Journal Local

Supporting and showcasing great hyperlocal

Patient Opinion: hyperlocal conversations about health services

by jamesmunro on March 10, 2010 | No Comments

You may have come across Patient Opinion already – a site which enables people to share their experience of local health services in public online, and see what others are saying too. The site is run by a small non-for-profit social enterprise in Sheffield. I’m one of the team.

Patient Opinion was the inspiration of Paul Hodgkin, a Sheffield GP, who wanted to see whether the power of the web – which has already up-ended sectors like music, finance, retail and travel – could be used to help public services (and specifically the NHS) get better. We aim to make it quick, easy, and safe for people to share their stories (even embarrasing ones) about local health services, in a way that everyone can see – and we aim to get those stories to the right people in the health care system who can really make a difference. That might be the local managers of a service, a hospital chief executive, or even a national regulator.

In many ways, what we do is inherently hyperlocal. People want to see what others are saying about the nearby services which they rely on. And mostly, we find that the people who want to receive feedback and can really do something with it are frontline staff at local level. That’s because very often patients are asking for small, simple changes which are quick and easy to sort out if you’re on the spot, but slow and laborious if they have to go through organisational processes. Patient Opinion helps this by making possible local public conversations about the quality of care, from the patient’s point of view.

We view stories on the site as small “donations of experience” which we think people give us because they want them used for wider public benefit. So we see the stories on Patient Opinion as a public resource to be used by anyone who wants to help health care, and health professionals, get better. We make all our published content freely available under a Creative Commons licence, and you can pull data from us either as RSS or Atom feeds, or via our fuller API.

Another possibility is to use the Patient Opinion widget, which can display recent postings from a local area, or about a specific hospital, or tagged with a specific tag. Examples of sites using the widget already include Halton Link, Cancer Action Rotherham, Nottinghamshire Healthcare Trust and  Wandsworth Link. It takes about 5 minutes to set the widget up, so long as you can edit the html of your page (and if you get stuck, we’ll try to help).

Patient Opinion is one of those things that can only work well as more people use it. We’d love it if you could raise awareness of Patient Opinion (hyper)locally, use our content if you want, and together we can help health services be the best they can be.

Category: Helping Hyperlocal
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Ignorance over local bloggers prevents community getting to news that matters

by Philip John on February 25, 2010 | 1 Comment

VentnorBlog, the well-established Isle of Wight news blog, found itself thrown out of a coroner’s court on Tuesday.

Coroner officer Richard Leedham told Simon Perry of the VentnorBlog, who is a member of the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) and who has been writing VB for over four years, that the coroner did not wish him to be in the court – as a journalist or as a member of the public.

Continue reading Local news blogger refused entry to coroner’s court at Journalism.co.uk Editors’ Blog.

Category: News
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Future of News West Midlands Round-up

by Philip John on February 9, 2010 | 6 Comments

Last night saw the first Future of News West Midlands meetup take place at Birmingham City University’s Perry Barr campus.

We started off with a quick introduction before Andrew Brightwell gave a short talk on his background and his involvement in new hyperlocal project, Grounds. Andrew told us how Grounds was the result of a chat between fellow students and the folks at Urban Coffee Co in Birmingham where Grounds is based.

Andrew Brightwell shows off Grounds

Andrew Brightwell shows off Grounds

He said that the success of the blog to him was not about sales numbers or generating revenue but how many people were involved, demonstrating how the driving force was community-centric.

Andrew also went on to speak about possible business models they are considering to help make the site sustainable. They included a white label dating site, event services and advertising as possible streams of revenue.

However, Andrew seemed less convinced about those as really viable options and more about having a network of sites like Grounds that collectively could present sufficient economies of scale and leverage that such streams would be viable. Not only that, but other streams could become apparent once such a network was in place.

Then, without further ado, we split into three separate groups for a challenge. The brief that I gave to the groups was this; they are managing a start-up news operation with six month’s worth of funding. Their funders will not back them again after the six months is up so they need to find a viable business model within that timeframe. The funding will get them an office with all the necessities, two people (these could be journalists, or not) and kit (laptops, smartphones) for 3 people (i.e. you and your staff of two). There were no limits on what kind of news operation, what area (geographic or otherwise) to report or anything else – it was a very open brief.

