Unlocking the secrets of open data journalism in Manchester

As more and more public bodies free their data to the public, and with interpretation of that data set to be increasingly important in journalism, it was only a matter of time before someone had the idea of bringing journalists and computer geeks together to learn from each other how best to crunch the data.

Over in the US, the Hacks and Hackers Hack Days have been established a little while and they recently held one in London. Here in the UK, the people at Scraperwiki have been building tools to help people clean up raw data before working it to produce the meaningful stories nestling within. I attended the News Rewired event in London in June – Scraperwiki were there too but with such a packed scheduled I had no chance to attend one of their mini intro sessions.

So when I heard that Scraperwiki was busy organising Hacks and Hackers Hack Days in the UK, I was very excited. More so when I heard they planned to hold one in Manchester. It would save me travelling to either Liverpool or Birmingham. But more importantly, it was an opportunity for my publication – Inside the M60 – to show that the new breed of digital journalists are more than willing to support such important collaborative ventures.

I’ll be the first to admit that my numeracy is patchy. From years of working in the arena of finance and banking I can spot flaws in a profit and loss account at 50 paces and tell when percentage changes don’t match the actual figures. But I’m hopeless with spreadsheets. I don’t know how to deal with data, but I’m very keen to learn as I can see plenty of opportunities for Inside the M60 to uncover important stories lurking inside Manchester’s own data sets.

This is why I and my colleague Nigel Barlow have been very busy behind the scenes, working with Scraperwiki for nearly two months to help make the Manchester Hacks and Hackers Hack Day a success.

Tickets go on sale today, for a special workshop on 15 October, with an equal number of places available for journalists/bloggers and coders/hackers. What’s going to happen? We’ll be working in small groups, learning from each other to produce stories from data and present some small projects at the end of the session to show what can be done. The previous sessions were a great success so we’ll be aiming to equal that here in Manchester.

Lots of exciting things are already happening in Manchester with data – the Open Data Manchester group persuaded GMPTE to release data sets on public transport recently and a number of interesting projects have already emerged, including phone apps of local bus timetables. Manchester’s thriving digital community will ensure that much more will happen, we local journalists just need to start working with them.

So, if you’re a coder or a journalist, do sign up – it promises to be a really useful and fun day.

And you know what? Even before this event got off the ground, news emerged that some of Preston’s enterprising journalism students and hyperlocal bloggers are already planning to form a hacks and hackers group that will meet regularly in Manchester to further whatever comes out of the workshop day on 15 October.

We are still looking for some sponsorship, so if you can support this valuable project do please get in touch! We are also still looking for someone to come and film the workshop for posterity.

If you can’t make the event, follow us on Twitter on the day. The hashtag will be #hhhmcr.

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The BBC rolled out its new-look BBC News website redesign today amid much fanfare. It’s attracted a lot of comment, not just on the site itself but also across the media-reporting media. Taking out all the “if it ain’t broke, why fix it” remarks, of which there were very many, there still seemed to be an overwhelming thumbs down for the use of white space, the disliked Helvetica Neue typeface and problems with display and rendering in various browsers.

Steve Herrman, the editor of BBC News Online, gave a lengthy explanation to readers of all the changes brought in by the redesign but you have to dig a bit deeper to discover why the new look news service will be completely unusable for many people.

The old version of BBC News offered a low-graphics option to readers – this was not only ideal for users still using dial-up or accessing the site with a mobile phone, it was also perfect for people with visual impairments. The simple format meant it could be easily read not just by people living with near blindness but also those with other visual problems such as dyslexia.

Not any more.

To find out why, you have to follow a link in Herrman’s editorial to the FAQs on the redesign. The fifth question explains why the low-graphics version was turned off in April:

The low-graphics version was designed as a low-bandwidth alternative to the full website at a time when most users of the site were using slow dial-up connections. We are now making improvements to the site which will meet most of the needs of the people who used the low-graphics version.

Fair enough, for the most part. But the next FAQ reveals that disabled people with visual impairments have been excluded from the accessibility of the new site:

How will you ensure the site is still user-friendly for those with disabilities?

We know that people used the low-graphics version because it was simpler to read and we now offer the mobile version of the site online which provides a similarly simplified presentation.

We are also expecting to roll out a suite of accessibility tools this year. These are designed to provide much better support to a range of users – especially those with lo-vision, asperger syndrome, dyslexia, ADHD, or those who find text hard to read. For those who have been using low graphics as a more accessible version, these new tools will provide a much better service.

You can find out more about it on the Ouch! website.

Quite simply, the BBC is saying “tough” if you can’t read the site anymore, you’ll just have to wait until we fix it. There’s no mention of any deadline they are aiming for to roll out accessibility tools for the visually impaired and they seem to have forgotten that many of those now excluded will have at least as much trouble reading the site on a mobile device. They also seem to have forgotten that disabled users of the BBC are licence-fee payers and just as entitled to full access to our public-service broadcaster as all other licence-fee payers.

