Electric Fishwrap has moved

Our paper just bought three audio recorders. In the waning days of 2007, the managing editor walked up to me and handed me the company credit card with orders to buy audio recorders and microphones and not to go too much over $300. I pushed it to $400 and we got some nice stuff. (Edit: I got three Olympus DS-20 for the newsroom.)

But who is going to use them? When I got here I was the only one who recorded and edited audio. After I bought my Olympus DS-40 I sold my two-year-old WS-100 to a coworker, and she’s been playing with it for a couple of months. I don’t know if anything has been put on the Web yet, but she’s learning and so far very enthusiastic about it.

Anyway, the paper has held one audio training to get reporters and photographers used to the new devices. Only two people showed for the first training, a photog and a sports reporter who already has his own recorder. The second training was postponed due to lack of reporters.

Mindy McAdams has some great suggestions on how to get reporters used to new recorders and also the editing process. I’ve been asked to lead the reporters through the learning process in the next to-be-scheduled audio session with the recorders and I think I’ll try to use this tutorial to ease them along.

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