- Market Research>Survey, Interview, Observation.
- Market Research>Understand potential buyers & their pain points, Identify opportunities, Monitor Competition, Factor Involved in decision making, Risk Involved.
- Market Research>Study Market Needs,& Want to mark it with your offerings and marketing. Market research is first step in marketing and this starts way before product is realized.
- Branding,Website,SEO,Advertising,Social Media,Content Marketing,Viral Service.
- Market Research> Product, Positioning,Pricing,Promotion, Plaform.
- Blogs etc owned media, Paid marketing is paid media,Earned media aka backlinking,Shared media .
- Popularity of Internet,Increased online shopping,varieties of options,At low cost,See reviews and comments,Convenient Ways.
- Need to be at right place, Right time, Ready to capture customer.
- Display Banner ADS,Email Marketing,Video Marketing,Social Media Marketing,Search Engine .
- Build Brand Awareness, Capture a Target Audience,Gain New Customers,Increase Revenue,Improve Local S.E.O
- Reach,Target Audience,Engagement,Price &ROI.
- 1990 STATIC DISPLAY ADS
- 1993 FIRST CLICKABLE AD
- 1998 SEARCH ADVERTISING KEYWORD
- 2000 GOOGLE AD-WORDS LAUNCHED
- Personal brands are becoming more important than ever before because they help in creating content that is tailored to your audience's needs. It also helps in building trust, which is essential for a successful online business.
- Digital marketing is important in today's world because it provides businesses with the opportunity to reach people who might not be reached otherwise. It helps them build their brand, increase sales and profits, and gain insights on what their customers want.
- Digital marketing tools can be used for many different purposes in the business world. They include social media marketing, SEO, email marketing, and landing pages. All these tools help businesses to reach their target audience and grow their business by increasing conversions.
- It is important for every company to have a digital marketing plan because it helps them in getting more customers and increasing their market share. One thing that companies should remember is that they need to make sure that they are using the right channels for their target audience. Companies should also make sure that they are using the right channels because what works for one company might not work for another.
Digital marketing can be used to create awareness, build brand loyalty and increase sales. The following are some of the ways digital marketing can help your company:
- Generate leads - Digital marketing allows companies to find more people interested in their products or services. It also helps them identify which people are interested in what they offer and how they can reach them. This helps companies generate more leads than ever before.
- Build brand loyalty - Brand loyalty is a crucial element of business success because it helps companies maintain high profits and customer satisfaction levels over time.
What is Digital Marketing?
First, let’s understand what marketing is—the action or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market research and advertising. Marketing requires a medium. The medium can be a TV ad, radio, magazine, bill boards, etc.
How does marketing work? First, understand the requirements & needs of the customer. According to that, modify product or service. The process involves understanding the buyer & their needs, provide existing users with your alternative, and even creating demand where it doesn’t exist. Also, an example is shown in the video of the same.
Digital marketing has changed the way of marketing. You will see, history of digital marketing in the video. Digital marketing is a technique in which products and services are promoted online. A very interesting comparison between traditional & digital marketing is explained in a video. You will see many benefits of digital marketing.
Digital marketing’s objectives are:
- Building a brand awareness
- To capture the targeted audience
- Gaining of new customers
- Increase revenue of a business
- Improve local SEO
Digital marketing media can categorize in four ways: Earned, Paid, Owned, and Shared. Earned media includes media relations, blogger relations, and influencer relations. In paid media, advertising, banner ads, Google AdWords covered. Website, blog, and content fall under-owned media. Shared media contains social media, word of mouth & referrals. Using any media or by combining two or more, one can promote their business.
Introduction Of Digital Marketing
In the introduction of digital marketing, we will see basic terms related to digital marketing like SEO, Google AdWords, CTA, Website, Social media, and much more. First, we will see SEO. SEO means search engine optimization. Search engine optimization is the process of improving the quality and quantity of website traffic to a website or a web page from search engines.
Google AdWords is a pay-per-click online advertising platform that allows advertisers to display their ads on Google’s search engine results page. There is a tool named ‘campaign manager’ to track advertisement. In this, you can manage depth reports related to the campaign.
Call to action refers to using words or phrases that can be incorporated into sales scripts, advertising messages, or web pages, forcing an audience to act in a specific way. You will learn how to make a website from this video.
In social media marketing, you will learn how to create an account on LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and other apps. And how to target an audience, run ad campaigns, etc., on social media. Video marketing lecture will teach you how to set up a channel, the importance of video marketing, and how to measure CPV.
Apart from above all, you will learn Email marketing, content marketing, google analytics, and mobile marketing in this course. By the end of the digital marketing video series, you will start your own business, or you will be capable of advising an organization in the digital marketing of their business.
- According to Smart Insights, social media marketing was the most effective technique in 2018, followed by content marketing and data management, with SEO falling somewhere in the centre.
- Digital marketing is vital because it connects a company with its customers while they are online, and it works in any industry. It links businesses with their potential customers on Google through SEO and PPC, on social media through social media marketing, and via email through email marketing.
- Marketing is defined as a philosophy whose primary goal is to provide client satisfaction, according to the official definition. Marketing is the activity, collection of institutions, and procedures for developing, conveying, delivering, and exchanging value-added offerings for customers, clients, partners, and society as a whole.
3 Types of Digital Marketing You Should Consider for Your Business
Content Marketing:- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
- Social Media Marketing (SMM)
- Digital marketing, often known as online marketing, is the promotion of brands through the internet and other kinds of digital communication in order to engage with potential clients. As a marketing channel, this comprises not only email, social media, and web-based advertising, but also text and multimedia messages.
- Add Meta Description To Your Blog- Many of you know how to add meta description but still many person does not know how to do that. So I will Tell you how to do that Go to Your Blogger Dashboard - Then move to Search Preference option -Then you will see a meta description option there you should write your blog meta description. Tips for writing good Meta Description- You should write your meta description as follow- “A Blog About Search Engine Optimization, Best Blogging Tips & Tricks, and can give you Free Premium Theme and Plugins.” And If you want to copy for competitors Meta Description then go to his site Then Right Click and choose Inspect Options and move on <head> tag and search for <meta type= “ description”> and copy all things from there to </meta>. That's done now follow previous step and paste it to your meta description.
- Add Robots.txt To Your Site- To add Roboto.txt you can search Blogger SiteMap Generator and open the first site then enter your Website URL then Click on Generate Button. Your Sitemap Roboto.txt will be generated now copy that then go to blogger dashboard click search preferences and click on roboto.txt now paste that code into it.You are ready to Rock
- Add sitemap for your Blog- To add sitemap for your blog go to Google Search Console and create a account there. Then add a new property there choose url option and enter your website link. Then click on sitemap click add button Now again search Blogger SiteMap Generator on Google and again choose first result and then again enter your website url. NOTE Your robot.txt Is also your sitemap code copy that code and enter it on Google Search Console. and your sitemap is generated.
- Now Your SEO setting is ready now you have to do the things is to do SEO research.You need to do Keyword Research, Generate Backlink, Bring Traffic to your blog .
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<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<title>Buttons</title>
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
</head>
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<button id='btn1' type="button" onclick="function1()">Turn Blue</button>
<button id='btn2' type="button" onclick="function2()">Turn Red</button>
<button id='btn3' type="button" onclick="function3()">Turn Green</button>
<script>
function function1() {
document.body.style.backgroundColor = 'blue';
}
function function2() {
document.body.style.backgroundColor = 'red';
}
function function3() {
document.body.style.backgroundColor = 'green';
}
</script>
</body>
</html>
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oImuaMHCco
Monitoring Social Media
Along with monitoring national and local media websites, radio and TV channels, it’s critical to monitor social media.
Follow Facebook pages and enter Facebook groups related to your areas of focus, such as local events, science, environment or celebrity news. Groups are helpful when seeking sources for niche content or reporting specific topics.
New content, photos and videos are often widely shared among people in Facebook groups before they appear in the mainstream or public media.
There are Facebook groups based around even the most niche of subjects. If for instance a politician or local celebrity took up rock balancing… (building towers of rocks without glue or support of any kind) you can be sure to find a Facebook group full of rock balancing enthusiasts who can give you the benefit of their opinion and expertise!
Officials, military, and emergency services also often share content on Facebook before it is distributed more widely.
CrowdTangle
CrowdTangle Search makes it easier to search for content across social media. Simply put in a keyword, hashtag, or URL into the search bar, and get the latest posts from across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Reddit. Modify filters to sort by country, language, post type, timeframe, and more. CrowdTangle is a public insights tool from Facebook that makes it easy to follow, analyze, and report on what’s happening with public content on social media.
NOTE: CrowdTangle is currently only available to a limited set of eligible organizations including news publishers registered with Facebook’s News Page Index.Build lists based on your areas of focus. These might include:
- News outlets and individual journalists
- Emergency services
- Celebrities and entertainment
- Science, environment, and technology
- Activists and NGOs
- Weather
Click + Create List and select either Pages or Groups
Key things to consider:
Is this person in danger? If the person’s safety is at risk it is best to leave them alone. For instance if they are hiding from a gunman, they do not want their phone notifications drawing attention to them. The more time they spend talking to you, the less time they can spend talking to the emergency services or their family.
Has this person witnessed something traumatic? Try to be sensitive if the person has experienced a shocking event. It is unethical to pressure or harass someone, particularly in this situation.
Could they cause themselves harm? Reaching out to people can encourage them to seek more photographs or videos. You should discourage this if someone is in an environment where they or someone else could get hurt.
What time is it where they are? No one enjoys being woken up in the middle of the night. Check the time before calling.
Tips on how to contact people
Click Send Message
Interviews
Whether in person, on a video call or on the phone, try to build a rapport with your interviewee before beginning. Often people give better quotes once they relax and know they can trust you.
Try not to interrupt them, you can check details at the end of the conversation.
If they have used abbreviations or incomplete sentences that may confuse people, ask them to repeat the point again more clearly.
For eyewitnesses, begin by asking them to describe what happened. Ask for their reaction and opinion on what happened.
Finally, it’s also worth asking: “Is there anything else you would like to add?” This sometimes draws out interesting and unforeseen points.
- When reaching out to someone to possibly use an image or video which you saw on social media, there are good and bad ways to do this.
- You’ll want to be polite and concise in what you are asking.
- When reaching out you are also legally obliged to explain how you propose to use someone’s video or photo in your reporting.
Here are examples of a bad and good outreach emails.
Bad outreach email:
Hi.
I saw this video/photo? [link]. Can we use it? I work for [organization].
Thanks.
You’ll notice that the bad email asks for permission before establishing who actually owns the video/photo. It is also not very polite, so the person will be less inclined to help.
Good outreach email:
Dear (enter name),
I work for (enter organization) and am reporting on the (enter news event).
(If it was a dangerous or traumatic incident) I hope you are OK.
I
saw you shared a (video/photograph) of the incident here (link). Do you
know who owns it? We would like to speak to them and ask for their
permission to use it for our reporting.
Feel free to call me to discuss further.
Thank you very much
When reaching out you are also legally obliged to explain how you propose to use someone’s video or photo in your reporting.
- For both breaking news, and when conducting long-term investigations, be sure to screen-capture posts and web pages, with their timestamps, as they can be taken down and later denied by the source.
- Make sure you always keep the original video or photo file, exactly as it came from the source, even the name they used for it. If you want to re-name the file so that it makes more sense to you and/or your organization, make a copy of the file and change the name.
- Make sure there is a backup copy of files, either on a company server, or by sending a copy to someone else in your organization, like an editor.
When reaching out to a copyright holder, you are legally obliged to explain how you will use someone’s video or photo. Are you embedding the link in your article or uploading it to your website? Are you licensing and selling it?
Your company should have legal wording or a document explaining this to the user. The owner of the video/photo needs to agree to this wording. You also need to be sure they have read it and understood it.
This can be done in a message or they can print it out and sign it. Consult your lawyer on the best course of action.
This message/signed form is a legal document that proves you have permission. Save it and keep it safe.
You must also ask how someone would like to be credited (i.e. their name or username)
- Identify the owner
- Explain how you will use their content
- Confirm what credit they require
- Secure their agreement
- Save the permission record
We have discussed how to find newsworthy content, but that is only part of the job. Now we must verify it. Publication without verification puts your reputation at risk, can mislead your audience, perpetuate misinformation, and put your media organization’s brand in danger.
Before we publish a photo or video found through digital newsgathering, it is vital to:
- Verify the source
- Verify the content
It is important to check that the photo/video on which you are focusing is the first version posted online. Anything posted afterwards is likely a copy.
-
Social History
Examine the user’s posts across multiple social media platforms and ask yourself:
- Does the user share other people’s content without crediting the source?
- What is their location? Does this match the content?
- What language(s) do they use? Does this match the content?
- Do they have an obvious agenda or motivation for sharing the content?
- When was the account created? Was it created recently with the intention to mislead?
By examining their social history, you are beginning to gauge whether this person can be trusted.
Don’t just ask if you can use the content, ask the user questions to help verify it. Such as:
- Who shot the photo/video?
- What were you doing when this happened?
- Why were you there?
- Can you describe what happened?
- What happened afterwards?
- What was your reaction to what happened?
- Do you have any other details that would help with our reporting?
Does what they say match up with news reports and what you know to be true?
Speaking to someone on the phone can be a good way to “employ your instincts” and better decide if you can trust this person.
When images and videos are shared to social media, they lose important
metadata which can be used to help verify content. Ask the source to
send you the raw file.
When images and videos are shared to social media, they lose important metadata which can be used to help verify content. Ask the source to send you the raw file.
Photographs
Right click on the photo and click Properties. This provides useful information such as date taken and what camera or phone was used.
If the file size is big, it is less likely to have been compressed or downloaded.
If the device type matches what the source said they used – and the time captured matches the time the event happened – this can help verify the photograph. But EXIF data can be manipulated.
This EXIF data viewer (see link below) can show even more data.
The online tool, Fotoforensics, can run checks for signs of photo editing. It even has a handy tutorial.
There are many tools available to help with verification. We’ll go over specifics on how to use them and what their limitations are. Tools include:
- Reverse image search
- Videos
- Invid Toolkit
- Visual cues
- Google Street View
- Google Earth Pro
- Suncalc
- Weather
- Expertise
Reverse Image Search
In the Chrome browser, right click on an image and click Search Google for Image. This searches where else the image has appeared online before.
You can also upload your file to Google Images to search by image.
Other image search engines include Yandex and TinEye
Sometimes an image may have been flipped, or mirrored, along a horizontal plane. Reverse image searches will not spot images that have been mirrored, but ImgOps will flip your image.