What I find really shocking is that accessibility was not built into the redesign from the beginning. There are globally agreed standards – WCAG 2.0 – for website accessibility that cover a huge range of issues such as “blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, learning disabilities, cognitive limitations, limited movement, speech disabilities, photosensitivity and combinations of these” (source: WCAG 2.0). The standards enable disabled users to render web pages in their browser according to need, allowing for text size adjustment, customisation of contrast and so on.

The WCAG standards have been around for a long time, which rather begs the question why the BBC hasn’t applied them this time – it’s not as if they hadn’t heard of them, given they have used them in previous versions of BBC News Online.

The Disability Discrimination Act requires all businesses and services to make “reasonable adjustments” for disabled people. That’s absolutely fine when it comes to figuring out how to build a ramp for a shop that is sited in a listed building, for example. But there’s no excuse when it comes to building something from scratch. It’s sad that many companies building new premises still don’t consider physical access issues when drawing up architect plans.

It’s even sadder in a virtual environment where the rules are clear and straightforward, especially when you consider the virtual environment is one where disabled people often find it far easier to participate fully in society than they do in the built environment. And when it’s a publicly funded service that is doing the excluding, it makes me want to weep with frustration.

The BBC didn’t need to make “reasonable adjustments” – they could have been incorporated from the start. It has breached the Disability Discrimination Act in a two-fingered gesture to a significant minority of its licence-fee payers. And it expects them to just wait it out until its web team gets round to making the necessary tweaks to provide full disabled access to our national news service.

Shame on you, Aunty.

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Tuesday’s Budget contained the not-entirely-unexpected announcement of cuts to benefits. There was a general expectation that Incapacity Benefit (IB) and its new incarnation, Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), both of which are claimed by many disabled people, would be targeted. IB is frequently in the news for its renown as a benefit that is relatively easy to make a fraudulent claim for and there has been much governmental chatter over the last couple of years about getting people off IB and back into work. So it was a surprise to hear that Disability Living Allowance (DLA) was to be targeted.

I’m not going to cover the issues around the last government’s proposed “fitness to work” scheme, which was to be aimed at IB claimants. Much has already been written about the problems with the proposed medicals, for example.

DLA, though, is non-means-tested and can be claimed by disabled people who work, as well as those who don’t. It’s a benefit that recognises that disabled people have higher living costs just because they are disabled and is meant to help counterbalance that. Indeed, many people with disabilities find their living costs rise when they work simply because when they get home they may be more tired to deal with household chores and so they need to buy in additional help. DLA, paltry as it is, helps disabled people maintain independence, freeing up council care services and residential services for those who really need them. It’s also really difficult to claim.

The Arbitrary Constant blog by Rich Watts (who is the director of the Essex Coalition of Disabled People) has made some excellent points about the motives behind the government’s decision to target DLA claimants, while Bendy Girl, on her brilliant disability blog, Benefit Scrounging Scum, has pointed to some interesting figures about benefit fraud that show DLA is the least likely benefit to be claimed by those intent on defrauding the welfare system.

But enough of the stats and the speculation. I’ve spent much of the last 48 hours wondering how I personally will be affected and I’ve concluded that I may be forced to give up work.

As a worker with a disability, I generate wealth for the state in the form of the taxes and national insurance I pay. I put vastly more into the pot every month than I take out in DLA. And I’m self-employed so I sometimes end up paying national insurance twice over (for example, if a client puts me on their PAYE scheme temporarily), which I can’t claim back so the state does quite well out of me. If my DLA is withdrawn, the effect on my ability to earn and stay independent would be catastrophic for me.

Here’s how.

It’s hard to quantify but about a year ago I worked out that my monthly cab spend is £250-300. Some of that obviously is personal travel, such as getting home safely in the evening after going out with friends, but I often work evenings attending events, even if I’m just there to network and make contacts. On those nights I still need to get a cab home because my walk home from the bus stop at night is lengthier and less safe than the walk I’d take in daylight.

In the daytime, I’m out and about almost every day for at least some of the time in my job as a freelance journalist. I use my concessionary bus pass as much as possible (which also means I can use the trams and local trains in Greater Manchester for nothing) but I still have to pay before 9.30am, which is quite often. And the public transport routes in Manchester are largely designed to get people in and out of the centre from afar – getting *around* from neighbourhood to neighbourhood is a lot more complicated. So often it’s simply quicker and easier for me to use taxis.

Some examples. A couple of evenings ago, I attended a meeting in Hulme, about 3 miles from my home. It took 3 buses and an hour to get there and I still had to walk half a mile. The cab home at 11pm was a tenner. The week before, I went to the police authority AGM, right on the other side of Manchester. That took a bus and two trains to get there, all of which I had to pay for as it was pre-9.30am. It took 75 minutes. By car, I could have done it in 20-25 minutes but I’m not allowed to drive. It took me more than 90 minutes to get home again. That was nearly 3 hours of travelling for 20 minutes of GMPA meeting. By car, I’d have spent less than an hour travelling.

