Category: News

As ONA’s newest staff addition, this will be my first ONA conference, and I’ve been hard at work setting up my must-see schedule. Here are six things I’m most excited to do in Denver:

1. Since I work in community building, you may not be surprised to hear that I’m passionate about audience engagement. I can’t wait to hear an update from the Coral Project and how we can better design journalism for conversations. And you know I’ll be following a Table Talk on audience engagement.

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Conference time! As always, we’ll bring together lots of smart and talented people working on incredible projects. There are a number of can’t-miss sessions for me this year, including the obvious: a great selection of keynotes that range from insights from Facebook’s Product Director Fidji Simo on how news organizations can work with the platform, an important talk about inclusivity in newsrooms (thrilled to have Jose Antonio Vargas returning to our conference stage!), and an inside look at the rise and unknown future for reported.ly, an innovative and inspiring approach to breaking news. If you’re looking for me next week, I guarantee you can find me in the front row for all of those.

But don’t let the keynotes be the only sessions you make it to next week. I know there are happy hours calling your name, but the most inspiring part of our conferences is hearing from journalists doing excellent work. Some of the sessions I am most excited for this year deal with audience engagement. I LOVE to think about how news organizations can find meaningful ways to reach people with news they care about, and this selection of sessions gives you a well-rounded look at innovative practices to take back to your newsroom.

<3 My can’t-miss sessions: <3

• Welcome to the Snapocalypse: Navigating, Surviving … and Thriving? … With Distributed Content If you’re interested in creating content for distributed platforms (SnapChat, Facebook Instant Articles, etc.) and want to learn how to measure success, don’t miss this one. It’s got four super-smart journalists from four very different outlets — reported.ly, CNN, ESPN and NowThis. I guarantee you’ll walk away with new ideas AND smart things to say to the non-believers out there.
• Getting into the Weed: Launching a Successful Niche Digital Media Product Yes, this session is about what it’s like to report on marijuana in a state where it is legal. It is also about developing a relationship with new audiences through great coverage and real community engagement.
•  Do Audience Better: Lessons from 150 Newsrooms and a Year of Writing Code for The Coral Project Can I just put a bunch of praise hands emojis here instead of explaining in words how much I appreciate The Coral Project? 🙌  Most well-known for embracing the comment section and the communities that flourish around them, The Coral Project creates tools that help journalists connect with people. Great ethos, great people, great tips for connecting with the people you want to reach.
• F* It, We’ll Do It Live: Workshopping The Hows & Whys Of Live Stream Part I Oh, a workshop about Facebook Live? Yes, please. And a session that focuses on why live streaming is so popular? Yep, there, too.
• Engaging Audiences with Live “High Def” Journalism Events provide a meaningful way to connect audiences with stories, as well as a range of revenue and engagement opportunities. We’ve been paying attention to the work Megan Finnerty has been doing at the Arizona Storytellers Project for years, and I’m so interested to hear more about how she scaled the project with Gannett.

Two bonus sessions that don’t deal exclusively with audience engagement and events but are of interest to everyone since they feature incredibly smart people on important topics: Rethinking ‘Diversity’: How to Cover Race & Inclusion (learn who is getting it right and how you can be sure your outlet does, too) and Fail Fest 2016: I Failed, It Sucked, But Here’s How I Bounced Back (hear from top-level editors about the times their projects really didn’t work).

These are just some of the sessions that will help you find ways to better connect to your audience. I’m super-stoked this year that ONA is using Hearken to help us get feedback from our community in advance of the conference. If you have a question for a speaker, click through the session title from the ONA16 schedule to send it in advance.

I’m thrilled to have been a part of planning this year’s conference as programming co-chair. My first thought when I was going over the schedule was: “I can’t wait to go to all of these sessions!” My next thought was, “Humm, how do I decide what to go to?”

Having seen this year’s conference come together from start to finish, I’m awed by the ideas and thought that went into the planning process. It’s a fantastic schedule. Below are the sessions I’m most looking forward to. Track me down in Denver and let me know what you think. See you there.
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Photo by Anya Semenoff

Over 2,100 journalists traveled to Denver in September for the Online News Association Conference (ONA16) to discuss the most exciting trends in digital journalism and to honor the great work of colleagues around the world.

We’ve pulled together a range of resources here so that you can level up your reporting, be inspired by excellent projects and share takeaways with your newsroom. Plus, we’ve got lots of ways you can stay connected throughout the year.

For ONA, this was a big year: Saying goodbye to Executive Director Jane McDonnell after her leadership of the organization for eight years, and welcoming Irving Washington as he steps up from his role as Deputy Director into the Executive Director position. We also announced Journalism 360, a new partnership between ONA, Google News Lab and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation that will help newsrooms experiment with and advance the field of immersive storytelling, and nearly $1 million in new support from the five funders of the Challenge Fund for Innovation in Journalism Education. With these new opportunities and changes at ONA, we look forward to doing what we do best — identifying and supporting great digital journalism.

