ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

October 3, 2012

TV News Evolved: Taking ABC News to YouTube

YouTube has turned inside out the way video is consumed, distributed and experienced. Each month, 800 million people watch four billion hours of video using the social video behemoth. In Australia, it is the most-used search engine behind Google. More than a way to watch video, YouTube is synonymous with the discovery, sharing and consumption of it.

The ABC charter makes it clear we should “provide within Australia innovative and comprehensive broadcasting services,” and the News division is constantly looking for ways to do that. One such method is to identify where people are looking for our journalism, and improve the service we provide for them on those third-party platforms, not just our news front page.

Last month alone, the ABC News YouTube channel attracted one million plays – and that trend is headed up. So clearly YouTube is important for us – but we think we can do it better.

Last week, we began devoting more of our digital newsroom resources to placing embedded YouTube content in our Twitter account (Australia’s most popular for news) and our Facebook page. We’ve also rebranded our News YouTube channel and created meaningful playlists to group content, making our YouTube experience more friendly for users of mobile devices - which account for 25% of our YouTube audience.

Across that period we saw a very large spike in our YouTube audience - from the average 220,000 plays to 350,000 from Monday 24th - Friday 28th. That’s almost 60% growth across the week. Last week was a heavy news week for the ABC - for reasons we won't revisit here. But it's important to note there has not been a spike of that size on our YouTube channel since the 2011 Queensland Floods, and there have been plenty of major stories in the intervening period.

It affirms to us our strategy of not just providing continuous news, but flexing our online journalism muscles: putting the right content in the right place quickly for a social media audience.

As a news organisation with an unbeatable track record in quality Australian TV journalism, it makes sense for us to really embrace video-on-demand in the aggressively competitive online space. But a big danger for a news service like ours is to assume that we can tick that box by just providing a ‘catch-up service’ for our TV News and Current Affairs bulletins – though ABC iview does an excellent job of that for those that want it.

We want instead to wrap an editorial process around the selection of ‘tentpole’ content – the kind of high-value, newsworthy and often timeless video material that audiences want to discover and share, instead of assuming they will come to our website by default and watch built news programs in full.

To borrow a powerful phrase from Scott Bevan during the launch of ABC News 24: “It’s a huge world, it’s a complex world, at times exhilarating, at times infuriating – and it’s important to get that gamut of emotion, that huge length and breadth of humanity – and bring it home so we can all share that together”.

That perfectly describes the kind of news we want to highlight and give online prominence to. We're doing that gradually - one TV program at a time - so watch our Twitter and Facebook accounts for more news on this front.

You can subscribe to NewsOnABC's YouTube channel to receive video as soon as it's available here.

Posted by Kieran Ricketts on October 3, 2012
September 18, 2012

Introducing the Engage page

Today we've launched the Engage page, the place where you can tell us what you think, what you know, and what you want to know about the stories of the day.

You can read more about the page here, and also have your say.

Posted by Gary Kemble on September 18, 2012
September 12, 2012

Haunting images of World Trade Centre take on life of their own

A year ago, as part of our 9/11 Remembered coverage, we published photos from New York City and Washington DC taken on September 10, 2001.
With the photographers' permission, we shared these photos on Flickr, and extended the project via the 'Day before the storm' group.

One year on, these haunting images are our most viewed on Flickr, and also our most favourited, and most 'interesting'.

It shows how content takes on a life of its own, once it's out on a platform where people can easily engage with it.

Return to News Editors' blog

Posted by Gary Kemble on September 12, 2012
August 31, 2012

The Reddit effect

A strange thing happened in our most popular lists this week.

A story with the headline Japanese man finds woman living in his closet turned up. On the face of it, there's nothing unusual about that - it's the sort of story that's a prime candidate for most popular.

The twist is that we published the story more than four years ago. The sudden surge in popularity is due to the story being picked up and featured in a comments thread on social news and discussion site Reddit.

It illustrates the potency of these sites in promoting web content. Reddit and sites like it work by inviting users to submit content they are interested in. Other Reddit users can then vote that content up or down in popularity, and comment on it.

When a link to an ABC News story becomes popular on Reddit - as it also did with this story about Bill Gates' quest to reinvent the toilet (view on Reddit) - this can have a big influence on our own most popular lists.

Even if the story is old news.

Posted by abc blog on August 31, 2012
August 27, 2012

Taking engagement a step further

I've written previously about our commitment to engaging with our audience.

Today, we're taking engagement a step further by introducing a Community Manager (CM) role to the ABC News Online team.

The CM's job is to talk to our audience - to find out what they know, what they want to know, and what they think about the day's big stories.

We'll be opening at least one story a day for comment, using a new system we're trialling called Pluck.

Those who wish to comment will need to sign up, but we think this will improve the quality of the comments we receive.

The CM will also pull together some of the most insightful comments - from our site, Twitter, Facebook and elsewhere - and showcase them on our site.

Today, for example, we're talking to you about Neil Armstrong and whether or not welfare should be linked to someone's racial background.

We'll also be spending more time engaging in places where we have an established presence - Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and Pinterest - and down the track branching out into new platforms.

Over to you. How can we do a better job of talking to you (and do you even want us to!)?

Posted by Gary Kemble on August 27, 2012 | Comments (2)
March 23, 2012

Introducing the ABC News Facebook timeline

ABC News is proud to launch its Facebook Timeline, chronicling the organisation's 80-year history.

From the first broadcast in 1932, which featured 'British Wireless News received by cable from London', through wars, natural disasters and political intrigue, the ABC has been at the forefront of Australian newsgathering and reportage, and we're glad we can showcase some of the highlights for you.

It's also an opportunity to feature some of the stunning photos our audience members have sent us.

So, what's new?