To look at it another way, I spent an extra almost two hours travelling that I could have spent earning money like any other freelance able-bodied person. I have calculated that I lose 5-8 hours a week every week in extra travel time – that’s the loss of a commercial day rate that’s roughly double my monthly DLA. That’s also 5-8 hours of earnings I would have paid taxes on too, so the state also loses out in a way, but not as much as I do.

DLA is basically a recognition that being disabled carries extra costs just to put you on a par with the able-bodied, as I have shown. I have to plan every trip I make with military precision and choose whether I can wing it by bus or order a minicab. I wish I could just jump in a car and go but I’m not allowed to hold a driving licence because I have epilepsy.

I live alone. When I lived with my former partner, I had care on tap. Just over half my monthly DLA is awarded for personal care assistance but I can’t actually afford to buy in care on a daily basis on the amount I receive for it. Even something as simple as cooking a meal on the hob is a risk that I take daily. The rest of my DLA is for lower-rate mobility costs. In practice I spend pretty much all my DLA on taxis so I can get around and actually work. The terms of DLA allow me to do this.

So what would happen if I failed the proposed medical test in 2013? Tuesday’s Budget statement said DLA would be targeted at those in most medical need, in an effort to slash the benefits bill. By most standards, I’m not severely disabled because my seizures are fairly infrequent. But I pass all the current critical tests for DLA because my seizures come with no warning and I’m at constant risk of injury as a result. That amount of risk doesn’t change according to how often I have a fit. It’s always the same.

If the bar is raised so DLA is only targeted at those the government considers to be in most “medical need”, I would almost certainly no longer qualify for DLA. Without it, I’d probably have to stop working as a self-employed journalist because I’d no longer be able to afford to get around, or afford to go to only a very small number of meetings and sources because it would take so much longer to travel around purely on the buses. And if I had to reduce the amount of work I can take on, I wouldn’t be able to support myself any more. Then I wouldn’t be able to afford to pay my rent on the private tenancy where I live, or the bills.

The result would be me making a claim for at least Income Support and Housing Benefit. I’d end up taking far more out of the benefits pot than I do at present. Probably at least triple. Maybe more. And of course, I’d no longer be creating wealth for the state in the form of taxes. Is forcing the disabled out of work really a good way to help plug the public deficit?

I can’t begin to describe the freedom that my DLA gives me. Or the amount I save the state overall by being able to keep working as a result of receiving it.

Yet not even three years ago, I had my DLA withdrawn. It took me 14 weeks to get the decision overturned – 14 weeks in which I first made a telephone enquiry as to why I had lost my benefit, then applied for a formal review (which I lost), then applied for a formal appeal at a tribunal, at which point the DLA office realised they’d lose the case seeing as they broke their own rules when they cut my money off so decided to reinstate my award. It was 14 weeks of constant stress and worry for me. I was given a lifetime award when my DLA was reinstated. That seems fair, given I can’t be cured of this particular disability and it’s unlikely to improve. Indeed, my epilepsy has worsened since then.

So I worry about what will happen if I have to undergo a medical test in 2013. I still won’t be any less disabled than I am now, but the government’s stated aim is to target DLA to those in highest need and to get the rest back to work. Except I’m already in work and paying more into the pot than I take out. DLA is not like IB – many people on DLA do already work. Many, like me, will now be wondering if they’ll be able to continue working, and by definition contributing to the welfare state, if they lose their DLA after being compulsorily reassessed.

So I ask again, just how will such a move help plug the public deficit?

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David Ottewell, chief reporter of the Manchester Evening News, used his day off today to launch an attack on hyperlocal news websites on his MEN blog. He singled out Salford Star Online but didn’t mention any of the other half-dozen or so hyperlocal ventures currently publishing in Manchester. One wonders why not, given his claim that “they end up simply regurgitating press releases, or ripping off stories from local newspapers, because they are one-man bands run by amateurs”. If he believes this, then why not name and shame?

Unsurprisingly, fairly soon after he posted his blog, critical comments from hyperlocal journalists, including two by me, began to appear below Ottewell’s blog. Many hyperlocal news operations work hard. I know of none that rip off stories from local papers, although no doubt many use press releases where appropriate as a starting point for a story. We certainly do at Inside the M60, the hyperlocal venture I co-founded with my colleague Nigel Barlow earlier this year.

Surely Ottewell is not suggesting that the MEN never uses press releases? Pretty much all newspapers rely heavily on press releases for content these days, now that they are understaffed and experiencing severe financial pressures. Indeed, while the MEN has a good track record in digging out exclusives, a glance at the paper any day of the weeks shows that a lot of content does derive from press releases.

Ottewell also suggests hyperlocal sites shouldn’t commentate or editorialise. Why ever not? Every newspaper in the land has an editorial column and employs commenters to write opinion columns. Yet, for some absurd reason, he believes hyperlocals should not. Indeed, at Inside the M60 when we ran a comment piece on city council leader Sir Richard Leese accepting a police caution for assaulting his teenage step-daughter, we came under extraordinary attack on Twitter for commenting publicly on this and reminding readers that Leese had launched a zero-tolerance campaign against domestic violence three years earlier. We felt it was fair comment, sad as the situation was for Leese.

