Welcome back to Wired Journalists

We're excited to see you back here!

A few big changes:

1. Wired Journalists has been acquired by Publish2.
2. Registration is now closed to non-journalists.  (For the answer to the obvious question about what makes a journalist, please see our Editorial Standards.)
3. You'll find news about the journalism world and great job listings curated by Publish2 members flowing through the site.

In January 2008, Howard Owens, Zac Echola, and myself, Ryan Sholin, launched a social network with self-motivated, eager-to-learn reporters, editors, executives, students and faculty in mind. 

Wired Journalists was born with the mission of connecting the knowledgeable, expert innovators in online news with journalists of all stripes hoping to learn something new about their evolving craft.

Today we're proud to announce that Publish2 has acquired Wired Journalists.

At Publish2, the mission of connecting journalists based on common goals and interests will continue and -- we hope -- grow exponentially as this social network becomes a space for collaboration on real-world reporting as well as conversations about craft.

Publish2 builds online tools for news organizations looking to bring the best of the Web to their readers -- and to each other.  Those of you who know me personally are likely aware that I joined Publish2 earlier this year as Director of News Innovation.  In one of my early conversations with Publish2 CEO Scott Karp, we started sketching out what Wired Journalists might look like if it had the funding, attention, and staff that we'd always wanted.

Out of those conversations came a rock-solid proposal to give Wired Journalists a new home under the Publish2 banner, where I could personally devote time to it as a part of my role at Publish2.

I'm sure that many of you may have questions about the future of Wired Journalists, what this means for existing members, and what this means to Publish2.  I'll try to preemptively answer a few of those now:

What's going to happen to WiredJournalists.com?

It's going to live on, powered by Ning, with some noticeable changes.  For starters, we're going to immediately implement Publish2's editorial standards for membership and moderate new registrations.  From here on in, new members at Wired Journalists will need to be journalists.  While we certainly thank our friends on public relations, advertising, and other fields for their interest, if you're not producing content that meets our editorial standards, we're going to ask you to move on.  (Students and faculty are especially welcome as always.  If you're planning to sign up a full class of students as the Fall semester starts, please let me know and I'll take care of it personally.)

You'll also notice some Publish2-powered streams of links start flowing through the homepage and other sections of Wired Journalists. The "Feedstream," a raw aggregation of RSS feeds, has been replaced with a recommended reading list of links about Media & Journalism from Publish2.  Over the next few weeks, we'll invite some of the sharpest eyes in the media blogosphere to join a Publish2 Newsgroup to power the News page at Wired Journalists.  Plus, you'll find links to the best media jobs, tutorials, and tools for journalists getting their hands dirty with video, audio, data, code, and more.

Who's going to manage the site?

Zac Echola and Howard Owens are staying on as Editors-At-Large, which means they'll be part of the team flagging content to feature, moderating submissions, and recommending links, among other editorial tasks.

As a part of my role at Publish2, I'll be doing plenty of day-to-day community management with a lot of help from colleagues like Publish2 Senior Editor Josh Korr, CEO Scott Karp, and soon, up-and-coming online journalist Greg Linch, who joins Publish2 in September.

But, as always, we'll be asking for help from you, the 3,000-plus members of the Wired Journalists network, to submit interesting blog posts, news stories, photos, videos, examples of your own work, and stories of your own success.

What's Publish2 going to do for me?

You get access to Publish2's tools for curating links, tweets, videos, tips from readers, and news from any and all sources. Get to know the system by seeing what news organizations have done with Publish2 at http://blog.publish2.com/examples and follow us at http://twitter.com/Publish2 to find out about new features and announcements first. 

You'll receive an e-mail from Publish2 soon about how to access your account.


Thank You...

...for making Wired Journalists a community built on collaboration and communication among journalists of all skill levels, crafts, organizations, and ideas.  You've made this network strong, and we're looking forward to working with you to make it stronger.