I’m on a period of leave at the moment, one of the benefits of this is having some time to read around and there’s interesting links below that I’ve stumbled upon. If you’re in the digital media, digital journalism, social media, digital comms space then I hope these are a good reading list. I’ll try and post these as frequently as I get chance, and if you find them useful let me know. And if you spot something I should include, or you’ve written something that you think should be shared then drop it over. I’m on edward_walker86 AT hotmail.co.uk
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WhatsApp says Channels will be available for everyone imminently – AndroidPolice – the big focus this week is on the launch of WhatsApp channels, a new feature that’s now rolling out globally and Zuckerberg gave us the nudge last week. In my view WhatsApp is the latest battleground for news publishers in the quest for scale and engagement. My personal use of WhatsApp tells me it’s become the unifying social app, at least in the UK, from updates about family life, to parenting pick-up chatter, to business/getting stuff done updates, it’s a space where people spend an increasing amount of time. Will they accept news publishers into this space? (the initial indications from the award-winning work my previous employer Reach has been doing is a yes). Looking through my channel suggestions it’s interesting how established and well-followed football clubs already are within the platform and they also feature in Tim’s summary below.
There’s some useful reads on WhatsApp, not just in the publishing space either, the basics here from SinchEngage on how to create a WhatsApp channel (they key is getting the channel attached to a phone number that isn’t yours, unless you want to suddenly have all WhatsApp responsibilities of an organisation attached to your personal phone number!).
Tim Gatt takes a look through how some publishers in the national space are already utilising WhatsApp channels – and as with most social platforms, the key is providing a mix and variety of post types (not just banging out link posts).
While Dan Slee looks at it through a public sector/comms lens, as concerns grow around the effectiveness/usefulness of X as a comms channel especially for public-sector organisations who need to get information out directly to the public, especially during an emergency.
The rise of WhatsApp channels, Insta channels, TikTok and more points to how media consumption is – on the whole – becoming a much more private thing or when shared, is shared with a focused and relevant (or sometimes trusted) group of people. This Insider piece explores how social media is becoming ‘less social’ on the whole compared to back in the 2000s and early 2010s.
City agencies in New York ordered to spend with community media – The Center for Community Journalism – my former coursemate Rhiannon Davies is on an interesting fact-finding mission in the States right now all about community media and the state of play there. She shared this piece as part of her learnings (worth seeing her LinkedIn summaries) about what happened in NYC when the Mayor (they have more power over there!) doubled-down on getting government agencies to focus their spending on advertising with community media. A big impact. The full report is here.
Thinking about how big anchor organisations and institutions within a city or region could focus their spend on media which is based, focused and providing impact within that geography and doing that spend directly (rather than through an agency or via a digital platform) feels like it could have a big impact for community and local media. You only need to think back to the pandemic and the industry-wide direct spend the government undertook with local media outlets for the uptick this had. The key is making it easy to do and delivering strong and tangible results – and both of those things aren’t easy!
Introducing LION’s Stages of Sustainability – LION publishers – another piece from over in the States, but the LION network of independent publishers have mapped and looked in detail at the path to sustainability for independent and community media. As someone who set up an independent media site in 2009 – Blog Preston – then I recognised many of the stages in this and it’s definitely far from being any kind of nirvana when it comes to hyperlocal or community publishing. A really interesting report and study.
The Happy Journalist – Jacqui Merrington – a smart cookie, Jacqui’s going to be writing weekly at the cross-section of AI and climate journalism. Two things I know she’s very passionate and interested in. She’s set up on Substack and I recommend giving her a follow and subscribing.
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Ed Walker 