Category: Technology

Review: Storify iPad app

Earlier this morning, Storify announced that they were releasing a free iPad app. I’ve downloaded it, and these are my first impressions.

The app works in landscape mode only. Getting to the login screen means typing in your username and password – slightly confusing for me because I’ve always logged in via twitter since the beta version. Having tried all the possible iterations of my twitter password I then had to do a password reset to my email in order to get in – this might just be me being forgetful, but those of you who’ve associated your twitter account with Storify may also hit this problem.

Anyway once you’re in you get access to all your Storify stories in a nice gallery view. You can edit them all from here, but I thought I’d create a short story just for this review.

The page for composing your story is similar enough, with the familiar tabs of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Flickr and browser links available for you to run searches in.

The only difference between the desktop version is that there isn’t a tab for Google content, which normally pulls out web searches, news and images. I never use that tab, but worth bearing in mind.

Once you tap on any of these, it’s very much like the desktop version. You can filter tweets by user, search and images, and the drag and drop interface makes it really easy to quickly create the story. Interestingly the iPad app also has one feature that the desktop version doesn’t – the ability to tweet from your own account while inside the app.

Pulling content from Flickr and YouTube is similarly pain-free, once you’ve run a search just pick up a piece of content by tapping and holding and then moving it over to the desired area on your story.

I can see the iPad app being incredibly useful for a couple of reasons.

The first obvious one is conference use. iPads are already ubiquitous at conferences – they’re better for tweeting and note taking than a smartphone without being as cumbersome as a laptop.

But because the iPad app’s drag and drop interface is so intuitive, you’d easily be able to collect together content in the break between a conference session. I’ve already written a few blog posts entirely in Storify, and I think this will only increase that trend.

The second obvious use is news coverage combined with mobile journalism. If you’re out and about covering an event with your smartphone – taking photos, video, livetweeting, it’s now really easy to just sling an iPad in your bag for some post-event curation in a nearby coffee shop. Again, getting rid of that laptop.

Once you’ve finished your story, you’re presented with the publish screen which thankfully has all the functionality of the desktop app – publishing to Facebook and Twitter, and the ability to @ reply anyone who’s been quoted in your story.

Maybe the announcement wasn’t as big as some people were expecting. It wasn’t an acquisition like some were predicting, but the Storify iPad app stands on its own two feet.

It has a few bugs (it crashed several times when swiping between stories) but that’s to be expected from an app that’s just been released.

In the long run this’ll mean only good things for Storify – capturing a particularly savvy audience of content creators while they’re on the move and giving people yet another reason to ditch their laptops in favour of an iPad when they’re covering events.

Here’s my finished story that I made on my iPad in about 5 minutes:

 

Sky News’ Social Media Policy – It’s not archaic, it’s just a new approach

By now you’re all likely to be aware of Sky News making significant changes to their employees’ social media usage via an email to staff last Tuesday.

In this week’s Media Mouthwash podcast I called the policy “anti-web”, but I’ve deliberately left it this long before writing something about it because I think it’s a much more nuanced issue than some dissenting voices have made out.

Don’t tweet when it’s someone else’s story

This is probably the most galling aspect of the policy. If an employee isn’t particularly social media-savvy, then there’s no harm in another journalist using Twitter and other networks to promote and share their content in a way that means it’ll get maximum exposure.

If I was the only person sharing my own work around Twitter, then it’d get very limited traction, and there’s no harm in staff helping get extra eyeballs onto a colleague’s piece.

Always pass breaking news lines to the news desk before posting them on social media networks

There is fundementally nothing wrong with this. If we’re acknowledging that Twitter is a medium like any other, and one that should sit alongside videos, blogs and audio reports amongst Sky News’ output, then it makes sense that it should be properly integrated with the news desk.

Communication with the desk is essential in order to make the news operation an efficient one. I don’t have a lot of experience with them, but I can’t imagine the vast majority of news editors being too happy with a journalist breaking a story on Twitter and then strolling over and telling the desk about it a few minutes later.

Breaking news without context on Twitter holds little or no value for the journalist or his/her audience in itself. The value comes from using Twitter as the start of a narrative.

When I was covering the bomb blasts and shootings in Oslo, I started by using Storify to collect information and photos about events in the city centre. Then when people became aware of the shootings, I moved to turning my Twitter feed into one dedicated to covering new developments.

My follower count didn’t rise because I was constantly breaking new information on Twitter, but because I was able to organise it more efficiently into an understandable narrative than others covering it at the time. I didn’t retweet everything I saw, I thought carefully about how people following me would be able to easily understand what was happening.

Breaking news in itself holds little value – were my parents really any the worse for getting the full picture of the London riots on Newsnight rather than watching it unfold in real time on Twitter?

Passing lines to the news desk before tweeting makes good sense in a large organisation because the news desk is the hub that controls their coverage. They can distribute information to correspondents, multimedia specialists and graphics teams.

The ego of a single journalist itching to grab a bit of social media limelight should be able to bow to the collective nature of a news operation in order to strengthen its overall coverage. As Martin Belam notes, “being first really mattered when your rivals had a 24 hour print cycle before they could catch up”.

