Here is my latest update on local media stuff:

• CTV Edmonton launched its expanded local news coverage today with the addition of CTV News At Five and CTV News at 5:30. Carrie Doll anchors the 5pm newscast while Daryl McIntyre anchors the 5:30pm newscast.
• The St. Albert Gazette is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, and they’ve posted a digital version of the first ever edition for you to check out.
• Also celebrating an anniversary is Avenue Edmonton – the September issue is the 5th anniversary edition (you can see the digital version here). They have a special section that looks at how Edmonton has evolved since 2006. Their list of the “five most entertaining battles of the last five years” contains three media-related battles: “Vue Weekly vs. See Magazine”, “Ed Stelmach vs. Dave Cournoyer”, and “Chris & Karleena Perry vs. Everyone Else” (they’re the couple that wrote a letter in the St. Albert Gazette arguing against a Habitat for Humanity project).
• Congratulations to Wade Sorochan – he’s the new host of Edmonton This Week. Christopher Webster at the City did a good interview with him.
• Too bad I missed this: Sonic 102.9 did a tour on Sunday for #yegmusicclub.
• Have you checked out Metro Edmonton’s new Live Wire? It’s “an opportunity for readers to contribute to the city’s #1 free daily news source and one of the fastest growing newspapers in Canada.” Basically they mention a few stories they’re working on, and you email any input you have to the managing editor.
• The Bear’s controversial “Win A Wife” contest attracted all sorts of coverage – even the Huffington Post wrote about it. I’ll give Gig City’s Mike Ross the last word on this one: “The real winner in all this is the Bear radio station, which has attracted a storm of attention over this contest – which is certainly in the running for the most outrageous and offensive local radio station stunt ever. Yay, Edmonton.”
• Here’s a nice write-up on Rawlco, which according to the latest PPM radio ratings has the second ranked station, Now! 102.3. Combined with Up! 99.3, the company’s share of the local market is 17.0, third to Corus’ four stations at 25.2 and Newcap’s three stations at 17.8.
• Here’s another media write-up in the Journal, on TSN’s Natasha Staniszewski. As the article notes, Edmonton is “fertile ground for TSN when it comes to talent,” with Bryan Mudryk, Gord Miller, Ryan Rishaug, and Darren Dutchyshen all spending time here early in their careers.
• In case you missed it: here’s my interview with Jeff & Sally on the end of the edmontonian, and here’s my look at the statistics the site accumulated over its run.
• CityTV’s new show Canada’s Got Talent will be in town starting on Wednesday for three days of auditions. The lineup starts at 6am at the Mayfield Inn & Suites.
• According to the Edmonton Journal’s September 2011 newsletter, QR codes in the paper have been scanned “close to 35,000 times” since the June 2010 launch, which I wrote about here.
• The presenters for Wednesday’s Pecha Kucha Night 11 have been announced. The lineup looks great, but I’m particularly looking forward to David Papp’s #BirdCam Social Media Experiment and Karen Unland’s talk titled “What Journalism Needs Now.” While you’re waiting, check out Karen’s latest Edmonton New Media Roundup.
• Congratulations to Edmonton’s own City and Baby, named to the top spot in Alberta’s Best Mama Bloggers! Edmonton blogs accounted for 7 of the top 10 blogs.
• Here’s a nice big write-up on Marty Forbes. He’s certainly a busy guy! Here is his latest column on our busy media landscape.
• On September 7, Barb Wilkinson wrote in the Journal about the new community newsroom, slated to launch next week. She wrote: “Later this month, we’ll announce the name, and tell you who will make up the local advisory board that will help us shape this project. We also expect to launch the community newsroom pilot site.” Too bad the name was actually announced the day before that article! It’ll be called The Bridge, and I am happy to have been selected to take part.
• Via Sharon, here is Arthur S. Brisbane’s interview with Jill Abramson, the first woman to serve as top editor of The New York Times since the paper’s founding in 1851.

Here’s a recap video of Pecha Kucha 10, courtesy of Telus TV:

You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.