Videos
Ask the source to upload the raw file to a cloud-based storage website such as WeTransfer, Hightail or Google Drive. Then download the file and examine the data. Right click on the video and click Properties.
If the file has a frame width less than 1920 pixels and frame height less than 1080 pixels, it could be a copy.
Most smart phones will record in 1920 x 1080 or more. However in some parts of the world people may be using devices of lower quality.
Invid Toolkit
The InVID tool enables you to create keyframes and thumbnails of videos, then reverse image search them. This enables you to see where else the video has appeared, and shows the upload date and time.
Visual Clues
Look for landmarks in the photo or video you are trying to verify (buildings, signposts, road layouts etc) and compare them with other photographs and videos you know to have been taken in that location (such as those from recognised news agencies).
Use online resources to compare landmarks, and to examine satellite imagery and photographs, comparing visible landmarks with those in your photo or video.
Satellite imagery websites include:
- Google maps
- Bing maps
- Yandex maps
- Wikimapia
Google Street View
Use Google Street View within Google Maps to compare with your photo/video.
Google Earth Pro
Download Google Earth Pro and select Ground Level View to compare its 3D landscape with the landscape in your photo/video. This can be helpful, for example when mountains are visible in the background.
SunCalc
Once you have established the video’s exact location, note the angle of any shadows. By using Suncalc you can see where shadows should be at a specific date and time.
Weather
Use weather websites to discover what the weather was like in that location on that day. Does it match the weather in the photo/video? The clothes people are wearing can also be an indicator.
Expertise
Use your colleagues’ local expertise to help verify:
- What language/accent can you hear? What language/accent is most likely to be used in that area?
- Does anything appear to be out-of-place or strange?
When images and videos are shared to social media, they lose important verifying metadata. It’s best to ask the source to send you the raw file.
Look for landmarks in the photo or video such as buildings, signposts, road layouts, etc. and compare them with already-verified photographs and videos taken at that location
You can then see if it matches the weather in the photo/videos or if the weather makes sense compared to the clothes people are wearing.
Build up a case of evidence by taking screenshots, keeping records, looking for corroborating accounts, and demonstrating the verification process to the audience. In the following case study, we explore the example of street clashes in Portland, Oregon, between protesters and police, and how Reuters verified the videos in question were legitimate.
A freelance videographer, Sergio Olmos, captured video of protesters
clashing with police in Portland, Oregon, in June 2020 during race
protests.
After studying his social history, we saw he had repeatedly posted similar videos from the same location.
He also did not have a history of uploading other people’s content without credit, and his Twitter biography made clear he was a freelance journalist covering events in Portland.
The videos he was posting also matched other photos and videos shared from Portland that night.
Through direct messages he confirmed he was there covering the protests and he sent us the original video files.
We can use Google Street View to verify the location seen in the video. The elk statue, building details, traffic lights, trees and memorial are all the same.
If we did not have the benefit of Google Street View we could use satellite data. We can identify in satellite imagery the Elk Fountain and v-shaped road markings (red), the streets lights (yellow), and the Lownsdale Square Memorial (white).
If we did not have these online resources, we could compare landmarks to those seen in an image we know to have been taken in that location.
A Twitter bio can make clear that they are what they say they are (in this case, a freelance journalist covering Portland).
Images seen in Google Street View can verify the location seen in a video (though, sometimes Street View can be years old so check out the year).
Like Google Street View, it’s another way to verify the positions of landmarks and traffic intersections.
- A good workflow means a fast, efficient and thorough digital newsgathering operation. There are many paid-for workflow tools that will allow you to import media and add notes and tags for colleagues to see. Free tools include Google Docs and Microsoft Teams.
- Communication tools can help when working with multiple people on a
story. The following sets out how to design a collaborative verification
workflow in the newsroom.
It is important your team knows:
- What digital elements are being chased
- Who is chasing them
- How well they have been verified
This will avoid:
- Multiple people chasing the same material
- Mistakes in the verification process
- Content being overlooked
You and your colleagues should be able to monitor where digital content is in this workflow journey:
DISCOVERY > NEWS VALUE ASSESSMENT > VERIFICATION > PERMISSION > EDITORIAL APPROVAL > INGESTION/PROCESSING > PUBLISHING
Example of a chat-based workflow working well:
- JOURNALIST 1 – Twitter photo link– “Seems to show a fire in Lower Manhattan. No reports of casualties yet. Are we interested?”
- JOURNALIST 2 – “Yes please chase”
- EDITOR – “Definitely”
- JOURNALIST 1 – “Buildings match Google Street View and seeing same scenes of black smoke in other posts. I Reverse Image Searched the photo and am not finding any other results so looks new. Will reach out to this user.”
- EDITOR – “This story is a priority, please put all resources on this now.”
- JOURNALIST 2 – “I’ll start looking at Twitter and YouTube now, thanks.”
- JOURNALIST 3 – I’ll focus on Instagram and Facebook
- JOURNALIST 1 – “Just spoke to them on the phone, they’re safe. They described what happened and I got some quotes for the website. They will email me the original photograph now.”
- JOURNALIST 1 – “EXIF data from photo proves it was taken today + shows its location too.”
- JOURNALIST 1 – “They want their Twitter username used as the credit. Just awaiting their approval of our permission wording.”
- JOURNALIST 1 – “Permission acquired. Will forward on original photo with required credit, how we can use it and the proof of permission.”
- EDITOR – “Alerting colleagues now for processing.”
- EDITOR – “Photo published. Can we focus on video now please? Thanks.”
Paid-for workflow tools can simplify this process even more by users tagging content with customizable tags. Often there is space for notes and discussion.
Here a piece of content moves through a tag-based workflow:
TAGS:
- JOURNALIST 1 CHASING
- CONTENT VERIFIED
- USER VERIFIED
- CREDIT ESTABLISHED
- PERMISSION ACQUIRED
- APPROVED BY EDITOR
- PROCESSING
- PUBLISHED
- When images and videos are shared to social media, they lose important metadata which can be used to help verify content. Ask the source to send you the raw file, by uploading the files to transfer services such as WeTransfer, Hightail or Google Drive.
- It’s worth noting however that metadata can be altered.
- When reaching out to a copyright holder, you are legally obliged to explain how you propose to use their video or photo.
Are you sharing their video on social media or uploading it to your website? How are you planning to use it in your reporting?
Have a lawyer assemble a template of legal wording explaining in what ways copyright holders are letting you use their content. The owner of the video/photo needs to agree to this wording. You also need to be sure they have read it and understood it.
Their permission can be done in a message or they can print it out and sign it. Consult your editor, lawyer or company policy to decide your preferred form of securing permission. People often request money when confronted with official language so be prepared to negotiate a price and pay them.
This message/signed form is now a legal document that proves you have permission.
Save it and keep it safe.
You must also ask them how they would like to be credited (i.e. their name or username).
- Identify the owner
- Explain how you will use their content
- Confirm what credit they require
- Secure their agreement
- Save the permission record
FAIR USE/FAIR DEALING
Some countries, such as the United States and the United Kingdom (see links in Resources, below), have legal provisions called “fair use” or “fair dealing”. These allow the limited use of people’s copyright without permission when conducting news reporting / reporting on current events, but only if specific legal criteria are satisfied. Relying on fair use / fair dealing is a risk and is not to be used lightly. It is best to consult a lawyer before relying on such provisions.
To be safe, it's best to get permission from the copyright holder! For general advice on copyright, see the link below in Resources.
These communication tools help when working on a story with multiple people. It helps to know some tips on designing a collaborative verification workflow in the newsroom.
When using someone’s digital content, like a photo or video, credit them how they want.They might use their name, or a website, or might wish to remain anonymous for safety reasons.
Fair use, particularly in the US and UK, allows only the limited use of people’s copyright without permission, if very specific legal criteria are satisfied. It is best to consult your lawyer before relying on these.
- There are many ways for people to manipulate media, especially images and video.
- Manipulated media types includes deepfakes, lost context, staged media, and CGI
- Lost context refers to an audio or video clip where the actual file hasn’t been manipulated, but where the context is wrong, either using a clip from a different event, or where the clip is selectively edited to achieve an effect other than what is intended or said.
TYPES OF FAKED IMAGES AND VIDEO
It is common to come across manipulated content when newsgathering. This material can be grouped into the following categories:
Lost Context
The media is genuine but is from a different event. Or the media is from the right event, but only a selective portion is shown. This misrepresents what happened.
Edited Media
This includes clipping, cropping, speed changes, audio alteration and changes in colour or quality. If the material is edited with no attempt to be a faithful representation of events, it can be considered manipulated.
Staged Media
Pranks, stunts and “planted” participants are often used to make amusing or dramatic videos/pictures intended to go viral. A situation can also be planned, enacted, filmed and then shared to influence public opinion.
Computer-Generated Imagery
Some people use CGI to show off their skills. Others aim to deliberately deceive. Sometimes videos created using computer imagery or from entertainment sources may be presented as real.
Synthetic Media
Also known as “deepfake” content, synthetic media uses computer-generated imagery and deep-learning algorithms (artificial intelligence) to create content that looks real.
Creators of synthetic media feed source images into machine-learning software. The programme recognises recurring characteristics in the data, such as the shape of someone’s face. It creates rules for these characteristics and then uses them to generate new content based on what it has learned.
Building Trust
It is important to build an online presence, presenting yourself as someone who can be trusted. Through your social media output, show potential sources that they can come to you with information or new content.
- There are devices you can buy to record the audio of your phone interviews. But for a bigger impact with your audience, it’s important to have a video recording too.
There are many video call software products available including:
- Skype
- Zoom
- Google Hangouts
- Microsoft Teams video calls
- Apple Facetime
- Tauria
These have recording functions, but for the best audio quality ask the interviewee to record their own audio on a laptop, computer or on their phone. Windows users can use the Voice Recorder application and Mac users GarageBand. There are also various audio recording mobile apps available. You should record your audio yourself as well.
Recommend interviewees use the best microphone possible, which could include the microphone on their headphone set.
Using video-editing software you can sync up Zencastr-recorded audio from your microphone and your interviewee’s. (see below for a “how-to” link explaining Zencastr.)
EMBED VIDEO
When interviewing someone on a video call, make sure the background behind them is simple and not distracting. Also make sure there is enough light on their face. Natural light is best.
During Videography Make sure the background behind the subject is simple and not distracting.Always make sure there is enough light on the subjects’ face. Natural light is best
- When you’re in the field you need to think multimedia. Become familiar with the devices you have so you can take photographs and video alongside text reporting. Also practise the most efficient way to send your content in high quality to the newsroom.
- Publishing through messaging apps allows you to reach new audiences and is a fast-growing method of getting your stories out to the public.
Make sure you know how to shoot video and take still photos, and also collect details for your writers or editors.
Phones and action cameras from brands such as GoPro, DJI and Sony can provide original visuals in situations where a large broadcast camera is not suitable.
Similarly drones can record visuals from a perspective that helps better tell the story, particularly after natural disasters such as mudslides, wildfires or earthquakes. But be sure to check local drone laws and receive drone flight training.
PUBLISHING THROUGH MESSAGING APPS
Publishing through messaging apps allows you to reach a new audience. These may be people who rely on messaging apps heavily and don’t have the time or inclination to consume your news in traditional ways, such as through your newspaper, on your website or TV channel.
According to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism’s Digital News Report, WhatsApp saw the biggest growth in news consumption in 2020 with increases of around ten percentage points in some countries, while more than half of those surveyed (51%) used some kind of open or closed online group to connect, share information, or take part in a local support network.
WhatsApp
With the broadcast list feature, you can send a message to several of your contacts at once. Broadcast lists are a one-to-many communication. Only contacts who have added you to their phone's address book will receive your broadcast message. If you want your recipients to participate in a group conversation, you should create a group chat instead.
Each broadcast list can hold a maximum of 256 people but you can create an unlimited number of lists.
All the contacts in lists must have your number saved in their address book.
Unlike WhatsApp groups, only the host can post content in Broadcast Lists.
Telegram
Telegram allows you to create a channel and publish your content there. By sharing the channel’s link, people can easily click Join to subscribe.
WeChat
WeChat allows Official Accounts to post articles and people can also follow you. In mainland China, with personal chat, business communications and payments all done through WeChat, it’s a great opportunity to present your news in the place where most people are spending their time. This means they do not need to exit the application and go looking for their news.
According to the Digital News Report, in most countries, local newspapers and their websites remain the top source of news about a particular town or region, reaching four in ten (44%) weekly.
But Facebook and other social media groups are now used on average by around a third (31%) for local news and information.
EMBRACING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR PUBLISHING
The Digital News Report found, across all countries surveyed, just over a quarter of people (28%) prefer to start their news journeys with a website or app.
Those aged 18–24 (so-called Generation Z) have an even weaker connection with websites and apps and are more than twice as likely to prefer to access news via social media.
Young people have consumed more news in 2020 through services like Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok than in the previous year.
In fact across all age groups, the use of Instagram for news has doubled since 2018 and looks likely to overtake Twitter over the next year.
Also across more than a dozen countries tracked since 2014, Facebook and YouTube remain by far the most important networks, with around two-thirds of people using them each week for any purpose.
So be prepared to embrace social media and make it essential to your news publishing as you work to expand your audience.
Radio, cable news and print newspapers are considered so-called “legacy” media, and are favored by older generations. Young people are more likely to consume news from newer, digital forms like Instagram and YouTube.
Legacy media, like cable news channels CNN and Fox News, are favored by older generations. Both younger and older generations are likely to consume at least some of their news content from Meta and YouTube.
Messaging apps are a quick and easy way to ask a source for verification.
Journalists can use social media either as a supplemental tool to promote their stories, or in lieu of posting on traditional media outlets. If your newsroom has a dynamic social media team, you can learn best practices from them. Ask them how they operate; or, time-permitting, sit with the social team for a day or week, or while they work on your story, getting it ready for publication.
There are several major platforms that journalists can utilize:
- Facebook, the largest social media platform in the world.
- Stories, Instagram, YouTube, and many other platforms which can now carry posts that disappear after a pre-allotted time period.
- Twitter, where journalists can promote their own stories or comment on current events.
- Reddit, based around communities called Subreddits.
- LinkedIn, whose user base of professionals can make it an ideal platform for sharing business and economic news.
- TikTok, one of the youngest mainstream social media platforms.
600 Million: Number of daily active TikTok users in 2020.1.6 Billion Facebook Users
Facebook, the largest social media platform in the world.
Facebook, whose average of 2.6 billion daily users as of January 2021, made it the world’s largest social media platform, offers several useful tools for journalists, including Pages, Groups and live video.
