Some trends on online journalism seem really fun. Even though I think I didn’t do a very good job, I liked my foray into liveblogging. I’d like to learn how to cut audio and video for websites. I’ve embraced Twitter after initially thinking it was dumb.
But other parts of online journalism freak me out, to be honest. The demanding workload of a 24-7 newsroom intimidates me, because I already work 24-7 and wouldn’t like to do that forever.
Politico.com is actually a good example of this, because they are one of the few really online newsrooms, and their physical newspaper is just to make sure old fogeys think they’re legit. I met one of their reporters over the summer and she told me they work incredibly long hours. (She said 18 hours a day, 6.5 days a week, which I assume is an exaggeration, but still.) They are also expected to be on top of their games very early in the morning, something most journalists aren’t used to. When I worked at McClatchy Newspapers over the summer, if I came in before 10 a.m. hardly anyone would be there, either at the office or in the Senate Press Gallery.
I’m young, and not afraid of working hard, but the idea of working those kind of grueling hours for the rest of my life doesn’t sound like fun.
Then again, John and Roger are older than me, and seemed to have adjusted just fine to the different kind of work schedule. So maybe it just depends a lot on the news outlet a person ends up at.
[...] says the workday of digital-era journalist, “freaks me out, to be honest.” She describes a conversation with a reporter for Politico, a digital-first shop known in [...]