Booktype: open source self-publishing platform
"Booktype is a free, open source platform that produces beautiful, engaging books formatted for print, Amazon, iBooks and almost any ereader within minutes. Create books on your own or with others via an easy-to-use web interface. Build a community around your content with social tools and use the reach of mobile, tablet and ebook technology to engage new audiences."
(Adam Hyde, 2012)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Website and wiki self-publishing through Google Sites
"Google Sites makes it easy for anyone to create and manage simple, secure group websites. Getting started is easy, and there are a number of helpful templates. More than just a visual theme, site templates can include site structure and navigation, custom page templates, embedded gadgets, and more. Google Sites is powerful enough for a company intranet, yet simple enough for a family website."
(Google)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Open journalism: the newspaper is moving beyond a newspaper
"If the story of the Three Little Pigs broke today, how would a modern newspaper cover it? That's the concept behind a new TV ad for The Guardian, the newspaper's first major TV spot for 25 years.
The spot launches a campaign to promote the paper's 'open journalism' approach – its name for the way in which it is attempting to involve its readership in not just commenting on stories, but contributing to and even determining its news agenda. 'Open is our operating system, a way of doing things that is based on a belief in the open exchange of information, ideas and opinions and its power to bring about change,' said Alan Rusbridger, editor-in-chief of Guardian and MediaGuardian publisher Guardian News & Media. 'The campaign is designed to bring that philosophy to life for new and existing readers.'
The launch ad examines the way in which the tale of the Three Little Pigs might be covered by The Guardian today, with all the different forms of content and different channels that implies. It also seeks to get over the way in which stories develop over time as new facts come to light and the effect of social media on switching the focus of coverage and debate.
An epic two-minute version (shown above) debuted on Channel 4 last night.
Comparisons will inevitably be made with 1986's classic Points of View by BMP (indeed the Guardian itself has said that the new ad is a 'nod' to the old one. They share an endline: The Whole Picture).
But while Points of View got over its message succintly and elegantly, Three Little Pigs is less focussed, less pithy. This can be seen as a reflection of the changing nature of media – newspapers are now less about relating THE story and more about acting as a platform for multiple strands around a topic to be explored by multiple participants, including the readers themselves, in real time. But it makes for a less memorable piece of advertising storytelling.
'The aim is to reach progressive audiences and show them why they should spend time with us,' according to Andrew Miller, chief executive of the Guardian's parent company Guardian Media Group. But you have to wonder whether such progressive types would not be aware of what the Guardian is doing anyway? The ad will probably make existing Guardian readers feel better about themselves, but will its slightly daunting complexity attract many new ones?"
(Patrick Burgoyne, 1 March 2012, Creative Review)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Guardian launches Facebook app
"The Guardian has launched a new Facebook app, becoming one of the first newspapers to launch a product alongside the social networking giant.
The new app, unveiled at Facebook's f8 conference in San Francisco on Thursday, will allow the social network's 750 million users to read guardian.co.uk articles without leaving the social network. The guardian.co.uk network of websites includes MediaGuardian.co.uk.
The Guardian is one of a number of media organisations to launch partnerships with Facebook at this year's f8, including the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal and Spotify.
'We know that a lot of Guardian readers are keen Facebook users, and vice versa, so we wanted to create a news experience that was native to the Facebook environment,' said Meg Pickard, GNM head of digital engagement.
'The app draws on the social functionality they are already familiar with to highlight and discover quality Guardian content, and makes users' reading experience more personal and relevant.
'We've had a presence on Facebook for some time, but working with them to develop this app as a Facebook Open Graph launch partner has demonstrated that it's possible to get the best of both social and news worlds. We can also engage new readers who may not already be frequently interacting with the Guardian brand, who can now discover our excellent content via their friends' interactions.'
Christian Hernandez, director of platform partnerships at Facebook, said: 'Since Facebook Platform launched four years ago, innovative companies have been transforming industries by rebuilding products through social design.
'The Guardian is rethinking how people consume news online through its new integration with Facebook, making it easier for people to discover the most relevant news through their friends.'
The Facebook app is part of Guardian publisher Guardian News & Media's shift to a digital-first strategy and comes a week after it launched its new US website homepage out of New York."
(Josh Halliday, 22 September 2011)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Twitter switch for Guardian, after 188 years of ink
"the Guardian today announces that it will become the first newspaper in the world to be published exclusively via Twitter, the sensationally popular social networking service that has transformed online communication.
The move, described as 'epochal' by media commentators, will see all Guardian content tailored to fit the format of Twitter's brief text messages, known as 'tweets', which are limited to 140 characters each.
...
At a time of unprecedented challenge for all print media, many publications have rushed to embrace social networking technologies. Most now offer Twitter feeds of major breaking news headlines, while the Daily Mail recently pioneered an iPhone application providing users with a one-click facility for reporting suspicious behaviour by migrants or gays. 'In the new media environment, readers want short and punchy coverage, while the interactive possibilities of Twitter promise to transform th,' the online media guru Jeff Jarvis said in a tweet yesterday, before reaching his 140-character limit, which includes spaces. According to subsequent reports, he is thinking about going to the theatre tonight, but it is raining :(.
A unique collaboration between The Guardian and Twitter will also see the launch of Gutter, an experimental service designed to filter noteworthy liberal opinion from the cacophony of Twitter updates. Gutter members will be able to use the service to comment on liberal blogs around the web via a new tool, specially developed with the blogging platform WordPress, entitled GutterPress."
(Rio Palof, 1 April 2009, The Guardian, UK)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
