Fall presents engagement opportunities: Halloween, football, leaves …

What is your newsroom doing to engage your community this month?

Fall offers a wide range of engagement opportunities:

• Halloween is a time of fun for children and adults. You could invite people to submit photos or videos of costumes, then have community vote for the best costume (perhaps with awards in different categories: funny, scary, homemade, age groups, etc.). You could invite submissions for recipes for Halloween parties. You could map community haunted houses, Halloween events and lavishly decorated homes and yards.
• Football provides engagement opportunities: seeking photos and videos from high school (or youth) games and/or from tailgate parties; fantasy leagues; predictions (high school, college and/or pro).
• Maybe your local major league team is in the baseball post-season and you’re engaging around baseball.

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#asktheregister: New Haven Register engages community in liveblog

I’m going to be interested in watching the New Haven Register’s effort to engage the community in an always-running liveblog:

We launched AskTheRegister.com today, an always-on live chat giving readers direct access to @nhregister editors. http://t.co/Oz6EtBTfVT

— Matt DeRienzo (@mattderienzo) October 4, 2013

The blog is at asktheregister.com and the community can ask questions on the liveblog or on Twitter by using the hashtag #asktheregister.

Initial posts include the budget of stories the Register staff is working on today and an admission by Connecticut Editor Matt DeRienzo that the Register is weak today on planning to cover the local impact of the federal government shutdown.

The blog “will enable readers to provide feedback or ask questions about what or how we’re covering particular stories, or why we’re not covering something they deem important,” Matt said in a blog post announcing the blog.

I like the approach and hope it is successful in engaging the communities in and around New Haven in a discussion of local news and issues. Other newsrooms should watch as well and consider a similar liveblog if this is successful.

Feedback, questions about our coverage can be shared at http://t.co/EfZYQGxI74 or by using hashtag #asktheregister http://t.co/Nlwvopdd0l

— New Haven Register (@nhregister) October 4, 2013

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