Talk about the MAPS 3 initiative has taken over the Oklahoma City metropolitan area.

Every MAPS votes seems to do that. Some people love the idea. Some people are opposed. And rarely to people with such strong opinions change their minds about a subject they are so passionate about.

But these issues are decided at the polls. Eligible voters will educate themselves, make a decision and cast their vote

That’s where we come in. NewsOK has put together a MAPS 3 coverage page with a bunch of information and details about the projects and the upcoming vote.

You can see:

• An interactive timeline about the downtown development, dating back to the 1980s
• A twitter feed from users that tag their posts #maps3
• An archive of articles written about the proposal in recent months
• All the videos we’ve produced on the subject, including some of the descriptive information about the proposed projects
• Photo galleries with artist renderings and images of the proposed enhancements

Learn more about the proposals. Then vote on Dec. 8.

We’ll create more lists in the near future. We won’t always have a list that’s so self-serving. I expect that we’ll create lists that will serve the info-seeking public on Twitter.

In the mean time, just follow our list, and you’ll know plenty.

Last week, we launched a project on NewsOK that has a simple name.

It’s called “Places.”

We launched with nine entries on the Places Web site. We’re going to add more each week. The goal is stated on the Places home page: “Accompany The Oklahoman’s writers and photographers as they investigate some of our state’s most intriguing places — seeing what they see, hearing what they hear and feeling what they feel.”

We think it’s pretty cool right now. But we think it will be a really cool site to visit and come back to as we add dozens and dozens of more entries into the site. We’ve already added one more this week - The Architectural Antiques and Dead People’s Stuff.

We’ve had some excellent feedback on the project, as well. Most of it is aimed at the lead writer for the project – Ken Raymond.

How enjoyable it was to read such creative writing being used to tell such a compelling story.  Senior staff writer Ken Raymond did an excellent job of pulling a sad and dirty story together into a very intense word picture which read so well that I felt as though I was looking through a camera lens.

And there’s this thought from a very appreciative reader:

Your writing is appreciated.  Thank you!!  Your style reminds me of Rick Braggs “All over but the shoutin”—one of my favorites.

And this one – another person who read some of the entries in the newspaper:

I enjoyed your piece in yesterday’s paper, “Folks of all stations ride the bus.” It was well-written and interesting. I’ll watch for your by-line again.

We also had one who found us on NewsOK.

I am very excited about this new series, Explore at Places.NewsOK.com.  There is so much to see and learn about in Oklahoma.  I applaud your efforts to make it easier.

The last person said it perfectly … “Explore.”

That’s exactly what we are aiming for with this series and this site. We want to explore Oklahoma, and we want to take you with us. We’re not going to write traditional articles on the places we visit. We’re going to channel the story-teller in us. We’re going to use our imagination and tell you what it feels like to be in that place at that time — what we see, what we smell, what we think.

We’ll add audio, slideshows and panoramic images as available to help capture the essence of that place.

So even if you’ve never been locked up at the county jail, you can say you’ve been there – thanks to Places.

The Oklahoman unveiled a special section with its Sunday newspaper yesterday. It’s the annual “College Bound” section – and it’s full of information for high school students and their parents who are looking at going to college in the next few years.

It’s all about choosing the right college, finding ways to make it affordable, finding scholarship opportunities, connecting with classmates, testing, timelines and tips.

Basically, it has everything you need to educate yourself on the college-planning process. It’s all online right now at NewsOK’s College Bound page.

We built it. We want you to use it.

Kelly Fry, vice president of news and information at OPUBCO Communications Group, presents NewsOK's video operation at the APME convention in St. Louis on Oct. 30. See more photos on Flickr: APME 2009

We were a finalist in the prestigious category of “Innovator of the Year.”

As our awards czar (unofficial title) Joe Hight pointed out before and after the award was given – the APME innovator award is one of the most prestigious awards in journalism and probably the most difficult to win. As he says, the hardest part is convincing a room full of top-notch journalists that you deserve the award.

Joe should know. We’ve won quite a few awards in the past year. I’ve blogged about them before. It’s fun to win. It validates the hard work.

I was lucky enough to attend the APME conference in St. Louis last week. The key person from our operation that wasn’t able to attend is our video superhero (unofficial title) David Morris.

The Innovator award goes back almost three years. It began with a vision from OPUBCO Communications Group leadership. It went through phases of implementation, training, construction and trial and error. It culminated with the execution of a plan to change the culture of our news and information operation and grow our audience.

It was good for the newsroom to win the Innovator.

Now – back to work.

Kelly Fry, vice president of news and information at OPUBCO Communications Group, accepts the award. That's me (Alan Herzberger) in the background.

]]> http://blog.newsok.com/newsok/2009/11/06/newsok-innovator-of-the-year/feed/ 0 http://blog.newsok.com/newsok/2009/11/05/one-happy-newsok-visitor/ http://blog.newsok.com/newsok/2009/11/05/one-happy-newsok-visitor/#comments Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:19:40 +0000 alan herzberger http://blog.newsok.com/newsok/?p=686 I received this message in my inbox this morning – a forward from sports editor Mike Sherman:

I just wanted to say that this website is looking amazing, and the functionality is great! I especially enjoy the sports team specific pages, as I look at the OSU page everyday, and it is set up great! Thank you for this service, it is greatly appreciated.