Group think time

Group think time

So the groups went away and after a good half an hour (’cause there was a lot of good discussion going on) the three groups reported back.

The first group talked quite extensively and I really enjoyed listening in on the conversation. In the end they concluded there was no one business model that would work. As Paul Squires put it, there is no panacea, no silver bullet.

The second group seemed to be obsessed with porn, interestingly, though there were some good suggestions. They came up with News Butler, a tailored news service which will take your preferences and then phone you each day to tell you the news that’s important to you. We were promised that Jon Hickman would be the guy on the other end of the phone – watch this space. There was also the news booth where you go and submit your own news. The most serious suggestion though, and one that really caught my attention was event journalism – providing reporting services for events. It was then that I filled everyone in on the last UK Future of News Group meetup where Not On The Wires launched their service after covering the G20 and Berlin Project.

Group 3 came up with a whole barrage of ideas; something I was hoping for considering the earlier comment about there being not just one model. Paul Hadley went through the various ideas for going about their news offering, including; specialised news services (e.g. banking news in Small Heath), daily site sponsorship (a different sponsor each day), vendor relationship management where the publisher becomes a broker between user and advertiser (correct me if I’m wrong, Mr Bradshaw), non-geographic community news (e.g. topic-based), advertorials, business listings, premium membership for special features, selling services of staff (kind of like a collective of freelancers), event services (again!), selling data about visitors, mobile/gps-based news & advertising, a supporters wall (like CiB has done), selling on content to different platforms, selling news to pubs to make use of their TVs (which could also move on to kiosks such as in bus stops and train stations).

So a whole raft of ideas but one thing that stuck out like a sore thumb was that none of the groups came up with anything solid – they all produced ideas for things that might work – they had very little idea what would work. This is where I was a bit cheeky about it, I guess – I knew that the task was kind of impossible but I wanted it to be obvious, as Paul said, that there is no magic bullet, there is no one option but that the future will see a multitude of solutions and that until we try all these ideas out we won’t know anything for sure.

Nigel Barlow made a good point – he said there are “lots of ideas for supporting local news but seem to revolve around ancilliary services which will subsidise news” – something to think about, as is the Seth Godin post that Paul Squires mentioned – Who will save us? – which emphasises the point that we will make our own future because it is within our power to do so.

My last point will be based on a point made by Dan Slee in the pub afterwards. Dan spent the previous day at a local government conference where there was lots of enthusiasm that was hampered by the risk-averse nature of councils when it comes to actually doing things. We have the enthusiasm but we also have the opportunity to experiment, and it’s actually pretty low cost to start experimenting – so let’s JFDI.

I’ll be sending out an e-mail to all group members soon to ask for your feedback so look out for that, and if you have ideas for future meets please do let me know! If you’re not yet a member but you’re interested, join us and see if you fancy the next meet.

I’ll be updating this post with other member’s contributions as they come in, so let me know when you have anything.

Big thanks to Paul Bradshaw and the Birmingham School of Media at BCU for letting us borrow a room for the evening.

Keep an eye out for Future of News South Wales (#fonsw) as hinted at by Hannah Waldram and the Scottish group (#scofong) that Iain Hepburn is setting up.

Update: Paul Hadley has typed up his notes on the group message board.
Update 2: Kate Hughes has written a great post about her thoughts on the meetup.
Update 3: Alex Gamela posted a nice continuation of his group’s discussion including the Online Journalism Talk audioBoo on business models with Caroline Beavon and Dan Davies.
Update 4: Judith Townend, organiser of Brighton Future of News Group has started a wiki to collaborate on future ideas.

Category: Events
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West Midlands Future of News Group

by andrewbrightwell on February 2, 2010 | No Comments

The first ever meeting of the West Midlands branch of the Future of News group will be held at Birmingham City University on Monday February 8 at 6.45pm. Inspired by the Future of News group in London, organised by Adam Westbrook, WM FON has been set up to discuss how new approaches can help to benefit journalism in the 21st century. A number of influential bloggers and journalists have already signed up to take part in the event, which will be held at the BCU’s Perry Barr campus.

