Photo Slideshow: CGSA turns 7

On Oct. 23, Boston University's Center for Gender, Sexuality and Activism celebrated its seventh year of operation.

NewsTrack blog: Slate's photo reporting

As far as I can tell, Slate doesn't make much use of photos for its reporting, especially in terms of original photography. For their regular content, they tend to use Getty Images and Flickr/Creative Commons. This is understandable, given that a lot of photo staffs are getting laid off from major publications (Example 1, Example 2), and Slate is relatively small. It doesn't particularly rely on visuals to tell its stories; rather, it focuses more on strong prose and analysis to distinguish it from other sites.

Slate does, however, have a blog specifically dedicated to photography, called Behold. But it's more of a blog that features photo projects from other photographers not affiliated with Slate itself. That makes some sense given that Slate is technically more of a magazine and not a newspaper, so it makes sense that its content would be more feature-like.

On this blog, instead of using a slideshow format, Slate just places all of the photos in a single post, so you scroll down the page to view all of the photos. I'm not sure how I feel about this format — it's personally easier for me, as I prefer scrolling to clicking, but I know that in some content management systems you can have slideshows bring more page views, which in turn boosts advertising revenue. Maybe Slate's platform doesn't use that.

In-Class Assignment: Slideshow

Infographic: Brain damage in football players

City of Boston officials address overcrowding in student housing

by Sarah Kirkpatrick and Mina Corpuz

Boston City Council met Thursday to address proposed city ordinances that prevent more than four undergraduate students from living in a single apartment.

NewsTrack: Analyzing "Richard Dawkins on social media" from Slate

This piece on Richard Dawkins caught my eye this week because I figured it would be a good piece that incorporates social media with analytical writing. I anticipated embedded tweets, responses to his tweets, and the like — but none of that appeared.

My initial reaction was that maybe it's the site's style policy to avoid embedding tweets, but I've certainly seen pieces on Slate before with embedded tweets, such as this analysis a few weeks ago of people's tendency to tweet in memory of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

So why did they not include the tweets directly embedded in the story, as opposed to linking them? I think the piece could have been much more efficient that way. Slate doesn't get any advertising money (as far as I'm aware) by linking back to Twitter, and I'd be surprised if people actually want to click on tweets to see the full context of them. I think it complicates the piece by forcing readers to physically exert effort into looking at the tweets referenced.

I think it could have also made the piece less dry to read if it had the physical boxes of embedded tweets breaking up the story. The piece isn't overly long as a whole, but some of the paragraphs are a bit long, so it would be nice if it was broken up a bit.

Also, I think it would be nice to have the visual context of the numbers of retweets and favorites Dawkins' tweets were getting, just for the sake of adding another dimension as to how popular these (arguably outrageous) tweets are.

NewsTrack: Slate's 'Dear Prudence' column, what works, what doesn't

One of my personal favorite aspects of Slate — which happens to be my favorite online publication — is the "Dear Prudence" column written by Emily Yoffe. It's a spin on the traditional "Dear Abby" advice column in that it's more of a contemporary, high-tech, PG-13 spin on proper courtesy.

It can touch on modern, current events: What do you do if your name is Hillary and people automatically associate you with Hillary Clinton? In that same column, should you allow your child to attend a party with an unvaccinated child? What is proper etiquette for Uber ratings? What happens if you found your husband in the hacked Ashley Madison database?

But her advice is very much evergreen content. When Yoffe is on vacation, Slate likes to recycle old columns and almost "highlights" of her best advice. Recently, they created a "greatest hits" of her wedding-related advice and vacation-related advice. This is a good way to continue to draw in page views (and advertising money) despite not having any new content.

Prudie's column, much like any other advice column, relies on user-generated questions. It's quite an interactive, accessible model — every week, Yoffe hosts a live chat where users can submit questions about anything for her to use in her column that week. It doesn't require quite the effort that a traditional advice column format does.

Occasionally Yoffe will post videos of her giving advice instead of giving written advice, to give some variation in the way people can consume her content.

The column, in all, is a pretty straightforward format that has been modernized to make it younger and more user-friendly.