My presentation during the introductory session of Social Media for Journalists training in Biratnagar, Kathmandu, Pokhara, Dhangadhi and Nepalgunj in October/November 2012 organized by Equal Access Nepal and funded by UNDP.

1. SOCIAL MEDIA
for journalists
@UjjwalAcharya

2. Plan Today
• Talk about social media & it’s importance
for journalism and journalists
• Discuss Facebook & Twitter as important
platforms of social media for journalists
• Talk on online journalism & web writing
• Discuss use of social media in journalism
• Try doing everything that seems working

3. Social Media

4. Social Media
• All tools on Internet enabling people to
connect to each other by sharing info.
• Communication used to be linear; then
non-linear but now with social media,
communication is circular.
• On social media, everyone is everyone
– creator, the distributor, the audience,
the commentator and the mediator.

5. New Info Order
• People are increasingly decreasing habits
to search information actively.
• Information finds audience.
• Social media is fast becoming first source
of information of many people.
• However, people still trust the information
they receive via mainstream media.

6. Example 1

7. Example 2

8. Example 3

9. Example 4

10. Journalism
Journalism
is not about print and ink,
its all about
NEWS.

11. Why online?
 Unlimited space
 Unlike traditional media, online media do
not have space/time restraint
 Global Distribution
 Global reach is basic feature of online
media

12.  Convergence
 Multimedia
 Storage & retrieval
 Permanent / easily searchable
 And, most importantly, immediacy

13. Weaknesses
 Mushroom
 News sites, journalists and
news/opinion
 Lack of Credibility
 It’s not easy to distinguish between
good and bad news site

14. Weaknesses
 Ethical Questions
 Privacy, accuracy vs speed,
copyright and advertising
 Digital Divide
 The gap between haves and have-
nots

15. Changes
 Interactivity: Increased ability of the
public to actively interact online
 Increased public access to forms of
media; access to big diversity of content
 Reduced ‘gatekeeping’ powers of major
news organizations in agenda setting
 New and powerful story-telling methods
through multimedia technology

16. Power shift

17. SOCIAL MEDIA FOR JOURNALISTS

18. Usages
1. Seek ideas & information
2. Cultivate source
3. Verify information
4. Publish / distribute news
5. Promote write ups
6. Get feedback / measure popularity

19. Ideas / Info
• Get the ideas for news
• Get the information
• Crowd Source
• Watch updates of related
people

20. Cultivate sources
• Try to find people
knowledgeable in your beats
• Follow / befriend them
• Connect with them
• Comments / likes / retweets
• Ask them

21. Verify info
• Every info needs to be verified
• See updates of related people for
indication to verification of
information
• If can’t ask openly –use direct
messages, emails and chats
• Important: begin with taking any
information online as fake

22. Publish / Distribute
• Publish all your stories online
• Distribute your content through social
media with a teaser online and a link
• Use all channels possible

23. Promote
• Promote your stories
• Create questions
• Engage in conversation
• Share / retweets good stories from
other than your sources
• Don’t share everything, share select

24. Feedback
• Ask for feedback
• Engage in conversation
• Measure popularity by likes /
comments and shares

25. Tips
Facebook
• Share one story every 3 to 4 hours
• Write compelling teasers, not just link
• Do not flood with updates
Twitter
• Share as many as you like
• Write short / sweet introduction

26. Thank you!
Now let’s try all those things!
LETS TRY