Short introduction to why social media matters - especially for journalists.

1. Social media for journalists
Mikael Hindsberg, concept developer at svenska.yle.fi
@mickhinds | mikael.hindsberg@yle.fi
4.10.2012

2. Social media for a public service
broadcasting company
• Our web  to serve the public
• On the web in general  to serve the
community
• In Finland  to serve society
• Transparancy and openness objectivity
• Interaction  from sewer to respect
• Helping the public  Case Iceland’s ashcloud
• Yle’s social media policy (in Swedish):
• http://yle.fi/yleisradio/om-yle/yle-ar-till-publiken/verksamhetsprinciper/riktlinjer-yles-och-
ylemedarbetares-verksamhet-i-sociala

3. Characteristics of the web
• The web is real time – don’t tease
about coming stuff, deliver straight
away!
• The web is fast and to the point - kill
your darlings
• The web is multimedial
• The web is interactive – collaborate!
• The web is mobile and fragmented

4. Social media matter!!!
• Arab spring
• Occupy wall street
• We are the 99% http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com/
• Bridges of Mexico (!)
• Lady Gaga, Justin Beiber, Katy
Perry, Rihanna and Britney Spears
http://twittercounter.com/pages/100
• Cyberactivism vs. Cyberhedonism
• Google as a geopolitical actor in the
case of the anti-muslim video (!)

5. 10 uses for social media in
journalism
• Based on the
excellent blog post:
• 10 Ways Twitter is
useful for journalist
• http://stevebuttry.word
press.com/2012/08/2
7/10-ways-twitter-is-
valuable-to-
journalists/
• Read it!

6. 1. Breaking News
• Tsunamis:
Indian Ocean 26 Dec 2004 vs. Japan 11 March
2011
• Sumatra – communication by SMS from Thailand to
Finland
• Japan – a ’tsunami’ on Twitter
•  #japan #tsunami #earthquake #quake #tokyo
#fukushima
• Find a few, follow, contact

7. 2. Follow people & org’s
• Google’s Eric Schmidt: historical time  2003 = today 
2014
• An endless stream of information  noise
• There is no such thing as information overload. Only bad
filtering.
• Based on quote by Clay Shirky: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LabqeJEOQyI
• Problems: relevance, accessability, preservability
• Information strategies:
• - prenumeration
• - recommendation
• - automated aggregation  Flipboard, Zite, Prismatic
• - Curation
 Charles Dicken’s Pickwick Club: read about ”Chinese
metaphysics” in the Encyclopedia Brittanica

8. 3. Crowdsourcing
• @NikuHooli & @AnttiHirvonen – Yle Suora
Linja, an interactive news cast
• Work with the public

9. 4. Find sources

10. 5. Gather community quotes
 Curate!
• ” News curators must collect, summarize, make sense, add
value, attribute, link, intrigue and entice.” Steve Buttry
http://stevebuttry.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/curation-techniques-types-and-tips/
• Yle just nu – Yle right now  http://svenska.yle.fi
• We are the information hub for our audience!
• Reading the riots  http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/series/reading-the-riots
• Excellent survey of what really happend!
• Borderline between academic and journalistic repporting
(Farida Vis)

11. 6. Story ideas
• Uppkopplad =
online
• Fast look on Twitter,
Zite and/or Google
Reader and there’s
a front page! 
• What’s todays
talk?

12. 7. Save time
• Social media can be a time thief
• It can be an extra gig
• But it’s up to you!
• It’s a tool – we use tools
to accomplish tasks,
that takes time
• It’s a new tool, bosses
haven’t allocated sufficient resources to it
• But it works – for you!
• Case: Looking for a young abused female

13. 8. Distribute content
• Beware careful using
social media as a
distribution channel
• Works well for some
content, not so well for
other
• Broadcast is NOT social
• But – the established
news media DO set the
agenda on SoMe!

14. 9. Continue the
conversation
• Follow up, listen to the audience
• Media convergence
• Social TV  Case: Obs.

15. 10. Interaction & brand managment
• Interact on equal terms
• Respond to criticism
• Market & manage your
brand
• Case:
• Nestlé
• Audi Finland
• Tate Modern

16. Personal vs. private
• Who are you?
• How do the audience see you?
• Does a personal touch endanger credibility?
• Personal vs. private accounts
• Does it all matter?

17. From products to processes!
• Believe in your content
• Work with your content, not with your media
• Think about how you can package your content
through your work process
• The same content can have different functions, for
different audiences, on different moments in time
 Don’t kill yourself with work! Maximize
your work effort in the channels available for
you!

18. The future is already here — it's
just not very evenly distributed.
- William Gibson -

19. Thank you! Questions?
Mikael ’Micke’ Hindsberg
twitter.com/mickhinds
mikael.hindsberg@yle.fi
http://svenska.yle.fi
www.slideshare.net/mickhinds