BY C.L. HARMON
In an effort to better serve our readers,The Mannford Reporter is offering a new and exciting program where readers can get paid for submissions.
We are all out and about in this busy world in which we live and as such we experience newsworthy events all the time. We now live in a world where just about anyone can be a reporter and/or photographer and with smart phones being so prevalant, reporting on news and events can be only a few clicks away.
Since the newspaper is available in both print and online, our need for content is growing rapidly. To meet this need and keep our readers informed as to what is happening in this neck of the woods, we thought why not ask those who read us to help us.
As for how this program will work, we will start with photos. For each photo we use, will pay $5. These will include photos that are basic occurrences, but still considered newsworthy and can consist of speakers at meetings, road construction, school or sporting events, storm damage and weather pics, among others. Each photo can be emailed or texted to the paper, along with a brief explanation describing the content of the photo that can be used in a cutline. The next class of photos are those that depict rare occurrences such as accident scenes and fire scenes including structures, vehicles and grass fires. These will pay $10 for those we use and an extra $5 will be paid to the person submitting the first photo to us. That person will still receive the $5 even if we choose not to use the first photo sent. Remember that all photos must accompany a content explanation that can be used to help make up a cutline.
Next will be submitting stories. This works the same as the photos, but only with a different pay scale. Payment amount for articles will be paid depending on several criteria including, but not limited to, length and quality. Story payments will range from $15-30 if they are used. It is a good rule of thumb to check with the paper before writing an article to verify that it is a newsworthy subject. Article suggestions can be for accident scenes (Car Wrecks), fire runs from local fire departments, crime scenes, feature articles on local people of interest, club and public meetings, community holiday activities, school board meetings, city council meetings and award banquets for schools and businesses, among others. Fire incident reports and accident reports are available through the Open Records Open Meetings Act from local law enforcement and fire departments. City and public meetings minutes are also available through the secretaries and clerks of those meetings. If a records request is needed, we will provide one to you to provide to them.
Our newest feature is adding video to our website. So we will pay for these as well. Simply shoot a video that you feel is newsworthy and send it to us. We will pay $5 per video if we use it. However, if you are able to get video that is “breaking news” and get it to us as it is happening, we will pay $50 if we use it. As this is new territory for us, we have not yet decided on which types of videos we will be using, but expect it to include footage of local bands, school productions, high school sports as well as news footage. Again, we pay for what we use.
Payments will be handled through an app that the submitter downloads. Once it has been downloaded and the material used, payments will be automatically sent to you through that app. In addition, all submissions will be given photo or byline credit.
To submit through email, send to
[email protected]. To submit through text at 918-809-7725.