My Online Media students finished their portfolios for the Spring 2010 semester. This exercise not only helps them with their design skills, but also makes them aware that they need to be working on their resume while in school even if they are sophomores. I enjoy working with journalism and public relations students on their portfolios because I am able to see their creativity and growth.

Here are the online portfolios from previous sections as well.

Honors Section
Caroline Porter
Chevas Samuels
Dustin Volz
Emily Timm
Eric Gembarowski
McKenzie Manning
Sal Rodri­­­guez
Saman Golestan
Sebastien Bauge
Shawndrea Corbin
Stephanie Snyder
Victoria Pelham
William D’Urso

Undergraduate Section
Alex Hampel
Cecelia Bustamante
Celeste Arkeat
David Vega
Derrick Lee
Desiree Salazar
Ekta Poudel
Erica Silva
Harper Babin
Jeremy Thompson
Kate Barnes
Kati Shearer
Kyle Burton
LeeAnn DiSanti
Monica Arevalo
Nick Shepro
Paige Soucie
Shanna Wester
Tommy Miller

I spent a few hours learning how to create a Twitter background in Photoshop for my Twitter page. I don’t have much free time, and playing with technology is one way I stay sane. Plus, a very active Twitter user and my student, Paige Soucie, requested to learn. Fortunately, I ran into my friend Nancie Dodge. She shared with me her recently acquired (last night) knowledge on how to create a Twitter background in Photoshop.

I will share my notes from her quick lesson on how to create the image in Photoshop. These instructions require a very basic knowledge of Photoshop.

Examples:
@mpranikoff
@knightfdn
@adamostrow
@JLab
@fvongraf
@drcarp

Free Social Media and Other icons:
50 Social Service and Bookmarking Icons Sets for Bloggers
35 Social Media Love Icons
Free Icons
75 Beautiful Free Social Bookmarking Icon Sets

Steps: This handout is for users who know basic Photoshop.
1. Open Photoshop
2. File > New > Name Document > Preset (Web) > Select 1280 X 1024 or 1024 X 768 (Size is experimental because people have control over the size of their browser by stretching the handles in the corner).
3. Pick a color using the Paint Bucket tool. It is best to stick to a solid color because you will have to match the background color chosen in Twitter because people may stretch their browser beyond the size of your image.
4. The left-hand side is the real estate typically used for sharing information about yourself or your company. The main Twitter center area is approximately 763 pixels. Design content for outside that area. Try 160 pixels for your width of your informational sidebar on the left-hand side. That is what worked for me.
5. New Layer(s) > Create your informational sidebar (e.g., name, social media icons, URLs, picture)
6. You will find you will likely have to upload several .jpg versions of your design to Twitter because the width does not always work. I uploaded 5 different .jpgs my first time.
6. File > Save for the Web and Devices
7. Go to Twitter > Settings > Design > Change Background Image
8. Change Design Colors > Find your Web color in Photoshop (e.g., 500303)
9. Test the final design on several computers.

I spent part of my break revamping my assignments for my Online Media class including trying to bring clarity to my social media assignment. I structured the assignment so it would be useful for my students and the audience at a PR Newswire event as well. In addition, Kaye Sweetser recently shared her social media monitoring assignment.

Step 1 – Identify your goals

1. Think about whether reach, reputation or engagement is your goal. Write down specific objectives related to your social media efforts. For example, a goal could be to get more social media mentions of your blog, find sources, increase readership, build reputation, find new story angles, etc. Goals encourage you to be efficient and focused with your social media efforts. Goals will change or expand over time. Understand that each social media application serves different functions dependent upon community members.
2. Be tuned into your online presence. Google your name, company, etc. in quotes “Jane Doe” and screen capture a .jpg of your Google results. Screen-capture your web presence by pressing command+shift+4 (Mac) to create .jpg of a section. You can capture multiple sections of your results. You can also use Super Screenshot! or PDFmyurl to capture entire page. You will capture the results again when you hand in the social media assignment.
3. Set up Google alerts for your name (e.g., “Serena Carpenter”; “Carpenter, Serena”), company name, employees, etc. PR Sarah Evans suggested other useful tools to monitor your online presence not required for this assignment: 1) use BlogPulse Conversation Tracker feed to monitor blog comments, 2) track mentions in video with Google, 3) monitor discussions with BoardTracker, 4) and view your reputation with Quarkbase.

Step 2 – Establish your credibility

1. Complete your bio on numerous sites. This includes the same picture, credentials, and URLs on every site. Hand in the your URLs on the due date. Sites can include LinkedIn, BrightFuse, Twitter, Flickr, MediaGeeks, YouTube, Vimeo, Google Profile, SlideShare, Delicious, FriendFeed, FaceBook, MySpace, Digg, Reddit, Favstar, OpenSalon, NewsVine, Twtjobs, etc. FB, YouTube and Twitter are the top three (right now).
2. Find influentials. There are several ways to find thought leaders such as Twitter’s Suggested Users, Alltop, Listorious, PostRank Topics, Technorati, Google Blog Search, and blogrolls.
3. Listen. Each topic and application has its own culture. You must observe before participating.
4. Share useful information before seeking friends or contacts. People will evaluate you based on your content and bio. You must participate regularly and thoughtfully. People like frequent and shorter form content.
5. Interact with others users, ask them to share their stories, submit photos, design and create videos, logos, etc., ask and answer questions, acknowledge other members contributions to the group, and comment on other blogs. Focus on becoming part of the read-write web.

