#augenstein

Vine’s got some major competition.

Instagram can now shoot 15 seconds of video, compared with Vine’s 6. You can choose one of 13 filters, select a cover frame, and share easily.

I’ve been pretty outspoken that while Vine and Instagram are capable of easy, fun, and in some cases very artistic videos, there are better alternatives for #iphonereporting.

Unless you’re just shooting and posting, shooting and posting, shooting and posting, editing counts — and you can’t do much of it on Vine or Instagram.

In Instagram you can delete your most recent snippet, Vine has no editing.

In a real news situation, I’d likely shoot with the built-in camera, edit in Voddio, upload to YouTube, and tweet it.

How iOS 7 will improve #iphonereporting

  When Apple's new iOS 7 debuts in Fall, two features I believe could mean major improvements for #iphonereporting are FaceTime Audio and AirDrop.

I'm not a developer, and don't have a beta version with which to experiment, so these are just first impressions on how the new operating system could benefit journalists, public relations professionals, and newsmakers.

    FaceTime Audio

Forward-thinking Nick Garnett of the BBC has pioneered doing live reports with FaceTime, in its current video configuration.

In my testing, the connection is generally more stable than Skype, in both WiFi and LTE.

During FaceTime video, the microphone used is located in the phone's earpiece (where you listen during a standard phone call), next to the front camera.

Holding that microphone a few inches from your mouth provides good, but slightly tinny audio (and a close-up view of your tonsils to the person on the other end of the video chat.)

With FaceTime Audio I'm hopeful the microphone engaged will be the far-superior microphone located on the bottom of the iPhone, directly to the left of the charging part.

The microphone on the bottom of the phone has much better bass response. I use that built-in bottom mic for the majority of my #iphonereporting.

  AirDrop

To this point, it's required some wired connections to transfer videos and photos taken on iPhone to iPad for editing. AirDrop will allow wireless sharing between devices (as long as you have an AirCloud account).

Typing 140 characters and adding a link or photo is so 2010.

Too many news organizations merely toss web or broadcast content in a tweet.

It's happened to every reporter -- you attempt to play back a recorded interview, and have the horrible realization you failed to capture the audio.

Here's how to avoid that moment of anger, frustration, and shame if you're reporting on your iPhone.

First, in Settings, turn ON Airplane Mode, which will prevent your phone from ringing during your recorded interview.

Once you begin recording audio, you can lock your iPhone in Record On by doing something that seems counterintuitive -- touching the On-Off button on the top of the iPhone.

Your screen will actually go dark, and you'll likely think "oh no, I turned off my phone."

Yet, when you touch the Home button to 'revive' your phone, you'll see your audio app has continued to run in the background while the screen was dark and your audio has been safely recorded.