Tips for a great Facebook post:
- Keep it short: Facebook allows posts up to 63,206 characters long, but you should still aim to keep your updates to a few sentences or short paragraphs. This will help keep your audience’s attention as they scroll through the feed.
- Use a conversational tone: Write in a conversational tone, especially when posting to your personal Page or a Group. If you are sharing your own work, consider writing in the first person and adding context that your readers might not find elsewhere.
- Choose visuals wisely: Attaching images, videos or graphics to your Meta post can help your content stand out.
- Add to your post: Take advantage of Facebook features that allow you to tag friends, attach GIFs, or “check in” to a specific location. Adding these can help your post reach more people.
Example
Pages
Pages are often the best option for sharing your reporting with the platform’s users. You can use your public Facebook Page to share links, photos, videos and other content forms, while keeping your personal profile private. Videos shared on a public Page may appear on Facebook’s “Watch” feed.
Groups
Facebook Groups are online communities gathered around a certain topic, location or interest. You can use Groups to find people with experiences relevant to your story or beat and to generate story ideas.
Before joining a Facebook Group, message the moderators to ask whether you are welcome. The moderators of any Facebook Group can be found under “Admins” on the front page. If they decline, you can still ask them to post your contact info to the Group, for example if you are looking for sources or tips.
Find Facebook Groups by entering a keyword in the search bar and selecting “Groups”.
Once admitted to a Group, be sure to read the Group Rules before making your first post.
An ethical consideration. If you plan to use a Facebook Group for reporting, you must introduce yourself and disclose that you are a journalist. If a Group is private, assume that messages are off-the-record and seek consent before publishing anything.
Making your own Facebook Group. You may want to set up a Group for a story or series of reports. Creating and moderating your own Group requires time and effort, but there are benefits. For example, you can set the agenda, and build a community around your work.
You will want to create some ground rules for discussions within your Facebook Group. Look at other examples from journalist-led Groups for inspiration. Here are some examples of Facebook Groups by journalists:
- VoxCare: Sarah Kliff (now at the New York Times), Dylan Scott and Julia Belluz, Vox reporters who cover health policy-related topics, moderate this Facebook Group about their field. The reporters regularly use the Group to find sources and stories.
- COCO+: Coconuts, an Asian online media organization focused on lifestyle and general news, offered an exclusive Facebook group for its paying members.
-
Womany: Womany, a female-focused media startup in
Taiwan, offers two private Facebook groups to facilitate discussion
among thousands of its followers, many of whom follow the Page for frank
conversations about gender issues.
Facebook Live
This feature allows you to interact with your audience in real time and can be used for:
- Taking questions directly from your readers
- Reporting from a breaking news event
- Hosting an interview or panel discussion
- Other creative real-time content forms
Some tips for going live:
Announce an event ahead of time. This helps build anticipation and will send your followers a reminder to tune in. Collect questions beforehand if you are doing a Q&A, to help get things rolling.
Test your set-up and wi-fi connection. Whether you go live using a face-to-camera selfie or a professional camera, be sure to test the connection and quality beforehand. You’ll want to catch any technical issues.
Make it participatory. Take questions and respond to audience members as they react.
Set a pinned comment. You can pin a comment to your Live discussion to set the agenda and encourage viewers to stay on topic.
Stories (Instagram and others)
Nearly every social platform now has a Stories feature allowing you to post videos and images. These typically disappear after 24 hours, although YouTube Stories last a week. You can use Stories to add a personal touch to your reporting, share quick thoughts or broadcast images to your readers.
Some tips for using Stories:
Be authentic. Record yourself in “selfie mode,” use captions and speak in a conversational tone.
Use native interactive features. Using “stickers,” such as polls and Q&As, can add an interactive element to your posts.
Keep it short. Between seven and 10 slides are considered an ideal length for an Instagram Story. Anything longer tends to have a lower completion rate.
Use video. Upload both photos and videos to Stories, but keep in mind that video is more dynamic.
Historic moments. If the news is a moment in history or something you want to keep, use the Highlights function (on Instagram) to save and feature your Stories on your profile. You can add and delete highlights any time.
Twitter
Many journalists have a public Twitter profile where they promote their work and build a community of readers. Because many Twitter users follow individual journalists as well as established organizations, Twitter is great for journalists who want to:
- Share links to their work
- Join conversations and provide analysis around news events
- Establish themselves as experts on their beat
- Find sources with specific expertise
Tips for a great Tweet:
- Get to the point: When you only have 280 characters, you’ll need to use them wisely. What is one central takeaway or fascinating detail you can share about your story?
- Share ‘reporting scraps.’ Include photos, quotes and details that were cut from your story in a Tweet or Thread.
- Make it interactive: Consider posing a question to your audience, especially one that can help with your reporting. See the example below of how a Washington Post reporter used Twitter to help him report Pulitzer Prize-winning investigations.
- Have fun. Many of the best-performing Tweets are playful or humorous. Viral memes are central to Twitter’s culture, and many brands and journalists have taken advantage of these formats to grow their engagement.
- Visuals: Attaching images, videos or graphics to your Tweet will help your content stand out. You can add multiple images to a post, but consider how they will be cropped on both desktop and mobile.
- Adding to your post: Take advantage of Twitter features that allow you to attach GIFs, run polls or add emojis.
Example:
David Fahrenthold of The Washington Post famously used Twitter to crowdsource his investigations into President Trump’s alleged charitable donations. He asked his followers to hold him accountable and send him tips. The stories that followed earned him a Pulitzer Prize.
In this Tweet from 2016, he shares a photo of his reporter’s notebook to share his progress with readers.
Threads
Twitter limits posts to 280 characters, and videos to 2 minutes 20 seconds, but you can thread your Tweets together by replying to yourself.
Examples of effective threads:
- Give readers an inside look at how your story came together
- Share photos or undisputed facts from your reporting that didn’t make it into the story
- Tell a story with photos, text and documents
Reddit
Reddit is made up of communities called “subreddits”, organized around a wide range of topics, from world news to looking after succulent plants. These communities are anonymous. Subreddits can also be places to gather story ideas, while the popular AMA (Ask Me Anything) format is a way to engage with your audience around a story or topic.
Promoting your work is looked down on in many subreddits, but engaging in these groups can help you build relationships with a community over time.
You can use Reddit to join conversations about articles you’ve written or topics on which you’re an expert. Monitor links from your site’s domain (see link, in Resources, below) to see which of your articles are driving discussion on the platform. Feel free to jump in to answer questions or offer context.
Use tools like Crowdtangle to monitor conversations about topics you cover and find potential sources.
Tips for a great Reddit post:
- Write a strong title: To see your full post, Reddit users will need to click your title, so make sure it is engaging, relevant and succinct.
-
Check that your post is original: Do a quick scan of
the subreddit before you post to make sure you are not sharing a link
that has already been posted or asking a question that has already been
answered. If you can, spend some time lurking or commenting in the
subreddit for a few days or weeks before writing your first post.
LinkedIn
With a user base of professionals, LinkedIn can be ideal for sharing business and economic news. Its posts tend to be longer than those on other platforms and have a more expert tone. Political stories traditionally don’t have an audience on LinkedIn, although this is beginning to change.
LinkedIn’s advanced search is a useful tool for finding and contacting sources in specific industries. Journalists are eligible for free LinkedIn premium access, which grants unlimited personal messages.
Tips for a great LinkedIn post:
- Go long: Because LinkedIn is not primarily a visual platform, longer text posts are more common. This does not mean all of your posts need to be multiple paragraphs long, but when appropriate, they can be.
- Be professional: LinkedIn is not the best place to experiment with humor or memes. Keep your tone slightly more formal and share stories that appeal to a professional audience.
- Start a conversation. Pose a question in your LinkedIn post to solicit audience feedback.
- Choose visuals wisely: Attaching images, videos or graphics to your LinkedIn post will help your content stand out on a text-heavy feed. An aspect ratio of 1200 x 1200 will work well. Again, keep the professional audience in mind while choosing images. Don’t share violent, sexually explicit, or otherwise graphic images on your page.
- Add to your post: Take advantage of LinkedIn features that allow you to create a poll, find an expert or upload a document. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box: Using the ‘find an expert’ tool can help you find sources, and the ‘document upload’ tool is a creative way to share photo slideshows.
Lauren Young of Reuters does an excellent job adding context to the link she’s shared, tagging relevant members of her network, and posing an intriguing question for her followers.
Tip: To grow an audience on LinkedIn, consider changing your CONNECT button to a FOLLOW button. You can do this under privacy settings.
For ethical reasons, you should introduce yourself and disclose that you are a journalist.
TikTok is one of the youngest mainstream social media platforms.
Reddit is made up of communities called “subreddits.” The subreddits are organized around a wide range of topics. The communities are anonymous.
Videos are among the most engaging forms of content on social media, and you don’t need fancy equipment or a large production crew to create clips that resonate with readers. Here are some tips to ensure your videos are optimized for all social platforms.
BY THE NUMBERS
Videos lasting longer than 3 minutes are well suited to YouTube and Facebook. On Twitter, shorter videos make more sense. For very short video clips, consider using the disappearing vertical Stories feature on Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook or Twitter, or looping them on TikTok or Instagram’s Reels.
Tip: Get straight to the point. The first 10 seconds are the most important for any social video. This is where you will either capture a viewer’s attention or lose it. Make this part of your video as engaging as possible.
Tip: Choose a thumbnail for your video that shows a visually appealing or exciting frame from your video. Most platforms also allow you to upload a custom thumbnail, which can improve your clickthrough rate. Think of the text on your custom thumbnail as a second headline: share what makes your video interesting without giving too much away. And keep this text short. Remember, thumbnails will appear very small, so you don’t want to overwhelm the viewer with a complex image or graphic.
Video production
Use these video production tips to elevate even smartphone video to professional-level quality.
Light your subject well. If you are filming people, face them toward a light source. For filming outdoors, dawn and dusk have the best natural lighting conditions. For indoors, use a three-point lighting system.
Use a tripod: Invest in a tripod built for phones. This will stabilize your footage.
Edit your video: Can be as simple as cutting off the beginning and end of a video, or combining shots with angles, along with captions, titles, and graphics. There are many free or low-cost video editing tools.
Don’t alter your images or use deceptive editing: When posting as a journalist, it is unethical to apply filters or other effects that distort your image. Be careful not to edit your video to remove important context or create a false sense of reality.
Video specs
Facebook feed/watch
- Recommended aspect ratios: Landscape or portrait
- File formats: MP4 or MOV recommended
Instagram feed
- Maximum width: 500 px
- Recommended aspect ratio: Landscape or square
- File formats: MP4 or MOV
Instagram Stories:
- Resolution: 1080 x 1920 px
- Recommended aspect ratio: Portrait (9x16)
- File formats: MP4 or MOV
IGTV:
- Minimum resolution: 720 px
- Recommended aspect ratio: 16:9 or 9:16
- vFile formats: MP4
YouTube
- Maximum resolution: 3840 x 2160 px
- Recommended aspect ratio: 16:9
- File formats: MOV, MPEG4, MP4, AVI, .WMV, MPEGPS, FLV, 3GPP, WebM
Twitter:
- Recommended resolution: 1200 x 1200 pixels (600 x 600 px minimum)
- Recommended aspect ratio: Square, horizontal or portrait
- File formats: MOV or MP4
Filling out metadata such as tags, alt text and descriptions, or uploading captions, will make your video easier to find.
Don’t alter your images or use deceptive editing. Don’t remove important context or create a false sense of reality.
Run through this four-point checklist to avoid amplifying false or misleading information.
Read before you share. Make sure to read the linked article or watch the full video before sharing it with other readers.
Consider the source. Do you trust the person who posted this? Are they an established journalist, elected official or researcher? If you aren’t familiar with them, do a little research. How long has their page been active? Do they have a presence on other social media platforms? Is this a satirical page or site?
Cross-check. Can you confirm the content of the post using a different, reliable source such as a trusted news outlet, university, or government agency?
Consider the amplification effect. Sometimes, as a journalist, you may want to share a post that you know is false, coupled with a fact check. But will sharing it will ultimately further its spread? If so, you may want to take a screenshot instead. If the screenshot could also cause harm, do not include it at all.
Cross-check and verify before re-posting something.
Read the whole article and watch the full video before sharing it with other readers.
If you determine a post is false, misleading, or harmful, keep it quiet.You may want to report it to the platform.
Every platform has policies that outline what are acceptable posts and what aren’t. In most cases, people who sign up an account need to abide by these policies as part of the terms of service for using the platform. Below are outlined what each platform has set out as its standards, with links to individual policies where you can find more details.
Facebook
Facebook's Community Standards outline what is and is not allowed on the platform. Facebook's Community Standards cover a wide range of content types and are updated frequently, but below are some important policies for journalists to know.
Harassment and bullying. Bullying and harassment come in many forms from making threats to releasing personally identifiable information, to sending threatening messages, and making unwanted malicious contact and all of these kinds of behavior are prohibited on Facebook. Facebook has different policies for private individuals and public figures. For the latter it will remove reported attacks that are deemed “severe” and there are examples of what is prohibited under this policy in the “Do Not Post” section.
Privacy violations. The platform will remove posts that disclose personally identifiable information or other private data. Non-consensual nudity falls within this category.
Misinformation.Facebook does not automatically remove false news, but says its algorithm is built to reduce the spread of such information. The platform will also remove content that could lead to real world violence or cause imminent harm, manipulated videos/deep fakes, militarized social movements and violence-inducing conspiracy networks (QAnon) and voter suppression. Facebook also removes COVID-19 misinformation that could lead to imminent harm, like fake cures, as well as false claims in relation to the COVID-19 vaccine.
Intellectual property. It will remove any reported content that violates someone else’s intellectual property rights, including copyright and trademark.
You can use the “Report” button to report Pages, Groups, profiles, posts and comments that violate Facebook’s Community Standards. You will be prompted to fill out a short form. You can also block, unfollow or hide people and posts. Doing this ensures they will not appear on your feed.
Tip.Facebook Groups often have additional rules for determining appropriate content. If you see something in a Group that violates its policies, you can report it to the moderator.
Instagram
Instagram, owned by Meta, spells out similar policies with their Community Guidelines. A brief summary:
Harassment and bullying. Instagram will remove content that contains “credible threats or hate speech, content that targets private individuals to degrade or shame them, personal information meant to blackmail or harass someone, and repeated unwanted messages.” It’s never OK to encourage violence or attack anyone based on their race, ethnicity, national origin, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, religious affiliation, disabilities, or diseases. When hate speech is being shared to challenge it or to raise awareness, it may be allowed, but Instagram asks that the intent is expressed clearly.
