For the first time this year, Americans won't be getting all their convention news from journalists. The Democrats have credentialed a few dozen bloggers to cover the convention. Perhaps even more interesting, many delegates also plan on blogging the convention, which should offer interesting new first-person perspectives (and story ideas). The Internet will also enable the Democrats, protestors, and other groups to publish directly to the public.
Here are a few good sites to help you quickly scan all these new sources for story ideas, as well as an easy way to find out who your local delegates are.
These three sites display headlines and brief abstracts from a variety of bloggers covering the convention. Each includes a slightly different mix of blogs and uses a different format.
If you're interested in reading more blogs -- including ones by delegates and journalists -- I've been keeping a more complete list of people blogging the convention on this page on my weblog, CyberJournalist.net.
Convention Releases
PRNewswire has put together a page listing all of the press releases related to the convention. It's a lot easier to look here than to sign up for all the various groups' e-mails!
Delegate Map and Convention Schedule
Alternative convention sources are handy, but one of the best sources of information is Boston.com, the excellent website of the Boston Globe. Journalists will find the following pages particularly useful:
SUBMIT YOUR TIPS FOR PUBLICATION What websites do you find handy when digging for information? Have you used the Web recently for a story? Send me the website and the story and I may print them. E-mail me at:
poynter (at) jondube.com
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