There’s no end in sight to the turmoil in the UK’s newspaper industry, but, at the same time, a movement of independent, self-funded news start-ups is gathering pace. Talk About Local (TAL), the 4iP-funded local news project on Saturday convened an “unconference” in Stoke-on-Trent, where the publishers of more than 50 hyperlocal sites discussed how best to serve localities with relevant news and information.
Is this finally the formation of the “Hyperlocal Alliance” as called for by Talk About Local founder William Perrin… ?
As we wrote earlier this year, pro-amateur local news enthusiasts need to cooperate, pool resources and knowledge. Judging by the videos, blog posts and tweets flowing from the event (even Northcliffe’s Stoke Sentinel took notice) it seems the answer could very well be yes.
As the founder of Mysociety, Tom Steinberg, put it at the event in this video (videos via David Wilcox aka socialreporter): “What you are looking at here is the future of local news…”
And here is one of the everyday people doing it: Annette Albert, who runs the W14 & SW6 Ning-based site covering Fulham in west London, talks about the site’s progress. As Perrin puts it, the people behind many of these sites are not necessarily young, web-savvy, digital media natives…
Perrin told me before the event: “It’s a very exciting time and there is a wonderful, boundless optimism, which is in sharp contrast to the traditional media. We are seeing people being driven only by a desire to make their communities better.” Perrin says many are happy to simply cover their costs and perhaps make a small profit — but he adds that some sites already are bringing in “substantial” advertising revenue.
It would help if local bloggers could form content relationships with established newspaper and online publishers — but Perrin points out that, despite local projects from the likes of Trinity Mirror and DMGT, the traditional media attitude tends to see local bloggers as competition. “They are pretty sharp-elbowed people and often they just want these site out of the way,” says Perrin though he stresses this isn’t the case for every organisation; professional publishing groups including Guardian News & Media were at Saturday’s event.
Perrin adds that DMGT’s Local People network is an interesting project, one that could be a “UK version of Ning”; Associated Northcliffe’s Roland Bryan told me last month that the project is now looking for ways to work with local, grassroots correspondents and sites. A bigger problem is publishers stealing sites’ content: “Every local website I speak to without exception has had a local problem with plagiarism — it’s disgraceful,” says Perrin.
The government’s director of digital engagement Andrew Stott made an appearance to tell delegates they can use official government data. His digital engagement team recently called on developers to go to town on 1,000 newly released government datasets.
If I were one of the big regional newspaper companies I'd be very very keen to hook up with local bloggers….
The fact that they treat them in a high handed way shows much about why they are disconnected from the public.
The greater the disconnection the more difficult it is to understand the new social dynamics..