AOL made 900 hires over the summer with 50% of the new people going to local blogs network Patch, CEO Tim Armstrong just told employees in a company wide meeting.

Figure all-in costs for each new employee is $100,000 per year, and AOL is set to spend $45 million per year on its new Patch employees.

That’s right in line with AOL’s previously announced plans to invest $50 million in Patch this year.

Patch.com representatives are coming to Kennesaw State University via our Center for Sustainable Journalism and Department of Communication on September 15 to make a pitch to our students and alumni, looking for full-time or freelance work.

Now JJIE.org’s watchdog, reporting role is more important than ever. Budget cuts are slashing at the very fabric of the system, which has two alternatives: to improve or get worse.

The budget cuts in the system could result in fewer beds for youth offenders in detention centers and believe or not, that could be a good thing. Here is the lead of the story by our JJIE.org reporter Chandra R. Thomas:

Georgia Department of Juvenile Justice Board members say there’s possibly a silver lining to the proposed 2011 budget cuts released today. They say despite the many challenges the cuts raise, there’s great potential for positive outcomes from the reductions recently mandated by Governor Sonny Perdue, but they’re mostly contingent on legislative support.

The department’s Deputy Commissioner Jeff Minor said:

“What we’re basically saying is with this reduction of beds that there is an opportunity for a conversation to be had about who needs to be in these beds. The worst thing you can do is to lock up a kid who doesn’t need to be there. It sets them on a cycle that is hard to stop once it starts.”

Board member Sandra Taylor agrees, saying:

“Legislators don’t need to know that children are our future; they already know that. What we need to do is provide them with the information behind the impact of these cuts. It’s our responsibility as an agency to keep that in the forefront of their thoughts.”

I boldfaced the words above because it is also a JJIE.org responsibility to keep all these issues in the forefront of everyone’s thoughts. If we don’t do it, no one else will.

I will try to find the back story on this ad campaign, but I remember this from a couple of years ago in a Star Tribune story:

MinnPost.com, the local start-up that bills itself as “a thoughtful approach to news,” got a lot more to think about recently when Minnesota Public Radio rebuffed the website’s offer to continue in a sponsorship role.

The website’s founder, Joel Kramer, said MPR chief Bill Kling won’t return his calls or those of his board chairman, Lee Lynch, a former MPR board member and donor.

So did they make nice or is this MinnPost giving MPR a little jab in the ribs. I am confident Joel, who monitors most blog posts about him, will let us know shortly.

Transparency declaration: Both Joel Kramer at the Star Tribune and Bill Kling at MPR were my bosses when I lived in Minnesota.

While social media use has grown dramatically across all age groups, older users have been especially enthusiastic over the past year about embracing new networking tools. Social networking use among internet users ages 50 and older nearly doubled-from 22% in April 2009 to 42% in May 2010.

“Young adults continue to be the heaviest users of social media, but their growth pales in comparison with recent gains made by older users,” explains Mary Madden, Senior Research Specialist and author of the report. “Email is still the primary way that older users maintain contact with friends, families and colleagues, but many older users now rely on social network platforms to help manage their daily communications.”

At the same time, the use of status update services like Twitter has also grown-particularly among those ages 50-64. One in ten internet users ages 50 and older now say they use Twitter or another service to share updates about themselves or see updates about others.

Read more here.

“the primary remaining scare resource is human creativity.” *

The lecture was to a group of freshmen, some of whom were thinking about going into journalism. Of course, they were worried about the state of journalism as well they should be. See this about the University of Colorado — Boulder’s journalism school in jeopardy, followed by this from one of its adjunct professors.

I think it will be tough for those journalism students who take the daily grind route, but there will be a select few who excel in human creativity. They will sail to the top. When you are young, of course, you assume, you will be one of those at the top so even as journalism declines, you probably figure it will hurt the other guy, but not the creative me.

Personally I think that’s an excellent attitude, beside today no job or field is without risk, so do what you want to do, but try your hardest to be on top of the human creativity mountain.

