iPhone photo from my May visit to speak to the 2010 summer college fellows.

Next week — Aug. 25-27, to be exact — I’ll return to my native Florida for a great opportunity at the Poynter Institute: a seminar that aims to teach journalists about programming and programmers about journalism. From the description:

Journalists will learn the programmer’s mindset, and programmers will learn how to see the world through a journalist’s eyes. Programmers will teach journalists how to turn data into usable information — and share great examples of efforts that worked.

The seminar also covers computational thinking, something I’ve written about previously. Needless to say, I can’t wait to discuss with other 15 or so attendees and instructors.

From the seminar page (with some links changed), the instructors include:

• Regina McCombs, Visual Journalism Faculty, Poynter
• Aron Pilhofer, Editor, Interactive News Technologies at The New York Times
• Matt Waite, Senior News Technologist, St. Petersburg Times/tampabay.com and PolitiFact
• Jeremy Bowers, News Technologist, St. Petersburg Times/tampabay.com
• David Stanton, Technology Fellow, Poynter
• Steve Myers, Managing Editor, Poynter Online

I know/have met in-person all of them — except Jeremy, who I look forward to meeting for the first time — and know that this will be an awesome seminar. Also, thanks to a handy Twitter search for “Poynter seminar,” I’ve seen a few tweets from others will who be attending. I look forward to meeting all of them soon.

Finally, a big thanks to Poynter for awarding me a partial scholarship for the seminar, made possible by the Ford Foundation. And thanks to Regina, Steve and Dave for answering my questions about the seminar.

UPDATE: The hashtag will be #journprog.

…programming should be used as a means to introduce kids to ways of thinking and problem solving that will be useful to them in many different spheres of human endeavor. If in the process they get hooked to computer science and end up in careers involving programming, that would not be a very shabby outcome, either!

Charles Profitt said this in a post about Computational Thinking, Programming…and the Google App Inventor on SmartBean (read other highlights).

I sat down Sunday morning to read that piece (which I found through my handy Google alert for “computational thinking”) and it reminded me of something I’d almost completely forgotten about:

In summer 2000 — before eighth grade — I attended IMACS (no relation to Apple) for a few weeks. IMACS, short for the Institute for Mathematics and Computer Science, offered STEM-related activities in a day-camp format for different age groups.

My faint memories from IMACS include programming some rudimentary commands to control a robot, working with simple electronic circuitry to illuminate small light bulbs and completing various logic/reasoning questions.

So why did I, as 13-year-old who was mainly interested in writing, do this? Honestly, I don’t remember exactly beyond these two basic reasons:

• My good friend Chris was going to attend
• I’d had some technical inclinations since elementary school

You see, Chris and I had been aftercare aids at Country Isles. Yes, we sometimes clutched clipboards and walkie-talkies as we deposited toys in classrooms. But we also assisted with tech and AV — even Winterfest in 1997 (I will never forget what it’s like to be a 10-year-old running cables and duct-taping down wires for a school-wide singing show. Oh, and what ever happened to MiniDiscs?).

Earlier in elementary school when people would ask me, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I would say, “A scientist and inventor.” Surely, even a few years after such a notion, that too factored into my decision to attend IMACS.

My larger point in recapping all this history is that earlier interests, such as from childhood, can stick with us as we grow up and it’s never too late to start appreciating other areas.

Honestly, math was my least favorite subject in high school. I used to think journalists and math didn’t mix. I was young(er) and wrong. In the year or so since I graduated college, I wish I had done at least one stats class (in addition to psychology, but that’s for another post).

So why am I now fascinated by computational thinking and programming? My passion for journalism and how the fields relate, sure. But it’s also clear that my earlier interest and experiences, even one as limited as IMACS, play some role. (I also always have to credit Daniel Bachhuber specifically on the computational thinking front because he shared the first things I read/listened to on that topic.)

All of this is not to say you can’t develop a tech inclination later in life. You certainly can. What I am saying is how it’s helpful to evaluate what and who might have influenced you — and what comes of that.

