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ulken.com · Eric Ulken’s adventures in online journalism

Posted here and there

The problem with writing for several outlets is that your stuff lacks a home on the Internet. But it's nothing that a little aggregation can't fix. In case you missed it, here's some of what I've been writing in the last few months: Today at De Nieuwe Reporter, the Dutch online ...

‘Killing local news’? I doubt it

I rarely opine about the print side of the newspaper industry, because it's not my area of expertise and I don't usually read printed newspapers. But humor me: As part of its continued downsizing, the Los Angeles Times has announced that it's getting rid of the standalone California section and folding ...

Who says newspapers are dead?

The scene at Second and Spring streets, downtown Los Angeles, 2 p.m. PST Nov. 6, 2008: For the second day since the election, the line of people seeking copies of Tuesday's paper outside the Los Angeles Times building is around the corner. (Copies of the paper are also listed at a substantial ...

Leaving the Times

I want to say something about what took place today at the Los Angeles Times, where I've worked for nearly 5 years. It's a drama that repeats itself in newsrooms across the country and has already taken place more times than I care to count during my tenure at the Times. The ...

Backchannel on blogging

What happens when you put a bunch of bloggers in a room, feed them pizza and moderate a discussion on their craft? You end up with two real-time conversations: One in the physical room and the other in the Twitterverse. I know that's no surprise to those who populate this corner ...

New at latimes.com: California Schools Guide

Our newest database project, launched today, is a guide to schools in California with test scores, demographics and other useful info on public schools in the state. (Private schools are listed too, but there's less good info available on them.) Data guru Ben Welsh (of L.A.'s Top Dogs fame) is ...

A visit to the pressroom

After four and a half years at the Los Angeles Times, I finally made the trek to the other side of downtown Friday to tour the paper's Olympic printing facility. As part of the effort to merge the web and print staffs, the Times has been giving some of ...

New at latimes.com: L.A.’s Top Dogs

Last week we launched a fun new database at work: L.A.'s Top Dogs, which shows the most common dog names and breeds by ZIP code, based on dog registration data from L.A. County animal control agencies. My colleague, Ben Welsh, assembled the data and built the app in Django. ...

New at latimes.com: Electoral vote map

Now that the primary season is over and the general election campaign is heating up, it's time to introduce a fun little electoral vote map built by my colleague, Sean Connelley. What's unique about this one is that you can create your own scenario here and then grab some ...

January 25th 2011
Category: News No Comments

Back to the newsroom, off to Seattle

When I left the Los Angeles Times in the depths of the 2008 financial crisis -- a time when the newspaper industry's future looked particularly bleak -- I wondered wistfully if I was walking away from my last newspaper job. I'd worked for newspaper companies my entire career, and despite ...
January 23rd 2011
Category: Views One Comment

Libraries: An appreciation

If I couldn't be a journalist, I think I'd be a librarian. I decided this after spending a lot of time in libraries in the last couple of years and interacting with some very smart (and completely unstuffy) librarians. Maybe it's because, as it turns out, journalists and librarians have a ...
August 20th 2010
Category: Idea file 3 Comments

Flash in the pan?

I am an ex-Flash user. I uninstalled the Flash plug-in on my primary browser about a month ago, and I haven't looked back. Here's how it happened: Back when Apple announced that its forthcoming iPad would lack Flash support, it sounded to me like a boneheaded move. If a device built ...
March 21st 2010
Category: Events No Comments

Continue the discussion here

Thanks to all who turned out today at UBC Robson Square for my workshop on online tools and techniques for journalists. I'm creating this post as a way to continue the discussion online. If you have questions or comments on the topics we discussed, please share them in the comments, ...
March 6th 2010
Category: News No Comments

Checking in from Canada

In the four months since my last post — yes, I'm a terrible blogger — I've moved to Vancouver and started teaching at the University of British Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism. Among other things, I'm coordinating the school's Integrated Journalism course, required of all first-year students, and advising some ...