I had the pleasure of meeting and listening to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Social Media Editor Sharif Durhams the other day. Sharif was a wild guy, with many interesting facets to his work. Just a brief checklist of his duties:

1. News blog
2. Main twitter account: Newshub
3. Direct use of twitter account above
4. Direct use of facebook page
5. Developing Google+ account

Sharif also expressed an interest in looking into various ways the newspaper could use pinterest to tell stories. 

Sharif had some interesting insight unto the evolution of journalism (spoiler alert: it involves social media!) and how news consumers could interact with the stories. He explained that people have different expectations from their news outlets now. No longer are the days where journalists would write a story, send it out print it and walk away. Media is now a two-way street, and consumers and journalists alike should expect to interact on a daily basis. As news travels faster, people need to be able to interact with it and each other in an open and meaningful way, in order to create a conversation. Social media is now ushering in a new era of citizen journalism and democratization and conversation on a huge level, which is pretty awesome. Social media allows for the ultimate Republic in that citizenry is always connected. I believe this is shown furthermore in the "Arab spring" we are seeing in the middle-east and Africa, and the revolution of young people who are finally able to converse and interact in an open forum. 

As journalists, Sharif explained, it is our duty to figure out how people are continuing to take in this information and stay ahead of it so we can cultivate that forum for discussion. 

Furthermore, this explosion of social media is interesting in the constructs of political election. Sharif brought about the example of Gov. Scott Walker, and how he used his twitter (@ScottKWalker) so effectively during the campaign. He mentioned how it was clear that he was the one twittering and that it really drove home and allowed people to feel connected to the guy. On the other hand, my guy Tom Barrett may have not even known he had a twitter (@Barrett4WI) when it was pretty evident he did none of his own twittering, like this tweet which tells how he's just "wrapping up my speech" while he had a picture of him doing an interview. 

Looking through my recent blog posts (see below), I have come to one undeniable conclusion; I'm not a great blogger. This is not to say I think I'm a bad writer, I don't have much to say via my blog, or that I cannot become a good blogger; I just haven't hit my stride yet. But for you, my Kevin Hogan faithful out there, I'm going to make a few promises going forward for this blog:

1. I'm going to blog for you.

No more are the days of blogging for my JOUR 4953 class (although my posts may be an assignment from that class). I will blog so that my multitude of fans out there can read, understand and know where I'm coming from on my coverage of the current election. 

2. My voice will dominate the blog. 

Going hand-in-hand with blogging towards my audience, I think it's important to include my personal writing style and let you get a feel for me. My writing will no longer be stiff, it will no longer be like reading a history report, rather it will be like having a conversation with me. A grammatically correct conversation with me. 

3. I'm going to care what I'm writing about, and not be afraid to be controversial. 

I'm going to ensure that The Houston Chronicle is the most doggone interesting paper in the world, for better or for worse. I'm not going to be easy on it, but rather I want to and I want you to understand what this paper is all about. The more I care about the writing, the better writing it will be and the more I hope you will care about reading my blog. 

Usually I'd include some sort of picture or more links here, but this is the "Kevin Hogan manifesto for a better blog" so I didn't feel it was appropriate. But in the future, expect links and pictures galore. 

Sincerely,

Kevin Hogan

The Houston Chronicle was all over the primary races in Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado Tuesday night and Wednesday reporting a big win for Rick Santorum in every race. While much of their coverage was from the AP, The Chron covered the race very in-depth, focusing anywhere from Santorum's huge day, to the implications of the race for Romney and Gingrich. The paper also had an article entitled "Paul says results help him rack up delegates" giving Paul's reaction to the big decision for him in the Minnesota primary race.

The best feature to date on the race is an interactive timeline borrowed from the AP that the paper has on its site. The timeline breaks down each of the big three candidate's polictical history, and their momentum up until this point. It also highlights the results of the Feb. 7th contests, as well as gives the figures for their individual POLs and PACs. The timeline pins all of these as well as where each candidate stands on the issues, and shows how well each have performed in various debates up until this point. It is an extremely helpful interactive guide allowing any reader to be up-to-date on the current GOP field and the race as it stands.