Case in point, yesterday I talked my sister through setting up a blog on WordPress.com. I didn’t succeed earlier in the summer in getting her to host her own cooking blog, but in June she did buy her domain. What changed yesterday? I don’t know. We were just video IM chatting and it happened. Michelle, a rising college sophomore interested in finance and business (she digs math), is now set up to be a creator — not just a consumer.

Even if she never sets up her own hosted blog, never touches a line of code or never goes any further, it has — thus far — certainly been worth my brotherly nudging. And, to borrow from Profitt, it wouldn’t be too shabby if she did.

What were some of your most noteworthy technical influences? Where did those influences lead?

Hacks/Hackers, Mozilla, the Medill School of Journalism, The Media Consortium, and others are teaming up to develop a solid six-week online curriculum that will benefit both “hacks” and hackers.

To make this work, we need feedback from both journalists and programmers on the questions:

• What topics should be covered?
• Would you be interested in helping to teach a topic?

via Hacks/Hackers and Mozilla want to know: How should we structure an online curriculum for journalists and technologists to learn together? – help.hackshackers.com.

That made me wonder on Twitter:

How would you characterize the relationship between mindset and thinking? Which one is derivative from the other?

More specifically, I’d say that I’ve long had an open mind(set) in the journalism realm. For at least a couple of years, I considered this one of the most important characteristics for a journalist — along with passion. I still think this is true.

Recently I’ve become fascinated with “computational thinking” (more on that later) and wonder if my mindset is informed by this “new” way of thinking or vice versa.

As Lauren Rabaino (@laurenmichell) and I discussed on IM early this week, my tweet was something of a chicken-and-egg question. As Lauren said (and I agree):

your mindset impacts thinking which impacts mindset which impacts thinking… etc for infinity

So why am I thinking about this now? Well, for one, I’ve proposed a session (with the same name of this post) for Saturday’s BarCamp NewsInnovation in Philadelphia: Rethinking our Thinking. The description:

Journalists often discuss the need for evolving skill sets. On a deeper level, we sometimes talk about mindsets. What I’m interested in currently is, “How can we reshape our thinking?”

Computational Thinking

That idea formed because I’ve been reading, watching and listening to a lot of insightful things lately, including material on computational thinking (first found via Daniel Bachhuber). For example, check out:

• Computational Thinking article by Jeannette Wing, which I first read months ago
• Jon Udell’s Interviews with Innovators podcast with Wing
• Computational Thinking for Everyone podcast with Joan Peckham
• Computational Thinking and Computing lecture by Wing, the which you can watch below or download as a video podcast [slides].

Finally, there is the Center for Computational Thinking at Carnegie Mellon, the university where Wing worked when she wrote the original article.

Evolving Interests

All of this comes in the larger context of my interest in learning more coding, an ongoing process that I started taking to the next level last summer with JavaScript. I put that on hold as I focused on a project using a JavaScript framework and then picked up back up for a bit before moving on to PHP and MySQL around the fall/winter. I used a little PHP for a small side project and mostly put learning that on hold too.

In February, as you might remember, I guest moderated a #wjchat (web journalists chat) on journalists and coders.

More recently I’ve stepped back and am looking at coding from a broader perspective. This coincides both with my role in helping to organize the first Hacks and Hackers event in DC as part of the May 4 ONA DC meetup at American University. Also related, is last week’s launch of the Hacks and Hackers forum, where I serve as a community moderator.

So, basically: Whereas before I was interested in teaching myself some coding languages to enhance my skill set, I’m currently focusing more on learning about the fundamentals of programming and computational thinking (with the practical skills on the side for now).

Is this an essential step in learning to code? No. Has it been and will continue to be helpful? Most definitely.

The discussion of the “programmer-journalist” (can we find a better name?) arguably started middle of last decade, so what has lead me to this point? I plan to delve into that with another post.

Also, I’m considering writing another post before BCNI Philly (and one after to synthesize the results of the “thinking” discussion). The pre-Philly post would be more focused on different types of thinking and why they’re important. UPDATE: I’ll be writing a wrap-up post. Until then, check out these notes and this mindmap from the session.