With that in mind, here’s a look at the highlights from ONA16, from keynote videos to great reporting.

Sessions: videos, social curation, audio, slides

• We’ve posted full videos from many ONA16 sessions, when available. Each session has its own page, accessible through the ONA16 schedule, featuring embedded video, live blog archives and resources from presenters. You can also watch the session videos on YouTube.
• Bonus: Our video team produced 30 short takeaway videos.
• The ONA16 Social Team curated live coverage of conference sessions. Their updates are embedded on the session pages, which you can access via the ONA16 schedule.
• Slides and takeaways from presenters, when available, have been added to individual session pages.
• Audio recordings of sessions, when available, are located on individual session pages and on Soundcloud.

Table Talks

We brought back the popular Table Talks this year, where expert speakers sat down with attendees to spark one-on-one conversations on major issues and big ideas, touching on everything from the future of podcasting to product management in the newsroom. See the notes from Table Talks, separated by subject area and discussions.

Great reporting from the Student Newsroom

Check out the comprehensive coverage by the 20 hand-picked journalists in the ONA16 Student Newsroom, sponsored by Google. Some of our favorite highlights include advice on how to banish “if only” from your newsroom, coverage on Amy Webb’s top tech trends, a video on the concerns of young journalists today and the app for attendees to see how connected they were to other people at the conference. Plus, check out the excellent work by our third class of HBCU Fellows, whose work was supported by the Knight Foundation. They even give you a behind-the-scenes look at the visual experience at ONA16.

Some great posts on ONA16

• Tips, tools, and themes from ONA16 to aid local journalism, by Marian Liu
• ICFJ Knight Roundup: Free digital tools showcased at the conference, by Sara Olstad
• Five takeaways from the conference, by Nausicaa Renner
• Trends and ideas from the conference, by Rachel Wise

#ONA16 on Social Media

• There were over 30,000 tweets on the main conference hashtag #ONA16, not to mention thousands more on individual hashtags for sessions! ONA16 was a top national trend on Twitter in the United States Wednesday, Sept. 14, through Sunday, Sept. 19 and a top worldwide trend on Thursday and Sunday. Plus, the keynote conversation, Do We Need A Bechel Test for News?, was featured as a Twitter moment.
• Meta: We used Facebook Live to broadcast our Opening Keynote on Facebook’s relationship with the media. Watch Fidji Simo, Facebook’s Director of Product, and Samantha Barry, CNN’s Senior Director of Social News, discuss how Facebook impacts news outlets both large and small.
• Check out more than 1,200 Instagram photos from ONA16 (and follow Online_News while you’re there to get updates from us).

Celebrating the best in digital journalism: 2016 Online Journalism Awards

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  Photo by Anya Semenoff

  See the full list of winners and their projects.

• Live blog and video of the awards ceremony.

Photos, gifs and more fun stuff

• Thanks to our friends at Twitter for letting us borrow the Twitter Mirror! Check out the fun selfies and gifs from the Opening Night Reception and the Diversity Reception by scrolling through the ONAConf tweets.
• Check out all the photos from the Facebook photo booth at the Opening Night reception

Get involved with ONA

Photo by Anya Semenoff

• Looking to connect with journalists in your community after the conference? We firmly believe local journalists are leading the charge in innovating and are invested in supporting work in their communities. Connect with an ONA Local group near you or let us know if you’re interested in starting one. You can also connect with the ONA community through Slack — sign up to get your invitation.
• Interested in VR, AR and immersive storytelling? Get involved with Journalism 360, a new project from ONA, Google News Lab and the Knight Foundation.
• We’re looking for women who are pushing innovation in digital media for the Women’s Leadership Accelerator, a tuition-free, week-long intensive training. ONA’s Accelerator will be held Feb. 5-10, 2017, at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. Apply by Nov. 15.
• Are you a journalism educator or student? Connect with over 1,200 people passionate about journalism education and interesting projects in the ONA Educators Facebook group.
• Based internationally? We were thrilled to have so many global attendees at ONA16. Keep the conversation going with other digital journalists in the ONA International Facebook group.
• Want to provide guidance for your newsroom or classroom on ethical issues? Our Build Your Own Ethics Code is designed for you to customize your codes on pressing digital media issues

Missed a meeting? Need a new tool?

Nearly 100 digital media and media-tech firms and educators supported ONA16 in Denver and we are so grateful to them all. If you’re looking for dynamic partners in the software, design, commenting, data viz, video, content services, advertising, social, research and hardware space — or seeking a new professional or educational opportunity — be sure to check out the offerings from ONA’s sponsors, exhibitors, supporters and Midway participants from around the world.

Save the date for ONA17

We’re coming back to the East Coast in 2017! Join us Oct. 5-7, 2017, at the Washington Marriott Wardman Park for ONA17.