So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!

Here is my latest update on local media stuff:

• The biggest media news of the week is also the saddest: Jeff & Sally have decided that September 9 will be the last day for the edmontonian. They wrote: “Our heads are bursting with ideas and schemes (seriously, call the head hospital!) and this will let us make space for new things to come our way.” In other words, we haven’t seen the last of Jeff & Sally (thankfully). Here’s their first “look back” post. I’ll have more on this next week, and I can’t wait to see all of the tributes that are created over the next while. The outpouring of support today has been great to see.
• Looking to get your feet wet with podcasting? The Unknown Studio is looking for contributors. Simply pitch your segment idea by September 30 and you could be a regular feature on the show!
• It’s that time of year! Karen looks at education in her latest Edmonton New Media Roundup.
• Erin Despas did an interview with Julie Matthews, Global Edmonton’s Trouble Shooter. “With sixteen years of experience in journalism, the thirty-five year old journalist has been with Global Edmonton for seven and a half years. Matthews has no plans currently to leave her job.”
• I discovered recently that Avenue Edmonton’s Omar Mouallem also contributes to the AOL Travel Canada blog! Cool to see him talking up Edmonton beyond our city’s borders.
• I quite like the Government of Alberta’s Newsroom page. Simple, but clear and with all the relevant links and information.
• If you’re a U of A student interested in media, swing by the Gateway offices in SUB – they’re looking for volunteers. They’re also looking for help with their weekly podcast.
• Oil Sands Truth is an interesting site from a media perspective. It both aggregates and curates recent news, data, maps, photos, audio, and video. Does anyone know of a good site that does the same thing with the opposite side of the story?
• This note about a new book called The Man in Blue Pajamas: Prison Memoir in the Form of a Novel came up in one of my searches: “Kurdish poet and journalist Jalal Barzanji endured imprisonment and torture at the hands of Saddam Hussein because of his outspoken writings. After emigrating to Canada in the 1990s, Barzanji, who was named Edmonton’s first writer-in-exile in 2007, finally tells his story.” Turns out Jalal is on Twitter!
• Nice shout out to “the social media rockstars of #yeg” from Jeremy Bibaud, who recently left the United Way after four and a half years. I think he did some great work to bring that organization up-to-speed with Twitter, Facebook, and all of the other tools they have started using, not to mention the new website! Best of luck Jeremy!
• Four members of the local media participated in a pizza eating contest on Sunday at the Viva Italia Viva Edmonton festival. Citytv’s Stacey Brotzel, the griff’s Jenny Feniak, OMNI’s Kit Koon, and SONiC 102.9’s Brandy Taylor all competed to see who could chow down the most pizza in five minutes. Brandy came away with the victory in a tiebreaker round against Kit, but no one left empty-handed: they got to take the pizza they didn’t eat with them!

Brandy Taylor, Kit Koon, Jenny Feniak, Stacey Brotzel

The media table outside the media room at City Hall.

You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.

Just a quick mention: we had a very productive MediaCamp Edmonton planning session tonight, and we expect to share more on that in the coming weeks!

So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!

Another week off! Can you tell it’s summer? Here is my latest update on local media stuff:

• Everyone was covering today’s sad news that NDP leader Jack Layton had died.
• As reported previously, ACCESS is being rebranded as CTV Two. The changeover is scheduled to take place on August 29.
• In Karen’s latest Edmonton New Media Roundup she takes a look at local podcasts. Let her know which are your favorites! I’m glad to see there are a few locals finding success with podcasting. Maybe of these days I’ll get back into it.
• Don’t miss The Unknown Studio’s episode on Festival City.
• Congrats to local men’s magazine Shave on scoring a partnership with Howzit MSN.
• Analog television broadcasting will officially be out of fashion on September 1, but Shaw says analog signals will be around in Edmonton for quite a while.
• The recipients of the inaugural CTV Citizen Of The Year Award are: Mr. Issa Kamara, and Mr. Amson Saintime. The award was created by CTV Edmonton in partnership with the Edmonton Heritage Festival Association.
• From the Edmonton Examiner: “Competition over young music fans is heating up on Edmonton’s FM radio dial.”
• Old news perhaps but I only mentioned part of it in my last update: The Edmonton Oilers and Corus Radio reached a new host broadcaster agreement that will last through the 2013/2014 season. Corus has broadcast every Oilers game since 1995.
• Speaking of local radio, Marty Forbes has the scene covered.
• Again, I’m late with this one but will mention it anyway – CJSR is looking for DJ’s, Reporters, Producers, & Designers!
• I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy this article at Slate. “According to media scholar Brendan R. Watson, bloggers writing about local public affairs do not rely primarily on established media for most of their source material.” I certainly try to link to as many original sources as possible.
• As I mentioned yesterday, the Edmonton Police Service recently launched a series of weekly videos called the Community Crime Update. Stay tuned for new episodes.
• I can’t seem to find anything online about this, but an ad in the Journal congratulated Marta Gold on winning the Excellence in Features Writing 2011 award from the Society for Features Journalism. The paper itself also received some kudos, as it was one of North America’s top 15 newspapers to earn “Best Features Section”.
• CTV’s Fall Preview Tour is travelling across Canada right now, and will be in Edmonton at City Centre Mall from September 15-17.
• In case you missed it: Sandra Sperounes wrote about the local edition of BalconyTV a few weeks ago. Hosted by Cheryl Wiwat and Jon McLellan, the concept was brought to Edmonton by Sean Martell.
• Here’s the latest edition of BalconyTV Edmonton:

I want to finish by highlighting a couple of posts from the edmontonian. If you don’t read their daily headlines, you’re missing out. Here’s a great discussion from August 10:

Newsrooms could also have mentioned to their audiences the Journal had a story about a late-night bus on Whyte, and worked on their own stories the rest of the day. Instead, they assigned reporters, editors, producers, video editors, and camera operators to produce the same story for Tuesday night and Wednesday.

One of the topics I love to rant about. Those same newsrooms will in the same breath complain to you about how times are tough and resources are stretched.

Here’s another great one from August 17:

The race to get the story into the news machine first damages everyone involved. It hurts the credibility of the media outlets who commonly treat factual inaccuracies as no big deal, and it fails the citizens who trust these outlets for information that shapes their reactions to the world around them. Reporting the news is a tremendous responsibility, and not just a game of  ‘who had what story first.’

Couldn’t have said it better myself. That’s why I linked!

You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.

So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!

After a week off, here is my latest update on local media stuff:

• The Stollery Children’s Hospital Foundation is looking for a Social Media & Communications Officer. The deadline to apply is August 12 – here is the PDF.
• CBC Edmonton is looking for a Senior Broadcast Technologist (EDM00241) and an English television Videographer (EDM00242) – search here. You can follow @CBCJobsEdmonton for updates.
• Another CBC tidbit – they launched a cookbook called Flavours of Edmonton as a fundraiser for the Edmonton Food Bank.
• I don’t know when they made the change, but I love that the Edmonton Sun now uses Disqus for comments.
• Yikes, retirement looks tiring. Here’s what Graham Hicks has been up to since “retiring” from the Edmonton Sun.
• Oilers Lunch with Bob Stauffer is moving to 630 CHED from Team 1260.
• Congratulations to Lucas Timmons on being one of three applicants from around the world to receive the MJ Bear Fellowship from the Online News Association.
• Karen’s latest Edmonton New Media Roundup is here. Her update from last week is here. She has also been busy contributing to Longshot Magazine.
• I meant to link to this one earlier: the Unknown Studio interviews Jay Runham as a welcome to the local podosphere.
• Here’s a great thank you post from Erin Despas who finished her four month term at the Journal last week.
• This is interesting: CKUA has signed on to use Groupigg’s software to provide daily deals to listeners across Alberta.
• Hot 107 is now being represented nationally by Bell Media Radio Sales.
• As I mentioned yesterday, Edmonton Next Gen is looking for presenters for PKN11!
• MediaMag reports that Art of Conversation LX is taking place at Sabor Divino on August 31.
• Citytv Edmonton has a new street team that has been fairly active on Twitter and Facebook so far. It looks like their photoshoot must have been lots of fun!

