A case study: 234next pulls all the stops.
Next published exclusive Wikileaks cables on Nigeria. Photo courtesy 234next
It incorporated an interactive website that can be accessed free worldwide. It also established blogs for many of its publications, where opinions and analysis can be obtained. podcasts and sms alerts are also a part of what the newspaper offers.
234Next gets an average of 1.1 Million total visits, 600,000 unique visitors and 4.3 Million page views per month. this is made possible by an established reputation for objective reporting (in a country where the journalism profession isn’t entirely devoid of political agenda) as well as its employment of social media tools such as facebook, and twitter. Reporters, contibutors and readers are also able to share stories on their personal social media accounts.
234next’s collaboration with online whistleblower, Wikileaks, has enabled the publication of exclusive exposes and transcripts on the Wikileaks cables on Nigeria. The medium has also paid particular attention to the increasing importance of citizen journalism, especially in reporting local occurences. One of such uses of the citizen journalist is in the launch of Election Watch, a site where individuals can submit reports of election handling in their constituencies during the forthcoming national elections in April.
Tolu Ogunlesi (photo by Ifeyinwa Uzowulu)
Established newsmedia will however be the solenoid of the online media, he says. “Because everyone has an opinion on social media, people are going to be seeking the most authoritative source and this is an opportunity for newspapers to justify themselves in their analysis.”
Ogunlesi, who uses twitter, facebook, tumblr and linkedin sees social media as “the quickest way to get the pulse of breaking news.” He, however, warns that with social media there is a potential for overload due to the sheer volume, and a bandwagon effect “It can be deceptive in its ability to focus your attention on something and shift your attention from others; like in the cases of Libya and Cote d’Ivoire. Also the attention span of social media is short, and therein lies the danger.” Read Tolu Ogunlesi on his blog.
Namibia declares flood emergency
President Pohamba declares flood emergency. Photo courtesy: The Namibian
The flooding which has particularly affected the town of Oshakati was caused by heavy rainfall which began in January and has resulted in heavy crop and livestock losses. Since news of the flood emergency broke yesterday, there have been conflicting figures for human casualties. A BBC report, shared by 132 people since it was published online yesterday, reports more than 20 deaths while Channel 6 and other national media report a whopping 62 fatalities with thousands of people displaced.
Namibians displaced by flood. Photo: allafrica.com
This is the third flood emergency that has been declared in Namibia in as many years and 30 million namibian dollars has been earmarked to lessen its impact on human life, agriculture and infrastructures.
Described by President Pohamba as perhaps the “worst flood disaster in (Namibia’s) recorded history”, it has affected neighbouring Angola to a lesser extent; and has generated a fair amount of attention in online news media and on twitter.
Do you know where to find the best market around Uganda?
Kampala is definitely the place to be for shopping according to BBC News.
This is the region where many recycled clothes from all around the world finally end up (China, USA, Korea, UK and Germany).
Some of the residents there comment that these products are of great variety, good taste and have low prices. Clothes from several brands such as River Island, H&M and Top Shop are proving to be very popular there. Thousands of people from Uganda and other African countries visit the city for shopping. Kampala is characterized by the BBC journalist as “a winner market’.
So, things that are useless to some people may well be useful to others.
UN-funded pirates prison opens in Somaliland
Officials of Somaliland, Northern Somalia on 29th March, opened a new prison for Somali Pirates. The refurbishment of the Hargeisa prison was financed to the tune of $1.5 million by the United Nations to allow for pirates to be incarcerated in their home countries. Already housing about 70 inmates, the facility is expected to soon recieve about a good proportion of the 600 pirates who have been convicted in 17 different countries. Since this story broke yesterday, more than 200 related articles have been published about it online.
Seemingly undetered, Somali pirates in Manila, Phillipines yesterday siezed a Kuwait-owned vessel at the gulf of Aden. The crude oil vessel M/V Sirku was captured on its way to singapore with 29 crew on board.
Authorities have however in recent months been able to apprehend a number of those involved in this widespread crime. The Yellow Gate police also yesterday arrested 16 Somali pirates who were first apprehended by the Indian Navy, which was also able to rescue 16 Iranian and Pakistani hostages in the operation.
