Jimmy Vielkind Talks Online Journalism
It's amazing that the amount of news that happens in the world every day just exactly fits in the newspaper (quote courtesy of basicjokes.com/illustration courtesy of Google Images)
Online digital journalist Jimmy Vielkind, 23, came to our media web design class today to discuss his new job at politickerny.com after leaving the Times Union for the website. At the Times Union he started as a night cop reporter working from 4pm-12pm and socialized with the old day in library, which made normal hours part of the reason the online media world sounded intriguing.
Online journalism is quickly becoming a profitable and effective medium that could potentially spell the doom for most newspapers. Jimmy covers state politics in New York in the Albany area and north of Westchester County. The only cost the website incurs is on his salary, computer, technology gadgets, and host server. For a Columbia grad with a Bachelor’s in Urban Studies and currently a part-time grad student in Urban Studies in SUNY Albany, Jimmy first felt like a journalist in a Six Flags rollercoaster ride.
“It was opening day for the canyon blaster at Great Escape Park in Lake George, a ride you’ll be in with your four year old brother,” Jimmy said. “This was my first time acting as a journalist and the ride gets stuck. I thought it was hilarious asking the park president, as an 18 year old kid, ’so did you test the rollercoaster’.
Jimmy Vielkind, 23, is a reporter for online political website politickerny.com. (Courtesy of Times Union Author Page)
There are some drawbacks to the job. Online media is a relentless beast that needs to be fed and people always are looking for updates. If you want to do this job you have to be ready to be on site updating events for online reader. This is something we are seeing now with newspapers using twitter to update news headlines.
The benefit that Jimmy finds in online journalism, versus the newspaper, is that you don’t have to just use words. You can use links, pictures, and video clips. It puts you, the reader, in control of how you want to view the content. It’s no longer the newspaper telling us what to read and how to read it. This has its complications and by no means is online journalism is not a simple science, but the business model seems to be there.
Here is a typical day of work for Jimmy:
- Wakes up at 7am
- Post links for the morning read by 8:35am to digest the news that happened overnight
- Works approximately between 10am and 6pm based on the events the occur throughout the day
- Does it again the next day
It’s a simple explanation from an everyday online news journalist, but his schedule is mainly dictated by being in the moment during an event.
Jimmy believes that online journalism is eventually going to open up more jobs in the medium. Revenue outweighs the cost online and advertising money is increasingly shifting over from print newspapers to media websites.
“It’s the future,” Jimmy said. “Three years ago my job didn’t exist”
Now his job does exist and he’s making money on the web. Kids, who are the future, are now growing in the world of social networking and web 2.0 so not much tells me that online journalism will be a bust.
