Steve Buttry

Director of Community Engagement & Social Media

Herndon, VA

I'm a journalist with print roots and digital blossoms.

Steve Buttry

Director of Community Engagement & Social Media

Herndon, VA

I'm a journalist with print roots and digital blossoms.

Featured
How journalists and newsrooms can use Pinterest
As Pinterest grows in use, it grows in value to journalists and news organizations. I don't pretend that I know all the ways that journalists should use Pinterest. My Digital First Media colleagues and I are discussing and experimenting with this now and many of them are well ahead of me.
The Buttry Diary
Social Media
Featured
How do you recapture the joy and excitement of journalism?
"I need to find the joy and excitement I once experienced as a journalist," an editor told me in a recent comment on my blog. "I just don't feel it right now. I pray it will return."
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
Featured
As the American Press Institute closes, another piece of my past fades away
As the American Press Institute closes, another piece of my past fades away March 23, 2012 by Steve Buttry Like a drawing on the Etch-a-Sketch that is so popular in politics now, my journalism past has pretty much been shaken clean. Almost everywhere I worked has been shut down or sold: Columbus (Ohio) Citizen-Journal.
The Buttry Diary
My career
Featured
Memories of covering seven Iowa caucuses in four decades
I've had a lot of fun covering the Iowa caucuses. It feels odd to be mostly sitting this one out. Last week I noted that I think it's time for Iowa to relinquish its place at the front of our nation's political line (or for political parties or federal legislation to reform the process, giving other states a turn).
The Buttry Diary
My career
Featured
Storytelling in journalism: No estoy muerta (I am not dead)
This will be a long post about storytelling in journalism. It starts with a story I wrote in 2000 that was never published. This was from a trip I made to Venezuela as a reporter for the Des Moines Register. In this version, I identify the Venezuelans I interviewed only by their first names.
The Buttry Diary
Reporting
Featured
Homecoming revisited
A photograph at an Iowa train station by Earle "Buddy" Bunker of the Omaha World-Herald won the Pulitzer Prize in 1944 and became one of the most famous photos of the World War II era. Sixty-five years later, a home movie has surfaced, showing the same moment and showing Bunker hustling into position to shoot the historic photo.
Cedar Rapids Gazette
Reporting
Featured
The Homecoming
The homecoming was joyous - an exuberant hug frozen forever by a camera's flash.
Omaha World-Herald
Reporting
Aggregation guidelines: Link, attribute, add value
Aggregation has become a dirty word in much of journalism today. Bill Keller, former editor of the New York Times, last year wrote: "There's often a thin line between aggregation and theft." Patrick Pexton, Washington Post ombudsman, in an April 20 column called plagiarism "a perpetual danger in aggregated stories."
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
5 ways my Mom and my sons' Mom shaped my journalism career
As I considered writing something about Mom or Mimi for Mother's Day, I initially dismissed the idea as not right for my blog.
The Buttry Diary
My career
Don't let your bosses' decisions control your career success or happiness
Don't let your bosses' decisions control your career success or happiness April 12, 2012 by Steve Buttry At the risk of repeating myself, don't let valid obstacles in your newsroom become excuses for your failure to develop as a digital journalist. No one benefits (or hurts) more from your career than you do.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
Dear Newsroom Curmudgeon ...
Dear Newsroom Curmudgeon, I sometimes share your anxiety and occasionally share your concerns about some of the changes in journalism. I learned journalism in the old school, same as you. I am steeped in the same values of accuracy, fairness, dogged reporting and good writing that you cherish.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
How Digital First succeeds at making money
How Digital First succeeds at making money December 23, 2011 by Steve Buttry I have blogged this week about various aspects of Digital First journalism. For any of that to succeed, Digital First must succeed as a business. It will. It is. I'm not going to explain that in detail in this post, though.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
Leading a Digital First newsroom
Digital First editors are caught in transition. Many are longtime print editors. However much they have been embracing and resisting the digital transformation the past couple decades (and most of us have been doing some of both), they understand now that the future is digital and they want to help lead that newsroom of the future.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
10 ways to think like a Digital First journalist
10 ways to think like a Digital First journalist December 21, 2011 by Steve Buttry Digital First journalists think creatively and individually, so this is a post that can't be completely true. To whatever extent my observations here are true, Digital First journalists will reflect wide variety in the degree and application of the ideas and views I describe here.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
Digital First journalists: What we value
Journalism values are not timeless and etched in stone. Values have changed through the years and the Digital First journalist recognizes that they are changing today. In some ways, a Digital First journalist shares the values of traditional journalism but may pursue them in different ways.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism
How a Digital First approach guides a journalist's work
Digital First means different priorities and processes for journalists. The name and approach of my company, Digital First Media, is getting a lot of attention in journalism, and other companies have declared they will follow a digital-first approach. But I don't think the approach is yet widely or well understood.
The Buttry Diary
Digital Journalism

About

Steve Buttry

I've been a reporter, editor, writing coach, trainer and various executive positions at seven newspapers, a digital startup, the American Press Institute and Digital First Media. In my 40-year journalism career, I have covered news, trained journalists and attended events in 44 states, nine Canadian provinces, Ireland, Venezuela, Mexico, Germany, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Ecuador and Siberia.