The New Journalist   

The on-line era demands added skills and innovative ways of looking at the profession.

W HEN AUTHOR AND COLLEGE PROFESSOR Jon Franklin hosted his former editor George Rodgers recently, the two old pals relaxed by the fireplace at Franklin's 50-acre Oregon spread and reminisced about their adventures at Baltimore's late Evening Sun. Then they cruised on to cyberspace, where they're masterminding a new pay-per-read site for literary journalism.

Perhaps they seem unlikely new-age pioneers -- Rodgers didn't even own a personal computer when he retired last fall. But they have a Web-load of company. As new forms of journalism expand at a Pentium pace, more and more traditionally trained news hands are converting to jobs that were unimaginable when their careers began.

Not long ago, the typical beginning reporter faced a simple choice: print vs. broadcast. Those options remain. But today's growth area is in multimedia jobs that blur and often obliterate the old boundaries. It's a proving ground forging not just new kinds of journalism but a new species of journalist as well.

Expertise and versatility define the members of this new species more than attachment to one specific medium. They can think and work across the widening spectrum from print to television to new information technologies.

Some are wholehearted outriders on the information superhighway, fleeing mainstream newsrooms they consider constipated and obsolete. But many faithfully keep their old-world ties, just branching out a bit for growth and fun.

Above all, whether by accident or calculation, they're positioning themselves to adapt and thrive wherever fickle technology flies next.

T HE CHANGES already have influenced recruiting for both online and traditional media jobs.

When Associated Press editor Ruth Gersh considers a job prospect these days, for example, she often skims past the cover letter, resumé and references, and zeroes in on another telltale indicator: the applicant's home page.

Gersh, who is developing a new multimedia service for AP clients, demands solid news credentials. But she also looks for signs that candidates can roam comfortably on the cyberbahn.

In the new "technitorial" age, she says, she needs people with a blend of traditional and futuristic skills, who can work imaginatively with the rich swirl of text, photos, graphics, audio and video that multimedia embodies.

"The people who have expressed interest so far," Gersh says, "range from very traditional print backgrounds to people who've come up on the broadcast side, the technical side, the photo side...people who've done design, even people who've done marketing.

"Of course," she adds, "what I'm looking for is all of this."

E DITORS ACROSS THE COUNTRY tell similar stories. At the Chicago Tribune, online editor John Lux agrees that applicants with a Web page have "a leg up." It shows their curiosity and commitment, much like previous generations of journalists got noticed by writing for any publication that would have them. One of Lux's recent hires worked for an online union paper. Another volunteered to produce a CD-ROM featuring prize-winning photographs.

And while electronic media--online providers, Web sites, CD-ROMs, e-zines, desktop publishing--have fueled the trend, it spills over into the hunt for journalists of all kinds.

Recruiters for Gannett newspapers, for instance, examine online college papers for evidence their alums have the right flair.

"We're hiring more on potential and brainpower and far less on functional skills," says Mary Kay Blake, Gannett's director of recruiting and placement. The idea isn't to identify computer skills per se, but to recognize that computer-literate people often "show clear thinking, strong analytical skills and connective abilities."

No one can yet forecast whether multimedia journalism will become just one more specialty, or fundamentally remake the mold. But for newspeople restless about the future, taking a taste of new media seems wise.

Youth does help, it appears. But a striking number of veterans are enlisting, from celebrities like Michael Kinsley and Linda Ellerbee (both recently lured to online projects) to longtimers from the news trenches.

What kind of world are they encountering? What kind of skills and attributes do they need? And what early lessons have emerged from this potentially momentous migration?

J OURNALISTS INFILTRATING the new media encounter a world that's frantic, exciting and begging for creativity.

Online coverage is everywhere, from a real-time Super Bowl site visited by millions to CNN's multimedia daily news files to prodigious plans for covering the Summer Olympics and the presidential campaign online. The Newspaper Association of America's Web page lists over 150 newspapers with online services.

When you expand the definition to online magazines, the numbers skyrocket -- one list counts more than 1,000 available e-zines. These online specialty publications range from crude tracts to sophisticated electronic magazines, and the topics and titles have mushroomed, from Bible study to dream interpretation, from Bad Haircut to Dead Pig Digest.

Online coverage of routine news is becoming, well, routine.