The theme in the Silicon Valley is bringing pieces of technology together to create something better. The people do it in their business and they expect it in their news media and KQED, the local public broadcasting affiliate, has (almost) risen to the challenge.
KQED's radio and television outlets are a lot like they were when I first started listening and watching as a little kid in the Central Valley. But check out KQED on the web, and a lot of the trends of convergence journalism jump right out.
Radio and television being the main parts of KQED's reporting, both of those elements are emphasized on the station's Web site. Two whole columns are set aside below a (somewhat disappointingly) standard print header story for radio stories with audio links, and a video story is also featured. Rounding out the home page is one feature I look for in any radio station Web site bragging about new age technology: a link to listen to radio station live, preferably that listeners can take on an iPod--news wherever you choose.
The station then has a good strategy of giving a page to each it TV and radio arms, with main stories available in full and clips of other stories they're pitching for the day's viewers, complete with a guide to what's on each station (because KQED covers a wide swath of the Golden State).
The only real downside to KQED's pitch for convergence is in the very media we're working in right now--blogs! Sure, a few individual program hosts maintain running journals of what's on their show and there is an Elections '08 discussion board. But there's no running feed of stories that are happening now, no opinions on the myriad of issues simmering in the nation (Hell, even the state has enough happening for at least a couple of blogs!).
And its this last point that makes me say they almost rose to the convergence challenge. KQED has the features. But without the blogs, or really kind of up-to-the-minute news, KQED looks like a "slow" network in a really "fast" news time. It takes KQED a couple of days to get on a hot regional or national story because they have to get it recorded and scripted and edited. All this time kind of defeats all their technological achievements. People want the news to look good, but today they also want it fast.
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