Working for Online News

By Maila Ager

When a friend asked me if I was interested in working for INQ7.net, the online news of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and GMA-7, I was hesitant.  For one thing, I did not know the medium; for another, I did not think I had the skill to write breaking news. I was also not prepared for the idea of not seeing my byline as I used to in the past six years when I was writing for daily newspapers.

But the opportunity came when I had become so disillusioned in my job in a paper, particularly the way my employer was running it. I was covering Malacañang then and the 2004 presidential campaign was about to begin.

So I took the risk. I handed in my resignation to my boss who informed me that he had just raised my salary. Unfortunately, even that was not enough to compete with my starting pay at INQ7.net.

Hard start
My first day at INQ7.net was difficult. Except for my personal mobile phone, I did not have any equipment. There were not enough computers for all reporters in the old press office in Malacañang. I was nervous and I felt pressured because I knew I had to produce something.

It was a little past noon when my editor called and asked for my stories. She said other online sites already had stories for that day. Because I had not yet turned in my articles, my office had to use  other online stories. I felt embarrassed, knowing that those stories should have been mine.

There were other awkward moments. Once my editor called me just to ask why I had used the word “absolved” in my story.

“Why don’t you just use the word ‘cleared’?” she asked.

Every time my editors pointed out my mistakes, I became even more convinced that the job was not  for me. Maybe I was wrong to leave my old job.

At the same time, I wanted to console myself by thinking that I was performing poorly because I did not have the right equipment to do my job well. When I joined INQ7.net, it had just started sending reporters to cover the beats so even my bosses were adjusting to the new setup.

When our office finally gave me a new Personal Digital Assistant and an extra mobile phone in time for the coverage of the provincial campaigns, I was able to submit stories a little faster. By then, I had already adjusted to the writing style and the time pressure in my work.

No deadlines but…
I had come to realize that writing for online news is more difficult than writing for print or broadcast. I had  to work  in real time. That made  time my enemy.

In provincial sorties, I had to write stories while I was in a moving vehicle so that when we arrived   at our next stop, I could immediately get other stories.  Print reporters can file their stories in the afternoon while radio reporters need not translate the stories into English like I  had to.

When I was reporting for print, I had the luxury of waiting after lunch before writing my first article. I had to get all the details and all the sides to a story before I could write it. I also knew that I did not have to rush a big story because my editors would wait for it until 6 or 7 p.m.

At INQ7, I do not have dead-lines. But I am always on call.

At  the height of the “Hello, Garci” controversy, my editor called me up in the middle of the night to ask me to cover Samuel Ong, former  deputy director of the National Bureau  of Investigation, who was holed up in a seminary in Makati City.

At that time, I was in a party with my friends in Quezon City so I had to leave and cover the Ong story until daylight.

During the canvassing of the 2004 elections, our schedules had to be constantly shifted. Some-times, my shift would start at 5 a.m.

Until I was assigned to the House of Representatives after the 2004 election, I was not aware that INQ7 was having any impact on anyone or that it even existed at all. But while I was covering a marathon session on the national budget bill, a friend who was a reporter in a broadsheet requested me not to post all the stories that we had gotten that night. She said it was unfair that other newspaper reporters would be getting the stories from the online site even though they had not stayed to cover the session as she did.

I understood her predicament but I had to tell her that waiting until the next day to post a story would also be unfair for me. I had covered the story until morning just so I would get to write it first. It was only then that I realized that some reporters had been checking out my stories in the site and saving themselves the effort of actually doing their jobs.

Ink station
Still, not all are aware of the existence of online news. Whenever I introduce myself to congressmen or any other government official, many  would think that INQ7.net is an ink refilling shop. I always   have to explain that it is a joint venture of the  Inquirer and GMA-7.

And because INQ7 is a sister company of the Inquirer, some sources would expect to read themselves in the broadsheet. They would be disappointed not to see their names in the Inquirer the following day.

Once, when I interviewed Makati Rep. Teodoro Locsin Jr. over the phone, he asked me if I was really going to write the story.

“I always talk to you but I don’t see (the story) in the paper. I don’t know if I am just talking to myself,” he told me.

Again, I had to explain that my stories do not appear in the paper but in the Internet.

It took me more than two years to establish my identity as a reporter from an online news agency. Now, congressmen would sometimes call to clarify a statement or give their side to a story.

House Minority Floor Leader Francis Escudero, for instance, phoned me to get a copy of a document that I had mentioned in my article. It was a document on media guide-lines for covering impeach-ment proceedings that were issued by the House deputy secretary-general, Noel Alba-no, without the approval of the appropriate House committee. Escudero then took the floor to question the guidelines.

The good thing about online news writing is that errors in the stories can easily be corrected. When Batanes Rep.Henedina  Abad read INQ7’s index change (or headline for the day) regarding the 17 Liberal Party members who had supposedly signed the Charter-change resolution, she immediately called my attention to correct the story. Apparently, my editor had omitted the word “some” from a quoted statement. The news desk immediately posted the corrected version of the story.

My work may be demanding and, at times, tiring but working for INQ7.net brings fulfillment in a way I never imagined. In its challenges lies its charm. In fact, I can no longer picture myself working for print or any other medium in the future. I am here to stay.

Before joining INQ7.net, Maila Ager was a reporter for The Manila Times.

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