The next person who tells me how The Washington Post is funny on TikTok…
Don’t get me wrong — they are funny. It’s one of the experiments on a social platform I was most interested in this year. But in this industry, there’s a risk every time someone has a successful idea that everyone else will just try to replicate it. And frankly, I don’t want to find ourselves spending 2020 brainstorming ways to make the morning meeting hilarious because boomers think that’s the way to talk to Gen Z.
When I first heard about what the Post was doing on TikTok, I thought: Great idea! It’s refreshing to see a legacy organization accepting the challenges of a new platform while more or less everyone else is shying away. Dave Jorgenson, the Post’s face on TikTok, developed the right voice and crafted a series of my-parents-on-the-internet videos to show what’s like to work in a newspaper (kind of). It’s a brilliant way to make a 142-year-old paper relatable, and it’s working for the Post — but that doesn’t mean it’ll work for everyone else.
I’ve spent enough time in newsrooms to know the standard criticism: “But where is the journalism in The Washington Post’s TikTok?”
Well, I don’t think that’s the point — as Jorgenson explained on Axios’ Pro Rata podcast, they’re currently focused on building a loyal audience on a platform that has a billion monthly active users while waiting for new features more friendly to journalism (like the ability to swipe to a link to an articles).
Right now, I’m not even concerned about when or if they’ll figure out a way to monetize it. What I am worried about are all the copycat outlets ready to land on TikTok thinking that Post-like videos are the only way to make news appealing to a younger audience. If we all start making a trend out of the Post example, the risk is to patronize youngsters according to the stereotype that Gen Z doesn’t care about the news.
In order to build a real community, the golden rule of social media is eternal: Don’t go on a platform if you have nothing to say on it. News organizations’ success on TikTok will depend on our effort to understand the audience populating that platform.
2020 will be the year more publishers play around with lipsync and filters. But I hope we’ll also spend more time asking Gen Zers what they really want from us. I’ll definitely try my best.
Francesco Zaffarano is senior social media editor of The Telegraph.
The next person who tells me how The Washington Post is funny on TikTok…
Don’t get me wrong — they are funny. It’s one of the experiments on a social platform I was most interested in this year. But in this industry, there’s a risk every time someone has a successful idea that everyone else will just try to replicate it. And frankly, I don’t want to find ourselves spending 2020 brainstorming ways to make the morning meeting hilarious because boomers think that’s the way to talk to Gen Z.
When I first heard about what the Post was doing on TikTok, I thought: Great idea! It’s refreshing to see a legacy organization accepting the challenges of a new platform while more or less everyone else is shying away. Dave Jorgenson, the Post’s face on TikTok, developed the right voice and crafted a series of my-parents-on-the-internet videos to show what’s like to work in a newspaper (kind of). It’s a brilliant way to make a 142-year-old paper relatable, and it’s working for the Post — but that doesn’t mean it’ll work for everyone else.
I’ve spent enough time in newsrooms to know the standard criticism: “But where is the journalism in The Washington Post’s TikTok?”
Well, I don’t think that’s the point — as Jorgenson explained on Axios’ Pro Rata podcast, they’re currently focused on building a loyal audience on a platform that has a billion monthly active users while waiting for new features more friendly to journalism (like the ability to swipe to a link to an articles).
Right now, I’m not even concerned about when or if they’ll figure out a way to monetize it. What I am worried about are all the copycat outlets ready to land on TikTok thinking that Post-like videos are the only way to make news appealing to a younger audience. If we all start making a trend out of the Post example, the risk is to patronize youngsters according to the stereotype that Gen Z doesn’t care about the news.
In order to build a real community, the golden rule of social media is eternal: Don’t go on a platform if you have nothing to say on it. News organizations’ success on TikTok will depend on our effort to understand the audience populating that platform.
2020 will be the year more publishers play around with lipsync and filters. But I hope we’ll also spend more time asking Gen Zers what they really want from us. I’ll definitely try my best.
Francesco Zaffarano is senior social media editor of The Telegraph.
Emily Withrow The year we kill the news article
Nushin Rashidian Are platforms a bridge or a lifeline?