With the online media inundated with news about somali pirates, it is not surprising that an alternate point of view is made available about what is viewed largely as a heinous crime. In the BBC video above a somali pirate gives his opinion on the “business forced upon” himself and other “gentlemen defending the sea”.
The facebook group Row, row, row your boat is dedicated to Somali Pirates and has a worrying 13,110 likes, with most of the comments extolling piracy. Eric Woolery on March 23 posted: “Piracy is the clear path i should have taken.” While Muse Guled commented, “Somali pirates are (defending their own territory), the European and the American corporations began to transport the toxic chemical waste in their sea, thus destroying their fishing fields w(h)ich they were using for generation(s), you guys those, are my home boys.”
And perhaps Guled and others have a point as the Somali coast-line had in the last 20 years been used by foreign companies as a dumpsite for toxic waste. Only time will reveal how effective the renewed local and international measures to curb piracy actually are.
Adoptive-court advantage
The tv recorded video above is a compilation of saturday’s highpoints and earlier victories. It was posted on Youtube by Flash752011
Amidst all the grim developments in their country, Libyans were on Saturday, 26 March, given something to cheer with the 3-0 victory of Libya’s national team in the African Cup of nations qualifier match played against Comoros.
News of the decision by Confederation of African Football (CAF) to move the soccer game to neighbouring Mali, in light of the prevailing political instability in Libya where it was earlier scheduled to be held, was reported in mainsteam and online media like Yahoo! News.
The Libyan team however received unexpected and unprecedented foreign support when about 20,000 Malians turned out to watch the match in the Bamako stadium , many of them bearing Gadaffi posters and showing their support for the embattled statesman and the national team with shouts of ‘Gaddafi, Gaddafi’ at each goal scored
The team, which was already well positioned to qualify for the upcoming African Cup of Nations with its defeat of Zambia and draw with Mozambique, has earned 7 points and top position in Group C with Saturday’s victory. But more than the pro-Gaddafi team’s victory, the unreserved approval enjoyed was the focus of twitter comments which, even days later, continue to pour in.
Social media scientist.- Using Twitter Data to Map Emotions Geographically May 7, 2012A few weeks ago, I spoke at a federal agency conference in Arlington, VA and one of the most interesting topics was the potential use of social media, by intelligence agencies, to map out and predict social unrest. So I decided to start experimenting with the concept on my own. By combining the linguistic analysis systems of TweetPsych with Twitter’s geo tag […]Dan Zarrella
- Introducing TweetCharts: Get The Twitter Data You Need April 30, 2012It used to be that if you wanted to get data on a certain industry, keyword, hashtag or Twitter user you had to wait for a geeky, social media scientist type to write the scripts and run the reports for you. With my new tool TweetCharts.com that’s no longer the case. Enter any word, phrase, hashtag, URL or username and TweetCharts will return a comprehensive […]Dan Zarrella
- [Infographic] How to Get More Pins and Repins on Pinterest April 11, 2012Data about Pinterest is sparse because they’ve been slow to release their API, but I was able to utilize search engine APIs to pull some data about the trendy new social site. I gathered information on over 11,000 pinned images and did some analysis to create the infographic below. This data should be useful for Pinterest users who’d like to get more repins […]Dan Zarrella
- [Infographic] How to Get More Clicks on Twitter January 25, 2012I’ve often said that the best use of Twitter is as a broadcast medium. You should be creating a ton of interesting content and sharing it with your followers. To that end I’ve done a bunch of research on how to optimize the clickthrough rate (CTR) of the links you’re tweeting. For the purposes of this data, I’ve calculated CTR as the number of clicks on a tw […]Dan Zarrella
- [Infographic] What are the Best Times to Blog? January 23, 2012One of the most popular webinars I’ve ever worked on, The Science of Timing was also one of my favorite. If you haven’t seen it, go check out the on-demand recording now. In it, I present data I’ve collected over three years about the effect timing has on a variety of online marketing activities, including blogging. Below is an infographic that represents a […]Dan Zarrella
- Using Twitter Data to Map Emotions Geographically May 7, 2012