In fact, since even before we launched Inside the M60 officially at Easter, we have come under sustained attack from other local journalists who have used Twitter to call us names and question our fitness to find and publish local news. Many of those attacking us are not even direct rivals but working in quite different sectors of journalism. Do we really scare them so much?

But I digress – let’s go back to Ottewell. He had approved nine comments on his blog post by 3pm, including two from me. I replied a third time but my comment is, at time of writing (5pm), still awaiting approval.

In the interim, conversations on Twitter revealed at least seven other people had posted critical comments and were awaiting approval. David Ottewell appears, however, to have gone to ground.

Sarah Hartley, the Guardian’s Local Editor, got fed up waiting for her comment to appear, so blogged it on her own blog. So did my Inside the M60 partner, Nigel Barlow – you can read his reply to Ottewell on his own blog.

Journalism tutor and hyperlocal champion Paul Bradshaw, highly respected in the journalism sphere, tweeted his as yet unpublished comment: “I said “Don’t throw around vague generalisations to which the Salford Star is an exception. Name names.” ”

Also still awaiting comment approval are @Journopig, @philipjohn and @JosephStash (for the 2nd time).

Just why has the MEN gone so silent? Surely it can handle a bit of criticism?

I shall, of course, update this blog post if the MEN ever does approve its backlog of comments on this…

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*Edited to add that just as I posted, a rash of previously unpublished comments appeared on Ottewell’s blog.

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A couple of recent events have thrown the future of Manchester into sharp focus as pundits and citizens both look at ways to develop the city in a fitting manner for the future. Manchester is the UK’s third city in terms of size but its second in many other respects. Culturally, it’s been a major hub for over three decades as a centre for music, theatre, TV and media. The latter has becoming increasingly visible in recent years, particularly with the development of Media City (technically in Salford) and the move north by the BBC. Linked to that has been the phenomenal growth of digital start-ups in areas such as marketing, apps, social media and programming.

In the digital arena, the issue of open data for Manchester has been on the table over the last few months. Julian Tait, co-founder of the monthly Social Media Café and one of the city’s “doers” with a yen to get things happening, has been pushing for some time to get Manchester’s various authorities to release their data sets so that people can use the data for the benefit of all. The February meeting of the Social Media Café focused on the topic, with Tait passionately arguing the case for Manchester and guest speakers such as Chris Taggart demonstrating their own experiences in this field.

Then, on 11 May, Tait argued the case again at the Digital Editors’ Network meeting, which focused on data issues. On both occasions, Tait observed that only City Hall has complete access to Manchester’s data sets yet in a technologically based society giving everyone access to the data, which they have paid for through local taxes, allows them to make informed choices about their communities, their neighbourhoods and their lives. Of course, the data needs to be reworked, something local authorities rarely have the time or cash to do. Allowing the geeks free access to the data sets means they can do creative things with them, such as pinpointing hotspots for ASBOs or areas that suffer from littering, and publish it in visual mashups that are genuinely helpful to residents. The London Datastore (Greater London Authority) and Birmingham City Council are already engaged in this process and Tait argues that Manchester might evolve very differently once the data sets are released.

Last week, Manchester’s annual FutureEverything festival, founded in 1995, took place. A glorious mix of music, arts, technology and debate, the two-day conference at the heart of the event again focused on the theme of open data. A whole day of sessions on the topic explored what open data could mean for Manchester as well as broader presentations by experts both amateur and pro who were keen to share their own experiences. Journalist Sarah Hartley, the Guardian’s local editor, has done an excellent job of summarising the open data strand.

Manchester is also a city of firsts – the first industrial city, the city that gave birth to trade unionism and the city that founded suffragism – so it was no surprise that the keynote event of FutureEverything was the City Debate, which took as its premise that Manchester should become the first experimental city. Manchester is already on the cusp of huge change once again as the authorities shape it for the 21st century and entrepreneurs cement its reputation as a creative and digital powerhouse. But what of ordinary Mancunians?

The debate featured a panel of Manchester’s various movers and shakers, some known and others less so, and was chaired by broadcaster Jennie Murray who lives and works in the city. Festival founder Drew Hemment set out the proposition at the start for an experimental city. A number of questions were on the table regarding vision, sustainability and social inclusion, with panellists having just 90 seconds to set out their visions for Manchester’s future development. Excellent summaries of the discussion have been posted by panellist Kate Feld, Sarah Hartley (again) and Inside the M60.*

The format of the debate was a little clunky – it was well underway before members of the packed audience were allowed the microphone to interrogate the panellists, of whom there were perhaps too many at 20. And no conclusions were reached, unsurprisingly given the very diverse views of those panellists. What it did do was start a conversation among the city’s thinkers, doers, visionaries and purse-keepers. That conversation now needs to move forward. The FutureEverything team already have a few smaller events lined up over the next few weeks and months that will keep the dialogue going. There is a chance now for everyone with a vested interest in Manchester, including residents and those who commute to work here, to have a real say in how this pioneering city of ours takes shape…

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* Disclosure: my tweets form part of Hartley’s Cover It Live Blog and I am co-founder of Inside the M60.

