July 2009

You may have caught our live coverage of the Republican National Convention. We seemed to have cameras where ever the action was and were reporting what was happening hours if not days before the legacy media.

So how did The Uptake, a non-profit that operates on a shoestring and the kindness of donors, manage to out-do the multi-million dollar corporate media? Simple: Train, Organize and Crowd source. We discovered people learn the most when we do hands-on, one-on-one sessions to cover the basics. Most important was to give people feedback on what they did.

Now you have a bunch of people who can run a camera and want to cover news. That’s great! But what are they all going to do? This is where applying the same organization techniques used in political campaigns comes into play …

Check out the rest of the story from the Twin Cities Daily Planet or get more tips on citizen journalism from the YouTube Reporter’s Center.