Privacy violations: Instagram does not allow content that exposes private information. You can report it using this form.
Misinformation. Instagram will remove content that “contributes to the risk of imminent violence or physical harm”.
Intellectual property. Instagram does not allow material that violates copyright and encourages users to send takedown requests directly to the account in violation. If that doesn’t work, file a trademark report or copyright report.
You can report violations of Instagram’s Community Guidelines at the Instagram Help Center or by reporting an individual piece of content (i.e. Post, Story, Reel, Direct Message) or account.
Twitter
Twitter’s rules are extensive; key points for journalists include:
Harassment and bullying. Twitter’s policy on abusive behavior includes bans on unwanted sexual advances, aggressive insults that target an individual, wishing harm on others and encouraging a targeted harassment campaign. Their hateful content policy spells out further restrictions for content that targets people based on their race, gender, sexual orientation, or other aspects of their identity.
Privacy violations. It does not allow publication of other people's private information without their permission, nor does it permit non-consensual nudity.
Misinformation. The platform applies explanatory labels to some manipulated media, as well as Tweets which contain misinformation.
Intellectual property. It does not allow content that violates someone else’s intellectual property rights, including copyright and trademark.
You can complain about an offending Tweet by using the “report” button. This will prompt you to answer a set of questions. Enforcement of these rules varies on a post-by-post basis.
YouTube
You can read YouTube’s community guidelines (see link, below). Key points for journalists include:
Harassment and bullying. YouTube does not allow threats to individuals and hate speech. Some exceptions include harassing content during discussions of public figures, scripted performances, or public awareness campaigns about bullying and harassment.
Misinformation. It specifically bans medical misinformation related to COVID-19. Content that contradicts local health authority or World Health Organization (WHO) medical information about COVID-19 is subject to removal. A channel with three or more removals on this basis will be terminated.
Intellectual property. If your copyright-protected work was posted on YouTube without authorization, you can submit a copyright infringement notification.
You can report content that violates guidelines using YouTube’s flagger feature.
Twitter applies explanatory labels to Tweets which contain misinformation.Particularly with election disinformation, there’s a whole policy specific to bad election Tweets.
YouTube has an across-the-board, “everything is public domain” policy for all posted videos.If your copyright-protected work was posted on YouTube without authorization, you can submit a copyright infringement notification with the platform
On Reddit, moderators can set additional guidelines for individual subreddits.Be sure to always check the subreddit’s specific guideline before posting or reporting.
73%: Percentage of mobile-only internet users by 2025, estimated by market research firm World Advertising Research.
Use visuals. Make sure your posts stand out on fast-moving mobile feeds by adding GIFs, photos, videos, and graphics to your posts.
Keep headlines short. Think about how your post will display on a mobile device. A three-line headline, for example, will obscure the lede and first paragraph, and might not incentivize users to click in or scroll down the article page. On some platforms, your headline might even be cut off.
Try out mobile-only features. Take advantage of app-exclusive features, such as audio posts and Fleets on Twitter; live video and Reels on Instagram, and Stories on LinkedIn, YouTube and Instagram.
Post Stories. Mobile users are more likely to click through the Stories feature on social media, so don’t neglect this space. You can use it to post short videos, photos, animations or short bits of ephemeral text.
Tip. Consider using square videos and images, especially on platforms like Instagram and Twitter, to create a more seamless experience for mobile users.
By 2025, an estimated 73% of people will access the internet on mobile-only. Always consider how something will appear on mobile devices.
Make your posts stand out on fast-moving mobile feeds by adding GIFs, photos, videos and graphics.
Consider using square videos and images, to create a more seamless experience for users across all platforms and devices.
Publishing Effectively on Social Media
Story
Here are some tips to help you schedule:
Consider your audience. Who do you want to reach on social media? What time zones are they in? What are their schedules like? Do they commute? Work at a computer? These questions can help you find the best times to post.
Manage your own time. How much you post and on which platforms depends on how much time you can commit. Consider what you want to accomplish and experiment with different publishing schedules.
Schedule your posts. Scheduling social posts in advance is the best way to ensure a steady and consistent stream of content. Employ an all-purpose scheduling tool, like Hootsuite or Socialflow, or use the built-in scheduling options on Twitter’s Tweetdeck or Facebook Pages and Groups.
Ask for feedback. Ask your audience directly about a publishing schedule that suits them, by using polls or open-ended questions. For example, you can ask “How many posts would you like to see from me each week?” or “What’s the best time for you to tune into a live video?”
Use analytics tools. There are many tools that analyze your audience’s online activity and engagement with your posts. Scheduling tools and the analytics pages on most social media platforms both offer this feature.
With a little planning, you can set up a schedule for higher story engagement and save valuable time.
You should always consider things like who you want to reach on social media. What time zones are they in? What are their schedules like?
Ask for feedback by using polls or open-ended questions like, “What’s the best time for you to tune into a live video?”
Attaching an image to your social media post can help your content stand out and boost engagement across platforms.
Image resolution. Pixelated images look unprofessional, but very high-resolution images can take too long to upload. Aim for a resolution between 700 pixels and 1300 pixels wide, depending on the platform.Small images will look pixelated when blown up and look unprofessional, but very high-resolution images might take too long to upload.
Graphic images. Although violent or graphic images can help tell a story, social media is usually not the place for them. When publishing, do not make a graphic image your lead image to ensure it does not populate automatically with your link. When sharing a story or video containing graphic imagery, you may want to add a warning. Check platform standards for more detail on each social network's rules for graphic imagery. Some platforms, like Facebook, automatically take down graphic image.
Share-worthy images. Choose images that your followers will want to share with their networks. When possible, avoid stock images, company logos and other generic images in favor of more visually arresting photographs. Include your own photography when you can.
Use graphics. Infographics, quote cards and other graphic elements can help your posts stand out. If you don’t have graphic design skills or access to professional graphics, free software such as Canva provides design templates and a user-friendly interface.
Choosing relevant images. If you include a link with your social media post on LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter, the preview will usually include the photo in the article. Make sure the image matches the copy and headline.
For example, in an article about a Republican tax bill in the United States, editors chose an image of Representative Paul Ryan. Although Ryan was mentioned in the article, he was not the subject of the headline: “Republican Senator Rand Paul will vote for tax bill.” On social media, some readers were confused by this juxtaposition.
Choose images that your followers will want to share. When possible, use visually arresting photographs and/or your own photographyOn Meta, Twitter and LinkedIn, adding an image to your post overrides the link card, so choose a photo that matches the copy.
Each social media platform provides analytics to help you analyze how your posts are resonating with your audience.
Facebook
Facebook Insights
Facebook Insights tracks how your Facebook posts are performing. These metrics are especially important to understand:
- Post reach: Want to see if your posts are going viral? Check the “post reach” graph under “Reach.” A peak on this graph can mean that your post was shared widely outside of your existing audience.
- Post engagement: Here you can see the number of people who liked, commented on or shared each of your posts, along with the number of clicks.
Instagram
Instagram Insights
In the Instagram app, businesses have access to some basic insights into how their pages are performing. These include key metrics such as:
- Post interactions: This number includes all likes, comments, saves and shares for your feed posts.
- IGTV views: Instagram, which is owned by Meta, uses the same definition for a video view: any time someone watches your IGTV for at least three seconds.
-
Instagram Story forward taps: One of the most useful
metrics to track whether your Stories are resonating is 'forward taps.'
This measures how many people are clicking forward to see the rest of
your Story rather than swiping to skip to the next one on their feeds.
You can see this number for each slide of your Story.
Creator Studio
Facebook's Creator Studio provides detailed metrics about videos, Stories, Instant Articles and audience. If your Instagram is connected to your Facebook business profile, you’ll also have access to Instagram insights here. Here are a few metrics look out for:
- Video views:Facebook defines a video view as any time someone watches your video for at least three seconds. You can find this metric under “Videos > Performance” for your Facebook videos.
- Net followers: This is the number of followers you lost over a period subtracted from the number you gained. This metric is especially useful for tracking your Page’s growth over time.
- Audience demographics: Creator Studio provides some aggregated demographic information about your viewers and followers, such as age, location, gender and interests. Paying attention to this data can help you tailor your content to your audience. For example, if most of your followers live outside of your country, stories about national politics might be less likely to resonate.
- Mentions: The number of Tweets that included your username. This will also include any replies to your posts. This number can help you measure the conversation around your account.
- Engagements: On Twitter, engagements include the number of replies, retweets, favorites, follows and likes on your Tweets.
- Video views: On Twitter, a user must watch your video for at least two seconds to count as a view.
Channel analytics
YouTube Studio provides a wealth of metrics for your video and channel. Some key data points:
- Watch time: YouTube boosts channels with high engagement, and one of the clearest signals that your content is engaging is whether people are watching for long periods. The watch time metric in Channel Analytics shows the number of cumulative hours your audience watched your videos.
- Impressions click-through rate: This metric shows how often a user watched your video after seeing it on their homepage, suggested videos or other parts of the site. If your click-through is low, that is a signal that you need to write more engaging headlines or choose better thumbnails.
- Subscribers: If your goal is to build a loyal audience on YouTube, you’ll need to track your subscribers. This metric tells you how many people opted in to receive updates when your channel posts new videos.
LinkedIn Analytics
LinkedIn analytics provides data to help you to track your LinkedIn page’s followers and content performance. Here are a few key metrics to watch:
- Engagement rate: This is the number of likes, clicks, comments, shares and follows for a post, divided by the total number of people who saw that post.
- Video views: On LinkedIn, a user must watch your video for at least three seconds while at least 50% of the video is on the screen to count as a view.
- Follower demographics: LinkedIn provides geographic data, as well as professional demographic data, including industry, seniority, job function and company size.
The correct answer is D : Meta and Instagram
Meta's Creator Studio provides detailed metrics about videos, Stories, Instant Articles and audience (Meta owns Instagram). It can track such metrics as video views, net followers and audience demographics.
YouTube prefers engaged followers, not just raw number of followers. If a Channel X’s video has thousands of followers, but only 10 views, as opposed to 100 followers with 70 views, that channel followers who are more engaged.
- Journalists have always faced the prospect of hostile reactions from the people or organizations they write about. In the past, that might have resulted in angry letters to their editors or even court battles.
- The Internet has made it easier to directly contact, and threaten, journalists, with the pressure exacerbated by an increasingly polarized political climate in many parts of the world.
- Online harassment can range from critical comments and bullying to explicit threats of a sexual or violent nature, and can come via emails, social media, text messages or other channels.
- People who don’t like a story may organize online attacks against journalists to intimidate them.
- Journalists in countries where press freedom is under attack are even more at risk.
- Nearly three-quarters of women surveyed said they had experienced online abuse, harassment, threats and attacks.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a Paris-based group which campaigns on issues of press freedom, describes online abuse as a new threat to press freedom.
"Online harassment is a phenomenon that is spreading throughout the world and now constitutes one of the gravest threats to press freedom. Journalism’s predators … deploy troll armies to hunt down and harass all those who investigate and report the facts honestly."
—RSF Secretary General Christophe DeloireInternational Federation of Journalists Survey
- A 2018 survey found female journalists are targeted the most
- 3X: Women receive more abuse on Twitter than their male counterparts
Mapping Media Freedom Survey
(May 2014 and September 2018)- 176 cases of online harassment of correspondents — or nearly one a week
- 63% said these attacks caused psychological effects such as anxiety or stress
- 38% admitted to self-censorship
- 8% lost their job
UNESCO and ICFJ Joint Survey
(September to November 2020 global survey taken by 1,210 international media workers)- 73% of female respondents said they had experienced online abuse, harassment, threats and attacks.
- 20% of the women reported being targeted with offline abuse and attacks that they believe were connected with online violence they had experienced.
- CNN reporter Andrew Kaczynski and his family had personal information disclosed for reporting on a pro-Trump video meme.
- When battling online harassment, it’s better to be proactive than reactive.
- When reporting on a sensitive story, consider whether you need to draw up a safety plan.
- Prepare and protect private information such as phone numbers, addresses and online accounts with enhanced security protocols.
- Use strong passwords and multi-factor verification.
- Google yourself often to see what information is out there.
- Consider how much information you want to share on your LinkedIn bios, personal sites and CVs.
- Remember your family and friends may be at risk too.
PREPARE
Active preparation is more effective than a reactive response to abuse.
- Protect your accounts, compose difficult passwords
- Use a secure password manager
- Use multi-factor verification
- Check regularly to see if your accounts have been compromised
- Beware of spam and phishing
- Decide whether you want your contact info published in online directories
PROTECT AGAINST “DOXING”
Doxing is when online harassers post private or sensitive information to intimidate people. Journalists who write about controversial topics are particularly vulnerable.
- Google yourself and check what personal information is out there
- See what data brokers have on you and consider scrubbing your data
- Audit your social media accounts and tighten your privacy settings; be sparing with identifying information (e.g. hide your personal information on your public Facebook page)
- You can also turn on “photo recognition” on Facebook, so if your image is posted somewhere, you can review it
- Check your online bios, CVs and personal websites and remove your home address, private email and cell number
- Set up separate email accounts for separate purposes
- Review your location settings
- Consider using a pseudonym
- Take steps to protect your accounts from hacking by composing difficult passwords or using a secure password manager and/or multi-factor verification.
- Check your online bios, CVs and personal websites and remove your home address, private email and cell number.
If your proactive measures haven’t worked in heading off online harassment, there are steps you can take in responding to, or dealing with, trolls. Some actions you can take include:
- Keeping a record of abuse
- Blocking or muting abusive followers
- Reporting abuse to platforms
- Seeking support
- They might have specific remedies or solutions to what you are going through. At the least, their shared experience might give you solace.
DON’T FEED TROLLS
In most cases it’s best not to engage with online harassers. Cyber bullies feed off misery and pain; a reaction may encourage them. It can be difficult to evaluate the seriousness of any threat behind an online insult. Consult colleagues and supervisors before deciding to ignore menacing messages.
KEEP RECORDS
Take a screenshot of the offending web page or Tweet. Record the links. If the messages you receive are distressing, ask a colleague to check your social media accounts and email. Getting someone you trust to monitor messages (or mentions) can help ease your anxiety.
BLOCK VS MUTE
Blocking and muting can be useful but might add new worries about content you’re not seeing. Be aware that blocking can make harassment worse because abusers can see they’ve been blocked, whereas they don’t know they’ve been muted and you can’t see their comments. The abuser who is blocked will sometimes proudly advertise the block.
