Another encouraging development for today’s journalism is coming from Google.
I had a chance to check out Google Living Stories, still under development in Google Labs. It basically creates landing pages for some of the big topics locally/nationally, aggregating to news stories, displaying a summary and timeline of events and more. 
As of right now, it only carries Washington Post and New York Times stories but, so far, it’s an impressive effort and is doing what more publications need to be doing with their Web presentations.
Below, to the right, is a good example of one of the landing pages — it chronicles the Washington Post’s coverage of the 3-9 Washington Redskins.
What makes this work so well in today’s journalism? Paul Bradshow describes it pretty well: “It is built around the way people consume content online, as opposed to how they consumed it in print or broadcast.” Basically, it takes advantage of what the Web does so well for journalism: convenience, linking, converging and connecting. People today don’t search by story like they did in a print newspaper 20 years ago — they search by topic. If I am a Redskins fan and I wanted to follow the team, its games and its in-season moves, I can go to the Living Stories site and get all the stories I need from the Post, the timeline of events and look at stories relating to a particular subtopic (On the left, if you click “Legal Disputes,” you can also see the latest on the controversy surrounding the Redskins team name). The site even highlights new content and fades out content you’ve already read.
Convenience at (nearly) its best.
My hope is the Google Living Stories feature grows, obviously. It may take awhile because of all the questions to answer (Bradshaw brings up advertising and how much of the page is constructed automatically). The interface could get better — elements on the pages are either too heavy or too light (for example, the headlines of the latest stories and the “conversations” button could use more weight or my eye to catch them). The conversations feature, available on the health care page but not on the Redskins page, is so unique in how it presents discussion, it deserves better play than where it is currently found. My eye needs better direction.
But my biggest hope is Living Stories converges other publications, outlets and even blogs. For example, a landing page on the Washington Redskins should include more coverage than just the Washington Post. I want to see other perspectives, reactions and opinions regarding the team’s latest games, roster moves and more. ESPN does this, but only to a certain extent. But what ESPN also does is show the team’s calendar of games, its place in the division standings and the team leaders in a nutshell, something Google Living Stories could do for its sports teams landing pages.
Another idea would be to converge social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Create a hashtag or use a current one, and curate all tweets on the subject. Create a page on Facebook and create more discussion. Reach out to other audiences, in other words.
I’ll keep watching Google Living Stories, though. I like where it’s headed, and I think more newspaper Web sites need to consider putting plans such as this in action for their biggest topics and issues, and even link out to other perspectives. Make your site a better source for everything your audience could need and more.
Posted by Brian Manzullo at December 11, 2009
Journalism