Digital Media Terms

Above the line costs

Refers to the list of individuals who guide, influence and hopefully add to the creative direction, process and voice of a given media project and their related expenditures. These roles include the screenwriter, producer, director, casting director and actors.

Affiliate

A local station that subscribes to the services and programs of a network

Anchor

The person who hosts the studio portion of a broadcast. The dominant voice in the presentation of content to the audience. Must be proficient in writing, producing, and editing content

Analytics

Information resulting from systematic analysis of data

AP wire

Associated press news service that supplies international, national and regional information and stories. Almost always rewritten before airing

Application

Types of software designed to provide a function for a user or another app including everything from web browsers, word processors, photo and image editing tools, and chat programs like Skype

ASCAP-BMI (American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers)

American not-for-profit performance-rights organization that protects its members’ musical copyrights by monitoring public performances of their music. It is a Music Performing Rights Organization.

Blanket License to broadcast music

Lets the station play anything it likes throughout the year

B-M-E

Beginning, middle, and end of any story

B-roll

Video that is shot for a TV news or feature story and used to visualize the script the reporter/anchor has written

Back End

“Under the hood” part of a website or web service that makes it run, and is typically not visible to the user interacting with the site or service

Back timing

A convenient way pf counting down the length of a media production in the TV studio. This tells you when each story must run in order for your broadcast to end on time

Beat Checks

Using a telephone to search for and record stories from a list of agencies. A good beat check would be comprised of the sheriff's offices, fire department, local police, state highway patrol, DNR, local hospitals, and other government agencies that routinely handle breaking stories.

Beats

Specific public institutions or areas of concern for which specific reporters in a are responsible for watching. (e.g.: county reporter, health reporter, education reporter, courts reporter)

Below the line costs

Term derived from the top sheet of a budget (Motion Picture, Television, Commercial, Industrial, Student Film, Documentary). The one separating the Actors, Director, Producers, and Writers from the technical crew (DP, editor, gaffer, grip, sound engineer) and associated equipment rentals during the production time.

Big data

Term for collections of data that are so large they can’t be processed through traditional data processing systems. These collections come from sources like mobile devices, emails, search keywords, user database information, applications, and servers. By finding ways to comb through this data, companies can identify consumer patterns and use them to predict and optimize their business.

Black Hat

Refers to individuals or firms that uses spammy or unethical techniques to try to “game” the system. Using techniques that aren’t best practice can lead to diminished search returns, penalties from search engines or even blacklisting.

Bounce rate

The percentage of visitors to a website who leave the website quickly without really looking at it—Google analytics calculates bounce rates based on website sessions where a visitor only sticks round to look at one page before bouncing. Sites aim to keep this number low—they want you spend time on their site— and so they’ll try to keep content as engaging and relevant to you as possible.

Branded content

advertorials, content made to look like normal content but it is advertising something.

Break

Place designated within broadcast programming during which commercials run.

Bugs

Coding mistakes or unwanted pieces of code that keep a website or program from working properly.

Bumpers

Small teases (with or without audio/video) that come at the end of one segment often previewing what is coming up in the rest of the broadcast or live stream.

Call letters

A station's legal ID (for example, WBIZ– EAU CLAIRE) is a legal ID, Z– 104 is not a legal ID).

Call to Action (CTA)

The text, banner, form, or image on a web page (or email) asking a visitor to literally take an action—read more content, join an email list, sign up for a webinar, buy a product, etc. CTAs are a marketing tool that converts web users into leads for businesses.

Character

Some person that makes the story tick– – – the owner, the customer, the passer– bye. Who will tell the story?

Closed captioning

processes of displaying text on a television, video screen, or other visual display to provide additional or interpretive information for differently abled consumers.

Click through rate (CTR)

the percentage of users who click on links in web pages or marketing emails. CTR is significant because it measures how many users are actively engaging with linked content on a site.

consultant

firms, groups, individuals hired by broadcast organizations to give advice on presentation, content, trends, viewer habits and preferences

content creation

the contribution of information to any media and most especially to digital media for an end– user/audience in specific contexts. Content is expressed through some medium, as speech, writing or any of various arts for self–expression, distribution, marketing and/or publication. Typical forms of content creation include maintaining and updating web sites, blogging, photography, videography, online commentary, the maintenance of social media accounts, and editing and distribution of digital media.