DISCONNECT
Turn off your phone, or at least turn off notifications, especially at night. Keep your devices out of the bedroom. A pinging phone is a disturbance when trying to sleep, and can even wake you.
REPORT TO PLATFORMS
Platforms usually ask users to describe the incident and type of threat (i.e., sexual, exploitative, physically threatening). Some platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook, have “flagging” options, so you can report abusive content immediately. Users may also be asked to provide a screenshot or link to the harmful content, so document your abuse (see link in Resources, below).
REPORT TO THE AUTHORITIES
If you think you or your family and friends could be at risk of physical harm, you should alert your employer and contact local law enforcement. If you do not feel safe engaging with your law enforcement or you do not have an employer to support you, contact trusted friends and allies. Reach out to organizations that support press freedom and human rights (whether they are local, national or international).
- Journalists can suffer from vicarious, or secondary, trauma, with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), as a result of repeated exposure to distressing material via electronic means as part of their job.
- Some journalists might be reluctant to seek help for this kind of trauma because they feel shame that they are suffering from “merely” watching images on a screen (as opposed to being out in the field covering dangerous stories).
- Take sensible steps to minimize unnecessary exposure to violent content.
- Understand what you are dealing with.
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“If you are exposed to distressing experiences, even when you are not physically present, your brain has the capacity to experience symptoms of distress similar to those you would experience if you had been there.”
–Sam Dubberley, special advisor to the Evidence Lab and manager of Amnesty International’s Digital Verification Corps
SYMPTOMS
- Emotional: A journalist may seem more anxious, irritable, withdrawn, numb, depressed, sad, or angry. These emotions may be sustained or intermittent.
- Physical: Symptoms can include sleep or eating disorders, rapid heartbeat, sweating, panic attacks, headaches, nausea and chest pain.
- Behavioral: Strained personal and work relationships are common. So is alcohol or drug abuse. Other signs can include an abnormally intense focus on work as a means of blocking out uncomfortable feelings.
PREVENTION
- The Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma suggests that journalists should think of traumatic imagery as a toxic substance that has a dose-dependent effect. Journalists, like workers exposed to radiation, have a job to do. But they should take steps to minimize unnecessary exposure.
- Reduce the number of people who need to see video or images rated for “extreme violence.” Discourage those who do not have to see the material from viewing it.
- Don’t dwell on the images/photos. See just what you have to see in order to report the news. Don’t play the video over and over again.
- If you edit footage for TV, don’t run the sound over and over if you don’t have to. Only play the sound if you need it to edit. When possible, turn the volume off or down.
- If you find you are being affected by the material, stop. Turn your mind to something else, like reading a newspaper, watching ordinary TV news, or chatting with your colleagues. Try to look at positive images – art for instance.
- Inform your supervisor if you think you’ve seen too many disturbing videos or images for one day.
- Don’t spend your free time trawling the Internet for violent videos. Try to have a different TweetDeck set-up at home than the one you have at work.
- If you only need to view one part of a photo or video to verify it, cover the rest of the screen with paper or your hand.
- You can manually turn off auto-play on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. That way, you can choose when you’re in the right frame of mind to start watching.
- Turn off auto-download on WhatsApp. In settings, tap “data and storage usage.” In the media auto-download section select “never”.
IMPACT OF TRAUMA
Trauma and traumatic stress affect different people in different ways. Some cope without trouble. Others find trauma distressing but get over it fairly quickly. Some will experience serious physical and psychological distress—sometimes in response to one overwhelming assignment, sometimes from accumulated exposure.
They can exhibit symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), as a result of repeated exposure to distressing material via electronic means.
YouTube allows you to manually shut off auto-play.Twitter and Meta also have this feature. You can choose when to start watching.
Different people are affected in different ways. Some cope without trouble. Some will experience serious physical and psychological distress.
- Digital overload is a risk of a 24/7 news cycle which requires the use of digital devices to report the news.
- We all need to find ways to de-stress, whether it’s through a healthy daily routine, ways to recharge, or switch off.
- Take 90-minute breaks to re-charge your brain.
25%
Amount of time each day knowledge workers waste in the United States while dealing with their growing data streams.
$997 billion
Annual cost to the economy of the time wasted.
(According to The Information Overload Research Group, a nonprofit consortium of business professionals, researchers and consultants)
90 Minutes
Time period of rest-activity cycles in which our brains work, when we sleep and while awake. Take a recharging break every hour and a half, especially if you’re multitasking with technology, which makes the brain overly active.
10 Minutes
Even a short walk in nature can be enough to have a calming effect. You might also listen to music, look at art, exercise or meditate.
SWITCHING OFF
- Set boundaries
- Don’t overextend yourself
- Learn how to say “no” to requests on your time
- If you find this difficult, remind yourself that saying “no” allows you to say “yes” to the commitments you want to make
Take a daily break from technology. Set a time each day when you completely disconnect. Put away your laptop, turn off your phone, and stop checking email or social media.
TIPS FOR BEATING STRESS
- Breathing. Inhale for a count of seven, then exhale for a count of 11. Making the “out” breath last longer helps the body relax, as it triggers nervous system reactions such as slowing the heart rate.
- Relationships. We are social creatures and having good connections with others enables us to feel happier, more secure, and gives us a sense of belonging. If you are experiencing isolation, consider a new hobby, volunteering or taking up a sport.
- Be active. Exercise releases feel-good hormones such as endorphins. People who are physically active are better at handling long-term stress without burning out. People often report that they come up with their best ideas while exercising.
- Diet. Drinking a glass of wine or eating junk food when we feel stressed may feel good in the short term, but if these habits continue, they may create greater problems in the long term.
- Gratitude. Taking time to think about what we are grateful for, can help people feel more optimistic. At the end of each day, list three things for which you are grateful.
- Nature. A walk outdoors can boost performance on tasks that require sustained focus. If you can’t easily find a natural setting, looking at images of nature can have some benefits.
- Fun. Laughter has been proven to reduce the cortisol stress hormone. It also improves circulation and can strengthen the immune system and the heart.
You should take a break every 90 minutes, a time-period that mimics the rest-activity cycles of our brains.A daily stroll outdoors is best to sustain focus, but If a natural setting isn’t close by, looking at pictures can help.
- Whether you work from home out of convenience, or because the office is shut during the pandemic, there are things you can do to make the experience more rewarding, or at least to mimic the positive aspects of being in the office.
- Here are 10 rudimentary steps you can take to improve home working, including creating a routine, taking regular breaks, and ending work at the same time you would if you were in the office.
Try these 10 steps for a healthier, at-home work day.
1. Stick to a daily routine. Wake up at the same time every work day. Shower and dress. Sign in when you have to, and establish a sign-off time. Set an alarm if you need the reminder. Take regular breaks (see below).
2. Write a running to-do list. This helps you focus on tasks at hand, and will become a visual cue to end your day. Be realistic with your list. Don’t overwhelm yourself.
3. Take regular breaks. Take a lunch and/or coffee break. If possible, step outside. A quick walk or stretch can be invigorating. If you can’t leave home, go somewhere quiet and relax away from screens.
4. Make stand-up phone calls. You don’t always need to sit down while making or taking calls. Standing helps with blood circulation, helps you stretch out, and gives a break from sitting at the screen.
5. Separate Work Space. If possible, make a distinct desk area away from your living and sleeping spaces. At the end of your work day, leave your work space and enjoy the evening. Don’t work from your bedroom. Your brain will associate the space with work, and it will be harder to switch off when it’s time to sleep.
6. Hobbies. If you have something to do after work, you’re more likely to stop working. Have something to look forward to at the end of the day, whether it’s cooking dinner, connecting with family or friends, or an evening exercise session.
7. Switch Off. When it’s time to go “home,” switch off your laptop completely. If the laptop is powered down, it becomes more cumbersome to check the news or emails. Same with your phone – if possible, limit how many times you check it when you’re done for the day.
8. Write a gratitude list. End or begin your day with something you’re grateful for. Your health, your family, the food in your kitchen, the roof over your head. Gratitude helps you focus on the present. Mindfulness calms your brain.
9. It’s great to talk! Our devices have made it so much easier to keep in touch with colleagues, family and friends. If possible, turn on your video so they can see your face and expressions. Try and not talk about work.
10. Take time off. Take your allotted vacation time to re-energize, especially if you are working from home because of the coronavirus. Your health – physical and mental – will be better for it.
Stick to a daily routine. Wake up at the same time every work day. Shower and dress. Sign in when you have to, and establish a sign-off time.
Do not work from your bedroom. Your brain will associate the space with work, and it will be harder to switch off when it’s time to sleep.
Take your allotted vacation time to re-energize, especially if you are working from home. Your physical and mental health will be better for it.
- There are many different types of digital journalism: text, video, podcasts, photography, graphics, commentary, aggregation and an ever-growing number of outlets and platforms.
- But we live in an era of heightened skepticism about the news media, with some people criticizing journalists’ reports not with reasoned arguments but by smearing them as “fake news.”
- To defend the value of journalism, we must make sure that our reporting is characterized by independence, honesty and integrity.
- A firm grasp of these fundamental principles can help protect journalists and journalism by safeguarding against damage to your reputation.
- he Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2022 found the connection between journalism and the public may be fraying again, after a brief rise in trust during the Coronavirus pandemic.
- It surveyed 93,000 online news consumers around the world and found that just 19% said all or most news organizations put what was best for society ahead of their own commercial or political interests.
- In most places, trust levels are still higher than before the Coronavirus pandemic, which reinforced the importance of reliable news media. But in many countries, trust had been on a downward trajectory for some time.
- Also, news is often accessed by young people in more fragmented ways than in the past – via social media or through word of mouth from friends, family and influencers – meaning that they sometimes miss key context.
- Based on data from six continents and 46 markets, the study reports:
- a declining interest in news
- a rise in news avoidance
- audience polarization
- news fatigue around COVID-19, politics and other subjects
Subjects that journalists consider most important, such as political crises, international conflicts, global pandemics, and climate catastrophes, seem to be precisely the ones that are turning some people away from news – especially amongst those who are younger or harder to reach. Many news organizations are embracing approaches such as solutions journalism around subjects like climate change, that aim to give people a sense of hope or personal agency. Others are looking to find ways to widen the agenda to softer subjects or make news more relevant at a personal level, but there will be a limit to how far journalists can go – or should go – to make the news more palatable.
The Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2022
- It is increasingly important for digital journalists to be aware of their audience – and to build trust with that audience – in an era when the way people consume news has changed.
- Journalists are, by definition, super-users of their own and rival news outlets. We must guard against assuming that everyone is as keen on “hard” news as we are.
- In a world in which news platforms, priorities and patterns of consumption are shifting at unprecedented speed, there are some constants.
- A reputation for trustworthiness is a bulwark of principled journalism, fundamental to building and retaining a loyal audience.
- These are some of the ways you can build a reputation for trustworthiness and reliability:
Accuracy
- It is your job to get the news first, but it is more important to get it right. As you report a story, be clear about what you know, how you know it and what you don’t know.
- It makes for better journalism if everyone in the news gathering process challenges their own reporting, asking “Is there anything we haven’t thought of?” or “What do I still need to find out?”
- When reporting a story, you should check and double-check all your facts and clearly state where they came from. For instance, if you report that your country’s inflation was 6.7% last month, double-check the number and tell your audience where you got it from, e.g., “according to the national statistics agency”.
Independence
- Independence is fundamental to the trust that allows you to report impartially from all sides of a story, from conflicts to financial markets.
- Anything that is, or looks like, a conflict of interest should be avoided. It might lead people to suspect that your coverage has ulterior motives.
- Examples of this would be:
- publicly supporting a particular cause that you then report on
- reporting on a candidate for political office who is a close friend of yours
- accepting money from a sponsor that you then report uncritically on
Integrity
- You should maintain the highest ethical standards to provide unbiased and reliable news.
- Never fake, fabricate or plagiarize a story or any elements of it. Don’t make up quotes or steal quotes from another publication. If you want to use a quote from elsewhere, make it clear where you got it from, e.g., “said in an interview with the Mauritanian Times last month”
- Don't accept payments or gifts from people or institutions you may have to report on. It will look like a bribe and would weaken the power and impact of any future reporting.
- Journalists should pay their own way and not accept free trips. If, for safety, journalists go to otherwise inaccessible areas on a military embed or with a humanitarian aid agency they should make that clear in their story, caption or script: e.g., "on a trip organized by the Israeli military, journalists were taken to...."
- If there is no way to pay your own way, for instance a company has block-booked a hotel, one way of dealing with it is to donate to charity to clear the debt and any perception of bribery.
- There should be a clear distinction between fact-based news stories and opinion pieces, which should be labeled as such. Other people’s opinions are often essential to a story, but the sources must be authoritative and named.
Fairness
- Take no side and tell all sides. Have no agenda other than accurate, fair reporting. After you have written or filmed something, clear your mind and try to view it as an outside observer to check for any bias.
- Bring stories that feel judgmental back toward a more balanced, factual tone. Avoid language or images that make it look like you are taking sides. For instance, if you say somebody “claimed” something, it sounds like you don’t believe them. “Said” is better. In images, are you showing all the sides of the story or are you just showing one? Have you cropped a picture that leaves out critical context?
- Quotes are sacrosanct. They must never be altered other than to delete a redundant word or clause, and then only if the deletion does not alter the sense. Make sure that the quotes you use genuinely represent what the speaker is saying.
- Inappropriate references to gender, ethnicity, religion, culture, appearance, age, and sexual orientation should be avoided. You should ask yourself: “Are they really relevant to the story?”, “Do they merit being placed high up, or lower down?”
- A nominal gift on such a holiday may be acceptable, but a box of luxury foods would certainly be above any acceptable limit. It would look like a bribe or an attempt to influence you.
Balance
- Journalists should strive to be scrupulously fair and balanced. Allegations should not be portrayed as fact; charges should not be conveyed as a sign of guilt.
- Always give the object of your reporting a right of reply. In a breaking news situation, it might not be possible to get hold of all sides immediately. If you can’t get a direct response from them, make that clear in your story and report any previous comments they or their representatives have made.
Transparency
- Be open about your sources, and correct mistakes quickly and transparently. Be clear if photos or video came from someone else. For example, "Video provided by the environmental group Greenpeace shows ...".
- Nobody likes to admit to having made a mistake, but it is vital to be clear with your audience when you have got something wrong. Every publisher, whether an individual blogger or a big institution, should have a clear corrections policy to let your audience know what you got wrong and what the right fact or story is. Don’t hide corrections.
