The value of social networks, and specifically Twitter, in engaging with audiences is something all news organisations want to understand more about, so it was intriguing to hear Newsquest Digital MD Roger Green’s view on this at yesterday’s AOP Microlocal Forum.
Explaining how some of his group’s journalists, and notably Brighton’s Jo Wadsworth, have used Twitter to great effect, Green pointed to statistics around the ratio of followers to followees of individual journalists as a way of displaying their listening prowess.
Jo, unusually, has a higher number of followees (2,346) than followers (2,135) which, Green asserted, meant that she was always listening to the readers.
In a rather pointed criticism of the UK journalists with the large follower numbers (mainly, but not exclusively, at The Guardian), Green contrasted these as examples of people who ‘liked to talk rather than listen’.
Now I’m all for bosses bigging up their staff’s achievements (and in Jo’s case it’s certainly warranted as she does indeed use Twitter very effectively and is very responsive), however, I’m not sure that the follower/followee ratio does actually demonstrate the point Green was seeking to make.
Surely the best way to tell if someone is listening is to see if they reply (and in Jo’s case she does) therefore looking at the number of RTs and @ replies to people would seem to be a more effective measure – something it’s easy to see on the public timeline but I’ve not seen demonstrated in statistical form.
My personal experience is that, once my followee number passed the Dunbar’s number, it became more tricky to effectively monitor all tweets, although the @ and DMs are still, thankfully, manageable and #tags and lists were surely invented to help us all keep track and participate effectively.
I’d be interested to hear how other people measure their activity in this area? Do you compare follower/ee ratios? What is the best measure for engagement? And most importantly, readers – how do we do?
Constructing the journalist of the future
A journalistic world where personal branding is a lifestyle, managing micro communities is second nature and developing areas of specialist knowledge is essential for survival in what is a freelance work sphere where multiple revenue streams as a sole trader are the norm.
Welcome to the lot of a journalist in 2012!
That’s my personal summary of far more detailed discussions spent considering such things as part of the MELD experience last week.
Held at the futuristic Sandbox at UCLAN, the two-day industry think-tank to consider what skills the journalist of the future might need prompted some interesting dilemmas.
Looking forward such a relatively short amount of time was a tricky experience, not least because the audience who will be old enough to vote in three years time, are one of the first who will be true digital natives.
Today’s teenagers have only ever known mobile phones, games, the internet and on demand services. They are also unlikely to have got the newspaper habit, so how will their experience of the world impact on journalism?
But as we all wrestled with the issues of who will be funding the journalistic endeavour of the future, how organisations will need to change their structures and the skill sets individuals might be faced with, there was one aspect which sparked little controversy – that the next generation journalist is most likely to be a freelance worker.
And for that individual journalist, the future which emerged from our discussions operated in a complex personal ecosphere where some sort of web presence was the essential hub of activity, where earnings could come from sponsorship and affiliate relationships alongside mainstream media commissions for content packages, or access to the special interest networks which they had nurtured and managed.
Contemplating the short-term with some of those who may help shape the future of the industry was a thought-provoking experience – and wasn’t purely an intellectual exercise.
Some of the input from the sessions will help inform journalism educators about the tools the journalists of the future might need.
I’d be very interested to hear what other journalists think the future might hold – join in with the time travel if you will! What do you think lies in store? Is the scenario detailed above a world which you’d embrace or recoil from? Where do you see the journalist of 2012? Thoughts most welcome.
Inside #1pound40
Two very different experiences this week have had me musing on whether there’s a north-south divide in how social media is used.
Looking first at the #1pound40 event in London. It was an intriguing concept – for just £1.40, the opportunity to share knowledge and ideas with some of the leading lights of the social media UK whirl.
There were Tuttlers, journalists and broadcasters; there were geeks, students and marketing types; the venue was impressive (Reuters in the Daily Planet like environs of Canary Wharf) and the whole event had an air of expectation.
Something was going to happen. SOMETHING IMPORTANT.
So, a couple of days later, why do I still have this niggling feeling that, if something did happen, I must have missed it?
Perhaps this feeling was in part provoked by my experience the night before at Leeds Social Media Surgery.
Leeds surgeons
The surgery was an opportunity for charities and not-for-profits to come and find out about social media and see if it could help them in their work. I spent the evening talking about blogging with a woman who wants to provide the opportunity for interaction via a blog for workers in the mental health sector, as well as hearing about an impassioned campaign to help Palestinians where I was able to offer some basic advice about libel. In this setting, the social media tools were just that – tools to be utilised as part of a wider aim.
Back to London and what was described as ‘a curated unconference’, the purpose of our gathering was to explore issues raised by social media – questions such as if Twitter was a force for good, whether journalism was being democratised by the tools of web 2.0 and my old favourite – who can be called, or call themselves, a journalist?
Unlike other ‘unconference’ events I’ve been to, there were no sessions or pitches and instead small groups at tables discussed the issues between themselves before sharing their individual pithy conclusions via Twitter.
