I’ll spare the clichés and just tell you that the ICM weblog is moving to a WordPress.com hosted blog. All of the content will be available on the new site, although links back to the blog may have broken in the migration and domain transfer.

WordPress (Photo credit: Adriano Gasparri)

For those interested in the details, our blog has been hosted since 2006 on a server at Vanderbilt University. The original installation was done by computer whiz Lee Clontz, with some help from Rob Pongsajapan along the way. The move to WordPress.com allows us to have a more stable host and support system.

The new blog (ICM 6.0?) is using Sight, a responsive WordPress theme with infinite scrolling (although with over 2,000 posts over the past six years, I wouldn’t recommend testing it). It should look fine on mobile and tablet platforms, as well as desktops.

One confusing factor: The domain name is in limbo until after the College Media Association New York Convention. I’ll be posting on the new instance of the blog at collegemediainnovation.wordpress.com, and this URL should be transfered soon.

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The Reese News Lab at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill has released an e-pub book about mobile news gathering: News On The Go. The book is priced at $4.99 and available in e-pub or pdf format. From the press release:

Americans are rapidly adopting mobile devices, transforming the way they obtain news. Nearly one in five Americans now access the Internet primarily using their phone, not a computer, according to an April 2012 survey by the Pew Internet & American Life project. In June 2012, the Reese staff – a team of designers, programmers and journalists – decided to explore how this trend could affect journalism. They created stories meant to be consumed on smart phones and tablets and launched WhichWayNC.com, a “mobile-first” project focused on North Carolina politics.

I just received a review copy of the book, and will update as I get through it. I hope to have an interview as well sometime soon.

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The latest edition of the College Media Podcast is live! You can listen below or go to the show page to download an mp3 and listen at your leisure.

Show notes:

Issue 1

120 Years Old, 120-Point Font: Quick Tales from 2 Student Newspapers (Daily Tar Heel, Indiana Daily Student) (College Media Matters)

Issue 2

Posterous will turn off on April 30 (Posterous)

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Time once again for one of my pet peeves. In fact, it’s not so much a pet peeve as something that summons my rage to levels no mere listicle can, and especially when an online-only outlet does it. I’m writing, of course, about the profound inability of some web sites to actually do a hyperlink properly.

I’ve written about this again and again and again and again, and until outlets start writing links like they understand what the World Wide Web is for, I’ll keep on raging about it. So here’s today’s villain: Engadget.

Exhibit A:

As you can tell from reading, this is a story about an app called Fleksy. You will note in the first paragraph (#1) that Engadget refers to the company and the app, and the words are underlined to link to other content. Below that (#2), the article refers to an Android version of this particular app.

A savvy veteran of the World Wide Web, or even a rank noob who’d spent more than a day with a browser, would think those links would point you to, I don’t know, the app company’s web site (in the case of #1) or the web page for the Android version (in the case of #2).

But you, dear WWW browser, would be WRONG. Both of those links lead to other Engadget stories about the Flexsy App! In fact, if you want to find the actual Flexsy App link, you have to read down to the bottom of the article, where it’s buried as “sources.” (#3)

If you’re going to do this, just don’t put links in your articles. Put the sources at the bottom of the page and be done with it. Turn off your automated internal linking widget and stop perverting the idea of the hyperlink. If you want to link to an archive of your previous articles, do so in a parenthetical, like this: (previous coverage).

And, as usual, Engadget isn’t unique in this aberrant Web behavior. They are just the one that crossed my path this weekend.

I do realize that one of the largest sites, Wikipedia, does not follow this convention, but Wiki inline links serve a different function. If you click on a wiki link, you are taken to another page with an encyclopedia entry related to the word/phrase you clicked on. There’s no automated collection of articles from the past there. The inline links on most news web sites are just callous attempts to keep you on site.

And just so you know, with the exception of specific references to CICM archives, every one of those links above function as they should – taking you to the source.

Lesson for the day: If you’re going to make a brand name or a business or a government agency name into a link in your story, make it a link to the web site of the brand, business or government agency. It’s not your property, stop using it like it is.

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Show Notes

Journalism Interactive:

100 Things I’m Learning at Journalism Interactive 2013: A Somewhat Live Blog (College Media Matters)

Tool of the Week:

ThingLink - Interactive photographs

Click here to listen or download the mp3.

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