Diversity
- Diversity serves to broaden and enrich the reporting in a newsroom, helping to overcome conscious and unconscious biases in discussions about coverage. Having people from different backgrounds helps open our eyes to angles on stories, realities and communities that we might have missed.
- In a newsroom filled with people from many different backgrounds, journalists should remain first and foremost journalists seeking facts and truths, parking nationality and personal politics at the door.
- Accuracy takes precedence over speed. The explosion could have been caused by either side, or something else. Wait for the facts before jumping to conclusions.
- You should always identify the source of a quote, even if it is a rival.
- The key to independent journalism is to be free of bias.
- Quality news journalism should take no side and tell all sides.
- Neutrality means reflecting all sides of an issue or conflict without any agenda other than finding out what has happened and what might happen next. Independent journalists should aim for impartial, accurate, fair reporting across all outputs: text, visuals, audio, social media.
- In any dispute – political, military, social, corporate – there are always at least two sides to consider. Journalists risk being seen as biased if they fail to give enough space to the different parties either in a single story or in the totality of their coverage.
- An even fuller picture can be gleaned if – time and space permitting – you reflect the viewpoints of other people affected by the story such as employees, customers, neighbors etc. The more points of view you listen to and report on, the less open to accusations of bias your reporting will be.
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“Let's invite one another in. Maybe then we can begin to fear less, to make fewer wrong assumptions, to let go of the biases and stereotypes that unnecessarily divide us. Maybe we can better embrace the ways we are the same.”
Michelle Obama – “Becoming”
- Bias can creep in through how we say things as well as what we say. It is important to look at the language you use to make sure it is neutral. Each language has its own issues so you should think carefully about what words might suggest a bias in your own.
- Here are some examples in English:
- Using “she said” is more neutral than “she admitted”. Admitted suggests that you think she was hiding something before. Similarly, “he insisted" suggests you might not believe him.
- “She failed to comment” suggests a judgment that the person is incompetent. “She did not comment” is neutral.
- “So-called” implies a judgment that you don’t think it should be called this. Better to source the name, for instance “the area, which authorities call ‘The Jungle’.”
- Avoid labels like “terrorist”, “extremist”, “mob”. These all imply the journalist is judging the people involved and is boxing them into emotionally charged categories. Find more factual descriptors like “bomber”, “attacker”, “anti-government protesters”.
- Be wary of adjectives and adverbs. They often imply a subjective judgment. For instance, “the well-connected business owner”. It might be factually true that this person has a lot of connections but is it relevant to the story? If you are choosing to point this out, people may think you are saying that they use their connections to get ahead in unethical ways, even if that’s not what you meant.
FULL DISCLOSURE
- Disclose the holes in a story. Acknowledging the key facts or mysteries that your reporting could not resolve adds to a story’s credibility. You can use phrases such as: “was not immediately clear” or “was not immediately available for comment” or “[your publication] was not able to independently verify the facts.”
FALSE BALANCE
- Objectivity does not mean always giving equal space to all sides. The perpetrator of an atrocity or the leader of a fringe political group may warrant less space than the victims or mainstream political parties.
- For instance, broadcasters and social media platforms have been accused of distorting coverage about climate change by giving unqualified skeptics a disproportionate voice.
CONTEXT
- Consider the context of what someone is saying or doing, and include that in your story if it is relevant. They may be with people or in a place where they cannot speak freely. Or, their body language – a smile or a wink or a shrug or a dismissive gesture – may undermine what they are saying.
SENSATIONALIZING
- It can be tempting to “hype” or sensationalize material to make it more readable or viewable. But skewing reality can mislead people into making wrong assumptions.
- What one outlet is calling a “flood” of immigrants or asylum-seekers may be a relatively small number of people. Did you check the actual number? Did you check how that number compares with last month? With last year? It may be the same, more, or fewer.
- A “surge” in a stock price may be a quite modest rise for that particular stock.
- How we use words leads to more precise, unbiased reporting.
- A colleague files the following story to you for publication: “After the surprise outcome of a referendum, the president
ACTIONS MATTER
- There are specific things you can do – and not do – to ensure that
you maintain a reputation for independence and trustworthiness.
- Personal Investments: You should not be involved in stories about entities in which you or an immediate family member have an interest.
- Conflicts of Interest: For instance, advising a politician who was a classmate of yours how to duck difficult questions from the news media. Even if it is unpaid, it gives you the inside track and undermines everyone else in your profession.
- Gifts: Journalists must not accept any payment, gift, free service or benefit offered by a news source or contact.
- Travel and accommodation: Pay your own way. In exceptional circumstances, such as war zones, it may be impossible to get to the news without accepting free travel or accommodation. It is good practice to reimburse the provider or make an equivalent donation to charity.
- Bribes: Under no circumstances should you take or offer payment for a news story.
- There are specific things you can do – and not do – to ensure that
you maintain a reputation for independence and trustworthiness.
- admitted his country was not fully prepared to leave the free-trade agreement.” It’s clear, quick and concise, so you can press the publish button.
- The words “surprise” and “admitted” are judgments by the journalist. “Surprise” can be omitted or placed in a paragraph with evidence to back it up. And “said” is more neutral than “admitted”, which makes the president sound defensive.
- You are watching a protest live on TV and the news anchor says the “mob” is heading toward parliament. You decide you should avoid such inflammatory language.
- It is inflammatory and imprecise. Instead describe the size, mood and political demands of the protesters.
- A prime minister offers to fly you to a Middle East country on a government plane to accompany him on the first official trip there following a peace agreement between the two nations. You should refuse.You may accept. But pay back what would have been the commercial cost of the flight. (Other journalists will almost certainly be insisting on a similar arrangement). And you should pay for your own hotel if you stay overnight.
- In a digital world, information travels easily and people are bombarded from all sides with information on news and social media.
- So, it becomes particularly important for journalists to try to get beyond official statements that may be inaccurate or propaganda and find out the truth of what has occurred.
- To do that, a good journalist needs excellent, well-informed and trustworthy sources. Sometimes, journalists are personally present at events, effectively becoming their own eyewitness sources.
- Far more frequently they are remote and must base their accounts on the testimony of others, data, images and documentation.
- In all these circumstances, independent, accurate reporting means being honest about the sources of the information that you are relying on.
- This is especially the case when it is hard to glean information about events, individuals or organizations. For instance, because they are in a conflict zone, or because a deal was done behind closed doors.
- In such cases, a news report must weigh sometimes conflicting accounts against each other and assess them for reliability. And then try to find details that confirm or disprove those accounts.
- There are some best practices for dealing with sources, data and documents. These will protect you against errors or being misled and convey to your readers that you made every effort and took every precaution to get to the truth.
- Over time, audiences will make informed judgments about which news outlets can be trusted to be judicious, and which jump to hasty conclusions.
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“As we know, there are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”
Former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, February 12, 2002.
The Rules of Sourcing
- DATELINES: If a journalist is present at the scene of a news event, the story should say so clearly.
- This is the purpose of a dateline, which indicates to readers that at least one of the journalists who produced the report was at the named location. You should never use a dateline if a journalist is not there physically. In video you can do an interview or piece to camera on location that shows you were there and builds your eyewitness authority.
- However, being present does not grant omniscience. It can be difficult to report a whole story on the ground and a single journalist will likely get only a partial view of events.
- They will often have to rely on other witnesses, authorities and colleagues elsewhere for what they did not see. Be clear about who has contributed to the reporting and where they were.
For instance, if there is a drought in southern China, you may have excellent on-the-ground reporting. However, colleagues in Beijing might need to report on the government’s response and others in Singapore might be reporting on the food market impact. Use a footnote at the end of the story to say which of the journalists was at the scene and who reported from the other cities.Sources
- Great journalism depends on having great sources. Much of the time, though, stories start out with what a journalist is given. In all cases, be transparent about how you got the information you are reporting.
- If the information comes from a press release, a statement or in a briefing to journalists, put that in the story. “The Prime Minister said in a news conference” makes it clear that this was public information, not a scoop.
- Likewise, if a report is based on someone watching live television rather than being there in person, say so e.g., “live coverage from Mauritanian TV showed”.
- Do not use passive sourcing, such as “it was announced,” “it was learned” or “it later emerged.” That only leaves your audience guessing as to who announced it or what happened in the background. It can give the impression of a journalist hiding information and erodes trust.
Named/Unnamed Sources
- There is a hierarchy of sourcing. Multiple named sources are preferable to one, and a named source is better than an anonymous one.
- That does not necessarily mean their information will be better. It is possible that the unnamed source is an excellent and trustworthy one who is well known to the journalist. But the reader does not know that, so will likely be less trusting of the information.
- Give as much context and detail as you can about sources, particularly when they are anonymous. For instance, “a source who was at the meeting but was not authorized to speak to the media” tells the reader that your information came from somebody with first-hand knowledge and explains why they could not be named.
- Readers should never be misled about your sources – either in what they say, or how many you have.
Dealing With Sources
- Identify yourself: When dealing with sources, either in person or by phone or email, always identify yourself as a journalist. Sources should never be tricked into thinking they are talking to a colleague, a detective, a concerned relative etc.
- Integrity of sources: Sources must not be allowed to say one thing in public and the opposite to you in private. For instance, there are government protests in a country you are visiting. An embassy official holds a press conference and gives a very low estimate of the crowd size. He then tells you privately that he is relying on local police figures but has some doubts about them. You should not present that estimate as confirmed by the embassy. Instead, get the original police estimate, report what the protest organizers are claiming, and refer your readers to photographs or TV coverage.
- Confidentiality: Always protect the confidentiality of your sources. You should disclose them to a senior editor if asked for legitimate editorial reasons. But it is of paramount importance that reporters and editors don’t disclose the source to other people involved in a story, to authorities or even in loose talk to friends. Your reputation and reporting ability is based on your trustworthiness. If you come under pressure from authorities to reveal your source, get a lawyer to represent you. We will deal with this in more detail later in the course.
- Attribution: Establish on what basis you are
talking to your sources. If the source says “on-the-record,” be clear
with them that means everything can be reported, and that they can be
named. There is no quicker way to burn a source than to “out” them,
accidentally or deliberately.
Terms such as “off-the-record,” “on background,” “not for attribution,” “to inform your reporting” and “Chatham House Rules” may mean different things in different countries. Familiarize yourself with the rules where you are and if in any doubt, check and double-check with the source.
Always push for the most clarity if a source doesn’t want to be named. For instance, “a government source” is weaker than “a source close to the President” which is weaker than “a source who was with the President when he made the decision.” Give as much detail as you can to show the authority and authenticity of the information you are reporting from your source.
“The Chatham House Rule is used around the world to encourage inclusive and open dialogue in meetings... When a meeting, or part thereof, is held under the Chatham House Rule, participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s), nor that of any other participant, may be revealed.”
The Chatham House policy institute, which aims to foster open dialogue and idea-sharing
Operating as Independent Media in a Turbulent WorldRecording Conversations
- Make audio or video recordings of interviews whenever it is possible and legal, and store them in a safe place. Save the file with a clear time and date. Back up your files and keep them encrypted with a password for access. This will protect you and your sources if your computer or phone is hacked or lost.
- Where you cannot record your conversation, take very detailed written notes. Again, note down the date and time of every call or conversation you had. Even if you called somebody for a comment and they didn’t answer or said they would call back and didn’t, you want to have a record of every effort you made to get in contact.
Beware Imposters
- Consider carefully whether a source may be an imposter trying to trick you.
- Sources get in touch in different ways – in person, by phone, text message and email. Double check any phone numbers or emails. For instance, does the domain match other emails from that person’s company? If they are using Gmail, why?
- If someone provides a resume, check it out properly with the colleges, employers and references supplied. This is how many deceptions unravel.
Testing Your Sources
- If you are dealing with an unnamed source, particularly if they are new to you, weigh the source’s track record, position and motive. Why are they telling you this information? Do they have something to gain personally? How do they know what they know?
- Get specifics and proof points that can be checked against known facts later: precise dates and exact times that something happened, geolocations, full names, dates of birth, achievements, qualifications, and any documentation that might verify them. Use the common sense test: if it sounds wrong or if it is too good to be true, check further.
Photos of Edward Snowden, a contractor at the National Security Agency (NSA), and U.S. President Barack Obama are printed on the front pages of local English and Chinese newspapers in Hong Kong in this illustration photo June 11, 2013. REUTERS/Bobby Yip - One of the most famous news stories involving information provided by a source with “inside” information was that of the former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, who exposed secret U.S. government surveillance programs.
- In 2013, he provided tens of thousands of documents to a reporting team from The Guardian, which resulted in a series of newspaper articles and a documentary about data collection by the NSA, and its relations with Google and Microsoft.
- So sensitive was Snowden’s information that he contacted reporters he trusted using encrypted emails and flew from his home in Hawaii to Hong Kong to meet them.
- The reporters spent nearly a week interviewing him, examining the documents in minute detail to verify them. After the story was published, Hong Kong journalists scrutinized every aspect of the stories and accompanying images in order to verify the scoop.
- “At the height of the search, reporters recruited Twitter followers to see if they could successfully identify the lighting and other hotel furnishings shown in the video in which he went public. They did: the $330-a-night Mira Hotel, on Nathan Road, the busy main shopping drag in Kowloon district.” - Ewen MacAskill, The Guardian, June 12, 2013
- The Guardian shared some of the classified documents with reporting teams from other publications outside Britain, bringing in national security and intelligence specialists to continue reporting them in detail.
- The move aimed to put the Snowden documents out of reach of the British government after it threatened legal action unless The Guardian surrendered or destroyed files supplied by Snowden about Britain’s GCHQ spy agency.
- The coverage, and reports in other newspapers, eventually led to a statement by then U.S. President Obama about the need for more oversight of the intelligence services.
- If you get a handout from a government, police force or military, it is not enough simply to label video or a photograph as “handout.” You should clearly identify the source. This makes it clear that the pictures were not taken by an independent journalist.
- For example, this photograph of U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi visiting Taiwan is clearly captioned: Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs/Handout
- Similarly, it is essential for transparency that material you did not gather yourself is clearly attributed in stories, including if the information came from other news organizations. Failure to do so may open you to charges of plagiarizing your rivals and their sources may not trust you in the future.
- A government spokesperson tells a press conference that the government plans to cut income tax by 2% next year. Later, she tells you that the cut will actually be 5%, but you can only use that fact if you attribute it to “a government source.” You should agree because you like the spokesperson, and she has been reliable in the past.
- Your duty is to your readers. You should never mislead them by quoting a source saying one thing on the record and the opposite on background.
- You are writing about a village where government forces arrested protesters. A journalist says she will be in the village by the time your story is published and asks you to put her name and the village dateline on the story. You should refuse. The journalist produced no reporting from the village for your story. It would be a misleading use of the dateline.