Organiser Philip John, of The Lichfield Blog and Journal Local, said he wanted the event to become a monthly forum for everyone interested in news in the West Midlands. “I’m really excited about the next few years for the news industry. My hope is that Future of News WM will be both the showcase and birthplace for many innovative new projects that can move the industry forward and prove it’s one of the most exciting to be in.” Birmingham City University’s Paul Bradshaw, founder and editor of the Online Journalism Blog will also be at the event.

To register for free attendance and for more information please visit the Meetup.com web page for the West Midlands group.
To learn more about the UK Future of News group visit the Meetup.com web page.

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Category: Events, News
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Lessons from traditional media

by Philip John on January 25, 2010 | No Comments

In his first blog post of the new year, and the first as ex-Birmingham Post editor, Marc Reeves outlined 3 reasons why he’ll miss newspapers and 3 reasons why he won’t. (Hey, Marc, your link baiting worked!)

I was directed to the post by Dan Slee who called it ‘essential reading for anyone connected to the future of newsgathering’. Couldn’t have put it better myself. There are lessons to be learned from what Marc sees as some of the problems at newspapers.

There’s no point me talking about it, go and read it for yourself and you’ll see why.

Category: Helping Hyperlocal
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Every little counts, especially lost cats and dogs

by Philip John on January 22, 2010 | 1 Comment

I’m not a massive animal lover, having only ever really had fish as pets but you can’t knock the collaborative effort behind Animal Finders, the service based out of Oxford that helps people to report lost and found animals. There’s even, of course, a Google Map.

This is just the sort of service that hyperlocals everywhere could take advantage of. Animal Finders could go national, and the community spirit that powers many hyperlocal sites could be the fuel to help it get there.

Thanks to Andy Mabbett for pointing me to the original story on the Google Maps Mania blog.

Category: Cool Stuff
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Could hyperlocal apps usurp blogs?

by Philip John on January 21, 2010 | 1 Comment

I mentioned the other day that I didn’t believe, for the most part, that hyperlocal is sustainable in it’s current form. Blogs run entirely on the back of good will from volunteers donating their spare time and the odd bit of cash are not going to make a massive impact on local media, in my view. There’s still a place for them as a great active citizenship tool and for strengthening community spirit, though.

So in that case a business model is needed to make hyperlocal sustainable. There may be one other possibility though.

The hyperlocal community, if you like, is characterised very much at the moment by a thirst for information, transparency and accountability. This is why we have projects like OpenlyLocal springing up, to make information more accessible.

Could it be though, that the blogs will be secondary to individual apps that make their way onto the scene. With the rise of mobile thanks to devices like the iPhone this is even more likely. One app from the US called Crime Reports “uses crime data, GPS, and Google maps to track everything and everybody in your neighborhood, district, and city, laying out all the crime going down in your area” reports NBC Bay Area.

Similarly in the UK, the FixMyStreet iPhone app allows citizens to report problems including potholes, vandalism, broken paving slabs and bad parking. As the Governments start to release more and more data and in more open formats, apps like these will become more prolific and the traditional ‘news & information’ model of local media may find itself spread amongst multiple providers.

Of course, services like those built by mySociety often provide APIs enabling the re-use of that data, which hyperlocals can take advantage of. It’ll be up to the citizen/consumer which they use, and the combined offering of news and information is likely to carry weight for a while yet.

It’s wise then for hyperlocals to innovate with what data they can now, and keep building into the future to ensure they’re not beaten to the finish line by others.

Category: Technology, data
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Future of News West Midlands?

by Philip John on January 21, 2010 | 1 Comment

I’ve just arrived home from the second Future of News meetup organised by epic visionary, Adam Westbrook. When Adam first announced the meetup I thought one for the West Midlands would be good but didn’t take the thought further till I met Adam at last week’s news:rewired conference.

You may be thinking, “oh great, another meetup/conference echo chamber for journalists” but it’s not. Adam has a great ethos for the meets – he says it aims “to do more than just commentate on the decline of journalism” and should be cynicism-free. Questions and phrases like ‘is journalism dead?’ and ‘are citizen journalist really journalists?’ are banned. It’s about getting stuff done, figuring out ways to move forward, not debate definitions and moan about what’s wrong with the news industry. Oh if you want an idea of what happened, check out the Tweetdoc.

