Mirror in the Bathroom...no, Stand Down Margaret...no Twist and Crawl!

Sorry that I can't think of an awe-inspiring title at the moment, but this article (h/t scripting.com) builds on some stuff I wrote about before. So, let's look at the article:

Beat reporting with a social network: can we get it to work?

In my previous post, I assumed that the major media would work in opposition to the social network (Twitterdude scoops Paul Moyer!). But what if they work together?

This is probably best done on a blogging-style platform at an established news organization that can devote a pro reporter to work with a circle of “ams” or contributors from outside the newsroom. Thus, beat blogging with a social network is another name for the same idea. Bring knowledge, contacts and interests of many different people from around the beat into the production of news, views and information for the beat, by making use of social networking tools that lower the cost of collaboration and make it viable for dispersed groups to become an editorial force.

The tools for social networking are by now advanced enough that a live forum like that, nurtured by a clever reporter with flexible skills, could become the working heart of an online beat, which could then feed other platforms—the daily print edition, a weekly supplement or magazine, a podcasting schedule, a radio program.

But now they're in a test phase.

This is a temporary site during our “test” phase. You won’t find us doing open source reporting projects with teams of volunteers quite yet. A new site (with the capacity to handle that kind of participation) is being built and will launch with the hiring of our first editor in the first quarter of 2007.

Looks like they need to hire that editor fairly quickly. Don't they mean 2008 (instead of 2007)?

[ADDED LINKS TO PRIOR POST.]

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