Digital journalism trends in 2016: From social newsgathering to social journalism

This is the first in a series of posts between now and the end of the year looking at key themes I think will emerge during the course of 2016. It takes a foolhardy journalist not to be familiar with Twitter or Facebook these days. There are probably very few journalists who haven’t written a

FOI: The council boss who threatened to sue a hospital

Good work from the Chester Chronicle in uncovering a remarkable spat between a local council and a local hospital. The Chronicle used FOI to obtain letters between Cheshire West and Chester Council and the Countess of Chester Hospital following a spat between the two bodies. As Chester West and Cheshire has long been one of

FOI Friday: What gets stolen from shops, dangerous animals in Chester, zero hour council contracts and finds by police diving teams

What is being stolen in shoplifting incidents? < Exeter Express and Echo A £22,500 shotgun has been stolen from an Exeter store and was never returned, it has been revealed today. The vintage weapon was stolen in March this year according to new information about shoplifting in the region from Devon and Cornwall Police. The

Forget the recession – learning to love audience data is the thing which will define the regional media’s future

For a long time now, it’s been almost a sport to predict the demise of the regional Press. Ex-editors and former journalists hiding out in universities have often been the worst offenders, but few predictions were more memorable than the one by Enders Analysis back in 2009 that half of the country’s regional papers would

FOI Friday: Classroom languages, councillor pensions and criminals applying to be teachers

1. What land has your council sold? Interesting stuff from the BBC in London (although finding a link to their story was very hard, so I’ve linked to one from a local newspaper which credits the BBC at least). They used FOI to ask all London councils how many plots of land they have sold

Top 10 most read FOI posts of 2011

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to conversations on this blog during 2011, challenging, debating and informing my understanding of FOI and how it should be used by journalists. Here are the 10 FOI-related posts which generated the highest number of page impressions: 1. How Jack the Ripper is helping to shape FOI rules When is

FOI FRIDAY: Maternity problems, schools failing fire checks, polluted rivers and cats stuck up trees

1. Closed maternity units It must be every new parent’s worst nightmare. Route to hospital carefully planned when contractions start, overnight bag packed, journey completed – only to be told the maternity unit is full. More worrying still is how common this scenario is, something the Western  Mail revealed when it asked hospitals for the