(As an aside, oddly for an event which ended up being monopolised by talk about Twitter, the backchannel wasn’t always in evidence – in fact when it was projected behind the panel at the end of the event it proved to be such a novel intervention that it completely distracted both panelists and audience!)
As the sessions concluded I took stock – had I learned anything? No. Had I contributed to anyone else learning anything? No.
It felt like we were all saying the same thing, speaking the social media speak. The digerati in full flow – agreeing with one another.
Some of the topics touched upon digital inclusion and the potential for political engagement through social media, but while we were talking, tweeting and pontificating, who was actually listening? What do the views of a bunch of always-on wired meeja professionals in London have to do with delivering news and information services to people working in tough but essential spheres such as the mental health sector, or living in areas where broadband access is still an aspiration not a reality?
That’s not to say it wasn’t an enjoyable event – I caught up with some people I haven’t seen in a while, put some faces to Twitter avatars and met some completely new people I’m sure I’ll enjoy following. As a meet-up, it was most conducive.
But all in all, for me at least, it was an afternoon inside the echo chamber, the reverberations of which will probably not even reach Islington, let alone Leeds.
There’s some other coverage of these two events that I’ve seen, as follows;
* The Guardian’s Mercedes Bunz gamely attempted a live blog of #1pound40 here and here.
* Leeds Social Media Surgery organiser John Popham summed up the evening here.
* The echo chamber is one of the topics which Christian Payne (AKA @documentally) also discusses in this audioboo which considered the psychology of Twitter.
* The Business Two Zero blog discusses the £1.40 event and also provides plenty of links to other views from the day.
Brighton’s Argus is to tap into the city’s network of PCSOs to provide content for its network of hyperlocal websites – blogging their beat you could say.
Web editor Jo Wadsworth told me that the officers will be working alongside students that have also been recruited to cover stories for the 25 sites.
After training from Jo, the community police officers will be able to upload their appeals and news directly to the sites and she’s also hoping they’ll develop into forums similar to one currently running in Preston Park.
As reported in the Press Gazette this morning, the newspaper has been working with the training organisation Journalist Works, activity which has been going on for over a year with the students pitching in material to the websites for the past six months.
The contributions are unpaid and are in many ways treated as an extension of the sort of work experience commonly on offer across local newspapers, the difference being that the blogs allow those participating a greater sense of ownership of the project.
To that end, the bloggers will receive traffic stats and other analytics plus training seminars on practical skills and going offline with social events is in the pipeline for next year.
The content expected will largely be text and pictures although the students are already creating weekly video vox pops (the latest here) and moving activity into social networks including Twitter and Facebook.
Some notes from this week’s discussion at the cabinet forum debate and dinner. It was an event with unusual format and, by way of explanation, the agreed rules around covering it are that all debates can be blogged, tweeted etc. without individual quotes being attributed to individual people.
In a variation of Chatham House rules, those present can also be identified and it was refreshing to see such a cross-section of voices represented at sessions hosted, by culture minister Sion Simon.
Newspaper reps including myself and The Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger able to sit around the same table as bloggers such as Jeff Jarvis via skype, hyperlocal activists including co-chair William Perrin, industry analysts, civil servants, broadcasters, commentators, people with experience of the local news landscape both in the UK and US.
I make no apology that what I’ve noted here are things of specific interest to me, and are in no way an attempt to provide the definitive low-down of the event.
Others have broadened the experience further and there’s links here. These are my notes while on the train north with the addition of this excellent set of slides from industry analysts Enders.
• What do we call these people? I’ve blogged on this issue before and it keeps being raised at the sort of events I attend. Because someone wants to engage with a news investigation, write a blog or post about a community event doesn’t necessarily mean they want to be a ‘citizen journalist’. Some do of course, but many are simply using the wonderful tools at their disposal as a means to another end – better community, organise an event, change the world or whatever. Do they even need a specific pigeon-hole to fit into? Can they just be people? Engaged citizens? Is the publication part of their output really the most important element in what they do?
• How do large institutions, such as the government or a major broadcaster, ensure these hyperlocal voices are heard? At present there’s no association, guild, group, etc. to represent their widely differing interests. Should there be one, and if there was, how could it be constituted to be truly representative and inclusive? What a challenge that would be, but without it, some of the proposals in this area such as IFNCs risk becoming a non-inclusive consolidation of giants.
• Who should be treated as a journalist? Relates again to the first point but, for those people who do want to be treated as journalists, how do they get access to sources of information? This issue has already seen some plainly daft responses such as councils providing different tables in the same council chamber etc. I always go back to my first Penguin Book of Journalism here which carries wise words for the reporter starting out reminding them that they have all the rights and responsibilities of a citizen. No more, no less. Access is an area where any journalist with legal/public administration training could assist by helping challenge the petty bureaucracies in town halls. But that raises the point again – does training make a ‘proper’ journalist if so what’s the qualification? Or is it experience – if so which institutions count and how long does it have to be to qualify? Or is it an NUJ card?- so are we back to the closed shop? Does it require being employed by a publication registered as a newspaper? Well that’s plainly not sustainable. As journalists we’re not exactly being very transparent with this are we?