Step 3 – Set up FREE metric tools. (Top three most important for this class.)

1. Bit.ly (Monitor link traffic). Shorten your links in bit.ly to track clicks and how your links are shared. Provide the top 10 links clicked on including the number of clicks.
2. TweetStats. Provide your average tweets per day.
3. Sitemeter (Traffic analyzer). Track your blog site traffic. Useful site to see the location of users and see how users found your site including keywords. Select previous 12 months and provide the visits and page views for each month.
4. Google Analytics (Traffic analyzer). On the Dashboard, select a date range for each month. Provide the visit number for each month. On the Traffic Sources Overview, please the three top keyword search terms used to find your site. Most users use 1-3 terms.
5. YouTube Insight (Traffic analyzer). Tracks how people get to your site, the content clicked on, average pages per visit, etc. for your Web site.
6. Feedburner (Subscribers). Provide the number of people who subscribe to your blog via RSS.
7. FriendFeed (Subscribers). Subscribe to multiple feeds related to one individual. Provide the number of subscribers.
8. Twitter Lists (Subscribers). Create a list that is of informational value to Twitter users and provide the number of subscribers.
9. Google Alerts and Tweet Beep (Monitor brand and conversations). Set up an alert for your name, company, or blog in quotes.
10. SocialMention (Monitor brand and conversations). Tracks mentions related to your name. Enter your Twitter id and/or name in quotes. Select to search “all.” Provide your strength, sentiment, passion, and reach numbers.
11. Addictomatic (Monitor brand and online mentions). Look up your twitter id and full name in quotes. Useful tool that monitors your presence across search engines and information aggregators TweetMeme shows who is referencing you on Twitter. Provide the top three referrals.

Step 4 – Measure your efforts

In the following tables, record your numbers. Numbers are only one measure of influence. It is also important to see track whether mentions are positive and negative. This can be referred to as sentiment analysis or opinion mining. You could also do a thematic qualitative analysis based on comments related to your company, however this is not required for this class. Under themes such as negative, positive, satisfaction, useful, place comments under each heading to identify your strengths and weaknesses.

Step 5 – Identify trends and readjust social media efforts

Monitor the cultures by participating. Where do you best fit in? Which applications do you most enjoy? Which applications serve your goals best? Is traffic up after posting on Facebook? What about Twitter? Where are your customers online? Think about how much time you put into connecting and how often you are mentioned within each culture.

Reflection Paper

Write a double-spaced four-page paper on lessons learned. I do not want you to simply list what you did, rather focus on what you have learned related to online communication and relationship building. Think about how this knowledge influences how you will create content in the future? How will social media influence your field? How will this knowledge influence your future? Why is relationship building important? How is online content different than offline? What were your perceptions before and after this assignment? What will you keep up following this assignment and why?

These items are not included in the four pages.

1. List of URLs
2. Tables
3. Before and after screen grabs

The key component that you will be graded on is your continual participation throughout the two months. Do not begin participating a week before the assignment is due.

ROI Table Examples

I have put together this list for my students to help them find work and internships. If interested, you can select one or more of these Twitter ids to follow. If you want to follow all of these Twitter users, I have also created a list to follow on Twitter. Don’t forget to submit your resume to Twitter at twtjobs.

@themediaishirin
@media_pros
@journalism_jobs
@lostremotejobs
@cwjobs
@socialmediajob
@prwork
@prnewsjobs
@PRSAjobcenter
@GetPubRelatJobs
@seojobs
@GetFreJournJob
@FreelanceSw
@uxdesignjobs
@TechwebJobs
@queryfreewriter

Arizona Jobs
@PHXmarketing
@tmj_phx_adv
@PhoenixStartups
@IABC_Phoenix

I thought I would share with you portfolios from my Online Media class this semester. They just completed them today. They had only a few weeks to complete them. I am very proud of their hard work and creative energy put into their sites. Here are the portfolios from my Spring 2009 group as well.

April Stolarz
Jackie Angel
Mallory Kydd
Dayne Ventrone
Zach Fort
Jake Harris
Shannon Beaver
Danee Garone
Hyatt Romeo
Monique Wilson
Gardenia Coleman
Lacee Wentworth
Julia Bender
Dan Neligh
Lindsay Dove
Patrick O’Malley
Sheila Burns

Online Journalism Review aggregated syllabi in 2004, however this list needs to be updated. In an attempt to aggregate this information, I have begun a list of syllabi dedicated to online journalism, online communication and social media. I found that results from Google do not showcase all of the best available syllabi online.