- You call a police station and say you are investigating a high-profile murder. The officer keeps calling you “detective” and begins outlining all the evidence. You should let him keep speaking because it means you’ll get a better story. Sources should not be tricked. You should identify yourself as a journalist as soon as you realize his mistake.
- No matter how certain a journalist is about the strength and accuracy of a story, it must go through the rigorous tests of fact-checking, editing and getting fair comment. Vetting the story with an editor can bring new perspectives to your reporting, make apparent any holes or biases, and ensure its full independence.
- It is important to make sure that anybody providing information is questioned carefully to make sure their version of events holds up against scrutiny of the facts you have found from other sources of information.
- This might mean going back and double-checking information with a source, doing extra checks on photos or video you have found on social media or that you have been sent, or running your story past its subject to get fair comment.
- This is particularly important if a lot of time has passed between your first reporting and preparation for publication. The story may have changed.
- In all cases, you should aim for “no surprises” journalism. Everybody involved should have been given the opportunity to comment on a story before you publish. It is important to explain to them what you are saying about them and seek their response.
-
- When reporting any story, think about all the people who are involved and who may have different opinions of what is happening.
- The best way to check information, and to make sure your story is as accurate as it can be, is to seek comment from everyone named in the story to give them a right to reply.
- Make every effort to contact them for their input. If you can’t speak to them directly, represent their points of view another way, for instance, “In June, the CEO said he was not interested in selling the company. He was not immediately available to comment for this story.”
- Try not to frame the person or organization you are writing about as the “target” of your story. And don’t see getting fair comment as a potential obstacle to your story. That risks you adopting an adversarial attitude. Instead, think of them as a key source, and one who is likely to hold critical information for your reporting.
Be Ready for the Risks
- Getting fair comment is not risk free. In a fast-moving digital world, the very act of seeking comment before publishing can lead people or organizations to try and release it themselves. That way, they can get it out first with their own “spin” – trying to get ahead of the story and limiting damage by what the public relations industry calls “controlling the narrative.”
- This does not relieve journalists of the responsibility to offer a chance to comment. However, you should be ready to publish your own story when you ask for comment so that you can move quickly if the subject of your reporting does go public.
-
Legal Protection
- Offering a right to reply also has a legal dimension.
- If an individual or organization sues you over a story, one of the legal defenses available is to show that the subject of the story was offered the chance to comment upon it in advance of publication.
- That said, the powerful and wealthy can sometimes still use the law to try and stop publication. Always consult your editors and lawyers if the subject of your story threatens to sue you if you publish.
Checking Back With Sources
- Dealing with sources can be a delicate business. A story might not exist without their contribution, but you should never let them control your reporting.
- You may often have to go back to sources to check details, see if anything has changed and sometimes to check quotes.
- There is a big difference between consultation and control. Do not let any sources vet stories before publication. You can ask them to check facts or verify a precise quote, but you should not allow them to retract or materially alter stories, scripts, images or captions to their advantage.
- Some sources are very experienced in dealing with news media and are used to influencing how their information is used, particularly with partisan news outlets that are not independent. Others might be nervous and might worry about how you’ll use what they said.
- You can share the context of your story but giving sources any sort of vetting power before publication breaches a journalist’s independence, credibility and reputation.
Top Tips
- Be aware that interview subjects or their organizations often ask to see in advance the quotes you plan to run.
- Have a formal response ready to resist such requests where possible.
- If you do agree to submit quotes, stipulate that sending them does NOT mean that you agree to make material changes.
- It can often be effective to give the source a tight deadline for approval. That way they cannot hold up publication indefinitely.
- When a key person, company or institution declines to comment on a story about them, be sure to provide their point of view some other way.
“Comment is free, but facts are sacred. 'Propaganda,' so called, by this means is hateful. The voice of opponents no less than that of friends has a right to be heard. Comment also is justly subject to a self imposed restraint. It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair.”
C.P. Scott, Manchester Guardian editor, 1921
Propaganda
- While it is important to reflect all sides in a story, it is also important not to be used by governments, interest groups, extremists and others to spread their propaganda. Instead, you should be transparent about what you know and can check independently – and what you can’t.
- For instance, if a government tells you what is happening in an area where they are fighting insurgents and you cannot go to the region, you should report what the government says and add “[Your publication] was not able to independently verify the facts.”
- If it provides footage or photos, you should use all the digital tools you have learned on this course so far to try to verify where and when they were taken. If you cannot verify them, be very careful before using any of the visuals, and make it clear to your audience that they are not independently verified.
- You should then make every effort to try to get comments from other parties on the ground, whether by phone, email or social media.
- You should also explain the context of the insurgency so that an audience that might not be familiar with the nuances of a story understands that it is getting only one side of the story.
Extremists
- Many extremists will try to use the media to get their message out more widely. This might include sending notice of bomb threats or making unsubstantiated claims of taking people hostage.
- Your decision about whether to cover any communication from violent groups should be based on whether it contains any fact-based news or is purely propaganda.
- Treat the threat of violence in the same way you would report a rumor. Check with the authorities if they are taking any action and report what is actually happening.
- For instance, if a plane has been diverted or a building evacuated because of a bomb threat, that is a fact and should be reported. If the national threat level about the likelihood of a terror attack has been raised to Severe from Moderate, report it. That is important information in the public domain.
- Be very careful before publishing any visual material and video statements sent to you or published on social media by extremist groups. It needs very careful verification and even then, you could be accused of giving the group the oxygen of publicity and falling prey to their propaganda.
- While journalists have a duty to report news and not suppress it, publishing unverified information can cause damage to people, countries and companies even if nothing actually happens. Be cautious in reporting threats as you risk becoming a tool through which bad actors can spread fear and panic.
- You should give someone the chance to comment before publication, not after. You have to maintain a reputation for balance, fairness and trustworthiness.
- A government says it has bombed and killed a group of separatists in a dangerous area. You can accept the fact that it is dangerous as confirmation that the government had to act firmly.The dead people may be unarmed protesters, or civilians. Accuracy is the priority. Contact the separatist movement. Tell your reader what you don’t know. Make as many checks as you can.
- Your best source realizes they have unintentionally implicated themselves in the story you are writing. You should carry on with your reporting and publish the story when it’s ready.You are an independent journalist, not a PR for your source. If they have turned themselves into the subject of your story rather than a source, you keep reporting. Send the quote to them ahead of publication and ask for their comment.
- The world of digital journalism is much more visual than the old 20th century world of text. Many stories are told through pictures and videos on social media platforms and the quality of modern-day phones is such that all journalists can shoot and edit visuals.
- It is important to remember some key fundamentals about visual journalism to protect your independence and reputation for trust.
Who's On First?
- No actions in visual journalism should be taken that amount to fabrication of images.
- Sometimes fabrication can be obvious, and easily caught. The legitimate photograph above shows former U.S. President Barack Obama at the head of a group of Middle Eastern leaders attending peace talks at the White House in 2020.
- But an Egyptian state-run newspaper provoked outrage and ridicule by altering a similar photograph to remove the late President Hosni Mubarak from his position on the far left and insert him at the front of the group, ahead of the other leaders.
- That alteration was quickly exposed – with numerous other photographs published on front pages around the world showing the lineup as it really was.
- Other fabrications are not so clear-cut. Even experienced photo editors can miss high-quality fakes and they can come from multiple sources – including governments, institutions, companies, NGOs and political and militant organizations, or unscrupulous photographers and video journalists.
Photo Editing
- Modern image-editing tools are now highly sophisticated, even on smartphones. It has never been so easy to fake photographs.
- Such is the advanced level of technology that a “chain of trust” from source to publication is the best way to ensure integrity of an image, so that everyone involved at every stage of production is reputable.
- The vast majority of the tools in sophisticated photo software are ones that a scrupulous journalist would never use, because they are specifically intended to transform an image.
- So, to be faithful to what is depicted in the image, journalists should limit themselves to a very “light touch” when editing. Less is better.
- The duty of photojournalists and editors is to reflect reality, not to enhance it or appear to change it.
TOP TIPS
- Photographers and editors should only make adjustments to color balance problems and over- or under-exposure, as has been done from the earliest days of photography.
- Cropping of pictures is an acceptable way to remove unimportant details from the edge of a frame, but not if it cuts out something that materially alters the scene.
- There should be no additions or deletions to the original image, cloning or moving elements within it.
- You should not carry out excessive lightening, darkening, sharpening or blurring of the image.
- Excessive color manipulation is also not permissible.
- Any editing procedures such as these can alter the reality of the news photographs and tell a story that you wouldn’t have seen with your own eyes. That breaks the core bond of trust between the audience and the photographer.
Sourcing
- With video, you must be clear about the source of any video clips that you have used, whether your own, amateur video, or from a third party.
- This is particularly important if the third party has its own agenda, such as a company, lobby group, military, militia or government. You should make it clear that the video is a handout and, if reporting from the video, be transparent about the source of it, for instance: "Video provided by the environmental group Greenpeace shows ..." or "video downloaded from a web site known to be used by the militant group XYZ showed...”
- If you obtain third-party or user-generated content (UGC), it may be safer to make that clear and qualify it with a phrase such as “the video purports to show...”. You will have learned how to verify UGC video in previous modules.
- Remember that the footage of the third party that you use is its intellectual property and may be subject to copyright. Make sure you have obtained permission to use it, preferably in writing. A credit to the source not only helps the viewer understand where it came from, it also is a professional courtesy.
Editing
- Video stories must not be shot, edited or scripted in a way that misleads the viewer. You should strive to record events exactly as they happen. Use wide shots as well as close-ups to give context.
- Audio must never be added in a way that may affect the interpretation of a story.
- Drone footage presents special challenges because it is usually silent, making it easier to manipulate because there are no audio markers to alert the listener. Do not speed up, slow down, reverse or add audio to drone footage unless you have clearly labelled it as such. Check drone footage supplied by others to make sure it has not been tampered with.
Staging
- Visual journalists must not stage or re-enact news events, tell their subjects what to do, or add, remove or move objects on a news assignment. News photography and video journalism must depict reality.
- If a subject is sitting for a portrait, formal interview or non-news feature image, there is often some direction needed, e.g., “Please sit here”, “I need you in the car”, “Could you look toward me now”. But captions and stories must never mislead the reader into believing these images are spontaneous.
- Here is an example of how to caption an image that is clearly a portrait shot:
REUTERS CAPTION: A Hindu devotee poses for a portrait during the Lal Kach festival in Munshiganj, Bangladesh, April 13, 2022. REUTERS/Mohammad Ponir Hossain The Power of a Camera
- Often, the presence of a camera crew can alter a situation. For example, people might rush to the camera and speak directly to you rather than allowing you to just observe them.
- If something is happening because journalists were present and because you were filming, you should say so, e.g., "residents protested at the scene after journalists arrived in the area.”
Special Effects
- Composite images that show the progression of an event (e.g., a lunar eclipse) must indicate in the caption that the technique has been used.
- Captions should also make clear when a specialty lens or a special technique has been used, for instance a timelapse in video or a slow shutter speed in photos.
It's Difficult To Have a Clear View”
- Keep an open mind to all sides of a story, rather than make a pre-formed judgment about what is happening in front of you.
- A good example is in 2020, when Reuters photographer Dylan Martinez attended a march by Black Lives Matter protesters in London, and saw it develop into a clash with far-right protesters.
- While many journalists focused on the familiar dynamic of hostility between the two sides, Martinez saw what appeared to be a scuffle in the crowd.
- At first, he thought it might be another skirmish, but he held off making assumptions and paid careful attention to the details of the scene in front of him.
- Suddenly, one Black Lives Matter demonstrator took it upon himself to rescue one of the counter-protesters from the crush. Martinez remained alert and open enough to the possibilities of nuance and individual humanity within an overall dynamic of polarization and hostility.
- In so doing, he captured what became an award-winning photograph of Patrick Hutchinson carrying an injured counter-protester to safety.
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“It’s very difficult to explain because it’s through thousands of people, there’s hundreds of people fighting, and still stuff was being thrown around, so it’s difficult to have a clear view, but suddenly I saw a white guy on his shoulders and everyone shouting, ‘This is not what we do, this is not what we do.”
Reuters photographer Dylan Martinez
You are sent to cover the story of a drought. You want to give a broad view of the impact of the weather on a whole valley, so you decide to use a drone. This is OK because it will give you a different angle on the story.The drone footage will help put the story in context which is critical to news coverage. You must just be careful not to edit in any sound on a drone that only takes pictures as that would be misleading. The soccer team from a town 20km away just won a major match. You arrive at the scene of a major celebration a bit late but can see that people had been throwing their T-shirts and scarves around. It is OK to ask the people there to do it again for you to film it because this is a happy, light story.You should never stage news photography or video. - Accuracy is at the heart of what journalists do. No set of rules matters as much as a passion for the truth.
- However, journalists are human and we all sometimes make mistakes, particularly when operating under pressure. Sometimes, we will notice the mistake ourselves. Sometimes, somebody will complain. In both cases, we must be honest, own up to the error and correct our story.
- Many errors can be prevented by checking simple things: the day of the week, numbers, the spelling of people’s names and titles. You should also double-check any facts you lift from other news outlets as you are responsible for the accuracy of everything in your story.
When things do go wrong, you should know how to correct your story and any other linked output such as social media posts. Acting quickly and being transparent helps your reputation for being trustworthy. It is also a key part of attracting and keeping an audience, who will notice and appreciate it if you are consistently open about your mistakes.COMPLAINTS
- When dealing with complaints, your attitude counts.
- Tone: You should seek to defuse rather than escalate. Getting angry and defensive may only make the complainant less inclined to listen to what you have to say. People are used to aggressive pushback in a polarized world of social media. Sometimes just being listened to in a professional way is enough to make them feel valued and respected.
- Nothing Personal: Try to think of what you’re hearing as feedback or constructive criticism rather than an attack on your credibility, or an unwanted extra workload revisiting something you thought was done.
Procedure
- Telephone: If the complaint is made by telephone,
you should note down all the essential details: the date, the name,
title, company and contact details of the caller. You should also assume
the conversation is being recorded at the other end. And record it
yourself if that is legal.
Keep the information carefully even if the problem seems to have been resolved during the call. The caller could have second thoughts and decide to pursue the matter further. - Email: If the complaint is made by email, keep it
safe. Be careful with any comments you make in email even if you are
just forwarding it to colleagues. Behave as if everything you say and
write may end up in court.
