Editor, revised

Where will I be working next month? Where will I be working next year? What’s the best platform for this story? How do I learn video storytelling?

These questions speak to one of the biggest challenges facing young journalists today: the need to be agile.

A quick bit of context: I’m writing this to participate in a blog ring of young journalists. This month’s topic relates to the challenges facing young journalists. I’ve been a working journalist for just about three years. And in that time I’ve observed that staying in this field for very long will require flexibility.

As someone else noted, a good attitude will give you a foundation. I want this post to be constructive, not discouraging, so I’m linking to resources that can help you become agile in terms of…

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I’m copping an idea from Mark Luckie at 10,000 Words (hat tip also to Palewire, who’s done a lot with word clouds).

I used Wordle to create a word cloud of stuff I’ve written about here (it’s above).

It was super simple.

1. Go to Wordle.
2. Type in the url for any blog or site that generates a feed (e.g. atom, rss)
3. Use the Wordle menu bar to customize the appearance.



4. Export it as you wish. I chose to use the Grab function in Preview to save a jpeg.

I didn’t realize I was using the word “posts” so often. How boring.

Since starting this Wordpress-powered blog, I’ve experimented with several Flickr plugins.

I’ve tried Wordpress Flickr Manager and Wordpress Media Flickr, which came highly rated by users and made it simpler to add photos to posts. But what I really wanted was something that would display photos in the sidebar. Because, you know, visuals help.

I’ve finally found it: Flickr Photo Gallery by Joe Tan. Look to your right, and you’ll see the fruits of my search. The plugin also came with some nice surprises:

1. Like the others I tried, this plugin has a function that inserts photos from my photostream into posts. I find this function cleaner than the others.
2. Flickr Photo Gallery can create a photo gallery page on your site, and all you have to do is create a URL in the plugin settings. Mine is right here.

I’m back from a short trip to Portland and Seattle, and I’ve got a few more days off to play around with this site.

Two immediate changes:

1. I’ve created a portfolio page, which you can access via that nav links above or by clicking here.
2. I’ve upgraded to WordPress 2.6 after ignoring the prompts for several weeks. I’m happy to report it was quick and painless.

I’ll be back with a real post soon.

I’ve been holding out from getting a Twitter account for years. Recently, my resistance has been slipping because:

1. Twitter users transmit news faster than the news wires. Case study: Wednesday’s L.A.-area earthquake.
2. There are tons of Twitter tools out there to play with, such as twhirl and summize.
3. It’s beautiful in its simplicity.
4. It’s like IM from your phone and SMS from your computer all at once.
5. Many of my favorite bloggers use it and recommend it. (e.g. here, here and here.)

But then again…

1. I’ve already got a couple hundred friends on Facebook, and I can use my status message as a tweet.
2. Do I really need one more social networking account out there?
3. I have a hard enough time keeping up on my RSS feeds!
4. For news, how reliable is information provided via Twitter? Case in point: Subway Jared’s nondemise.
5. I’m doing everything I can to maintain a longer attention span; I can’t see Twitter helping that.

So, who out there loves to Twitter? Who else is holding out?