• Who will report from the council chambers and courts if local newspapers close or retract so much that staff are unable to fulfil this function? And there lies the BIG question. What will be the long-term impact on democracy? Will councils use that situation as justification for uncritical publications extolling the virtues of their services? People at the forum and generally, in my experience, seem to agree this sort of reporting is a Good Thing. But what’s it going to take to ensure that continues – just how Good a Thing is it? Subsidy? Tax-breaks? Platform agnostic service provision to all as outlined by PA at the Digital Editors’ Network later in the day? This is such a huge issue for the minister to wrestle with……any thoughts, contributions welcome.
It’s the story we are all more than familiar with, but is it the whole story? Newspapers layoffs have all too quickly become part of the fabric of life in regional journalism this year but what happens next is barely recorded.
Now academics at UCLAN and staff at journalism.co.uk are going to address this by carrying out a survey of laid-off journalists. Posting at the journalismleaders blog , Francois Nel explains that the online survey is looking for volunteers and that information received is confidential:
“We want to know how about your experiences of being laid off and how you have adapted in your personal and professional life since leaving the newspaper. We’re also considering the gap in knowledge and experience you have left behind.”
The survey takes about 10 mins to complete and can be accessed here.
There’s been some interesting reaction to the job advertisements put out this week by The Guardian for the project I’m involved in.
Beatblogger isn’t a job title used much here in the UK as yet, and it’s prompted some common questions in the comments section of the initial news story about Guardian local, and elsewhere, which I thought I’d pick up here.
In addition, any potential applicants are invited to put their questions during a forum I’m taking part in about developing journalism roles which will be held next Thursday, October 22 between 1pm and 4pm at http://careers.guardian.co.uk/forums
Back to those points;
* Firstly, pay.
Although it’s normal practice for The Guardian not to state pay grades in its job ads (in common with many other news organisations), these are full-time paid positions.
* Are these bloggers, journalists?
All Media Scotland was one of those which asked if the term “beatblogger” was a new word for journalist. This is a role which has specific attributes and skills used to create a beat blog, a good definition of which is provided here by New York’s Prof Jay Rosen an extract from which states:
“Content-wise, a beat blog presents a regular flow of reporting and commentary in a focused area the beat covers; it provides links and online resources in that area, and it tracks the subject over time.”
For anyone interested in the specifics of what will be entailed, there’s detailed descriptions at the links at the bottom of the ads – this is the one for the Cardiff post, but the descriptions for Leeds and Edinburgh are just the same.
* What about experience?
This job could well appeal to experienced reporters with great contacts from traditional backgrounds but is just as likely to attract people who’ve set up community websites or blogs and have a passion for their locality. Rather than be too prescriptive about background, we’re asking people to demonstrate why they believe they would be successful in the role and how they feel equipped to cover the city.
Any potential applicants with further questions can log on to the forum debate next Thursday, October 22 between 1pm and 4pm at http://careers.guardian.co.uk/forums and it would be great to hear from any beatbloggers out there who want to share their experiences or offer any advice to potential applicants.
Talking about local
This weekend’s first unconference event for those running local community websites raised some fascinating issues – not least in areas of ethics and access.
Bringing together people from across the UK to share skills, knowledge and experience meant Talk About Local 09 quickly revealed some of the issues for these self-publishers, community activists, bloggers and journalists.
And how these people are considered lies at heart of these issues – what do we call someone who’s taken it on themselves to start a website for the local community and how should they be treated?
It was clear from listening to their experiences that there’s no consensus on this. At the one extreme, local councils had denied access and even been accused of making late-night pressuring calls to remove material, while at the other end of the scale, some more enlightened council press officers treated the new news sources in the same way as the established local newspaper.
As I pointed out in The Guardian piece on this issue, the governing body the National Association for Local Authorities is reviewing its stance, but one thing’s for sure, the authorities are not moving quickly enough to properly reflect the reality of the changed local news landscape.
One of the participants in Saturday’s event thinks the issue is one of perception of who brings ‘the truth’, as a posting on the blog Culturing Stuff says;
“Just lately it seems as though every institution we hold dear, has some kind of skeletal defect waiting to be discovered if we decide to open the cupboard door. So with this in mind let’s revert back to the point… How come blogging is blogging and the news is THE NEWS (all official and truthful) and is Bloggin seen as a lesser being, just because the format has no established rules or code of conduct?”
All this appears to lead us back to one of the debates circulating last week about transparency and it is perhaps that, in the end, which will provide the measure of whether something is regarded as credible or truthful by the authorities currently keeping the gate of information sources.
Any journalists – or council press officers – want to comment?
* See more pictures at the Flickr pool for Tal09 and dip into the day’s debates with this Tweetdoc.
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