: Create a visual way to illustrate audio on social media
Exercise 4.3: Listen to and analyse podcasts to identify winning formulae
Exercise 4.4: Create a podcast pitch, explaining what will make your podcast work
Exercise 4.5: Experiment creating content for a social audio platform
Exercise 5.1: Compare how the same stories are told differently across social media
Exercise 5.2: Use publicly available metrics to analyse news on social media
Exercise 6.1: Find a story and start developing it into a digital report
Exercise 6.2: Practice shooting sequences and make a shot list for a news video location
Exercise 6.3: Practise your social listening skills
Exercise 6.4: Create a data visualisation that functions as a news report
Exercise 6.5: Analyse a fact checking process
Exercise 7.1: Explore how much personal information is readily available on social media
Exercise 7.2: Create a personal online safety plan
Exercise 7.3: Make a risk assessment for a story you want to work on
Exercise 7.4: Make a list of people you trust who can support you
Exercise 7.5: Think about how you would respond to online abuse
Exercise 7.6: Create a self-care plan to bolster your mental health
Exercise 7.7: Complete your personal safety plan with a list of helpful resources
Exercise 8.1: Create a report using a social media news format that you have developed yourself
Exercise 8.2: Plan a news report for new technology
Figures
Figure 1.1: Screen grab of social short from BBC Yorkshire posted on Facebook
Figure 1.2: Screen grab of social short the Washington Post on Instagram
Figure 1.3: A timeline in Adobe Premier Pro for a social short
Figure 1.4: Natalia Jorquera explains climate neutrality in an ITV News explainer
Figure 1.5: Journalist Alice Cruickshank appears Duet-style in a BBC News TikTok
Figure 1.6: Guardian reporter Madeleine Finlay using green screen for her TikTok
Figure 2.1: Fabrizio Romano breaks a football story on X
Figure 2.2: Reporters from ITV News in the UK and ABC News in the USA sharing video on X. The clips have been viewed nearly a million times between them
Figure 2.3: Slides from an Instagram carousel report by Vice UK on attitudes to Brexit
Figure 2.4: The first post in a thread on X detailing the tactics of a football team
Figure 2.5: The first three posts in a thread on X about snow leopard population
Figure 2.6: An interactive screen from a Brut Instagram Story
Figure 2.7: A title video to an ITV News Instagram Story series called ‘The Rundown’
Figure 2.8: A Financial Times ‘social card’ on Instagram
Figure 3.1: The inverted pyramid structure for news writing
Figure 3.2: A screen grab showing part of an article from The Guardian about coral bleaching
Figure 3.3: A Word Press CMS screengrab
Figure 3.4: Extracts from a Sky Sport live news blog 1 August 2024 and a BBC News live blog 7 July 2022
Figure 3.5: An example of a very simple live blog created using WordPress
Figure 3.6: Some examples of listicle headlines
Figure 4.1: Student journalist using a microphone with a windshield. [By permission of Shanai Dunglinson].
Details
- Pages
- XXXIV, 184
- Publication Year
- 2026
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9781636671901
- ISBN (ePUB)
- 9781636671918
- ISBN (Softcover)
- 9781636671895
- DOI
- 10.3726/b23643
- Language
- English
- Publication date
- 2026 (August)
- Keywords
- Digital journalism digital journalism skills social storytelling social video social audio digital video writing for online news online safety for journalists mobile journalism audience analytics fact checking data visualisation artificial intelligence
- Published
- New York, Berlin, Bruxelles, Chennai, Lausanne, Oxford, 2026. XXXIV, 184 pp., 41 b/w ill., 11 tables.
- Product Safety
- Peter Lang Group AG