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Several zillion words were written yesterday on the sale of the Manchester Evening News to Trinity Mirror – the details, the commentary, and the rest of the speculation. I’m not going to rehash what’s already been said.But, as a freelance journalist working in my adopted city of Manchester, I’ve had time to ponder what it might mean now I’m past my first wave of fury.

Fury, yes. I’ve not written for the MEN but know many who have. It’s a good, solid, regional paper, albeit one that’s been in gentle decline in recent years chiefly due to neglect by Guardian Media Group and its shameless milking of MEN profits to prop up the loss-making Guardian. It’s only 18 months since the MEN moved into its shiny new HQ in the heart of Manchester city centre – when I visited, it was so new the building still had that strange whiff of new electricals and pristine carpeting. Barely seven months later, the axe fell on 150 staff – half from the MEN itself, the rest from the stable of local titles based in Greater Manchester’s outlying districts. I was angry then, angry that much local news would no longer be reported. So it has proved – those local titles have become shadows of their former selves, while the MEN itself has carried far less comprehensive coverage of the metropolitan area’s affairs.

Trinity Mirror’s purchase does not bode well for the paper’s future. TM has a history of asset-stripping its purchases, slashing staff and then shutting titles. Many TM journalists are rightly incensed by TM’s claims in recent years that it’s been too broke to give them decent pay rises, decent staffing levels and decent kit, because TM doesn’t seem to have had any trouble conjuring up nearly £8m in cash for GMG as part of the £44.8m deal. That £8m could have gone a long way to supporting TM’s existing titles and the staff that produce them.

But what does it mean for the MEN? For Manchester? Rumours were rife today that operations would be moved out to Oldham. It would be disastrous for Manchester if true. A daily paper covering an area populated by 2.5 million people and with no city centre presence could not possibly be expected to maintain even the existing (reduced) standard of coverage. TM has claimed that it’s looking at various options and the Oldham move is not set in stone. Manchester-based freelance journalist, Nigel Barlow, offers a different perspective, suggesting that a move out of town could be beneficial for city reportage, although I’m not convinced myself. I agree with him, though, that it offers a great opportunity for hyperlocal ventures to spring up, take ownership of a patch or beat and flourish.

I’m currently temping at BBC Radio Manchester, which has just received some of its best-ever RAJAR figures.  I think it’s fair to say that BBC regional stations don’t always do local very well, but Manchester does do community pretty well – that’s certainly been my overriding impression over the last 6 weeks on the inside. Obviously, BBC Manchester can’t be a substitute for the MEN although it has always sat comfortably alongside it. I do wonder if the BBC might mop up some of the MEN’s readership if predictions for the paper turn out to be true and it plunges even further into doom and gloom. Time will tell but, for now, the city’s large media sector is watching developments with very keen interest…

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At risk of stating the obvious, we’ve had a lot of snow this week. News coverage of the cold snap generally has been at saturation levels, often at the expense of more important stories such as the Robinson scandal – I’m surely not the only person fed up of news footage of people telling us how much snow they’ve had in their town or press websites asking readers to send in their pictures of the weather. It’s winter, it’s supposed to snow and be cold. And, ideally, things should run more or less smoothly like they do in the rest of Europe in mid-winter. Unfortunately, however, things tend to grind to a halt at the first flakes here. It’s a cliché but only because it’s broadly true.

And precisely because things fall apart in the UK when we get more than a centimetre of snow, local news sources are vital for keeping people informed about what’s going on, or not as the case may be. Here in Manchester, we were particularly badly hit by the weather with some 8 inches of snow falling overnight on Monday/Tuesday. Manchester was chaotic on Tuesday morning. Even main roads were barely passable and, unsurprisingly, public transport was in severely short supply. The GMPTE website had almost no useful information, if you could even load it. If you wanted to know anything at all – which buses were running, whether schools were closed, or what officialdom was doing – there was only one place to turn. Local media. (Well, two, actually, as Twitter became an excellent source of real-time updates. More on that in a bit.)

The Manchester Evening News reinstated its live weather coverage using Cover It Live blogging software and had pretty good real-time updates on public transport services collated partly by the paper’s reporters and partly from aggregated tweets. BBC Radio Manchester turned its breakfast show into a rolling news service as it kept Mancunians informed about school closures, traffic updates and statements from the police, NHS and council about the changing situation.

I must disclose here that I’m currently working at Radio Manchester as part of the inFUZE programme (which aims to provide professional journalists with additional skills) and I’d started there only the day before. So when the snow fell, I was determined to get to the BBC by fair means or foul. I left home early, expecting my 20-minute bus ride to take considerably longer. Even before I stepped outside, I’d used Twitter to crowdsource information on the buses and knew I might not be able to catch one. Mancunians were using Twitter as a form of public service announcement platform – incredibly useful for those few of us on the move. As I waited in the still-falling snow, I joined in passing on what little info I had.

