Poynter Online
Go


Top Story

Bill Keller Explains NYT's Handling of Rangel Letter, Reporter Response
Most Recent Articles
Most E-mailed
Recent Comments
Recent Tags
Community Activity

Poynter Training
Poynter Seminars
Small, in-person training experiences.
News University
Today's most popular courses on NewsU, Poynter's e-learning site for journalists.
Webinars
Our online classroom is just a click away. Learn more.
All Webinars

Al's Morning Meeting

Home > Al's Morning Meeting
Tools: Text Sizeor, Print, RSSRSS, Subscribe via e-mail
Al Tompkins
Story ideas that you can localize and enterprise. Posted by 7:30 a.m. Mon-Fri.
POYNTER GROUPS
Find and join conversations about Reporting, Writing & Editing and Online & Multimedia.

CHECK AL's
TWITTER FEED for nonstop story ideas throughout the day.

UPDATED: JOIN AL ON THE ROAD AND LIVE ONLINE

APPLY FOR BROADCAST AND ONLINE SEMINARS

SEND AL YOUR STORY IDEAS

A dozen sites
I'm diggin'


*1. For anyone looking for a year-end project, consider this one from the Democrat and Chronicle in Rochester, N.Y. The paper put a face on every person murdered in Rochester for the year. Stunning and simple use of multimedia.

*2. The St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times produced a fascinating story that sheds light on how easy it was to defraud the banking system during the housing boom.

*3. Watch a simple but telling video essay about how immersed children can get while playing video games.

*4. The Rural Blog discusses what failing auto companies mean to rural communities.

5. Salon investigates "Friendly Fire" incident that leads to document shredding.

6. Seven key questions about a car company bailout.

7. The Flip Cam has gone HD with a customizable cover.

8. A fun video to help you with digital conversion.

*9. In a weird way, I dig this photo essay on abandoned Christmas trees.

*10. The Atlantic sits down with China's Gao Xiqing, who oversees $200 billion of China's $2 trillion in dollar holdings. The lesson to the U.S. is "shape up."

11. You thought sub-prime lenders were gone? No way! They are making FHA loans.

12. Planet Money is a really good blog about money and finance.

All of my Diggin' sites are saved on Poynter's del.icio.us page.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends on the accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. We will correct errors and inaccuracies when we become aware of them.


Food Prices Prompt Home Gardeners to Plant Veggies
The Boston Globe finds:

Escalating food prices are prompting more people to return to the soil this spring, according to community garden coordinators, garden centers, and merchants. Seed sales are up across the region, and organizers of community gardens report that waiting lists are expanding.

... American Seed -- which sells 35 million seed packets annually -- said it is shipping out about 18 percent more vegetable seeds to dealers than last year.

The story is similar at New England Seed Co. in Hartford. Sales of vegetable seeds are up about 20 percent from last year, said Warren Shepard of Brockton, the company's New England sales representative. Racks in some retail outlets are continually in need of refilling, he said.

The Arizona Republic reminds readers not to spend so much money on water that they actually spend more on garden-grown food.
Posted by Al Tompkins 1:29 PM
Tools:
Comment, e-mail, Permalink, Share
Username
Password
New User? Signup Now
Poynter Careers
More media jobs