Six takeaways from ONA15

By the ONA Mizzou Executive Board

Photo by Sarah Darby

The Online News Association's annual conference is recognized as one of the premier conferences for all things related to digital media and the future of news. Every year, huge numbers of journalists travel to the conference to learn about new journalism technologies and to discuss ways to advance the industry.

If you're like our executive board, you couldn't make it to the conference in Los Angeles last week for ONA15. But, we're always interested to see what happened, and one of the best things about an online organization is that they're really good about putting things online. As we dug through the conference content, here were a few of our favorite sessions.

Party conventions opportunity for news organizations to show off online, social coverage

By Laura Davison

Social media was around during the 2008 Democratic National Convention,
shown above, as well as for the Republican convention, but it will play a
much larger role in 2012

London Olympic stadiums were buzzing with tweets, Facebook posts and live streams, and it looks like two political venues are up next.

But while medals were awarded every day during the games, the Republican and Democratic National conventions often don't reveal anything new. For many news outlets, the conventions are more chances to show off online coverage.

ABC, CBS and NBC are kicking their Web efforts into high gear. Although they'll show nearly an hour of prime-time coverage, they'll also offer live streams and real-time analysis. The networks say the live streams will have TV-quality production value. 

The GOP convention is Aug. 27-30 in Tampa, Fla., and the Democratic convention is Sept. 4-6 in Charlotte, N.C.