When I finally arrived at the newsroom (by cab, and by luck), only a skeleton staff had made it in and the phones were ringing non-stop. BBC reporters worked incredibly hard to get the news out (and I did my bit monitoring Twitter for them to get updates on bus services, closed institutions and the like). Tuesday’s radio schedule was completely rejigged to stay abreast of the news and key staff stayed in a nearby hotel overnight to ensure the news would be out on Wednesday as well. And so it went for the rest of the week.

An internal memo at the BBC on Thursday indicated that page impressions on the various regional news hubs on the BBC website had rocketed up to 23-fold, while figures for radio and TV audiences tuning in for local coverage had also gone through the roof. No doubt MEN’s website has seen similar traffic. All because of a few inches of snow. The Cumbrian papers combined forces during the autumn floods there to share real-time information on the internet, using reporters, aggregated tweets and updates from the emergency services to keep Cumbrians up to speed on the disaster unfolding there. It serves to prove that in such situations, only local media can provide the kind of on-the-ground hard facts that local people need.

An unprecedented number of local papers closed in 2009, or made drastic staff cuts in order to stave off closure. Communities without local media are left bereft, not just of the day-to-day news but also a focal point when there’s a crisis. Hyperlocal news is the buzzword for 2010 – most media pundits agree that hyperlocal news will fill such gaps where papers have closed and many also agree that this will be the year that sees many self-employed journalists setting up their own hyperlocal ventures. While few will have the kind of clout enjoyed by the BBC regional hubs or papers like the MEN, they will undoubtedly play a crucial role in keeping communities informed on the things that matter, particularly in a crisis situation. The snow will be gone in a week or so, but the need for solid local reporting will remain forever. It matters not whether that reporting is on a small-scale hyperlocal basis or by a long-established newspaper or radio station. The only thing that matters is that local people continue to be able to get quality local news.

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My thirst for knowledge never seems to diminish. There are always things I’m curious about, want to know more about, pique my interest enough to go exploring further. Much of my curiosity is transient – I’ll read a blog and look up something on Wikipedia or remember something someone mentioned in passing and do a net search for more info. In a work context, learning is often referred to to as CPD, a horrible clunky acronym that belies the reality of the simple need to stay ahead in one’s profession and the simple pleasure of learning for its own sake.I still remember clearly the day 20-odd years ago I started working on a computer the first time – the sense I was out of my depth, struggling with something alien to me but determined to master as much of it as I needed (and a little bit extra) in order to be able to keep working.  I’d sensed this was a permanent shift.

And so it continues. I learned some DOS, then early Windows, then switched to a Mac and Quark Xpress, then back to a PC… I’ve been blogging for more than 10 years and while I wouldn’t describe myself as an early adopter, compared to the general population I probably am. Workwise, it always seemed logical to me to embrace change and exploit it. In an industry that is shifting rapidly, it makes sense to use the tools online that are available to expand the opportunities to work.

The need to stay ahead as a freelance was what prompted me to sign up for inFUZE. I almost didn’t apply, thinking it wasn’t aimed at tech-savvy hacks like me, and in a way I was right. When I turned up for the week of workshops, I was not only a fair bit older than the rest of the intake but also more technologically advanced in many ways. This surprised me – I’d have expected the 20-somethings there to be comfortable using blogs, Twitter and other social media platforms. I had a frustrating day or two sitting through sessions on how to blog, which I obviously didn’t need, but it shows just how important programmes like inFUZE are if younger journalists coming up through the ranks are not being taught these skills as part of their job or degree course. I suspect the real benefit for me will be when I go on the staff placement early next year, where I’ll get to share my social media skills in exchange for other experience I’ve not yet had despite a lengthy career in journalism.

I also like to grab other opportunities to learn when I can. I’m not only interested in technology and how I can use it, I sometimes write about it too. I’m fortunate to live in Manchester, a city long renowned for its creativity, which these days it’s just as likely to be technological as musical. The city is awash with tech developers of all hues and the events calendar is full of possibilities to meet up and learn for the fun of it. The hottest initiative in town right now is the MadLab, the Manchester Digital Laboratory, a community project born from the desire to have a permanent hackspace for geeks to come together and share their knowledge. Based in the Northern Quarter, the MadLab is a welcoming meeting place for all kinds of local techy groups to collaborate.  It’s a non-profit enterprise so events can be held for free, making it a valuable resource.

Pic: © MadLab, used by permission

I was delighted to be able to attend the #ARdevcamp at MadLab last weekend. I’m not a coder, a hacker or a developer but I’m interested in augmented reality and mobile apps so the chance to learn about AR was too good to resist. Dave Mee, one of the brains behind MadLab, introduced the day-long session with potted history of augmented reality using video clips and other examples and then the developers were off, busy dismantling strings of code and trying to hack solutions. I felt out of my depth but it was a wonderfully relaxed atmosphere in which to soak up other people’s knowledge and I left hours later considerably wiser than when I’d arrived. MadLab will undoubtedly be hosting more workshops of this nature – it’s a fantastic initiative that not only benefited my own understanding of a certain type of technology but will benefit many others once it really becomes established as an integral part of Manchester’s growing and expert digital community.