Sarah Alvarez I’m ready for post-news
Alfred Hermida and Mary Lynn Young The promise of nonprofit journalism
Knight Foundation Five generations of journalists, learning from each other
Annie Rudd The expanded ambiguity of the news photograph
Fiona Spruill The climate crisis gets the coverage it deserves
Heather Bryant Some kinds of journalism aren’t worth saving
Mariana Moura Santos The future of journalism is collaborative
Moreno Cruz Osório In Brazil, collaboration in a time of state attacks
Helen Havlak Platforms shine a light on original reporting
Nico Gendron Make better products if you want to reach Gen Z
Victor Pickard We reclaim a public good
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen The business we want, not the business we had
Beena Raghavendran The year of the local engagement reporter
Heidi Tworek The year of positive pushback
Catalina Albeanu Rebuilding journalism, together
Kathleen Searles Pay more attention to attention
Jasmine McNealy A call for context
Talia Stroud The work of reconnecting starts November 4
S. Mitra Kalita The race to 2021
Geneva Overholser Death to bothsidesism
John Garrett It’s the best time in a century to start a local news organization
Whitney Phillips A time to question core beliefs
Meredith Artley Stronger solidarity among news organizations
Colleen Shalby Journalists become media literacy teachers
Don Day Respect the non-paying audience
M. Scott Havens First-party data becomes media’s most important currency
Carl Bialik Journalists will try running the whole shop
Dannagal G. Young Let’s disrupt the logic that’s driving Americans apart
Sarah Schmalbach Journalist, quantify thyself
Simon Galperin Journalism becomes more democratic
Bill Adair A Nobel Prize, a Brad Pitt film, and a Taylor Swift song
Mike Caulfield Native verification tools for the blue checkmark crowd
Michael W. Wagner Increasingly fractured, but little bit deliberative
Tom Glaisyer Journalism can emerge newly vibrant and powerful
Stefanie Murray Charitable giving goes collaborative
Julia B. Chan We 👏 take 👏 breaks 👏
Kristen Muller The year we operationalize community engagement
Monica Drake A renewed focus on misinformation
Carrie Brown-Smith Engaged journalism: It’s finally happening
Kourtney Bitterly Transparency isn’t just a desire, it’s an expectation
Richard Tofel A constraint of the reader-revenue model emerges
Ernie Smith The death of the industry fad
Cory Haik We’re already consuming the future of news — now we have to produce it
Madelyn Sanfilippo and Yafit Lev-Aretz News coverage gets geo-fragmented
J. Siguru Wahutu Western journalists, learn from your African peers
Anthony Nadler Clash of Clans: Election Edition
Lauren Duca The rise of the journalistic influencer
Cristina Kim Public media stops trying to serve “everybody”
Irving Washington Leadership isn’t something you learn on the job
Kerri Hoffman Opening closed systems
Craig Newmark Formalizing newsrooms’ battle against disinformation
Joe Amditis Collaborative journalism takes its rightful place at the table
Sonali Prasad Climate change storytelling gets multidimensional
An Xiao Mina The Forum we wanted, the forum we got
Raney Aronson-Rath News deserts will proliferate — but so will new solutions
Lucas Graves A smarter conversation about how (and why) fact-checking matters
Gordon Crovitz Fighting misinformation requires journalism, not secret algorithms
Joanne McNeil A return to blogs (finally? sort of?)
Alice Antheaume Trade “politics” for “power”
Sarah Marshall The year to learn about news moments
Peter Bale Lies get further normalized
Joshua P. Darr All that campaign cash will make the media’s problems worse
Juleyka Lantigua A changing industry amps up podcasters’ ambitions
Mira Lowe The year of student-powered journalism
Greg Emerson News apps fall further behind
Tanya Cordrey Saying no to more good ideas
Elizabeth Dunbar Frank talk, and then action
Meg Marco Everything happens somewhere
Rachel Schallom The value of push alerts goes beyond open rates
Logan Jaffe You don’t need fancy tools to listen
Hossein Derakhshan AI can’t conjure up an Errol Morris
Barbara Gray Join local libraries on the frontlines of civic engagement
Elizabeth Hansen and Jesse Holcomb Local news initiatives run into a capital shortage
Mario García Think small (screen)
Steve Henn The dawning audio web
Nathalie Malinarich Betting on loyalty
Kevin D. Grant The free press stands against authoritarians’ attacks on truth
Joni Deutsch Podcasting unsilences the silent
Alexandra Borchardt Get out of the office and talk to people
Francesco Zaffarano TikTok without generational prejudice
Laura E. Davis Know the context your journalism is operating within
Josh Schwartz Publishers move beyond the metered paywall
Jeremy Gilbert and Jarrod Dicker A call for collaboration between storytelling and tech
Mary Walter-Brown and Tristan Loper Power to the people (on your audience team)
Sara K. Baranowski A big year for little newspapers
Ståle Grut OSINT journalism goes mainstream
Christa Scharfenberg It’s time to make journalism a field that supports and respects women
Dan Shanoff Sports media enters the Bronny era
Monique Judge The year to organize, unionize, and fight
John Keefe Journalism gets hacked
Doris Truong The year of radical salary transparency
Jim Brady We’ll complain about other people living in bubbles while ignoring our own
Logan Molyneux and Shannon McGregor Think twice before turning to Twitter
Jeremy Olshan All journalism should be service journalism
Rick Berke Incoming fire from both left and right
Candis Callison Taking a cue from Indigenous journalists on climate change
Sue Robinson Campaign coverage as test bed for engagement experiments
Brenda P. Salinas Treating MP3 files like text
Linda Solomon Wood Everyone in your organization, moving toward a common goal
Cindy Royal Prepare media students for skills, not job titles
Alana Levinson Brand-backed media gets another look
A.J. Bauer A fork in the road for conservative media
Seth C. Lewis 20 questions for 2020
Jennifer Brandel A love letter from the year 2073
Jake Shapiro Podcasting gets listener relationship management
Jakob Moll A slow-moving tech backlash among young people
Sarah Stonbely More people start caring about news inequality
Rachel Davis Mersey The business of local TV news will enter its downward slide
Felix Salmon Spotify launches a news channel
Jonas Kaiser Russian bots are just today’s slacktivists
Jeff Kofman Speed through technology
Ben Werdmuller Use the tools of journalism to save it
Brian Moritz The end of “stick to sports”
Matt DeRienzo Local broadcasters begin to fill the gaps left by newspapers
Matthew Pressman News consumers divide into haves and have-nots
Eric Nuzum Podcasting finally creates another mega-hit show
Imaeyen Ibanga Let’s take it slow
Nicholas Jackson What’s left of local gets comfortable with reader support
Masuma Ahuja Slower, quieter, more measured and thoughtful
Tonya Mosley The neutrality vs. objectivity game ends
Rachel Glickhouse Journalists get left behind in the industry’s decline
Bill Grueskin Our ethics codes get an overhaul
Zizi Papacharissi A president leads, the press follows, reality fades
Margarita Noriega The platforms try to figure out what to do with single-subject newsrooms
Errin Haines Race and gender aren’t a 2020 story — they’re the story