In preparation for that post and the session, I need your help.

As I asked in the Hacks and Hackers forum, what has most shaped your thinking? As a journalist — heck, as a person. Let me know in the comments.

Interesting Reading

For now, I leave you with some valuable selections of what I’ve been reading — I recommend reading them all:

• The Pragmatic Programmer Quick Reference Guide on Coding Horror
• New dual-degree master’s in journalism & computer science announced by Columbia (plus Wired magazine’s coverage and some reactions)
• The Journalist as Programmer: A Case Study of The New York Times Interactive News Technology Department by Cindy Royal
• Software Is Media by Fred Wilson
• The Zen of Python
• The Bias of Veteran Journalists by Lane Wallace

Maybe I’ll even throw in some of the ol’ tips.

As would be expected, I posed a question on Twitter about what I should discuss.

• ckanal: @greglinch Awesome, congrats! Twitter, personal branding + networking.
• AAdamGlenn: @greglinch Def’nly social media (see: http://bit.ly/socmediaskills). But also participatory jurno, curation, entrepreneurship
• lavrusik: @greglinch The importance of understanding the fundamental shift to social news and the need for them to innovate. Sounds flowery, I know.
• MikeHigdon: @greglinch why they should start their own start ups…

(Tweets curated and published with ease courtesy of this and this.)

Thanks to Craig Kanalley, Adam Glenn, Vadim Lavrusik, Mike Higdon and Yuri Victor for their advice. These are all great topics and I hope to touch on as many as possible.

As I read the responses, I thought more about the best approach for the visit. Here’s what I’m thinking now:

• Introduce myself
• Ask students to introduce themselves
• Discuss their interests and goals
• Ask what they want to discuss
• Maybe show some things on the screen
• Challenge assumptions, if warranted

The last point bounced around my head as I asked the question and read the answers, most likely because it was the topic of my Skype video chat with Dave Stanton‘s senior-level journalism class earlier this month.

Then I saw this and laughed:

• danielbachhuber: Questioning the assumptions will always produce mind-blowing results.

Daniel and are often on the same wavelength, but this was just a funny coincidence. He sent that tweet via text message and wasn’t responding to me (I doubt he even saw the question).

I will qualify and say I don’t think you will always get mind-blowing results, but we could all use a little more challenging of assumptions now and then. Particularly when it comes to journalism education and how we deal with related conversations.

So let me know what you think of this approach and what would you discuss if you were speaking to a graduate-level online journalism class.

The site was created by 13 undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Miami as part of Rich Beckman‘s spring 2009 Seminar in Visual Storytelling class. It’s built on WordPress using a heavily modified Branford Magazine theme. The main feature is an interactive grid, which includes audio clips from the interviews with an awesome group of multimedia professionals, built with PHP, JavaScript and Flash (for the audio player).

A clean and simple home page, with The Grid front and center.

We began the project in late March and launched in private beta in May. Thanks to everyone for their feedback!

Here’s a slightly tweaked description of the site that I wrote for the School of Communication:

There are plenty of Web sites and blogs devoted to multimedia journalism, and many of them are great. But there’s no single hub to discuss, share, critique, rate and learn about the field – including in-depth thoughts from industry leaders. That’s the hole Multimedia Standards aims to fill.

But what about the name: Multimedia Standards? The site offers none. Instead, we offer resources and opinions on everything from “what is multimedia” to “what is good multimedia” and beyond.

Users can listen to an international group experts in an interactive grid; submit and critique projects; find other sites on our resources pages and easily subscribe to them (we provide the RSS feeds); see upcoming events on our calendar; and read about upcoming contests and recent winners. User input, from critiquing multimedia projects to saving links in our Publish2 newsgroup (which feeds to the top-right homepage widget), is key and we plan to continue updating the site with more featured links.

