Chat about journalism on Twitter, elsewhere online

Twitter, the website

 

You don’t need to attend a dedicated training session to learn new or better ways to work. Talking with others who are up to date on the latest trends in the industry and eager to share is useful and, at the least, a great place to start. Here are some suggestions for reaching out beyond the StarNews.

Twitter chats: Several regularly scheduled chats on Twitter offer the opportunity to ask questions or just “listen” in on what others are talking about. If you’re looking for tips on how to best follow a Twitter chat, check out the suggestions from the Society of Professional Journalists.

• SPJ hosts a chat at 8 p.m. Thursdays. Follow the hashtag #SPJchat, and contact @spjchat on Twitter for details. This Thursday’s chat will address “Social Media’s Influence on Sports Coverage.” A schedule of future topics is online along with tips on how to join in.
• A Web journalism chat happens at 8 p.m. Wednesdays. In case you can’t follow live – search for the hashtag #wjchat – the chats are archived at  http://wjchat.webjournalist.org/. If you want to suggest a topic or have other questions about the chat, you can reach out to co-founder Robert Hernandez (@webjournalist).
• A chat for visual editors uses the hashtag #visedschat at 9 p.m. Mondays. Check with @jimmcbee on Twitter for the latest.

Know of others? Let me know so I can pass them on.

Online chats: Twitter isn’t the only place for journalism training talk.

• Poynter hosts weekly chats about managing a journalism career, biweekly chats on writing and sporadic chats on breaking news topics. You can access an archive of the chats at the Poynter site. If you register at the site you can receive e-mail newsletters to alert you to upcoming coverage.
• The Reynolds Center for Business Journalism also hosts regular chats – not restricted to business topics. You can access an archived version of a recent chat about personal branding at BusinessJournalism.org. Future chats are scheduled to address real estate and multimedia storytelling.