Hyperlocal News Gathering with Chris Jones

Chris Jones is the TV Crime reporter for CBS affiliate KUTV-2 in Salt Lake City. He’s been involved in the business for more than a decade and has developed a good local following and credibility with his viewers. Now he is taking the next step forward. Chris has created and launched his own micro news site called OurSouthValley. com.{{{gold}}}

Using good old social networking sites like Facebook he is pulling in local traffic to get locals engaged with what’s really going on and what matters to them. Many journalists are trying to figure out how to make the leap that Chris has taken. I caught up with Chris to discuss a little bit of his process and see how things were going.

Here is what he had to say.

Chris, thanks for taking the time to talk with me and congratulations on the launching of your hyperlocal site OurSouthValley.com. What inspired you to take on this venture and how is it going so far?

I think we are all watching profound changes unfolding before our eyes. Journalism, the profession, is in the middle of a transformation that I don’t think we’ve seen since the invention of the television, and the web, I think is behind this.

The big media companies are shedding jobs by the thousands as they grope for a way to maintain profits, and find a way to monetize the web. Meanwhile there is a niche out there that is under served. That is news on a hyperlocal level, news about our neighborhoods. I think, this can be supported by ad dollars, but those dollars aren’t enough to support a massive conglomerate, but it can supplement, even support a person and a family.

Now, I know that being in the journalism business you are always on the look out for good stories. What has the response been from the community and how are you using sites like Facebook to pull in story leads, and generate online readership?

My primary goal is finding stories for television. I’m a crime reporter for 2 News in Salt Lake City, so I spend most of my morning culling records for a television story. Many little tidbits I pick up along the way are great for hyperlocal news, but not necessarily for television.

In addition, Twitter, Facebook, and Google alerts have been invaluable for not only finding stories, but building readership. Every city I cover has a Twitter page, one quick tweet from them, and a couple phone calls later and I have enough for a story.

You actually started your own Facebook group for the to support your site?

I actually established my Facebook page for OurSouthValley.com BEFORE I established the website. For a month, I searched for people who live in the communities I serve, I invited them to be friends, then I started posting short stories, and pictures. Then I launched the site, soon after, people began asking me questions, “I saw some police over on Elm Street, do you know what happened?” I have nearly 500 friends, and I have 500 people who follow me on Twitter. Of course when I write a story, I always post a link on Facebook or Twitter.

Can you talk a little bit about the value of micro news? How it gets lost in the mix of mainstream news reporting when say a huge tragedy like the earthquake in Haiti occurs?

All politics is local, and so is all news. Take two divergent stories, the unimaginable suffering in Haiti, and word that there were three auto break-ins on your street. One chronicles the unheard of tragedy affecting millions, the other just petty crime affecting maybe a half a dozen people. Which news story is more useful to you? I would argue news of the burglaries affects you more directly if you live on that street.

One story touches us on a human and emotional level, it may even prompted us to donate money, or even try to go to Haiti to offer aid. The other touches us on a practical level. “I know tonight, I better park in the garage, because someone is smashing car windows and stealing stereos and laptop computers.”

If your car is burglarized, you must replace the window, call the cops, call the insurance, get a new stereo, heaven forbid they took your laptop, now you have a whole host of other issues, did they steal my identity, my proposal is gone, all my tax records. I bet, given that, I would argue that news of car burglaries in your neighborhood is more useful, not more important, but more useful to you than news about Haiti. That is what oursouthvalley.com wants to be.

How do you see the net changing the long term local news gathering game?

I think immediacy is the most profound change we are seeing.

The local paper that covers this community publishes every month. They do a great job of covering news, but do you really want to wait 30 days to hear about a shooting on your street? I don’t think so.

They are still working in an old model, a bunch of reporters go to meeting write the stories, they spend ridiculous amounts of money buying the newsprint, and the ink, they run the press, paying a dozen guys 30 bucks an hour plus benefits and 401K They hire a dozen more people to delver the papers while paying for fuel costs. Then they sell ads at high prices to appeal to an every shrinking audience.

I can use my 200 dollar Video camera to take a picture of the fire, walk into my kitchen, plug it into my laptop, and for just the cost of my time, punch a few buttons, and within 20 minutes, you are reading the story.

It’s like flying a 747 to your neighbor’s house to borrow sugar. Why hire a pilot, pay for fuel, wait for a taxi time, submit a flight plan, do a safety check, when you can put on your slippers and tiptoe next door?

Share a little bit more with us about how you see your model evolving, goals and ideas?

This is primarily a news site, but I have noticed that I’m able to incorporate nuggets from my past experience. For example I wrote a story about a man who has been arrested once a decade for flashing people in a nearby town. In the story I mentioned a similar case I covered with identical aspects. This site will be all news with some off the record stuff, It will be about the story. You won’t hear stuff like “I had a fish taco today!”

The goal now is building readership. That will take time, but I’m excited about the prospect.

Learn More:

• www.OurSouthValley.com
• www.facebook.com/oursouthvalley
• www.twitter.com/oursouthvalley
• www.Connect2Utah.com
• www.twitter.com/jonesnews