What I've Been Reading: State of publisher apps, ploughing a new furrow and the digital publishing workflow
Plus breaking down how councils, police and other public bodies have produced content about the UK riots
Good afternoon,
Hope everyone’s having a good summer so far, in the UK at least the summer holidays has already been the subject of incredibly sad events in Southport. I point you in the direction of my former colleagues at the Liverpool Echo for superb and sensitive coverage and also Andrew Brown, former editor of the Southport Visiter, who runs Stand Up For Southport and has been reporting extensively on the community’s response and reaction to what unfolded.
My Dad was from Southport, I still have family there and it will always be a place associated with myself and my family. It’s difficult to comprehend something like that taking place anywhere, let alone in ‘sunny Southport’ as it was always referred to.
It’s also triggered this piece from David Higgerson at Reach about the need for ‘bedrock journalism’, and set in the context of the piece I feature later from Dan Slee, it’s essentially about making sure there’s enough journalist resource there to cover communities when events of this magnitude happen. It will have taken a huge effort from all involved, be that locally or nationally reporting, with what’s taking place across the country at the moment.
Now, to the digest which comes back to the riots at the end…
Has anyone figured out how to get stories turned in at a reasonable time? - Danya Henniger - some good pointers from Danya here, which were featured in the Dave Burdick newsletter, about the editorial workflow. It’s all about ensuring those with a digital publishing eye and nuance are exposed to the copy and story ideation early in the process. This means social posts, homepage treatment, push alerts, all the parts that then make up the distribution of a story can be crafted earlier rather than being scrambled post-publication. And it’s where good content editors earn their crust, keeping the focus and intensity on ensuring the stories are flowing through the right pipes and crucially updates or details about stories/pictures/videos are circulated to the teams who need them ahead of time.
Ploughing your own furrow - David Lee - this piece really resonated with me as David reflected on 15 years since he had left The Scotsman and built his own business and career since then. This time last year I was taking stock after deciding to leave Reach and there were lots of paths to potentially take (or do nothing for a bit longer, but those who know me will know that’s not something I’m good at!). David’s piece is great as it reminds you the advantage of having worked in media is you are armed with a great amount of skills and experiences to drawn upon as you tread out into a new or different field. Thanks for sharing your experiences David and I hope in 15 years time I’ll be lucky enough, and no doubt a lot greyer(!), to share my experiences of how we’ve got on with Alma by then too.
State of the Mobile Publishing Market Report - Pugpig/Esther Kezia Thorpe - there’s a lot to unpack in the full Pugpig digest (you need to register to receive a copy of the report) about what’s going on with publisher apps at the moment. Esther’s post about how if you’re in a subscription/membership model then having an app as part of that process is out-scoring if you’re in a more pure scale and audience chase.
RIOT CONTENT: Some eye-catching content before and after disorder - Dan Slee - from police to councils and lots of other public-sector organisations, Dan’s got a great run through of how the disorder taking place has been communicated. There’s been some tough reading and watching of what’s been unfolding. There’s some good lessons from Dan in what’s been communicated, and how.
He also draws out the importance of ensuring those who are brought to justice for what took place is communicated. And Gareth Davies call for a ‘Local Justice Reporting Service’ is timely and one which should be explored, and it links in with David’s piece from above about ‘Bedrock Journalism’.
We shouldn’t get to a place where it is a police or council press officer is the only source of justice having being done (they absolutely can and should share when cases are resolved through the courts) but they shouldn’t be the only source of that information.
And that’s this week’s digest. I’ve got a busy couple of weeks coming up with work projects and family stuff too for the summer holidays, so taking a pause until Wednesday 4 September when I’ll pick it up again then.
Keep going and many thanks for reading.
Ed