If anything, this shows that Sky would like to step away from the “never wrong for long” tag that indicates they’re happy to be wrong as long as they correct themselves quickly.

The BBC are rarely quicker than Sky when it comes to breaking news, but hold far more trust because they seem to pride context and verification much more. Is it a bad thing that Sky want to move toward this model more? I don’t think so.

Do not retweet information posted by other journalists or people on Twitter.

This is slightly more problematic, but I wouldn’t go as far as saying that it’s removing the social from social media. As a Sky News employee, I certainly wouldn’t have been able to cover Oslo or the riots in the way that I did if I’d adhered to this rule.

However, if you look at the social media usage of many journalists, they primarily use it as a promotional, rather than as a news gathering tool. Sky News’ new social media policy does not stop journalists from seeking out sources on Twitter, or finding photos that can be later added to strengthen news coverage. There are lots of journalists with big followings on Twitter, but only a fraction of them seem to use social media to actually dig things out and add another aspect to traditional sources.

If anything, the whole debate seems to be a microcosm of the divide that often seeks to engulf any rational discussion about online journalism. That is, if you don’t agree entirely with the popular view of mainstream media persistently “not getting it”, then you’re old news, you’re irrelevant, or Victorian.

I think it’s important to understand that there are many shades of grey – what works for Sky News wouldn’t work for Tech Crunch and vice versa. This policy is neither surprising nor as draconian as some commentators have implied – what’s more interesting will be observing if it becomes indicative of Sky News’ shift to a markedly different kind of news provider.

Review: The Guardian iPad app

So a few days ago I blogged about the initial reaction to the Guardian’s iPad app when they announced it on Monday. Yesterday it finally hit the app store, and after several hours of stress-inducing load times, I’d upgraded my iPad to iOS 5 which meant that I could download the app.

The app features on Newsstand, Apple’s new system whereby you can see all your magazine and newspaper subscriptions in one place. So far mine is rather sparsely populated with the New Yorker and the Guardian, but it’s nice to know that there’s a dedicated place for my more long form reading.

I think that’s also the key here – it doesn’t make sense for me to put the New Yorker in the same “news” folder as Huff Post, Sky News and Flipboard – it’s a different reading experience, and so is the Guardian.

Anyway once you open up the app you’re given a free trial – mine doesn’t expire until 13 January next year, which gives you more than enough time to work out whether you like it or not and are likely to stump up the £9.99 monthly subscription fee.

It’s an issue based app, which has drawn some criticism, owing to the somewhat static nature of the app. However, I’m inclined to think that it’s a shrewd move by the Guardian, and one which shows that they’re very savvy when it comes to working across multiple platforms. Martin Belam also hinted at integrating story updates in a comment on my post earlier this week.

Data shows that the majority of tablet use is in front of a television or in bed – things that happen primarily in the evening after a day of work. This echoed Alan Rusbridger’s sentiment when he spoke about the Guardian’s printed output, saying that he viewed it as more Newsnight than News at Ten. So why not continue that kind of thinking with the iPad?

I’m on board with the concept behind the iPad app, because I think it epitomises Martin Belam‘s idea of stopping the shovels, but what about the functionality of the app itself?

Well, on starting up you’re presented with a crisply designed homescreen that provides a quick look at all the sections. You can scroll through the top bar independently to skip to a specific section, or browse down the front page if you’re after a more general read.

On opening the comment section, the app presents you with a few commentators’ mugshots as well as the cartoon of the day. To my eye, it’s far more attractive than the web version of Comment is Free, and feels right on an iPad. Tapping on a header takes you into the article, which is again a clean and uncluttered affair that screams “long read” at you.

Amazon’s Kindle is often the favoured device for voracious readers, but if executed well iPad apps can hold their own. From the article page you can share via email, Facebook and Twitter, taking advantage of the new iOS 5 functionality.

Cycling through the various sections of the app, you get the sense that each one has been tailored for its content. The Arts page, for example, is very strong on visuals with some arresting images, while others are more pared down.

Overall the app is a joy to use- and that’s what you want from a news app, something that compels you to pick it up each evening because you know the content is going to be presented elegantly and with attention to detail.

If I had one quibble it would be that in order to access the video section of the Guardian you have to visit the “on the website” category, which redirects to guardian.co.uk. It’s a shame that the iPad’s functionality as a mobile video viewer hasn’t been taken advantage of, but that’s a minor issue.

In fact, I’d go as far as to say that the app could be one of those hallowed few that become strongly associated with the device itself. Simply put, it should make you want to buy an iPad after using it. So give it a go, and let me know what you think.

UPDATE: Some discussion on Twitter this weekend revealed that at the moment the Guardian have decided not to include their weekend edition or the Observer in the app.

I was made aware of this by Patrick Smith, who opined that the Times app launched in May 2010 with all its sections. He was swiftly corrected, but the point remains that it feels a bit lacklustre that the Guardian haven’t included weekend editions from the outset – it would follow with the more contemplative attitude of the app which is suited to weekend reading.

However, as emphasised in another post, they are waiting to see how readers use the app before adding upgrades and changes.