• From the Edmonton Journal’s August 2011 newsletter – they’re still killing it online, though the Edmonton Sun has shown some improvement and is rapidly catching CTV Edmonton:

• The homicide rate has been in the news in Edmonton a lot lately, which led to me launching everybodyinthiscityisarmed.com. Jeff has written lots of great stuff about this, so don’t miss his coverage. I focused on MacEwan criminologist Bill Pitt, but the media are just as much (if not more) to blame for the sensational coverage and hyperbole:

You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.

So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!

Here is my latest update on local media stuff:

• YegNews.com is barely a month old, but it is already on to its second editor. Scott McKeen announced last Monday that he is moving on from the site. He will apparently stay on as an independent contributor, though he has not written anything since July 7. In fact, nothing was posted to the site between July 7 and July 18. Dave S. Clark is the new editor of YegNews.com. Let’s hope he lasts a bit longer!
• West Edmonton Local is still going strong, however! Check it out if you haven’t lately.
• Also last Monday, the Edmonton Journal finally revealed new details on its community newsroom initiative. They are looking both for new ideas, and for individuals interested in joining the “local advisory board”. Email community@edmontonjournal.com by July 31 if you’d like to get involved.
• Here is Karen’s Edmonton New Media Roundup from last week, and here’s her latest.
• Global Winnipeg’s weather anchor Craig Larkins is joining CTV Edmonton’s new morning show. Here’s his tweet about the news. Friday was his last day on air in Winnipeg.
• Shaw’s launch of the New Shaw Movie Club (PDF) on July 15 was widely reported as an attempt to compete against Netflix. The news reignited discussions about network neutrality with Shaw forced to clarify that the new service would in fact impact bandwidth caps for users.
• MediaMag has an entry on Hero, the new magazine launched by the Stollery Children’s Hospital back in April.
• Another new magazine launched this month: WE Magazine. A publication of the United Way of the Capital Region, it aims to “inspire people to come together to make a lasting difference in our communities.”
• A post on the Puget Sound Radio forums indicates there are changes afoot at Astral Radio in Alberta (The Bear, Virgin Radio, and Team 1260 are the local stations).
• Edmonton Journal reporter Jennifer Fong is heading across the pond on August 14 for grad school. That explains the new opening in the Arts & Life section at the Journal. Looks like the going-away-cake was tasty!
• Apparently the Twitter race is heating up for PC leadership candidates here in Alberta.
• An Edmontonian has been traveling the world, posting a video of himself drinking a Coke in each location visited. Sounds like an expensive but memorable trip for Duane Perera. Makes one wonder about the value of travel media when individuals document their trips like this, doesn’t it?
• The primary argument made for why Edmonton should continue to host the Indy is the media exposure we get around the world. I decided to look at Google News for an indication of how successful the event was at that (take these numbers with a grain of salt, they change nearly every time I do the search). Since July 18, there have been 889 articles posted about the topic, according to Google News. Roughly 268 of those appear to have been simply about Power winning the race.  Narrowing the field to just United States-based media, the number drops to 388 articles. If you try to restrict it to just Alberta-based media, the number of articles is 154 (though I think that is low, considering the Edmonton Journal accounts for 103 articles and the Edmonton Sun accounts for 72). Of course not all media sources are in Google News, and I’m sure supporters will quickly point out the TV coverage, but I think the results are interesting nonetheless.

I was away all of last week so I wasn’t paying as much attention to Twitter as usual, but I still didn’t notice as many #yegindy tweets as I expected. That said, there was some great coverage online. fusedlogicTV was recording video and posting photos over the weekend. Here’s a glimpse of what their AutoMojo show captured:

Today, Microsoft released Avatar Kinect on Xbox Live. I just had to give it a shot!

You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.

So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!