February 2, 2009

In another sign of its savvy Web strategy, the Guardian has signed up YouTube makeup star Lauren Luke to write a column (with accompanying video) in the revamped Weekend section. (The Guardian also just ran a full-page story on Luke in Saturday’s paper.)

There’s a line in the story that shows the importance of online news distribution: “A brief BBC interview with Luke for a local Tyneside news program has been seen by more than 2.2 million people, becoming one of the most viewed BBC clips on YouTube worldwide.”

Here’s the video:

I’ve written before that if you want to get into journalism you should have a blog. I’d add to that: If you want your own column, you should build a following on YouTube, too. Increasingly, news organizations will be looking for people who not only know what they’re talking about, but who can distribute it effectively online.

It’s a shame the Guardian‘s video of Luke is not embeddable, though.

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Paul Bradshaw writes the Online Journalism Blog, and is a Senior Lecturer in Online Journalism, Magazines and New Media at Birmingham City University (formerly the…
Paul Bradshaw

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