This section highlights faculty syllabi that focus on skills, theory, online communication, and journalism. The selected sites featured interactive, timely, and great resources for students, educators, journalists, and people with a desire to learn. I have also highlighted some useful features that I believe may be useful for educators.

Mindy McAdams – University of Florida
Mindy McAdams shares her syllabi focused on the teaching of multimedia, animation, and reporting for online users. Her sites are designed simply and feature possible assignment ideas and online resources for educators and students.

Dave Stanton – University of Florida
Dave Stanton has a broad background, which enables him to teach web consulting, design and XHTML/CSS. I really like that Dave gives his students video tutorials to help them process information outside of class.

Serena Carpenter – Arizona State University
My class is the foundation class for all things concerning online media. It is divided into three sections: 1) social media, 2) visual communication, and 3) Web site creation. The focus throughout the semester is on online communication. I provide ideas for class assignments as well. I also provide tutorials on my blog.

Leslie-Jean Thornton – Arizona State University
This is an online reporting course for students in a Masters program. The resources page also provides some useful tutorials.

Carol Schwalbe and Nancie Dodge – Arizona State University
The Advanced Online Media class builds upon skills taught in previous basic online media classes.

Cindy Royal – Texas State University
Cindy Royal’s site contains useful ideas to include into lectures.

Don Wittekind – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
I am impressed by Don Wittekind’s ability to teach Flash, based on my experience from a past seminar. Don provides a list of classes that he teaches in the left-hand navigation section. He provides some lectures and handouts as well.

Ryan Thornburg – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Ryan Thornburg shares his online reporting syllabi. His assigned readings page is interactive.

Alfredo A. Marin-Carle – Ball State University
The New Media Journalism concentrates on web design. The reference section offers a list of useful sites for people teaching such courses.

Tracy Rutledge – University of Tennessee at Martin
Intro to Multimedia focuses on creating multimedia websites. She provides some tutorials as well.

Donica Mensing – University of Nevada-Reno
Donica Mensing shares her syllabus for her online reporting course, which covers multimedia reporting, social media and HTML/CSS. She provides helpful videos as well.

Laura Ruel – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Laure Ruel teaches design and multimedia storytelling. She has a great downloads section that features storyboarding and usability execises.

Chris Harvey – University of Maryland
I like that this instructor’s Online Journalism class schedule is interactive and detailed.

Sean Mussenden – University of Maryland
His Online Journalism course has screencast tutorials teaching others how to use WordPress.

Gaurav Mishra -  Georgetown University
The Social Media in Business, Development and Government course concentrates on social media literacy.

Henry Jenkins – Director of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program
The New Media Literacies course site shares resources related to online participation and communication.

Alice J. Robinson – Arizona State University
The Digital Cultures and Social Media course is a doctoral seminar. There is a list of thought-provoking pieces on her schedule and on her Delicious page.

Corinne Weisgerber – St. Edward’s University
The Social Media for Public Relations class offers useful material for anyone teaching social media including how to reach online users.

David Carlson – University of Florida
He teaches an Applied Interactive Newspaper course and an online communication class. I like that student projects are shared.

Tim McGuire – Arizona State University
The Business and Future of Journalism class encourages students to reflect on the journalism industry by having them write about business models. Tim also provides links to suggested readings.

Siva Vaidhyanathan – University of Virgina
This Introduction to Digital Media instructor encourages students to take a critical look at new media and its impact on culture. The reading list is a useful resource.

Jeffrey Michael Heer – Stanford University
Research Topics in Human-Computer Interaction is a graduate-level course focused on HCI. He also includes links to student articles.

Vin Crosbie – Syracuse University
The course examines how new media differs from traditional media. Crosbie provides a list of books that may be useful for other instructors.

To add your course to the list, email me or provide your syllabus in the comments section including background information related to the course. I hope that these examples are useful for educators designing their classes for future semesters and for those looking for resources to learn more about the online media environment.

Every semester I struggle with the grading of my students’ blog posts. For most of my students in my Online Media class, it is the first time that they have blogged.

It takes awhile for students to adjust to online communication and how the blogosphere plays a part. I just finished grading their first two posts in my class. Based on my experience, I felt compelled to create a rubric for grading blogs in future classes. I would appreciate any suggestions. Feel free to apply it to your class. Here is the PDF of the grading rubric for blog posts.

*Hat tip to Dale Cressman for the idea.

I gave a lecture yesterday to my Online Media students on Twitter. I explain the anatomy of Twitter and how it can be used for online communication, community building, brand management and networking. If you would like to see my lecture, please visit my slideshare site.

There was a push for video in 2006, however that emphasis may be changing at U.S. newspapers.

Video is published only a few times a week at most U.S. newspapers, according to a recent survey published in the Newspaper Research Journal by John Russial.

The online staff is usually responsible for editing video. Online staff averaged 11 people at large-circulation sized , 5 at mid-sized, and 2 at small papers. However, it is photographers (75%) and reporters (45%) who are responsible for gathering video, and very few news leaders report using a team to produce video stories for the web, which may result in lesser quality work. Russial argues that this may mean that people with broad technical skills rather specific skills are valued at newspapers.