Pssst-Looking For #MediaDiversity? Click Here!

By Benét J. Wilson, DJTF co-chair, Online Managing Editor-Business Aviation, Aviation Week Group

Editor’s note: the Digital Journalism Task Force is holding a BlogTalkRadio session Tuesday, Jan. 11 from noon to 1:00 p.m. on this year’s convention.  Our panel, which features convention chair Rod Hicks, programming chair Dr. Sybril Bennett and Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists President Sarah Glover, will discuss what members can expect at this year’s event. Bennett will also offer guidance on what she and the Programming Committee will expect for this year’s workshops and panels.  We’ll also leave time for your questions. I hope you can join us.

One of the great things about the advent of the Internet, including things like e-mail, Twitter and Facebook,  is that you get to “meet”  and keep in touch with people you otherwise would have never been able to connect with.  One of those people is Emma Carew.  Emma is a member of the Asian American Journalists Association, the owner of the wonderful Dreaming of Pots and Pans blog (I now know how to make Kim Chee because of it) and she *just* joined the digital staff at the Minneapolis Star Tribune as a home page producer.

Emma and I chat regularly via Twitter and email about journalism issues.  On Monday, she emailed me asking for help with a “small project.” That project turned out to be the creation of a #MediaDiversity spreadsheet.  The spreadsheet came as a result of a Twitter chat held Dec. 29 by PBS Media Shift to discuss the issue of finding qualified minorities.  And the conversation continued with a Media Shift post yesterday – Are People of Color Missing in New Media? A #MediaDiversity Chat.

“This is intended to be the seed of a public list to be shared throughout journalism conference organizers to solve that problem — at least in finding more diverse journalists (of all colors!) who are doing cool and innovative web journalism things,” writes Carew.

Well, after working with Emma and five others, the list is out, but it’s still a work in progress. A small, core group will work to keep the list up to date and try to get it a bit more organized.  But we need your help.  Please post a link to this blog to your journalism networks.  Have your friends and colleagues  send their best nominations (including yourself) with the appropriate details.  You can forward your submissions to anyone listed on the home page of the document.

Who makes the list? For now, there are no formal criteria.  “The people we’ve nominated and added to the list are all ones we could say, `Yeah, I’d attend a panel he/she was speaking on,'” says Carew.