New technology is embraced by many but resisted by some print traditionalists, according to the manager of the newspaper's multimedia lab.NEW YORK—From the Mars rover landing and the space shuttle disaster to villages in remote Afghanistan, California wildfires and presidential conventions,
USA Today's Media Laboratory brings audio and visual storytelling to its online readers.
At Streaming Media East here on Tuesday, Scott Cunningham, multimedia technologies manager for the lab, described the process of creating these presentations as a flexible and experimental endeavor.
"We're a research and development lab that looks into the future of storytelling devices," Cunningham said at his "how-to" presentation. "We combine media forms to tell a story that cannot be told without one of those forms."
USA Today uses a combination of multimedia solutions, partnering with FeedRoom Inc. of New York, a supplier of syndicated broadband news content, and internally utilizing Macromedia Flash to create graphically enticing video and photo story supplements.
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The lab's latest creation combines streaming movie scenes, photos, character biographies and an interactive quiz for the upcoming film Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.
"It doesn't always have to be video," said Cunningham, who is also a researcher and reporter for the multimedia lab. "Some other things work much better than video only."
For that, USA Today relies on graphical storytelling. "Infographics are our bread and butter," he said. "We're finding new ways to make it more interactive."
With 16 full-time staff members in the rich media division, plus an array of print and audio journalists from other parts of USA Today, diversity and creativity are encouraged and new methods are brought to the fore. An abundance of tools, talent and media assets allows the lab to draw from multiple sources and combine it all across various multimedia.
So far, the "experiment" seems to be working. According to Cunningham, breaking news that the division turns into multimedia stories can draw up to 500,000 visitors in the first few days.
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While banner advertisements don't appear within those stories, which are presented in pop-up windows, in order to get to the stories visitors must click through the USA Today site. The sheer number of eyeballs that view the sight is the business justification.
Not everyone at USA Today is convinced that multimedia and streaming news online are the future. Speaking of traditional print journalists, though not naming names, Cunningham said that "some are threatened by us, but others have really embraced it. It depends on who you ask."
Cunningham said that he, for one, believes technology has altered how news is presented and will continue to alter it.
"Bandwidth and connectivity have not only changed the user experience, but it's changed our news gathering methods," he said.
Streaming Media East is being held May 17 and 18 at the New York Hilton Hotel. Panel and keynote sessions are broadcast live and archived by TV Worldwide Inc., an Internet streaming company and show sponsor based in Chantilly, Va.
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