1. Agricultural Agencies and Electronic Communications AGED 4143 Electronic Communications in Agriculture

2. Ag Agencies and Publications Thousands of ag-related organizations have traditionally leaned on print publications for educational, informational, and promotional purposes Examples: –Extension service fact sheets –Breed organization publications –USDA reports –Popular farm magazines

3. Electronic Publishing Around 1995, organizations began to realize the economic potential of electronic publishing First attempts were html documents Adobe popularized.pdf format (portable document file) –Acrobat Distiller converts documents from several formats to.pdf –Entire publications can be quickly converted –Conversion software is now built in to most word processing and DTP software

4. Worries for the Print Industry? Some debate about the future of the print industry took place, with most believing there would always be a demand for printed pubs Now the two media co-exist for most organizations Most use each to market the other State Extension Services are saving lots of money with “print on demand”.pdf’s

5. Jobs Galore Many print editors became web designers The pressures of both responsibilities are too great The demand for web editors continues to grow –Students are still being plucked from high schools and colleges to work in $50,000 jobs –There may be no more marketable combination than web design skills and journalistic skills