Category Archives: Web/Tech

PDFs of printed section fronts

Monday1:59 p.m.

Robert emailed over the weekend to say thanks for adding PDFs to Kansas.com of section fronts from the printed paper. You’re welcome, Robert, we’re happy to be able to add this service for Web site users. He wonders if we could add in the Business page from the daily paper.

We’re looking at options for doing that. The process of uploading the PDFs is automated and is based on a program that knows that those pages have the same page number every day. That might be a hitch with the Business page, since it runs inside the Local & State section, which can vary in size. We’ll try to make it work. Stay tuned.

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Headlines, Kansas.com, News content, Reader issues, Web/Tech | Comments (0)

Reader feedback: Direct email vs. posted comments

June 27, 200812:27 p.m.

Alan, I’ve never done a formal count of phone calls/emails I get compared to comments posted on the board. A rough guess is that at least 90% to 95% come to me directly. Increasingly, those people explain that they didn’t want to post publicly. Also, I often address questions here that I get in person at community events.

I understand their point and yours about subjecting yourself to abuse by rude posters. On the other hand, when you post publicly, everyone gets the benefit of reading all of your comments. I suppose it’s a plus that more people use their real name when they email or call, and they probably wouldn’t in a posted comment. So in that regard, it’s a more personal connection for me to get direct contact vs. a post.

But posted comments allow for a multi-directional conversation. If you do post, and you feel like someone attacks you personally, flag that post and we’ll review it.

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Kansas.com, News content, People, Reader issues, Web/Tech | Comments (1)

Where are the Editor’s Desk bloggers?

June 27, 200812:14 p.m.

Ellie asks a pointed question, and she’s right. Our posting is spotty on this blog, and we need to do better. She says she clicked on the About link, and has “never seen a peep from those peeps.” Her chastising is on point and we’re without a good defense. We need to do better.

When I make time to post here, I get (mostly) great feedback from readers and I love the two-way conversation. The other newsroom editors also need to get in the habit of making time to post - we all do, and Sports Editor Kirk Seminoff brought this up recently. So you’re right, and I’ll take your challenge to crack the proverbial whip. And yes, I’ll also gig Jean to post a “real bio.”

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Kansas.com, News content, People, Reader issues, Web/Tech | Comments (0)

The newsroom’s goals for 2008

May 6, 20086:18 p.m.

I realized today that I haven’t shared the newsroom’s goals for the year with readers. In The Eagle’s newsroom, we have four overriding priorities for the year, and every department (metro news, business, sports, etc.) writes measurable goals that support these priorities:

1. Developing a harder-news edge to the front page, with dominant stories that are based on breaking news or investigative reports versus “softer” feature stories. And making sure all elements of a page - the articles, design, photography and headlines - work together so story packages are clear, compelling, accurate and balanced.

2. Reporting more “enterprise” and investigative news. Enterprise stories are those that aren’t readily available in a press release or on a meeting agenda. Our aim is to seek out the less-obvious stories - those now going unreported - and to improve our editing and reporting so all important questions are always answered in a story. A key part of this goal is reviewing and analyzing more public databases, and ensuring that government operates in the open.

3. Building huge audience growth for our Web site, Kansas.com. We’re aiming for at least a 20% increase in monthly unique visitors, through increased news, information, tools and features for Web users - and also through better innovation, and more individual responsibility throughout the newsroom.

4. Focus on individual growth and learning. Every staffer will log 30 hours of training time through in-house seminars and other training opportunities.

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Headlines, Kansas.com, News content, Reader issues, Uncategorized, Web/Tech | Comments (3)

A tonic for your financial headache

March 8, 20083:30 a.m.

Kevin G. Hall and Tony Pugh

Does thinking about the economy and personal finance make you feel like you rode a Tilt-A-Whirl after drinking a few too many mojitos? McClatchy correspondents Kevin G. Hall and Tony Pugh know how to make things stop spinning.

From the true rate of inflation for the average Jane/Joe in the country to sorting out the rebate stimulus plan, Hall and Pugh dole out answers to readers’ financial and economic questions. They’re not financial advisers but, as their Web site says, they “are available to answer your questions about the shaky economy at home and abroad, and what’s in store for ordinary Americans in the face of gathering economic storm clouds.”

To root around or ask a question of your own, visit their forum here.