Content curation

the process social media sites use to gather and present content (articles, links, videos, images, etc.) that are relevant to a specific topic or a user’s area of interest. Content can be selected manually by a person designated as a curator, or it can be gathered through automated programs that track things like upvoting, likes, hashtags or analysis of a user’s previous online activity.

content marketing

uses online content—e– books, videos, blog posts, podcasts etc.—in order to attract an audience who might become customers. Content marketing doesn’t explicitly advertise a brand, but is designed to indirectly stimulate interest in products and services.

Control room

Where the technical equipment for putting a broadcast on the air is kept and operated.

conversion rate optimization (CRO)

a marketing system for raising the percentage of website visitors who convert to paying customers. CRO methods usually involve encouraging users to take specific actions on the website, such as filling out a web form, signing up for a trial, or joining an email list.

COPE

create once publish everywhere

CSS (cascading style sheets)

the language used to add style to documents created with HTML. Where HTML comes first and creates the foundation for a page, CSS comes along next and is used to create the page’s layout, color, fonts, etc.

CSS3

the latest version of CSS, introducing features like rounded corners, shadows, gradients, transitions or animations, and new layouts like multi– columns and flexible box or grid layouts.

cue

usually a physical signal by engineer or other technical person indicting to anchor to perform a task (start reading, wrap up, go to break).

cue up

Putting a sound bite, package, wrap, voicer, or other recorded material at its beginning.

curating/aggregating

Fining the best representative sample of a group of something and sharing it.

data architecture

How data is collected, stored, accessed, and used in companies and organizations

data modeling

Determining what kind of data is needed and how it will be structured and organized

data visualization

the use of graphs, charts, tables, infographics, etc. in order to define and communicate data being analyzed and the findings that have come from it.

database

describes the way data is collected, stored, accessed, and used in companies and organizations. It can be seen as the roadmap for how data flows across an organization’s IT systems and applications.

elements

individual HTML components of a document or webpage. For example, a paragraph in an HTML document is an element. Elements are made up of an opening tag (<p>), a closing tag (</p>), and information between them:
<p>This is my paragraph! </p>

embedding

the process of putting social media content on a web page. When you see a YouTube video on a blog you’re reading, or a tweet posted on a business’ website you’re checking out, that’s an example of embedding. Embedding is done through HTML code, and most social media sites have an “Embed” option that gives you the exact code you’ll need.

engagement

term used for likes, shares, comments, and other interactions with a business’ social media presence. It’s one metric company use to measure and evaluate their social media performance. Liking posts on Facebook, tweeting on Twitter, and viewing pins on Pinterest are all examples of social media engagement.

engineer

Technical personnel who can both operate, maintain and repair equipment.

export

Removing a digital media project by transferring it to a clip server or compressing it to a file or platform like YouTube.

EZ newsreel

the newsroom computer software. It allows you to create show rundowns, write stories for a variety of broadcasts, print scripts, have teleprompter all from the same location/server.

FCC

regulates interstate and international communications by radio, TV, wire, satellite, and cable in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and US territories. An independent US government agency

feed

A live or recorded report, or a set of recorded reports sent to a station/producers via satellite, phone, or other device for inclusion in a broadcast or live stream.

feedback

An ear– splitting squeal or howl caused when sound from a loudspeaker is picked up by a microphone and reamplified. Feedback can also happen when the output for a given tape deck or other device is fed back into its own input.

font

what determine the look of your text—they are typically designed by people who specialize in type design.

front end

describes all the parts of a website that can be seen and interacted with by users. development involves coding with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

growth hacking

the creative use of technology (websites, marketing emails, apps) and analytics (data mining, A/B testing) in combination with product development to increase a company’s growth.

growth hacking

focuses on lower cost marketing alternatives to traditional television, newspaper, and radio ads and is often used by startup companies looking to grow their business rapidly during their launch phase.

happy talk

the casual banter that goes on between anchors/talent and other “on– air” people. Mostly considered light hearted.

headlines

A kind of "tease" read at the beginning of broadcast.

HTML (hypertext markup language)

the standard language used to create web pages. It’s the most basic building block you’ll need for developing websites.

HTML5

latest version of HTML, focuses on features that can be used on low powered devices

IATSE

a labor union representing over 140,000 technicians, artisans and craftsperson’s in the entertainment industry, including live theatre, motion picture and television production, and trade shows.

