Feb 6, 2008

Top bird: My favorite multimedia story of 2007

Who would have thought that chickens in Missoula could be so funny? Or that they would make a great subject for a multimedia project?

Well, Anne Medley knew. Her video , "Missoula Squabbles Over Urban Chickens" tells a story of a classic struggle of where to draw the line in allowing rural elements to enter city life. It's wonderful in so many ways. I don't know what to praise most - the opening money shot of the chicken at the door .... the subtle use of cluck, cluck, clucking sounds ... the talk of neighbor-on-neighbor fights paired with the image of a chicken trying to peck another chicken's eyes out ... the banjo instrumental of "America The Beautiful" playing behind a chicken photo montage ... or just the quote: "I'm mostly neutral but I guess slightly pro-chicken."

I first saw this video a couple of months ago and have watched it about a dozen times since. And I still enjoy it.

Beautifully shot. Hilarious. Just plain brilliant.

This is what the future of journalism should look like. Bravo to Anne and to www.NewWest.net . I stumbled across New West this fall and was surprised by the quality of the content and the spread of the coverage area (Oregon, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming). After e-subscribing, I have consistently been enticed to return.

They call it "a next-generation media company" and I've been keeping an eye on it because of its online-only format, wondering if they might have figured out the mystery that seems to be eluding so many news outlets: How to produce quality journalism and profits.

As far as I can tell they must be doing something right because they've actually recently added a print magazine .



Has that happened before? Starting out online-only and moving to print? Interesting.... I may just have to subscribe to that as well.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It is very interesting for me to read that article. Thanx for it. I like such themes and anything that is connected to them. I definitely want to read more on that blog soon.

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