The team

Each student gathered and edited audio and were involved in the planning and research of the site. The class included:

• Deborah Acosta – content team leader
• Walyce Almeida – content team
• Andrea Ballocchi – programming team
• Matt Byrnes – design and programming teams
• Melissa Gerber – programming team
• Andrea Huber – design team leader
• Akilah Johnson – content team
• Shell Jun Zhu – content team
• Greg Linch – producer
• Holly Max – design team
• Brian Schlansky – programming team leader
• Laura Sutnick – design team
• Jesse Swanson – content team
• Rich Beckman – executive producer

The site

We spent a good deal of time early on discussing how to best organize the site’s content because of the nature of the content. The sections/navigation include:

• Summary – a synopsis of all our research from the interviews, including an overview of the topics discussed and thoughts on the future
• The Grid – 10 questions and answers from our interviews; links to profiles, which feature the full interviews
• Resources – RSS feeds featuring multimedia producers, commentators and related organizations
• Submit/Critique – submit multimedia sites and projects for critiques and star ratings by users
• Events – a Google calender with upcoming conferences, training events, etc.
• Awards – information about upcoming awards and recently announced winners
• About – credits, photos and links to individual Web sites, Twitter accounts and e-mail addresses

The Grid

Unfortunately, The Matrix was taken. So we went with The Grid, which features (A-Z):

• Alberto Cairo
• Leo Caobelli
• Pamela Chen
• Andrew DeVigal
• David Dunkley Gyimah
• Kim Grinfeder
• Kenny Irby
• Gary Kebbel
• Tom Kennedy
• Brian Storm
• Will Sullivan
• Ashley Wells

What can I do?

Your interaction is key to the site being more than just a static presentation of our work. For example, submitting and critiquing projects, adding events and more.

Let me know if you’re interested in learning anything more about the site; I’ll respond via the comments or write another post, if the questions warrant. Also, please comment with feedback. How can we make the site better?

Send comments to multimediastandards [at] gmail [dot] com

Looking forward, there’s a second round of interviews in pipeline, which will be used to create a second grid. Although I’ve graduated and won’t be directly involved with that, I’ll be sure to post an update when part deux launches.

Yet another CoverItLive blog! Yes, on Thursday at 1 p.m. EDT I will help lead a Poynter live chat about avoiding social media overload (during my lunch break):

How Do I Help Students Handle Information Overload on Social Media Sites?

The URL is simple and easy to remember (and tweet!), so please share the link with others!

http://bit.ly/poynterchat

Also, please come ready with questions and/or ready to help answer others’ questions.

If you are not able to follow the chat live, you can submit questions beforehand by commenting below or contacting me on Twitter.

I’ll be co-leading the discussion with Poynter’s Sara Quinn, a visual journalism faculty member who oversees the Poynter College Fellowship, which I attended in late May.

Speaking of cool Poynter people…

Mallary Tenore invited me to help with this chat, and I thank her for the opportunity. She’s awesome. If you don’t read her blog or follow her, you should.

I’d also like to thank Ellyn Angelotti, Poynter’s interactivity editor, who you should also follow.

Some background: While at #pcf09, some other fellows and I joined a live chat led by Emily Ingram. Ellyn said if I pitched a good idea, I could lead one too. I mentioned the topic of effectively using various social networks, which soon became this topic. Voila!

The Andersons from Greg Linch on Vimeo.

I doubt that it needs to be said, but I’m extremely excited. As I wrote in my essay, I’m looking forward to not only learning from some of the most respected journalists in the field, but also to learn from my peers.

Oh, and did I mention, the tuition is free!

After a little research, I’ve found 10 others who have been accepted, nine of whom I found through Twitter search.

One of my tweeps is listed as alternate. We’ve never met, but I hope she has the opportunity to attend because I know she’s a very talented college journalist.

As for how this effects my summer plans, it doesn’t change anything. I will go to my internship at the Dallas Morning News, which I am also eagerly anticipating, soon after the fellowship.

In short, I proclaim this the summer of Greg!

PS. I can’t believe I’m graduating in a little more than two months. Where have the college years gone?