By Michael Roehrman | Filed under Current Affairs, Web/Tech | Comments (1)

A few thoughts on Kansas.com registration

Feb. 23, 20089:35 a.m.

It’s been nearly two months since we launched registration for Kansas.com users and for the most part, it’s gone very smoothly. When I last checked in with our senior editor/interactive, Nick Jungman, a few days ago, we had about 9,700 registered users, growing by about 150 per day. We don’t ask users to register unless they hit a threshold of visiting about 40 pages over a few days.

One of the best user benefits of registration is access to some very useful e-mail alerts we send daily, including morning and afternoon headlines. The information you give us helps us learn more about who uses our Web site so we can improve it, and it helps our advertisers understand the audiences they’re trying to reach. We don’t ask for extensive personal information — as Nick pointed out to one Web user, the registration form we use does not gather enough information from you to allow us to mail you a postcard.

Most online users register when asked and move on. Some, though, have been downright angry. I got one email from a reader who was irate at the idea that we’d ask him to register to access our site, and he also found the advertising on the site irritating.

With Kansas.com, we offer readers, for free, a service that is very expensive to provide — round-the-clock news. In addition, the Web gives us the opportunity to offer far more news content than the printed paper (especially multimedia such as photos and video), discussion boards and interactive conversation on ever-increasing levels, and rapidly growing opportunities for advertisers to reach the exact people they want to reach with their messages, and in unique ways.

It’s a phenomenal public square for news users, communities, journalists and advertisers.

The reason we can make this available at no cost to users is because advertisers support the Web site and printed paper.

I’m often asked whether I believe that one day people will have to pay to access news Web sites. I just don’t see it happening. The business model is still evolving, but I believe the advertising will have to pay for free access to news. Users expect it.

In the morning, I still want to hold the paper in my hands, drink coffee, and read the news. Millions of readers feel the same way. Many others don’t, and a computer screen is preferable to them.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask users to give us a half-dozen or so pieces of demographic information to access that free news. Our aim is to improve our Web site constantly, both in content and experience, and your feedback — including the information you give us by registering — helps us do that.
I doubt Westar is going to give me my electricity for free, or Cox is going to decide to quit billing me for my Internet service. You, either. But we can provide news for free on the Web. Taking two or three minutes to register seems like a sweet deal to me.

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Kansas.com, News content, Reader issues, Web/Tech | Comments (7)

News in your Inbox

Jan. 18, 20083:20 p.m.

We’ve launched two new e-mail newsletters that give us a cool opportunity to bring Eagle headlines to you in a timely and convenient way.

Our morning and afternoon headline briefings of local news are available as a perk for readers who sign up as registered users at Kansas.com. The e-mail reports are sent out at 7 a.m. and 4 p.m. weekdays to update you at home or the office on the news of the day. You can scan the reports as is, or click any of the links for the longer stories.

In addition to the morning and afternoon news briefings, you can sign up for our Mid-Day Business Report (every weekday) or Michael Pearce’s weekly outdoors report. And you can expect us to add more offerings of other e-mailed news reports in coming months.

I hope you’ll take a few minutes to sign up for the newsletters after you register on Kansas.com.

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under News content, Reader issues, Web/Tech | Comments (0)

Missing comics, games

March 27, 20076:59 p.m.

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Much of the response Kansas.com has received since the site’s transition to a new system has been about games and comics missing from our Comics & Games page.

Since ownership of Kansas.com passed from Knight Ridder to McClatchy Co. last summer, much control of the Web site has been returned to us here in Wichita. That’s mostly a good thing, and it will allow us to better customize the site for you. However, among the drawbacks of this shift in control is a shift in costs. One big cost we were facing was the bill for all the comics and games we have carried. Given the relatively low usage of those features, it just didn’t make sense for us to pay to keep everything. We chose to maintain the two most popular features — the crossword and sudoku — and let the others lapse.

I apologize to those of you who’d developed a habit of using some of those features, but I hope you understand the situation we found ourselves in.

— Nick Jungman

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Web/Tech | Comments (4)

We’ve moved

March 22, 20079:53 a.m.

At 10 a.m. this morning, Kansas.com moved. We’re hoping you didn’t notice.