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It’s election time at the NUJ and my vote was long decided before the ballot papers were issued. At stake is the editorship of the union’s publication, the imaginatively titled The Journalist. Unlike most such jobs, where you fill in an application form, get through a couple of interviews then negotiate terms and conditions, this post is balloted by the membership rather than decided by a couple of senior executives. It’s an important job, because the magazine is a key way for the union to communicate with its members.

I must confess to being a somewhat lazy cardholder. I pay my subs but don’t really get involved. I’m one of those members that is glad the union is there when I need help but tend to ignore it the rest of the time. It’s partly because too often I see the executive putting effort into supporting causes abroad rather than working to improve our lot at home. Don’t get me wrong, supporting journalists overseas working in difficult conditions is vital but such official solidarity has often been given at the expense of helping members here. The NUJ has been slow to adapt to the rapidly changing face of British journalism. Gone are the days of huge chapels at every paper or magazine. And while the London Freelance branch has a thriving membership, us freelances outside the capital often feel ignored or forgotten about.

This is why I’m voting for Michael Cross. I’ve been privileged to know him as a colleague and occasional drinking buddy for a while and I was one of those who persuaded him to run for office (disclosure: I also helped set up his online campaign). Michael has many years experience under his belt – he’s been a staffer, worked abroad, done stints in broadcast and also has enjoyed a thriving freelance career of late. In short, his work record alone makes him someone who understands many of the different roles a journalist might perform. Indeed, as the number of freelances grows, Michael’s own experience should appeal to many.

Crucially, Michael’s vision for The Journalist is the most comprehensive. Although he has the smell of hot metal in his nostrils, he’s also very aware that our union mag needs to be fit for our multimedia, digital era. And despite being a former FoC, Michael’s no yes man – he will bring an independence to the job and know when it’s necessary to stand his ground against the union leadership, should the need arise.

Perhaps most importantly, Michael aims to turn The Journalist into a proper publication advocating journalism and reflecting our working lives, rather than being a union propaganda sheet – propaganda is all well and good at times, but I for one want a magazine I actually want to read and I know I’m not alone in that. The NUJ is full of lazy members like me but a properly produced The Journalist should be there to cover professional issues and not just workplace ones (especially for the hordes of us whose workplace is their front room). Being in a union isn’t just about standing on picket lines but also about feeling supported as a professional. Michael’s vision would mean The Journalist would be a publication non-members would want to read too, which could be crucial in halting and reversing the declining membership. And that vision also includes a wide-ranging online strategy, essential for attracting young journalists who won’t remember the pre-internet way of working.

Michael’s manifesto is openly available on the Facebook campaign group and you can also follow him on Twitter. There will also be a hustings in Manchester on 22 October if you want to hear him speak (the other candidates will be there too).

The ballot’s already underway and closes on 6 November. If you’re an NUJ member and you haven’t made your mind up yet who to vote for, I urge you to check out the manifesto and put a 1 in the box next to Michael’s name. You won’t regret it.

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I attended TEDx Manchester yesterday – a half-day of presentations and debate on technology, entertainment and design (the TED of the title). I’m still digesting much of what was put out, because there was an awful lot packed into the five-hour programme. Apparently, too, this was the biggest TED event in Europe to date – at a rough guess, the audience numbered around 200. BBC Manchester had kindly opened its doors yet again to Manchester’s huge creative and digital community (it has twice hosted the Social Media Café this year) and TEDx took place in Studio 7, normally reserved for the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.

As with a lot of these kind of events, the quality of the speakers and their presentations varied. I’m pleased that most of the TEDx Manchester panel was up to scratch. I was left disappointed by Dr Mariann Hardey’s presentation on social media etiquette, which focused largely on how to use platforms such as Facebook – given that probably almost everyone at TEDx is digitally savvy enough to have been using social media for some time (as evidenced by the heavy tweeting during the afternoon), it was surely a case of preaching to the long-converted. Likewise, Matthew Postgate’s (head of R&D at BBC Future Media and Technology) presentation on what the BBC are doing with social media left me with the impression that the BBC is desperate to be seen as up to speed when it comes to social media platforms but is still struggling to catch up with what ordinary people are doing digitally. This does raise some interesting issues – firstly, that the BBC seems very keen to grab user-generated content for its vast website without paying for it (and indeed that raises the further question of should it pay for it out of the licence fee?).

And secondly, with the BBC being funded by licence-fee payers, just how much should it be spending on investing in digital projects of whatever sort instead of on programming? Clearly, as technology moves forward at an astonishing pace and changes how the viewing and listening public want to receive their media, the BBC needs to keep up and it has indeed done some ground-breaking stuff, like iPlayer. But just where does that remit start and stop? This came to the fore later in the programme when Hugh Garry (senior content producer for BBC Radio 1 and 1xtra) showed us a film he’d created by handing out mobile phones to the crowd at a music festival and told them to just go and film whatever they fancied then hand the phones back. The clip we saw was extraordinary in its creativity and looked as good as anything shot on a proper film camera. But what does filmmaking have to do with radio?

