People, companies, and government agencies don’t always return your phone calls. To investigate secretive subjects, reporters can make creative use of documents that are out in the open. Lawsuits, Instagram posts, tax records, and disciplinary records—to name just a few publicly available sources of information—can reveal a lot about who’s in trouble and who’s making money off whom. With persistence and discernment, journalists can piece together all kinds of stories from the public...| The Open Notebook
The Q&A story format allows writers to act as mediums between experts and audiences, tackling both broad and nuanced topics and exploring through conversation the expert’s story, thought processes, and accumulated knowledge. But preparing, steering, and editing an interview as a stand-alone article poses challenges—and opportunities—that differ from those of a typical news story. The post Crafting Clear and Conversational Q&As appeared first on The Open Notebook.| The Open Notebook
Changing a name is a very personal decision. Unfortunately for trans journalists, it’s a decision that has to occur in public. Changing a byline can mitigate the abuse and harassment that trans journalists routinely face and help them honor their gender identity. Amid an increasingly hostile environment for trans people, their perspectives and stories have never been more important. Here are some strategies for staying safe and maintaining well-being while changing your byline as a trans jo...| The Open Notebook
Dementia affects more than 57 million people worldwide, yet media coverage often reduces these experiences to either tragic narratives or false promises of cures. Journalists instead should center the experiences of people with dementia, skeptically navigate the complexity of Alzheimer’s research, and avoid harmful stereotypes. Through compassion and nuance, reporters can portray the reality of dementia as a complex lived experience filled with challenges, adaptation, dignity, and hope. The...| The Open Notebook
Navigating an interview with a scientist doesn’t just take prep and good interviewing skills. The hurdles can be psychological, too, requiring reporters to summon the nerve to interrupt and admit holes in their own knowledge. Every journalist, no matter how prepared, will at some point have to confront a conversation with a scientist that’s so dense with jargon, it’s almost unintelligible. But pressing sources to speak more plainly isn’t a weakness; it's a strength—essential to craf...| The Open Notebook
Reports, often published by leading institutions and organizations, are goldmines for science journalists—packed with data, insights, and leads that can spark compelling stories. These offer journalists a deep-dive into topics that can reveal important findings, which reporters can cover or use to supplement reporting for other stories. However, sometimes reports can be pages worth of dry and technical language, making them hard to digest. In this roundtable conversation, reporters and edit...| The Open Notebook
Many reporters hesitate to invest time or money in a potential story without any guarantee of a return, but they overlook pre-reporting—or developing a story before it’s accepted for publication—at their own risk. A well-planned pre-reporting process helps journalists stress-test story ideas, solidify communication with sources, build confidence in a beat, nail pitches, and ultimately develop richer stories. Pre-reporting, when done well, may even boost your efficiency and save you time...| The Open Notebook
