WEYBURN - Journalism is a team effort, as there are many people involved in the behind-the-scenes duties at every newspaper office, TV and radio station, and website. I have often mentioned to others who ask about my job that I consider myself the shortstop of the team, as I do a little bit of everything. There are many other teammates who are also trained in several different tasks, so that we can cover for each other.
With the recent awareness regarding the federal government’s Online News Act, also known as Bill C-18, there is more and more attention on the hard working journalists and their teams who are dedicated to ensuring local news and events are still available to our loyal consumers.
Since the arrival of SASKTODAY.ca, I have had the pleasure of getting to know many members of our Saskatchewan journalism team, even though we are spread out in different offices around the province. As a content curator, my responsibilities include helping out SASKTODAY reporters with Search Engine Optimizers for their stories, and help monitor their social media pages (like Facebook and Twitter).
One of my favourite tools to use is Parsely, which can provide a site overview of which of our stories are getting the most page views, and where the majority of our readers are finding our news. Currently, we are carefully watching those Parsely reports, with the reports of both Meta (the parent company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) and Google starting to block posts by licensed Canadian media.
It definitely is difficult to basically feel like a small fish in a big pond. There is nothing that journalists can do but wait and watch the situation, and hope that some sort of agreement is made between the federal government and these companies. A large percentage of our consumers rely on either Meta or Google when they are looking for local news, and it is important that there is a valid source of reliable information available.
In the meantime, journalists are going to do what they do best: cover the news in their community. We have an excellent team who works diligently to post to SASKTODAY.ca. It is a great website to bookmark, especially since you can customize right to your community page, or any other pages that might be in your interest (including business, crime, the arts, oil and gas, sports, and our photos and videos pages).
There is also an easy way to sign up to get the SASKTODAY.ca newsletter, which come in various options, as you can subscribe to news from particular communities or a province-wide collection.
Of course, the Weyburn Review and Weyburn This Week will continue to hit the newsstands every week, with local news and content. Show your support by subscribing to our paper, and stand with the local journalists who are part of your community.
