3 / Journalism revolutions, Paraguayan visuals and Yemen casualty mapping
"We are in an era of extreme creativity. We need to match that in news," Ros Atkins.
Dear reader,
The Reuters Institute recently discussed the future of journalism with with Ros Atkins in an insightful interview that I recommend to anyone interested in the field. Here are a few highlights.
When I look at the need to innovate, to reimagine, to restructure what we do, it’s not because change is fun and creative and exciting – though it can be all of those things. For me this is a necessity. If you believe in the importance of journalism to our society, then actively engaging in what we need to become isn’t optional.
Digital isn’t only a distribution revolution – it’s a story-telling revolution too. Look around at how people are sharing their stories and talking about their passions – it often doesn’t look anything like news as we know it. From TikTok videos to gaming livestreams to comedy shorts on YouTube to threads on Twitter to podcasts. We are in an era of extreme creativity – we need to match that in news.
Investigative Spotlight
This month I want to spotlight our own work. We recently published The Yemen Tribute, a visual investigation that documents Yemeni history and civilian war casualties using an interactive map to plot a year of open-source investigative research by Hassan Saffiedine.
We’re currently in talks with the Yemen Foundation for the project to be used as a part of their coalition campaign to end the war.
Visual Spotlight
I’m actively seeking visual publications around the world, so this week we’ll be travelling to Paraguay.
In another interview with El Surtidor’s co-founder and editor-in-chief, Jazmín Acuña, the Institute focuses on learnings and business possibilities in visual journalism.
From the very beginning, El Surti’s team decided not to pursue advertising. Right now around 50% of their revenue comes from grants and a sizable part of the remaining 50% comes from selling services. “We have learned that our skills in visual journalism could be in high demand. So we're now trying to market this expertise”.
I highly recommend trying some of their animated scroll stories, this example on deforestation reads like an illustrated novel.
Under-reported news
Southern Madagascar has been hammered by two years of drought that has left 1.5 million people – half the region’s population – facing extreme hunger. You can read the peace
Children are particularly at risk. An estimated 500,000 children under the age of five are suffering acute malnutrition, and 110,000 of them are severely malnourished, according to UNICEF.
Obsessions
Procedural storytelling will change how we craft stories
The arrival of transparent videos
An escape game made with real-life images of a ghost town
ARTE and Iko partnered to produce Inua, a game that plays like a story
Updates
The Kashmir interactive documentary is planned for release mid-July and will be called Lines of Control, we’re currently in post-production.
We’ve planned a Buried Signals V2 launch in August. The new updates will transform the project to be much more community-oriented with more regular content and insights.
Yours,
Tom
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