Below, I posted my thoughts on newspapers in the 21st century in two Seesmic videos. As I reckon almost nobody has watched them, I present a précis here:
i) I reckon blogs/the internet in general increase people's interest in news, as being able to take part ("readers" can now take part) makes it more fun. So, media companies should see the rise of the blogosphere as an opportunity
ii) The technology used by journalists should incorporate things like bookmarking (sending links to source material which would be displayed on the website as related links) creating maps and (I didn't say this in the video) monitoring comments automatically (so we can reply to them) - and this technology should be provided by employers and integrated directly into the process of writing stories. It's no use writing blog posts saying "journalists should create Delicious accounts", it won't work.
iii) Newspapers have always been about communities - the internet provides new ways for people within communities to communicate, so why not encourage them to do it through us? Why not encourage Birmingham would-be bloggers to set up blogs on the Birmingham Post & Mail website for example, instead of on Wordpress or Blogger.com? Why not allow people to share photos of Birmingham on the Birmingham Post & Mail website - or simply get their Flickr gallery streamed onto our site? And 101 other things.
Thanks to Fiona of Subs' Standards for prompting me to write a text summary.