Unfortunately, in this business, the people that work hard on providing important information to the public rarely get to hear about the positive impact and the results of their efforts.

So I’ll blog about it as much as I can.

Sam Bradford made his decision public yesterday, ending a week of speculation, debate, cancellations and breaking news turned breaking predictions.

(Yes, that last part is a friendly shot at ESPN and their coverage on Thursday and Friday.)

In the end, everybody reported the truth at about the same time. Sam Bradford was having surgery. It’s scheduled for Wednesday. We’ve blogged about it. We’ve shot videos about it. We sent SMS text alerts. We sent e-mails. We wrote stories.

We have it covered. Reporters Jake Trotter and David Ubben have had it covered from the beginning. On Wednesday, NewsOK correctly reported the facts and reasons behind the news that Bradford’s news conference was cancelled. On Thursday, NewsOK was hoping it didn’t have to report about something that wasn’t scheduled and wasn’t planned, but when talk about an impending news conference became widespread, a report was necessary. It was good work by our local reporters. Jake and David can be counted on for the most complete and most accurate information about OU sports — guaranteed.

And now more about knowing Sam ….

See our ‘know it’ on Sam Bradford. It has everything you need to know about Sam. You can see all the stories, all the blogs, all the videos, all the stats, all the links from around the Web. You can even join the message board about Sam Bradford and talk about everything Sam.

We launched ‘know it’ topic pages on OU quaterback Sam Bradford and OSU quarterback Zac Robinson shortly before the season began. After the first couple of weeks, we thought we had unknowingly unleashed a ‘know it’ curse.

Look at the early evidence:

• Bradford was hurt and the Sooners lost.  (See BYU)
• Robinson was looking a bit shaky early in the year. Was he secretly hurt? Did he gain too much weight? Was he just overrated?

Bradford’s luck continued down a unfortunate path, but Robinson has emerged as a strong All-Big 12 quarterback candidate. So I can rest easy — there is no ‘know it’ curse.

However, we also launched  ‘know it’ topic on Kevin Durant. If he goes down with injury, I’ll reopen the investigation.

A few weeks ago, I shared a page we produced as a test. It was our first Story Wall – a collection of photos, videos, quotes and text from the Oklahoma State Fair 2009.

I was so inspired that I assigned another wall to be produced for the OU-Texas game 2009. I thought it would be a great way for OU football fans to re-live the biggest game of the year.

Of course, when I made the assignment and helped coordinate the specifics, I expected fans would be re-living and celebration a Sooner victory. Instead, it was a close loss in a demoralizing way (losing Sam Bradford …. again). It might be a game that nobody wants to talk about ever again, let alone re-live.

Alas, we did it anyway. And now that you are a full 48 hours removed from the end of the game, it might be a good time to experience our OU-Texas Story Wall. It truly is a fun experience.

But here is a quick steal from his blog – the air times for the shows:

Here is the upcoming schedule:

Sat 10/17 3:30-4:00pm 7 OKCOX7
Sat 10/17 8:30-9:00pm 7 OKCOX7
Sun 10/18 1:00-1:30pm 7 OKCOX7
Sun 10/18 4:00-4:30pm 7 OKCOX7
Wed 10/21 9:30-10:00pm 7 OKCOX7

It was so outstanding that I had to stay far away from my blog for two weeks just to let the servers cool down. But now I’m back (we’re looking for a strong October, as well).

Breaking traffic records isn’t new. Our audience continues to grow steadily. The opening of the football season in September always provides a nice boost. And unfortunately, when a Heisman-winning quarterback at the University of Oklahoma sprains his shoulder in the first half of the first game, people care – and they go to the one place that covers OU football better than any other place.

It also rained a lot in September. And if people online in Oklahoma are interested in anything more than they are interested in football, it’s weather. We launched a new interactive weather radar. It’s really cool. You can change the settings and see exactly what you want to see — things like warnings/watches, current temperatures and lightning information. You can also scroll across the map and see the live radar for Australia if you want. (I believe knowing the weather conditions in Australia can be a big help).

We also shattered the records for traffic on the NewsOK blogs. It’s been the fastest growing area for traffic on NewsOK in the past year, and it doesn’t appear to be slowing down. Penny Soldan’s Television Blog and Brandy McDonnell’s BAM’s Blog led the way, followed closely behind Tim Henley’s Celebrity Gossip Blog, George Lang’s StaticBlog and Matt Price’s Nerdage. As you can see, our Life and A&E audience loves blogging. That works for us.  (Side note – my blog did not crack the top 50. I’m counting on you to change that in October).

Thanks for making September a stellar month in both page views and unique visitors. We’re growing and adding and improving NewsOK.com every day. We’ll count them up again at the end of October.