You should discuss any complaints with your editor or lawyer and go back to the complainant politely. - Social media: If somebody criticizes your story in the comments on your website or on social media, you should refer to your company’s guidelines on what to do. Online engagement with an audience is a critical element of digital media. However, there is no point in getting into endless arguments or confronting trolls directly. Consider the complaint raised and if there is a factual error, correct the story. If it is just criticism, leave it. If the complaint is personal or threatening, escalate it to your manager.
Escalating Serious Complaints
Dissatisfied Complainants: If someone disputes facts that need to be checked, that will take some time to deal with. Likewise, if somebody makes a subjective judgment that your stories are slanted – for example your coverage of India, Pakistan and Kashmir or China, Hong Kong and Taiwan – you will not solve the issue straight away.
In such cases, politely inform them that you will need to discuss the issue with others and that someone will be in touch with them. Don’t argue, engage or make commitments which the complainant could use against you. Just be polite and then escalate the issue with your editors and lawyers if necessary.
Pressure: The complaint may come from a government department that threatens to cut off reporters’ access if you do not correct a story. Or an advertiser saying they will pull future ads if a story is not withdrawn.
Stay calm, take notes or record the conversation, ask them exactly what action they are asking for and then call in anyone else who needs to be aware of the problem, such as editors, security guards or lawyers.The report of my death was an exaggeration.”American novelist and journalist Mark Twain, speaking to the New York Journal of 2 June, 1897. It was prompted by an erroneous article published a day earlier in a rival newspaper.
Dealing with Mistakes
- In a digital age, it is tempting just to update a webpage without drawing attention to your mistakes. However, it is important to be transparent with your audience to keep their trust. The action you take depends on the seriousness of the mistake.
Minor Errors
- Minor mistakes - like the date of a related event, a spelling mistake or a dropped word - can be recognized and corrected without unnecessarily alarming readers.
- These do not detract from a story’s credibility and do not affect the facts of the case. Simply explain what you have corrected at the top or bottom of the story in brackets.
- On social media, either update a post making it clear you are correcting it or, if there is no edit option, you can send a new post explaining what you have corrected and then delete the old one.
Substantive Errors
- If you make a factual or substantive error, you need to be more obvious with your correction.
- A substantive error is one that alters the meaning or significance of the story or undermines its credibility. For instance, using “million” instead of “billion”, attributing a quote to the wrong person or dropping a keyword like “not” (he was found guilty vs he was found not guilty).
- Depending on your publishing system, you may need to issue a new story and headline like the Reuters one below. Remember to issue the correction across any output or platform where the story might have been published. For instance, did it get into a video or a podcast?
Official Corrections
- If the mistake was made by a usually reliable government agency or source, not the journalist, it is acceptable to make clear to readers where the responsibility for the mistake lies. For instance, here, when South Korea’s parliament corrected a figure it had released earlier:
Independent Presidential candidate Ross Perot holds aloft a historic newspaper Nov 1 that declared Thomas Dewey the victor in the presidential race against Harry Truman. Perot drew a parallel to his own candidacy in front of 12,000 people. Picture taken November 1, 1992. REUTERS/Sam Mircovich - “The most famous wrong call in electoral history” is how the Chicago Tribune newspaper refers to its own 1948 front-page prediction from early opinion polls and political pundits that Republican candidate Thomas E. Dewey would beat incumbent President Harry S. Truman in the U.S. presidential election.
- According to the Tribune’s website, a printer’s strike forced the paper to go to press hours before it normally would, contributing to “every publisher’s nightmare on every election night.”
- The Tribune blamed the opinion pollsters for its mistake.
You write a story saying that the prime minister gave a speech on Monday, but it was actually Tuesday. You can just edit the story and put a note at the bottom saying you corrected the day of the week.The error does not change the substance of the story, but you should still make clear you have made a change so that your audience knows you’ve acknowledged the error and doesn’t think you just covered up your mistake.
Someone calls you up to make a complaint about your story. After a short conversation, they calm down and say they may have been wrong. You are now in the clear and you can throw away your notes of the conversationThey could well reconsider, and they only said “may”. You should keep your notes or recording of the conversation. You should also look into whether any or all of their complaints may be legitimate.
OilCo, the biggest energy company in your country, released its annual results and said profits were up 24% to $3 billion. It later issues a second statement saying the rise was actually 16%, not 24%. You need to correct your story but you can say it was OilCo’s mistake, not yours.An “OFFICIAL CORRECTION” can be made to the story, making clear that the source of the error was the company, not the reporting. However, keep the correction very objective. You don’t need to use words like “blame” or “fault”. In this case, you could write “Corrects the profit rise number to 16% from 24% after OilCo issued a second statement with the right number”.
- Working as independent media and not giving in to pressure from powerful people is critical for our reputation but can bring with it great risks.
- In 2021, a record 293 journalists were jailed around the world, up from 280 the year before, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
- The New York-based nonprofit organization established to promote press freedom said at least 24 journalists were killed globally because of their coverage, with 18 more dying in what it called murky circumstances.
- China remained the world’s leading jailer of journalists for the third year in a row, the CPJ report found, with 50 behind bars. Myanmar was second after its media crackdown following the February 2021 military coup. Egypt, Vietnam, and Belarus were the others in the top five.
“In a world preoccupied with COVID-19 and trying to prioritize issues like climate change, repressive governments are clearly aware that public outrage at human rights abuses is blunted, and democratic governments have less appetite for political or economic retaliation... In addition, authoritarian leaders are increasingly finding more sophisticated ways to block independent reporters and outlets – notably internet shutdowns and increased surveillance through high-tech spyware – than keeping them behind bars.”
Report by CPJ Editorial Director Arlene Getz, Dec. 9, 2021
Protecting Sources and Stories
- Journalists have a duty to report the truth, to challenge censorship and to break news of major public interest.
- As we learned in the chapter on sources, it is a fundamental tenet of independent journalism that sources should be protected. Their identities should not be disclosed to government authorities, companies or others demanding to know where a story came from.
- Likewise, journalists should not voluntarily hand over published or unpublished material to authorities. If they are seeking your published material, it is better to refer them to where it is publicly available, such as your website or app.
- Any requests for published or unpublished content from police, security forces or lawyers should always be referred to senior colleagues, and to your own lawyers.
- That includes, but is not limited to:
- Video files
- Drafts of stories
- Photographs
- Journalists' notes
- Details of phone calls, email and other messages involved in reporting
- Other background materials
- After checking with your lawyers, you may consider moving the materials to a safer place than your office, or even out of the country beyond the reach of the authorities.
- Where appropriate, your lawyers might consider filing challenges to court orders that seek to compel disclosure of your work.
- This is for the safety of the journalists involved, their sources, and to preserve a reputation of independence from political and other pressures.
- Journalists and their news material are vulnerable to intrusive authorities at every stage of the reporting process.
- This is especially true when passing through airports and border crossings or entering high-security buildings. An immigration official may demand to see data on your phone or laptop, or to inspect your social media feeds. If you go into an embassy or ministry, they may ask you to leave your phone in one of their lockers.
- Always try to keep your kit with you. Even the best end-to-end encryption can be circumvented if the phone or laptop falls into someone else’s hands.
- Such vulnerabilities risk exposing the identity of colleagues and sources kept anonymous during your reporting and publication.
- Resist demands to hand over raw photographs and video to authorities unless the physical safety of you and your colleagues is under immediate threat. Their metadata may give away locations and movements of you, your colleagues and your sources.
What You Can Do
- Keep your software and apps updated. It makes them less vulnerable to hacking.
- Delete social media apps from your phone before going through airports.
- Clear browsing histories on laptops, delete social media bookmarks.
- Bring a burner or borrowed phone on any trip to a place where authorities may be against independent journalism.
- Leave your phone outside the building if you think you will have to surrender it. Pick it up when you leave.
- If you have to surrender a device, do not connect it to your organization’s network until you get it checked out. Change all your passwords.
- Encrypt your hard drive with tools such as Symantec Endpoint, Check Point, BitLocker on Windows and FileVault on Mac.
- Activate two-factor authentication, using tools such as Google Authenticator or Symantec VIP Access.
What You Can Do
- Keep your software and apps updated. It makes them less vulnerable to hacking.
- Delete social media apps from your phone before going through airports.
- Clear browsing histories on laptops, delete social media bookmarks.
- Bring a burner or borrowed phone on any trip to a place where authorities may be against independent journalism.
- Leave your phone outside the building if you think you will have to surrender it. Pick it up when you leave.
- If you have to surrender a device, do not connect it to your organization’s network until you get it checked out. Change all your passwords.
- Encrypt your hard drive with tools such as Symantec Endpoint, Check Point, BitLocker on Windows and FileVault on Mac.
- Activate two-factor authentication, using tools such as Google Authenticator or Symantec VIP Access.
Recaptured drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is escorted by soldiers in Mexico City, Mexico January 8, 2016. REUTERS/Henry Romero - Identities and locations can be given away inadvertently.
- A supposedly secretive October 2015 meeting in Mexico between Hollywood star Sean Penn and Sinaloa drug cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman in a jungle hideout reportedly helped the Mexican government to catch Guzman.
- Penn said he was sure the Mexican government and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration were tracking him. Senior Mexican government sources later said they were indeed monitoring Penn’s movements.
- An angry military spokesman calls you furious about an audio report that your outlet published overnight and wants you to send a transcript to pass up to senior officers. This seems like a good way to mollify them. You should send them the transcript.The material is in the public domain, they have the resources to transcribe it themselves and you have journalistic work to do. Think carefully about handing material over at the outset of what may become a formal and lengthy complaint process. Check with senior colleagues.
- Threatening journalists with jail is the main way that governments seek to stop journalists doing their work.Journalists worldwide face a whole raft of pressure from authorities including electronic and human surveillance, intimidation, phone and computer hacking, restrictions on access and pressure from other people or groups who work at arms-length from authorities.
- Under no circumstances should you ever hand over raw unpublished material to authorities.If they are demanding it at gunpoint and you have serious reason to believe that you or your colleagues’ lives are in immediate danger, you have little choice. They can take it anyway.
Protecting You and Your Data
- Journalists are facing a surge in online violence, often leading to psychological or physical harm and self-censorship.
- There are measures you can take to protect yourself and your information.
- Keep your software and apps updated – hackers exploit vulnerabilities.
- Change your passwords regularly. Do not store them in obvious places, and make them hard to guess.
- Consider using a password manager to store unique, strong passwords securely.
- If you are working on sensitive stories, don’t travel with important data but put it on a hard drive that you leave in a safe place.
- Make sure your hard drive is encrypted.
- Data can also be encrypted and stored in the cloud. That is a good way to offload it before leaving a sensitive location that you have been reporting from.
- Cover your computer webcam with tape when you aren’t using it.
- Don’t log on to unsecured networks, for instance in a coffee shop or at an airport, without a VPN.
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Harassment
- No journalist should have to put up with personal harassment online, but it has become an increasing issue that independent journalists, particularly female reporters, have to deal with.
- Every social media platform has a harassment policy so you should report any trolling to their community standards teams. If the harassment strays into the criminal, such as death threats, you should also report this to the police.
- You may consider other responses such as:
- Block the poster – but talk to your security or legal adviser in case they need to monitor what is being said about you.
- Keep a record of the harassment in case you need to demonstrate a pattern of abusive behavior.
- Take screenshots of offensive webpages, posts and links in case they try to delete them later.
- Appoint someone else to screen your social media responses.
- Ask social media companies to delete posts or accounts.
- Send a legal “cease and desist” letter.
- Notify law enforcement.
https://www.trfilter.org/ - The Thomson Reuters Foundation (TRF) has launched TRFilter to help journalists and activists deal with online harassment.
- TRFilter is a free web application. It syncs with the user's Twitter account, automatically recognizing and flagging harmful or abusive comments using machine learning.
- The tool provides a toxicity score which allows journalists to block or mute comments at scale without having to review the content. It also allows users to create reports with any harmful comments and accounts identified in the process. These can be stored or shared with third parties as needed.
- It was designed with the help of Jigsaw, a Google unit whose mission is to provide scalable solutions to threats facing open societies.
Zanji Sinkala, an investigative journalist who works for Transparency International Zambia, spoke about her experience dealing with online abuse.
“It really takes a mental toll,” she said. “The supporters of the people that you expose attack you. That's what happened to me. Many people basically started attacking me online claiming that I sleep with my editors so that I can get good stories.”
Conversation hosted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation at Twitter Spaces.
- There are other tools that can help protect you. Research the type of security software that you are looking for. They should not be free, and the company should be based in a jurisdiction with good privacy laws. And read the fine print to see what logs they keep of a customer's online activity.
Deleteme
- This service helps remove personal information from publicly available database websites that gather information from public records. It automatically logs opt-out requests with aggregator services that collect personal information. It works mainly in the United States, but has a beta product available in other countries, so check for your location https://joindeleteme.com/
Hardware
- Use full disc encryption. There are many kinds available.
- Use air-gapped laptops which will not log on to unsecured networks.
Password Managers
- Again, there are many types available. Check what logs they keep of your online activity.
On The Road
- When traveling, there are many more points of vulnerability in your set-up, as you may have to connect with wifi networks and charging points that are out of your control.
Top Tips
- Power down computers and phones before going through airport security or immigration.
- Don’t use USB phone-charging stations in public places, use electrical power points.
- Don’t connect to unsecured, non-password-protected wifi hotspots.
- Use encrypted USB drives such as IronKey
- Disable fingerprint locks or Face ID for the trip.
- Disable Siri, Alexa or other digital voice assistants.
- Delete any potentially sensitive apps on your phone.
- Clear your Internet caches.
- Switch off wi-fi and Bluetooth on your phone when you are moving around.
- You are at a demonstration in an authoritarian country. Your phone battery is dying so it is OK for you plug into a USB charging hub, because the priority is to get your story out.The USB hub could be used as a surveillance tool to collect data. Use an electric charger, or carry your own portable one.
- Your friends all leave their laptop webcams open because they often livestream themselves to increase their social media reach. You resist the temptation, worrying that it might compromise you. You should keep your camera closed.Your computer webcam can be hacked, giving away a lot about your movement and activities. Put tape or a purpose-designed sliding plastic cover over it.
- There's no reason to be concerned about mixing personal information with your journalism on your social media. It lets your readers know who you really are and protects you by boosting your profile internationally.
- Aggregator services vacuum up a lot of personal data about you that may
be used by hostile entities to track you or compromise you and your
family.
- Telephone: If the complaint is made by telephone,
you should note down all the essential details: the date, the name,
title, company and contact details of the caller. You should also assume
the conversation is being recorded at the other end. And record it
yourself if that is legal.
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