IDE (integrated development environment)

software application that includes tools like source code editors (text editors specifically designed for writing code), debuggers (tools for testing code), and build automation tools (tools for compiling code into machine– readable format and running automated tests). ex. visual studio

impressions

the number of times an online ad, article, video, or other piece of content has been “fetched” (or requested) from its source

influencers

individuals with a presence on social media who use their platform to affect group opinions and behavior.

ingest

link, import or otherwise bring content/media from a SD card or other means into a media project on a digital editing computer.

interview

A conversation with a person who can provide information on a story you are developing.

kerning

refers to the space between characters (letters, numbers, punctuation) and the process of adjusting that space to avoid unsightly gaps and improve the legibility of text.

keywords

words or phrases commonly used in search engines to look for online content.

kicker

An offbeat or humorous story that typically is used to mark the end of one segment and the beginning of the sports/weather segment.

lead

first line/paragraph of body of story that summarizes/indicates most important information.

lead story

first story in a broadcast or segment (in broadcasting) or a story that is above the fold in print– this considered the most important story of the day.

lead-in

broadcast term for beginning part of a package or story anchor/talent reads introducing the story and/or person reporting story.

leading (“led-in)

the vertical distance between lines of text on a website—in other words the space between lines, a subtle (but important!) part of design appearance.

live

Doing something that will be seen immediately and either recorded or not recorded but streamed to public.

live shot/report

A TV story during which an anchor/reporter/talent is live at a remote location. Within this report can be included a SOT, VO/SOT or PKG.

marketing automation

describes the use of software or online services (like HubSpot, MailChimp, and Act– on) to automate repetitive marketing tasks like emails, customer relationship management, social media posts, and analytics.

mentions

ways of referring to a person or account on social media platforms (@yourTwitterhandle on Twitter or +YourName on Google+)

meta elements

HTML elements that don’t appear visibly for the user on a webpage, but give the web browsers additional information about the page— keywords, author of the document, last modified, etc.

microblogging

a subset of traditional blogs where instead of longform content, short messages consisting of a few sentences, an image, a video, or a link are posted and shared.

mood board

collections of content (images, materials, pieces of text) used to represent the visual style of a website—or any creative project— (color palette, images, icons, and fonts) in pre– production.

multichannel marketing

uses a variety of communication platforms (website banner ads, Facebook ads, marketing emails, a blog) to interact with potential customers. This approach allows users to choose which channel they want to use to interact with your product and increases options for converting impressions into customers.

native apps

made specifically for certain platforms. They only run on the platforms they were built for, and are stored locally on those devices.

Natural sound

Background voices, music, machinery, waterfalls, and other environmental sounds that are recorded on– scene and used to create a sound bed for a recorded or live report.

news feed

feeds of stories/actualities sent to affiliates by networks for air on the individual stations.

NFC (near field communication)

technology that lets mobile devices communicate using radio waves when they’re very close to each other (about four inches or less) and is used for services like sharing files, pairing accessories, or wireless payments.

Nielsen

service primarily used in determining tv ratings.

on-set appearance

Reporter appears on set and is introduced by an anchor. The reporter can than introduce his/her package/report/digital short his/her story from there.

organic content

describes social media content that ranks highly because individual users have liked, reposted, or viewed it—not because companies have paid to promote the content.

outcue

usually the last thing in a recorded story or digital short (i.e. PKG) indicating the piece is ending. (Example: “FOR MU Multimedia, I’M BILL SMITH.”)

outro

usually the “Goodbye” or end segment of a broadcast or live stream, often during which news/feature/wx/sports (content) anchors engage in “happy talk.”

PSA

An advertisement for a not– for– profit organization such as the American Heart Association, Partnership for a Drug– Free America, etc..).

PKG

A report from a correspondent that contains a sound bite inserted between the introduction and the epilogue (usually inserted after the reporter's second or third sentence). These need an in– studio lead for the anchor.

producer/editor

Plans and supervises broadcast. Can also work with reporters in the field planning and gathering information for stories.

pronouncer

Phonetic spelling of a difficult word or name (i.e. Greg Louganis = Greg loo– GAY– muss).

raster images

computer graphics made of pixels that can be edited pixel– by– pixel with programs like Painter and Photoshop. stored in GIFs, JPEGs, PNGs

ratings

measuring units used to tell broadcasters how many households and/or viewers have their stations/programs on at a particular time. This information is used in determining how much station will charge advertising for commercial time.

reach

a measure of your potential social media audience size—it’s the number of people who have access to your content, though reach doesn’t measure whether or not the content was actually viewed.

reader

A story read by anchor without any audio/video.

render

Final step in creating graphics on a timeline before it is exported from a digital

editing program.

resolution

the number of pixels that can be shown on a device’s display. As with PPI, the higher the resolution on a display the more pixels can be shown, making images and texts sharper.