The most obvious changes are the 'Cover Image' and the timeline functionality.

We'll use the Cover Image to highlight special coverage or feature great photos that we've taken or that you've sent us. At launch we're featuring Zoe Daniel's beautiful photo essay on Burma. If you'd like your image featured here, you can post to our wall or upload here.

Alongside the page, you can click back through the years, right back to 1932. The archival content is sourced from this history of the ABC, the ABC Archives Flickr account, the 50 Years of Four Corners project, ABC Pool, Pandora, the Wayback Machine Internet Archive, and the National Film and Sound Archive.

Underneath the Cover Image are quick links to photos, Likes, and a place to sign up for the ABC News email.

If you would like to send us a news tip or a private comment, you can do so by clicking on the Message button, under the Cover Image.

What do you think? Is there something you'd like to see featured on our timeline?

Leave a comment below, on Facebook, or send us a message.

Posted by Gary Kemble on March 23, 2012 | Comments (2)
October 19, 2011

Clicks no substitute for engagement

With statistics showing that more and more people are finding their news via their social networks, it has become more important than ever to provide a relevant, timely social media service.

Mainstream media have taken various approaches to this, ranging from a fully automated feed, through to having a social media editor/producer who posts updates.

We've taken this a step further at ABC News by integrating the tweeting duties with the main news desk, so the people sending the tweets are the people crafting the top stories collection on the ABC News website.

This has a number of benefits:

Speed: rather than Twitter being the optional extra at the end of the process, it's the first thing producers do in a breaking news situation. By having the senior producers send the tweets, there are minimal barriers between our audience and the news.

Engagement: because our producers are sending tweets, they're also monitoring Twitter for breaking news, tip-offs and feedback. While @abcnews is not a 'talkative' account, we do respond to audience concerns over inaccuracies in our coverage.

Relevancy: sending tweets manually means we have full control of what we send, and can make full use of the medium by adding hashtags.

Human touch: people appreciate knowing there's a real person (or in our case real people) behind the account. Each morning our early producer sends a 'Good morning' tweet and these human touches make a difference.
@abcnews is now Australia's most followed news Twitter account. We also have an active community on Facebook, where our approach has been to bring together the best content from the ABC's news and news-related radio and TV programs.

But what does this really mean? It's been noted elsewhere that click-throughs are what really matter. But for us it's engagement that really matters. Having a strong, dedicated audience means that when news breaks you can reach as many people as possible. Our following may be modest when compared to some of our overseas rivals, but our tweets have at times reached millions of followers worldwide.

When big news breaks - for example the Brisbane floods, the Japan earthquake/tsunami or the Christchurch earthquake - we receive a spike in our social media follower stats. People need the news, they need it quickly, and they want it from a source they can trust.

Having a dedicated following means we've got a headstart when we invite the audience in to collaborate on a project with us. For example, in our '9/11 Remembered' coverage our connection with the audience resulted in some harrowing stories of survival and haunting images of the world before September 11.

We're also reaching out on other platforms too, such as Flickr. Through the process of asking permission (which is by no means industry standard) to use photos from Occupy Wall St in this Storify presentation, we connected with former Wall St journalist Francesco Fiondella. We then worked more closely with him on this colour piece about the protest.

This is just the start. We've got plenty of ideas - we're keen to take things to the next level and really invite the 'former audience' to become an integral part of the newsgathering process.

Posted by Gary Kemble on October 19, 2011 | Comments (0)
March 1, 2011

Changes to the ABC News Facebook page

As you may have noticed, over the past couple of months we've changed the way we're using the ABC News Facebook page.

We're aiming to provide the best content from throughout ABC News, whether that be from TV, radio or online. We're also aiming to post from early in the morning through to late at night, seven days a week, rather than just during office hours.

If you are a fan of ABC News on Facebook, what do you think? Too much? Not enough?

Is there more of a particular type of content you'd like to see? Or less?

If you use Facebook but aren't a fan of ABC News, is there a particular reason why?

Please let us know what you think. We welcome all constructive feedback! Leave a comment below or join the discussion on Facebook.

Posted by Gary Kemble on March 1, 2011 | Comments (0)
February 24, 2011

ABC TV Weather Flickr group

People love taking photos of weather, and we love seeing them. To make it easier for people to upload their photos and to share them with other ABC weather watchers, we've set up the ABC TV Weather group on Flickr.

The idea is that members of the audience can upload their weather photos, for broadcast on 7pm news bulletins around the country or on ABC News 24.

The group has been going for less than a week, and already it has more than 50 members, who have uploaded more than 140 photos. And as you can see from the slideshow above, there are some stunners!

Posted by Gary Kemble on February 24, 2011
February 3, 2011

International streaming of ABC News 24 to end tonight

Over the past few days, as far north Queensland has been menaced and then bludgeoned by Cyclone Yasi, people from all over the world have been able to watch the drama unfold on our online stream of ABC News 24.

The numbers of people accessing the stream have been quite staggering. By 10:00am today the number of page views on our streaming page was approaching a quarter of a million. No doubt, a good proportion of those were expat Australians now living abroad.

Unfortunately, shortly after midnight tonight, the stream will be blocked for people living outside Australia.

The reason for this is straightforward. The ABC does not have the rights to stream much of the video content supplied by our partners outside Australia. It's simply too expensive for us to secure these rights, therefore we have to restrict access to the stream to people living in Australia - a process known as geoblocking.

As I wrote in an earlier post, we are working on making more of the programming that goes to air on ABC News 24 available to our overseas audience. But this remains a work in progress.

In the meantime, please be assured that the next time the ABC mounts rolling coverage of a news event with national - and international - implications, the geoblock will be lifted and the stream will be available to all.

Posted by Stuart Watt on February 3, 2011