Photo credit: Sam Bailey
Azmat Khan 101:
Twitter / Facebook / Instagram / Google +
-- Tumblr/Blog
-- "The Brothers" (PBS Frontline in Cairo)
-- "The Bombing of al-Bara" (PBS Frontline):
Show Notes:
5:58 - Defining ‘success’ in the digital media age:
It depends on the institution. Some friends of mine have been given quotas to hit. I’ve been lucky not to have to do that. I value response and resonance as an indicator - people writing about it, talking about it online, questions, even critiques, things like that I really value in terms of success. The ideal success of course is when there’s a problem or injustice is to see that result in a conversation that hopefully elicits change.
7:50 - Al Bara Film
10:20 - Is Google News driving all of our news consumption?
Not necessarily - I’d say it’s more social. Facebook in particular, not as much Twitter, is one of the biggest sources of traffic, and it’s not a bad thing for a good thing to be shared a lot. And for people to study data to figure out ways to make it reach as many people as possible. In that way, it can be a very good thing. And there’s the opposite of that - when stories are told in a way just to elicit pageviews of clicks.
11:36 - A follow up point on success in journalism:
That it endures, and can be a reference point for something later… that can be a definitive portrait of something at a particular time.
16:00 - Staying up on social media:
I dip in an out of that depending on how busy I am with other things… But I spent a lot of time in the past curating lists of people to follow on Twitter. This can include newsletters. I use Digg’s website news.me and wakeup with a morning email. I use Reddit Edit.
At the same time, I think there are lots of non-traditional ways I gather information from areas that are less talked about.
Facebook Groups. If there’s an issue that sparks my interest or I want to learn more about or report on, one of the first things I’ll do is see if anyone has coalesced around that issue in a Facebook Group. It’s more useful than Message Boards, so you can message them directly, and it’s super easy to get in touch immediately and quickly. And people get intimate on a place like Facebook. That’s one of the most under-reported tools to use when trying to figure something out. It’s not representative of an issue, but it is individuals, and you can learn so much. It’s an incredible starting place that people don’t think about when they want story ideas.
20:58 - for the kinds of stories I’m doing now, I rely more on individuals than people talking about public issues on Twitter.
24:00 - Right now, one of the most fascinating things you can see online are people who’ve supposedly run off to join ISIS. They have blogs, and social media accounts. They are so interesting. But verification is very hard when it comes to these things. The best reporters have done a good job corroborating the facts… but I do wonder, what does this platform or accessibility do in terms of small errors or embellishment of the truth.
26:00 - Norwegian filmmaker and a fake short on Syria
28:02 - Fake blog taken for real news here. Proof here.
32:33 - I think books are increasingly underutilized. The people who turn to information that isn’t publicly accessible when they’re writing about whatever issue it is online.
33:48 - Brainpickings.org. It’s great because much of the material is not publicly accessible, the information is not at fingertips. There should be more of that, we may be losing a lot of that.
34:31 - I think the internet echo chamber is one of the dangers of how we receive our information. You would think the internet would afford more perspectives and differing ones than what you encounter in real life, walking around, but it actually in so many ways provides the opportunity for people to singularly identify - by hashtag, website, by following people - to actually narrow that down further.
38:10 - Standard research tools for Azmat:
Know how to write a Freedom of Information Request
Pacer.gov is an invaluable resource
Look at the courts
Ask for feedback
42:31 - Language classes are a game changer. (Matt and Alex feel quite strongly about this - you should take them. Need inspiration? Read Alex’s great post on why you should learn languages. And then pair with his second post on how you should learn that language.)
46:18 - Being fluent in a language puts you ahead in so many ways, it’s incredible. I can’t even explain it.
49:45 - If it’s Thursday, I’m listening to Serial. Any other day, I’m listening to NPR’s five minute newscast.
50:35 - I’m also obsessed with audiobooks, and prefer fiction.
54:00 - Azmat’s Instagram account.
56:30 - Azmat on Twitter.
How did she grow her account to some 48,000 people?
It’s about providing a service, or context, or things that people find useful and interesting. Don’t necessarily push a narrative or an opinion - people really liked that.
1:00:01 - Azmat’s Tumblr.
1:04:00 - Azmat’s moving over to Buzzfeed.
Azmat’s Book: Never Let me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
Matt’s Book: Zero to One by Peter Thiel
Matt’s Story: Why Our Memory Fails Us by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simmons, creators of the famous Invisible Gorilla test (a Selective Attention test)
Azmat's Music pick:
Alex’s Book: Seasons of Trouble: Life Amid the Ruins of Sri Lanka's Civil War by Rohini Mohan
Azmat’s Film: It’s A Disaster
Azmat’s food she would eat if she were on death row: buttery lobster.
Matt’s Book: Being Mortal by Atul Gawande