Pulitzers expand to include online-only reporting

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/awards/pulitzers_to_recognize_original_online_reporting_102749.asp

 

I'm collecting my top 10 posts right now. That Pulitzer might help me get a job selling ladies shoes!

 

I don't like this. I think it encourages newspapers to cut space, resources, etc., etc.

I understand that the times they are a-changing, etc., but still not crazy about it.

 

From wanting to work at the Plain Dealer to aspiring to being Al Bundy. Ace, what happened to ya, buddy?

 

It's just a temporary solution till the Plain-Dealer is back on its feet.

 

I would like to be the first to nominate host for his intrepid investigative work in the thread, "Has Obama Been Blinded to his own Chicago Mob Ties by Ambition, or ..."

 

Turns out, host is Patrick Fitzgerald!

 

They've included on-line stories in The Best American Sportswriting for years -- ESPN.com, SportsJones, and even the U.S.S. Mariner fan site.

 

The one concern I had was the integrity of the entries. Probably all of us have seen cases in which a Web site has screwed up and then -- poof -- mistake vanishes through the miracle of editing. Easy to cheat that way when it comes time for prizes. It looks like the Pulitzers have addressed that by wanting a screen shot with time and date. Worth noting that you'll need to think ahead and save evidence that the entry is the original post, not something doctored months later:

Q. How should online material be submitted? A. Two main ways. The standard 12 x 17 format should include a printed representation of the online material, such as a screen shot, with a date, time stamp and the name of the newspaper or eligible news organization. We strongly urge that online stories and other online elements that can be easily printed out should be displayed in whole for jurors in scrapbooks. In addition, that material must be available on an active URL that shows the material as it was published. The URL should be brief (we recommend no more than 25 characters) and directions to that URL must be submitted with the entry; if necessary, the entry should include a username and password. You are responsible for making sure the URL works from “outside” your organization.

It's on pulitzer.org in a pdf accompanying the news release about the contest.