Virtual Media Source Book

Here are some useful sites for journalists. Add more sources under these topics and add more topics and sites that you want in your source book. You can click on these links and save them as bookmarks or copy the URLs when you access the sites. (If any of these links are out of date, search for the site by name.) 

Government	Legal/   Ethical	Media   Organizations	Media resources	Web    Design
Broadcast	Public Relations	Advertising	Jobs	Web Tools

 

Government (U.S. federal, state and local): International students should add links to useful sites in your native country.  

• Fedworld: a searchable guide to federal governmental agencies, personnel and Government Internet servers.
• U.S. Bureau of the Census 
• Statistical Abstract of the United States 
• THOMAS: Legislative Information on the Internet 
• Library of Congress 
• The White House 
• Central Intelligence Agency 
• American University's Campaign Finance Site Complete state-by-state records of campaign finances for state and federal legislators. 
• The Washington Post Federal Internet Guide: a well organized set of resources to federal agencies and documents, all in one convenient starting point.
 
Back to Index Table

Legal and Ethical Resources  
• The Electronic Frontier Foundation 
• FindLaw Index 
• Freedom of Information Center
• FOI Resource Center, Freedom of Information center maintained by the Society of Professional Journalists
• Cyberspace Law for non-lawyers (a complete course in easy terms) 
• Libel and defamation (definitions for non-lawyers)
• Cyberspace Law Center

Copyright sources 

• The Copyright Website 
• United States Copyright Office 
• U.S. Copyright Office FAQ 
• Copyright Basics 
• Copyright Crash Course (by Georgia Harper, office of the General  Counsel, University of Texas System) 
Copyright & Fair Use at Stanford University

Ethics

• Journalism Ethics 
• Ethics on the WWW,  a comprehensive collection maintained by Professor Paul Lester at the University of California, Fullerton. 
  
  Back to Index Table 
 

Media Organizations and Institutes 

 

• Poynter Institute for Media Studies 
• Freedom Forum 
• Investigative Reporters & Editors (Includes a database of thousands of investigative stories.) 
• Society of Professional Journalists 
• American Society of Newspaper Editors 
• Newspaper Association of America 
• Journalism & Women Symposium 
• Asian American Journalists Association 
• The National Association of Black Journalists 
• Center for Investigative Reporting 
• Education Writers Association 
• Society of Envrionmental Journalists
• Native American Journalists Association
• National  Association of Hispanic Journalists 
• National Gay and Lesbian Journalists Association
 
Back to Index Table
Great Media Resources 
 
• The World Wide Web Virtual Library: journalism (This is a huge compilation of reference sites by John Makulowich) 
• ProfNet (This is a service that will find academic experts in various fields to answer your questions -- for working journalists only.) 
• American Journalism Review Resources 
• American Journalism Review 
• Facsnet, an excellent resource for journalists. 

Reporting, Writing and Copyediting resources

 
• The Reporters' Network
• The Reporter's Desktop, an excellent collection of resources by Seattle Times reporter Duff Wilson
• reporter.org,terrific resources for reporters including links by beat at www.reporter.org/beat
• Inkspot: resources for writers
• CMC magazine (Computer Mediated Communication); issue devoted to digital journalism 
• The Greatest Tale Ever Told; a 44 part online murder mystery by John Updike 
• Writing for the Web, column by Jakob Nielsen
• How to write for the Web; study by Jakob Nielsen and John Morkes
• Electronic Citation Style Manuals
• World Wide Web Citation Formats
• Modern Language Association (MLA) style
• The American Copy Editors Society
• Copy editing for magazines, created by new media consultant Mindy McAdams
• Take Mindy McAdams' spelling test of 50 commonly misspelled words
• Inkspot: a comprehensive source for writers
• Copyeditor Good links for copy editors
• Deadline Online.com, another outstanding collection of resources for journalists by Washington reporter Alan Schlein
• DEJA NEWS, a good search engine for newsgroups  
• SWITCHBOARD , a people finder  
• WHOWHERE , another good people finder and business resource with phone numbers and e-mail addresses  
• FOUR11, yet another good people-finder with e-mail addresses  
  
Back to Index Table

Broadcast 
 
• WWW Virtual Library: Broadcasters 
• MSNBC 
• CNN 
• TV stations 
• Broadcast Education Association 
• National Association of Broadcasters
• Black Broadcasters Alliance
• theAntenna , good information about online broadcast media
• Radio-Television News Directors Association

Back to Index Table  

Public Relations  

• PR Central 
• PRNewswire
• International Association of Business Communicators 
• Directory of Public Relations Agencies and Resources on the WWW 
  
Back to Index Table 

Advertising  

• Ad Council 
• Advertising Age 
• Advertising Research Foundation 
• Advertising World
• American Association of Advertising Agencies
• Internet Advertising Bureau  
• Newspaper Association of America (has a lot of marketing and advertising information related to newspapers) 
• Audit Bureau of Verification Services (for online advertising) 
• Internet Advertising Resource Guide

Back to Index Table 

Jobs  

• Journalism Job Bank
• TV jobs 
• Editor & Publisher Interactive 
• AJR's Awards, Grants and Scholarships 
• Journalism jobs file  

(This file changes every week.  Check it regularly. 
• JobLink: This job site, created by Eric Meyer, is on the American Journalism Review site.  
• Gannett Co. These jobs are in Gannett newspapers, broadcast and other parts of the company, which owns USA Today and more than 100 other media properties.  
• JobsPage: Job opportunities in the Knight-Ridder chain.  
• National Diversity Journalism Job Bank: a site committed to but not limited to helping minority journalists.  
• Marketing Jobs Online for those of you interested in marketing and advertising.  
• Broadcast jobs: Check the jobs site in theAntenna  
• Advertising jobs in the Monster Board Job Bank via Ad Age.  
  Here are some general job resources for all fields:  
• Monster Board Job Bank : a huge database of jobs.  
• Online Career Center: another large database of jobs in all fields.  
• College Grad Job Hunter  
• Jobtrak, a neat job listing service for college students.  
• NationJob Online Jobs Database  
• CareerPath:  Not limited to media jobs, this site is a partnership among  more than 35 newspapers.  It lists all the classified ads that appear in these newspapers.
• Job-Hunt: A meta list of job resources
  
Back to Index Table 

Web Design 

• Hotwired Webmonkey HTML Teachingtool 
• HTML Primer 
• Bare Bones Guide to HTML
• Beginner's Guide to HTML 
• The Web Developer's Virtual Library
• Elements of Web Design and Secrets of Web masters:
• Graphics from Yahoo; links to scores of free graphics
• Barry's Clip Art Server: 
• Randy D. Ralph's Icon Bazaar

Back to Index Table 

Web Tools 

• Graphic Construction Set for Windows (shareware)
• Graphic Converter (for Macintosh)
• CNet's Designing Graphic Software and related sites.
• Website Garage: Get a free analysis of your Web site.
• Doctor HTML: Another checkup for your site, links and design. 
 
Back to top