1.
Strategic communication,
news media and influence
NATO March 2017
Prof. Charlie Beckett
Dept of Media and Communications,
LSE
@CharlieBeckett

2.
Three things you needed to know today?

3.
Three things I needed to know today?
“Is my flight home to London going to be on
time?”

4.
Three things I needed to know today?
“Is Andy Carroll going to be fit to play against
Chelsea tonight?”

5.
Three things I needed to know today?
“What’s the latest in German politics – especially
Shulz v Merkel?”

6.
• What’s the latest in German politics – especially Shulz v Merkel

7.
News is now networked and blended into
information ecology
• Mixed market of publishers (legacy, native, amateur, corporate etc)
• More, varied platforms (TV, radio, print, SM, Internet)
• On demand and personalised
• Direct communication (disintermediation)
• Online and mobile
• Different formats: video, data visualisations, alerts
• User at the centre
• Narrative control and influence now ‘distributed’

8.
Reuters digital report

9.
Mixed media ecology: legacy, native & social

10.
Blended, personal, emotional

11.
Echo chambers/filter bubbles/polarisation

12.
Tow Center, Columbia University
October 2016

13.
Terror events – example of changes
• Faster: the information spreads instantly, comment is instantaneous
• Bigger: more people know, includes live video, images, audio and
graphics
• More diverse - direct sources – including terrorists, politicians, law
enforcement, intelligence
• Verification problems – deliberate fake news, propaganda, mistaken
sharing, misinformation, mistakes, prejudice

14.
Fake news

15.
"Fake” News

16.
Propaganda war

17.
Relativism – everything is fake

18.
NATO – not US opposition but indifference?

19.
Survival kit for truth

20.
Journalists
• Connect - be accessible and present on all platforms
• Curate – help users to good content where ever it is
• Be relevant – use users’ language and listen creatively with data
• Be expert – add value, insight, experience, context
• Be truthful – fact checking, balance, accuracy
• Be human - show empathy, diversity, constructive
• Transparency – show sources, be accountable, allow criticism

21.
Networks
• Filter out fake news better
• Give the user better signals of the quality of content
• Promote better content through algorithms
• Promote news literacy

22.
Authorities
• Communicate where the public communicate
• Talk the right languages: conversational, human, even humourous
• Be relevant
• Open up
• Interactive
• Be realistic – media has limited influence

23.
Specific organic solutions

24.
Strategic solutions

25.
Citizens
• News literacy
• Media empowerment - creativity
• Information citizenship
• Informational rights
• Etiquette

26.
Remember the good about digital
• People love it
• You can’t reverse it (though it can become more closed, captured)
• It challenges power and complacency
• ‘democratises’
• Promotes hidden voices and ideas
• Greater diversity
• It can mean better quality content made more accessible

27.
Thank you. Keep in touch
Professor Charlie Beckett
Director, Polis, LSE
Department of Media and Communications, LSE
Email c.h.beckett@lse.ac.uk
Polis blog: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/polis/category/director/
Twitter @CharlieBeckett
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