I agree with your observation – some people need to be introduced to the Web (and Web journalism in particular) to become enthused. A great deal of the old dinosaurs might not become Web reporters overnight, and some will always struggle with the most basic concepts of internet research and writing.

But if we can win one new enthusiastic online journalist out of a group of twenty old-school pros, training has already paid off. Journalism will suffer enormously if we apply Conley’s suggestions as we’d lose many of the most experienced journalists to a potential windfall in reporting quality.

I am a firm believer in formal media training, but we’d be doomed by restricting all teaching to the Young and leave the rest to DIY autodidactic learning.

This might be different in B2B publishing that Paul refers to, but from my experience in ‘standard journalism’ it is much easier to turn a senior print journalist into a Web journalist then to start with a rather young journalist and turn her into an experienced online reporter.

I’m curious to hear what the guys at Poynter have to say about this.