Then, without much effort on my part it was quickly apparent that a Future of News meetup for the Midlands/North would be very welcome. Tonight has already sparked a Brighton meetup, led by Judith Townend so here’s the start of the third!

Here, take a quick poll for me so I can see how much actual interest there is:

Okay, good. I was thinking we could move it around. Perhaps BCU would host it one time? Then Staffs Uni? How about Urban Coffee Co as Andrew suggested? Sarah suggested Leeds? I might even get everyone over to Lichfield! Another poll I here you ask? Oh go on then…

Comments very, very welcome.

Category: Events
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Conservatives propose ultra-local television stations

by Philip John on January 19, 2010 | No Comments

In a Parliamentary debate on the newspaper industry last week, Shadow Minister for Culture, Media and Sport, Ed Vaizey MP said that the Conservatives will propose ‘ultra-local television stations’ as a response to the decline of the newspaper industry. Combined with the relxation of media ownership rules they believe this is the correct course of action and not the Independently Funded News Consortia (IFNC) which are being put in place by the Labour Government.

Vaizey said, “What I’m really working up to are our own exciting proposals for a network of ultra-local television.” He then went on to challenge Sion Simon MP, his opposite in Government, accusing him of a lack of proposals on the issue and urging him to respond to Roger Parry’s consultation, Creating Viable Local Multi-Media Companies in the UK (PDF).

His proposals, Vaizey said would “put in place a network of 81 local television stations combined with newspaper, web and radio and provide the ultra-local news and accountability that local communities need.”

Vaizey also promised to review the Local Authority Code in a move designed to curb the proliferation of council-run free sheets.

Category: News
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Is social enterprise the future of local media?

by Philip John on January 18, 2010 | 5 Comments

In a recent parliamentary debate on the state of local newspapers, Derek Wyatt, Labour MP for Sittingbourne & Sheppey, made reference to the The Guardian’s status as the subsidiary of a charity, the Scott Trust as opposed to it’s rivals who are for-profit ventures. He went on to propose the model for local media as an answer, whether in part of whole, to the trouble facing newspapers.

Wyatt said, ”There will be a Guardian alternative locally for groups of people wanting to set up not for profit newspapers often online but need funding.” The suggestion here is that at a local level the answer might be the Guardian-style of ownership whereby the media is part of a charitable trust or social enterprise, and a not-for-profit operation.

It’s an interesting suggestion on the day that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport announced the eight  successful bidders for the Independently Funded News Consortia pilots which aim to deliver local television coverage.

These are two very different solutions. Existing, large and profit-hungry media companies such as ITV, Trinity Mirror and Johnstone Press compared with independent, grass-roots community groups setting up as charitable organisations.

Whether IFNCs are the right solution is producing much debate, including strong words from the Conservative Party who are vehemently opposed to the idea.

As for the social enterprise route, nothing much has been talked about. I’ve been out talking about how The Lichfield Blog is taking steps in this area, by incorporating as a Community Interest Company (CIC). A CIC is limited company like any other but is bound by it’s entirely community-focused aims. It’s a kind of middle ground between commercial enterprise and charity and an official ‘non-for-profit’ label.

So Wyatt’s comment rings some bells with me and not just because he suggested the very route we’re taking in Lichfield. One of the main motivations for taking the decision was reading Manchester Guardian’s founder CP Scott’s values and centenary leader article. I’m sure this is at the top of every journalism student’s reading list but having never been involved in journalism until this past year I’d never seen it.

It strikes me that amongst all the talk about the state of local media plenty of people are putting forward their idea of what the future of local media is. As I said at news:rewired last week, I believe the future of local media is journalism and I feel like the only one saying it. Those principles that CP Scott presented to the world back in 1921 are still true today as ever but I fear many in this industry have lost sight of that.

While existing media struggle to cope without their massive profit margins and react by creating even bigger monoliths then, could it be that in order to save journalism we need to go down the social enterprise route and fund local media through grants and subsidies?

Category: Comment & debate
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