Thursday, June 14

3:00-4:15
LOCAL ISSUES: THE PORTLAND EXPERIMENT
How does Portland do it differently? A panel of local experts will discuss the region's unique approach to public-policy issues that have national resonance, including land-use planning, mass transit, assisted suicide, sustainable development and medical marijuana.
Moderator: Hank Stern, Willamette Week
Panelists: Erik Sten, Portland City Commissioner; Jon Chandler, Oregon Home Builders Association; George Eighmey, Compassion & Choices of Oregon; Madeline Martinez, executive director, Oregon chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML)

4:45-6:00
RESTAURANT REVIEWS: CHEW ON THIS!
Across the country, newspapers are dropping their restaurant reviews -- and that includes some alt-weeklies. Meanwhile, reader reviews and restaurant blogs are encroaching on the domain of the professional food critic. So are restaurant reviews still worth the headache? Is the professional food critic even necessary anymore? Are there alternative ways to write about food and cover the restaurant industry? And if you are going to do reviews, what are the ethical considerations? A panel of AAN members argue the stomach-churning pros and cons. Bring your own Pepto-Bismol.
Moderator: Kelly Clarke, Willamette Week
Panelists: Jonathan Gold, LA Weekly; Margaret Downing, Houston Press; Jennifer Strom, Independent Weekly; Erik Wemple, Washington City Paper

Friday, June 15

9:00-9:50
EDITORIAL CRITIQUES: HOW GOOD ARE YOU?
Are your columnists as clever as you think? Do your headlines need more snap? Are your investigative scoops destined to win a Pulitzer? If you can't answer these questions yourself, maybe it's time for a fresh perspective. Sit down with an editor from a similarly-sized paper in another city and hear how your paper reads. In turn, you will read three issues from someone else's paper and offer the same feedback. If you're the sensitive and defensive type, you might want to sleep in instead.

10:00-11:15
NEW OPPORTUNITIES IN DIVERSITY
The rising importance of the web, local news and advertising, and user-generated content presents some interesting opportunities for AAN papers to improve their coverage of minority communities and diversify their staffs. Donna Ladd, editor of the Jackson Free Press, is an industry leader in this area, and just back from Columbia University's "Let's Do It Better" Workshop on Journalism, Race, and Ethnicity. She'll be joined by Charles Whitaker from the Medill School of Journalism, director of the Academy of Alternative Journalism, and Mike Lenehan, executive editor of the Chicago Reader, who's the chair of AAN's diversity committee. They'll discuss the new opportunities and then throw the floor open to a more general discussion of diversity problems and ideas. They'll also proselytize for AAN's diversity internship grants. If you don't know much about this program or haven't figured out how to take advantage of it, please come.
Panel: Mike Lenehan, Chicago Reader (moderator); Donna Ladd, Jackson Free Press; Charles Whitaker, Medill School of Journalism

LIBEL AND PRIVACY: CONVERGING LEGAL ISSUES IN PRINT AND ON THE WEB
What if someone had posted Alex Baldwin's taped telelphone message to his daughter on your website?  What should you have done?  And what about that Senate aide whose sexual adventures with the "Washingtonienne" were detailed on her "private blog"?  Is that fair game for you, in print, or on the web? Your readership used to be local, but with the web it's now international. What impact does that have on your liability? Are web publishers really operating under a different set of rules than print publishers and whose row is harder to hoe?  Alice Lucan has been handling these kinds of questions for AAN members and other publishers for many years.  Come and hear the answer to these and other knotty legal questions.
Speaker: Alice Neff Lucan

11:45-1:00
PODCASTS, VIDEO STREAMS AND MOBILE MEDIA
New models of content and distribution offer new ways to reach readers, and provide opportunities to take advantage of user-generated media. Consider how newspapers and media companies are utilizing podcasting, video streaming and mobile media, and learn about the technological issues involved.
Speaker: Al Stavitsky, Univ. of Oregon

3:00-4:15
COVERING ELECTIONS I
A panel of bloggers and political reporters will share ideas about how national and local elections should be covered.
Moderator: Mark Zusman, Willamette Week
Panelists: Jane Hamsher, firedoglake.com; Arianna Huffington, Huffington Post; Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone

4:45-6:00
COVERING ELECTIONS II
A panel of AAN editors and reporters will discuss past successes (and failures) covering both local and national politics, and offer tips for covering the upcoming 2008 election.
Moderator: C.J. Janovy, The Pitch
Panelists: Jimmy Boegle, Tucson Weekly; Michael King, Austin Chronicle; Julie Lyons, Dallas Observer

Saturday, June 16

10:00-11:15
ONLINE EVENT LISTINGS: BEST PRACTICES AND SOLUTIONS
A number of well-capitalized competitors -- including Google, Microsoft and Yahoo -- have turned their attention to the online distribution of event information and to the formation of social-networking tools that aggregate events, store online calendars and build online interest groups around events. AAN commissioned Todd Stauffer to review the state of the art in online event listings to help AAN members defend their turf from these behemoths, as well as a number of start-up competitors. In this session, Stauffer will suggest best practices for presenting online events; recommend tools to enhance the distribution of event information online while facilitating a web-to-print workflow; and propose technology standards for integrating event content into popular social-networking tools.
Speaker: Todd Stauffer, Jackson Free Press

11:45-1:00
POYNTER EYETRACK07
How do people read a newspaper? How is that different from how they use a website, and how should those differences inform your work? Sara Quinn will answer these questions and more in this presentation of the results from Poynter's major eye tracking study of print and online news reading, in which 600 readers were tested to make comparisons between tabloid, broadsheet and online formats. Find out how various story and visual forms engage readers and help them better comprehend what they've read.
Speaker: Sara Quinn, Poynter Institute 

STRETCHING NEGLIGIBLE RESOURCES: AN OPEN-DISCUSSION FOR SMALL-PAPER EDITORS
You're an editor of a small paper with one or two reporters. How can you get your paper to consistently produce the kind of work that makes you proud? Nobody has all the answers, but everyone has at least a few tricks up their sleeve. So come prepared to share your tips and advice in this open discussion.
Moderator: David Rolland, San Diego CityBeat

3:00-6:00
TALENT MANAGEMENT: DIRECTING AND ENERGIZING EDITORIAL STAFF
Finding the people-management side of your job a tough challenge? Alt-weekly editors face some distinct difficulties in building and maintaining a productive team. Laura Dell will cover the best strategies to meet those challenges. We'll cover principles and practices -- customized to fit your milieu -- that increase motivation, improve productivity, and ease the burden of managing others.
Speaker: Laura Dell