Today's essential reading for journalists

Every journalist needs quick access to their most important sources of information.

One of the most effective ways of ensuring you don’t miss anything is to set up feeds from those key sites, individuals and publications from which you get the most news, information and ideas.

I’ve bundled the RSS feeds that I find most valuable into a combined feed. It appears to the right of this post.

You’ll want to make your own, tailored to the work that you do. Actually, you may well want several, focusing on different subjects.

If you are following Multimedia Journalism: A Practical Guide and are a journalism student, you will want a feed for each of the publications you are creating as part of your course, and  for any reporting beats you have been assigned.

My beat is multimedia journalism and I suggest that, if you want to keep up to speed with developments in the media, it should be one of your beats too. So you might find my feed useful as a starting point. You can preview it by going here, and then subscribe if you find it useful.

There are 17 feeds in my bundle. Not all of them post every day, but some of them post several times a day. I have set up this bundle to give me what has been posted just that day, hence it’s called Today’s Essential Reading.

Here’s what I value each of them for

10,000 Words

This is one of my top three sources on innovation and learning. I like it because, in the words of 10,000 Words, it is: “a resource for journalists and web and technology enthusiasts to learn the tools that are shaping digital journalism. The site offers examples, resources, and tutorials of both new and established technologies used to enhance journalism.”

Buzz Machine

Jeff Jarvis is journalism professor at City University of New York, one of the very best educators, and another of my top three. He understands better than just about anyone how multimedia and social media affect journalism. He’s also very good on entrepreneurial journalism and much more besides.

Dan Blank

Dan Blank specialises in B2B and is way in the lead on how this sector can keep up with web developments and cope with profound challenges to survival. He offers great, detailed advice in long posts on, for example, optimising the use of Twitter and Facebook, and the future of magazines. He completes my top three.

I also have three most-trusted sources of news about journalism:

Roy Greenslade

Jon Slattery

Journalism.co.uk

The latter is also invaluable for tips on new developments in multimedia and how to learn about and use them

I could easily add the also-excellent Press Gazette and Holdthefrontpage to this list. Check them out, you might prefer them.

The rest of my 17 have their own specialisms

Adam Sherk

Expert information on developments in social media

Currybet.net

Martin Belham’s blog. He’s part of the Guardian’s web development team and is very good on newspapers and the future of news and information online

Cybersoc.com

Robin Hamman devises, implements and manages social media projects, particularly within broadcasting. He posts daily clusters of links to posts on a wide range of topics. A recent post covered geotagging, coping with negative feedback on social media sites, community management, new tools for journalists, and paywalls, among others. A great way to survey a lot of potential leads swiftly.

Innovations in Newspapers

Does as it says.

Internet marketing and Social Media Connections

Good on social media and internet marketing. Publishers have to get much better at marketing themselves through social media, and thereby reaching out to new audiences, and this blog covers this area well.

Martin Stabe

Martin Stabe’s the online editor of Retail Week magazine. He posts a daily bundle of links to things he has spotted across the media.

OJR: The Online Journalism Review

Part of the Knight Digital Media Centre , which “is dedicated to helping good journalists and good journalism succeed in the 21st century” through training. So it helps the working journalist get better, by keeping them abreast of developments and demonstrating how they can be used.

Paid Content UK

Covers “the UK’s digital economy” under headings including digital Britain, newspapers and the BBC.

Reinventing the newsroom

Explores the challenges faced by newspapers in the digital age

TechCruch Europe

Is “a blog covering Web 2.0 and mobile start-ups” edited by Mike Butcher.

How do you make a bundle?

I did it in Google Reader. If you have found other software that does good bundles, feel free to share by adding a comment.