* Yochai Benkler, 2002. “Coase’s Penguin, or, Linux and the Nature of the Firm,” Yale Law Journal, volume 112, number 3 (December), pp. 369-446.

The University of Colorado announced Wednesday its School of Journalism and Mass Communications will be discontinued.

Here is a press conference video produced by ColoradoDaily.com:

The Denver Post reports:

…shuttering the School of Journalism in its current form — a process called “program discontinuance” — will begin, although the committee could potentially recommend that the school remain as it is, (CU-Boulder Chancellor Phil) DiStefano said. All current students will be allowed to complete their degrees, whatever the changes.

“Discontinuance” is an unfortunate legal term, said journalism-school dean Paul Voakes.

“It implies that we’re shutting down, when the opposite is true. Discontinuance is the necessary legal process that would enable us to create the innovative new programs our students need,” he said.

The Denver Post adds:

The process leading to Wednesday’s announcement began in April when Doug Looney — a CU alumnus, former Sports Illustrated writer and then-chairman of the journalism school’s advisory board — wrote a “white paper” to DiStefano complaining of infighting in the school.

“The SJMC (School of Journalism and Mass Communications) and its dysfunctional faculty are hopeless,” Looney wrote. “Prospects for improvement are nonexistent. It should be closed.”

The Knight press release says:

Knight Foundation is looking for more high-quality ideas that use technology to cultivate community engagement.

These first five grants that we’re announcing today are just the beginning. Learn more about the initiative, and how to submit an idea, by visiting www.technologyforegagement.org.

Here’s who is receiving the first $2.23 million:

Craigslist Foundation ($750,000) will make it easy to find great ideas for community building. The foundation is creating an idea-sharing site, where institutions and individuals tell their community’s success stories and connect with people of like minds.

Jumo ($750,000), a nonprofit startup created by Facebook cofounder Chris Hughes, will use a social network to connect people with the issues and organizations that interest them, with the goal of fostering lasting relationships. The site matches users with relevant organizations, then engages them through e-mail, Facebook, Twitter or other applications to encourage contributions of time, skills or money. (Hughes talks about the project here.)

Code For America ($250,000) wants to transform city governments across the country by enlisting the nation’s most promising developers to apply Web 2.0 principles to civic problems. Based on the Teach for America model, members will create web applications to help make city governments more transparent, participatory and efficient. Knight Foundation’s funding will ensure the participation of Philadelphia, Pa. and Boulder, Colo., two Knight resident communities.

Community PlanIt ($250,000), a project out of Emerson College’s Engagement Game Lab, will revitalize the community planning process by developing an interactive game platform that lets stakeholders work—and play—together to solve problems. The grant will fund game development, in collaboration with four Knight communities.

And, finally, CEOS for Cities ($235,000) will test whether residents can help create solutions to local problems, filling a gap left by shrinking budgets. This project will connect developers and city officials to build a crowd-sourcing platform that invites citizens to work with government to identify problems and find answers. San Jose, Calif. and Grand Rapids, Mich., will test the idea.

Leonard Witt

As mentioned in the article our marketing expert Carole Arnold produced an excellent slide share presentation on how to effectively use LinkedIn to find a job. You can find it here.

Carole Arnold

Also see more find information about our upcoming Social Media Integration workshop on Oct. 22-23, which was also mentioned in the article. Be sure to register at our early bird rate.

From 2005 to today, J-Lab has tracked $164,455,589 million in grants awarded to at least 137 news projects in 20 states and the District of Columbia…funding [is] only for news and information projects. It does not include funding for public broadcasting programs, for the underwriting of documentaries, for journalism training or student news services.

If you want to see who is giving and who is getting, you can browse their searchable database here. The database is just one part of a funding toolkit that gives nonprofit news start-ups tips on how to get funding.

Here is a piece of what he writes:

I think the thing to keep in mind though is that because of the interactivity of the site, we not only provide the news but enrich it for the individuals reading by making its delivery a different kind of story…Just as the newspaper model cannot accomplish this kind of intimacy and ambiance, I don’t think the Patch model would either.