There was also a third BBC staffer on the panel, Marc Goodchild (head of interactive and on demand at BBC Children) who talked about creating digital content for children. I tuned out a lot here, not having kids myself and not knowing any of the programmes he mentioned, but he did raise a couple of points that caught my attention, largely because they weren’t 100% accurate. Firstly, Goodchild said the QWERTY keyboard was basically not very good because it meant you had to learn how to type and they keys were all in a funny order, etc. I was quite staggered by this as I’ve never learned to touch-type – I basically get by with a couple of fingers, like many do – but it hasn’t hindered me in 30 years of earning a living using a QWERTY keyboard. You simply do not need to be able to type “properly” to use a keyboard to communicate digitally. The other point I perked up at was his mention of needing to rethink how they provided interactivity as, for example, a conventional mouse is too big for a child’s small hands – children are very active with technology from as young as 5 but are adapting themselves to deal with accessories designed for adults. His comment that technology design for children is not being driven forward because there’s no money in it (“small hands do not have big wallets”) is not really true because children don’t need to buy their own technology – their parents buy it for them and today’s parents have very deep wallets when it comes to spending on their kids.

Incidentally, as an aside, I’m pleased I was one among many who was very irritated when the floor was opened to questions and some people took the opportunity to not ask questions but instead rant about everything that’s wrong with the BBC. This was not why we were at TEDx and it was an appalling abuse of the limited chances to raise issues from the audience, depriving others who really did have questions of the possibility to ask them.

Only two of the presentations were non-digital. Architectural expert Phil Griffin gave a truly inspiring talk and slideshow on the built environment, with a very obvious local focus. As I’m relatively new to living in Manchester and still finding my way round, seeing the interiors of some amazing historic buildings that have been regenerated for different purposes was fascinating. A lot of Manchester’s mills have been turned into living accommodation, for example, or modern work spaces or even night clubs. Griffin made the strong point that while building new buildings can be important (illustrated neatly with a slide of the new BBC premises being constructed at Media City in Salford), it’s also vital to “bodge, make do and mend” as he put it – to reuse the many magnificent but decaying and boarded-up old buildings scattered by the hundreds across this wonderful city, which has turned the notion of recreating itself into an art form already in so many ways. Sustainability, in other words. Global Socialite’s blog on TEDx Manchester expands on Griffin’s contribution, picking up on the notion that the non-digital remains vitally important in the exchange of ideas.

Sustainability was an unspoken theme running through the presentation given by Sarah Hartley, digital editor at The Guardian, who spoke about the importance of local journalism and how communities provide the lifeblood for journalism at every level, as they are the source of so many stories as well as sustaining local media. She pointed out that much of what journalists do is now done by ordinary people, through blogs and online communities. She cited Help Me Investigate as one pertinent example of people coming together to investigate local issues with the help of journalists as a way to break important stories. Hartley noted news pioneers are often community activists, too, and that many local news blogs are popping up run by such activists to fill the gap left when local papers get closed. This merging of press and activism is leading to what her editor at The Guardian, Alan Rusbridger, has called the mutualisation of news. We can probably expect to hear this phrase a lot more in the near future as the Guardian goes head to head with News International and Rupert Murdoch: two very different news models are emerging with the kind of locally fed and supported, community-sustained mutualisation facing off Murdoch’s forthcoming paywalls. Seeing which one will ultimately dominate is going to preoccupy media commentators for the near future.

Ben Light, a professor at the University of Salford, turned the gathering into “TEDsex” with his illuminating presentation on how gay men brand themselves on dating websites. He used popular site Gaydar to illustrate his findings about online identities, stereotyping and fascinating market data, such as gay men being more likely to use all the obscure features on a mobile phone than straight people. It was clear that much of Light’s research about personal branding applies to non-gays who date online, too, and there was much laughter at a question from the floor about whether the professor had pursued his findings on other niche online dating websites, such as those for people who practise BDSM.

The final presentation was by Paul Coulton, who undertakes mobile research at the University of Lancaster, who gave a very entertaining talk on mobile gaming. I’m not much of a gamer at all and certainly not on my phone, but he held my attention with his wit and some startling statistics, such as that for every four babies born, 27 mobile phones hit the market and that with more than 4 billion owning a cellphone we have truly become cyborgs. Coulton breaks down games and gamers into different types, such as pre-Raphaelite (the Wii apparently being one of these – I’ll take his word for it as I don’t own one). I’m not convinced by his statement that gaming can change the world but I’m happy to accept that gaming has changed the way people interact with each other.

All in all, Tedx Manchester probably raised far more questions than the panel could ever attempt to answer. There was a feeling the surface had barely been scratched on some discussions while it was great to have new topics (such as the gay research) thrown open for our perusal. The TED concept is spreading so we can expect to see more of these events popping up around the UK. I certainly hope it will return to Manchester before too long. Thanks are due to the BBC for hosting and to the huge team who worked hard to pull it all together (details of whom are on the TEDx Manchester website).

The Twitter stream for #tedxman can be seen here and here if you are interested.

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