For weeks, our staff here in Wichita and a host of folks at McClatchy Interactive, our parent company’s online division, have been re-creating Kansas.com in a new computer system. Each of about 160 standing pages of the site had to be re-created from scratch on new servers, using powerful new software that we in Wichita were introduced to just last month.

The result — we hope — is a relatively seamless transition. Most of the pages of the new site have been designed to be nearly the same as they were in the old one. A few things have moved, though, and a few things have been discontinued. If you think something is missing, we encourage you to look again. It may just be at a different spot on the page, or it may have gained a new title or position in the navigation menus on the left side of the page.

But, if you can’t find something, let us know. It might have been overlooked. Indeed, if you find anything wrong with the new site — a broken link, garbled pages, forms that don’t work — don’t hesitate to tell us. We’ve set up the e-mail address fixit@wichitaeagle.com to collect your reports of problems with the new site. You can also use the site’s feedback form.

Although we’ve designed the new site to look just like the old one, we expect our new system to soon make possible a host of new things that you’ll find useful or entertaining or both. We expect, too, to find ways to make the site easier to navigate and even more interactive than it is now. In a few short years, WE Blog and our discussion boards have become fantastic communities where Kansans can connect on a host of topics. We’re certain there are dozens of other communities waiting to be created.

If you have some ideas about that, or the future of Kansas.com in general, we’d love to hear them. We invite you to discuss your ideas in the comments below.

— Nick Jungman, senior editor for interactive, and the Kansas.com team

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Web/Tech | Comments (15)

We’re focused on our digital future

Feb. 16, 20076:26 p.m.

It’s not every day that a company embarks on its future with a fresh, full-out charge. But that’s what we did in The Eagle’s newsroom Thursday.

For us, a key part of that future is kansas.com , The Eagle’s Web site. Newspaper Web sites have quickly become vital — and thriving — parts of the papers’ news reporting and advertising functions. That’s certainly true for The Eagle, where our online audience grew about 45% in 2005 and more than 20% again in 2006.

We can no longer think of ourselves as a newspaper company that has a Web site. Both forms of media are vital to our organization, and we can’t afford for kansas.com to be an afterthought.

You may not realize just how many people use our Web site. We are by far the most-visited local news Web site in the Wichita area. In January, for example, we recorded more than 1.5 million visits, with more than 11 million Web pages viewed.

Kansas.com launched 10 years ago, primarily posting stories from that morning’s paper. Now, we report dozens of stories online throughout the day and night. We are also the deepest source of useful local information, from things to do to places to eat.

We have a lot more growing to do.

But that means changing the way we think, and changing ways that we’ve done our jobs through most of our careers.

And it means changing the way we operate our newsroom.

On Thursday, we reorganized our staff to focus more people on our Web efforts. I’ll emphasize the same thing to you that I did to the newsroom staff Thursday afternoon — none of us work only for the printed paper, and none of us work only for kansas.com. We all have to get comfortable doing both.

So Thursday, I named Nick Jungman as the new Senior Editor/Interactive, overseeing a greatly expanded online department. Nick is currently our Senior Editor/Nights, responsible for the front page and in charge of the newsroom at night.

Nick will be responsible for all news aspects of kansas.com and will report to me. He’ll work across all newsroom departments to expand content on our Web site, and will work with other divisions on new online initiatives. I know Nick would love to hear what you like best on kansas.com, and what you want more of. Drop him a note at editorsdesk@wichitaeagle.com.

Nick’s staff will include Jeff Butts, Senior Producer for the site; Katie Lohrenz, content programmer; and Josh Wood, sports producer.

Photos and video are popular features for kansas.com users, so our talented nine-person photography staff will move into the Interactive Department, with added responsibility for developing photo slideshows and video. They’ll be led by Brian Corn, who was Photo Editor and now becomes Visuals Editor.

In addition, four reporters will move from the metro staff to the online staff: Ron Sylvester, Stan Finger, Amanda O’Toole and Hurst Laviana.

The staff also will include a multimedia editor to be hired later.

So how does all of this affect you? It means you’ll see faster improvements on kansas.com in the coming months – more news, new features, and easier navigation. More interactivity – because it’s not so much our Web site, but your Web site. And more ways to offer community service through the most-visited local Web site in town.

Sherry

By Sherry Chisenhall | Filed under Web/Tech | Comments (0)