Beyond expectations: My first rodeo in radio

While I adore print and online and will continue to work in those fields, I’ve yearned to move into radio for years (so much so it even made an appearance on my one and only mood board in 2020). Last week, to my amazement, there I was up Salford, Manchester helping produce BBC Four’s prestigious Today programme and Radio 5’s Wake Up to Money. I absolutely loved getting stuck in, thrashing around ideas for the next day, finding and briefing guests, and learning first-hand how a radio show is produced. I was only in for two days for a test run but it made me realise how much I love being part of a team. I used to freelance in-house at magazines and at the Guardian but apart from volunteering at the food bank, winter shelters, and Crisis and so on, I haven’t worked as part of a team for years.

Like most people facing a new challenge, I’d had pangs of self-doubt before entering Quay House so I was taken aback when the editor told me how impressed they all were with me and that he’d already shared his thoughts about me with the two bigwigs above him. To have that level of feedback obviously made my heart sing, especially as I’d spent the last six weeks worrying about how it might go. At the end of my last day, he said they’d like to properly train me up.

After longing to move into the format for so long, I'm surprised by how quickly doors have opened. On the first day the editor asked where I lived. “Margate, and actually, kind of also Amsterdam now,” I replied. Ears pricked up behind me. “Did you write the piece “Can Amsterdam make the circular economy work?” asked the BBC World Service editor sat behind me. I nodded. “We were just discussing you yesterday. Would you be open to pitching me ideas?” This was exactly the situation I wanted to be in – reporting on the radio from overseas. I discussed some ideas. This is exactly the stuff we want, he said. We’ve been in touch since and I’m thrilled to say (and I'm still in full pinch-me mode) that he’s commissioned me my first audio piece for BBC World Service (well, as long as there's no tech issues).

While there's a huge learning curve ahead of me and as self-indulgent as all of this is, I wanted to share this as I thought it might help any readers who are faced with barriers when it comes to achieving their ambitions. I never thought this chance might happen, even though I knew I could definitely I'd give it a good shot if it ever came my way. Now, hopefully, I’m at the start of the journey and a new chapter in my career. Of course, it’s all new and anything could happen, but just to get a foot in somewhere I was starting to think was impossible feels like a huge milestone.

What this means for my current mode of semi living in Amsterdam I don’t know, although I’m hoping that the opportunities with BBC World Service means I can get my foot in the door and report from overseas in a different way and more than I currently do.

As for yourselves, obviously I’ve only worked there for a few days so far but it’s been super useful in making me understand how businesses and PRs can pitch radio producers. My learnings will come through in another post, or as part of my course/workshop soon. When I’m working regular shifts, I will let you know what kind of pitches I’m open to and how best to pitch.

Does AI spell the end of journalism?

It’s no secret that journalists have had a rough ride for a long time: hello stagnating rates, falling print circulation rates, publishers dropping out of the sector. Shall I go on? Well, yes, because we have another huge challenge hurtling at us. Come on at us, artificial intelligence (AI).

ChatGPT has prompted huge debate and column inches since its launch at the start of year. Standing for Generative Pre-trained Transformer, the machine-learning platform is a very nifty tool enabling users to type in queries and the AI responding in just seconds. If you haven’t tried it already (it’s quite easy to sign up and give it a whirl), you can see the gist of it with the picture below.

I started by asking ChatGBT to first write an article on the impact of Airbnb on communities across the globe. I followed this up by requesting a closer look at the impact of Airbnbs in Margate in the UK. You can see the response below:

Ok, so after testing the technology, I've decided I won't start rereading What Colour Is My Parachute? just yet.

As you can see, the very basic response did cover some of the key concerns of the platform, but I couldn’t see a national newspaper replacing its human crafted articles with this pared down content just yet. It’s lacking depth, critical thinking, and facts - and then it would need to be fact checked. But arguably, it forms the start of an article (or a GCSE essay). However, one of many other concerns is that the AI isn't providing you with unique copy; instead it's regurgitating the same content to people who have asked similar questions.

Still, some titles have jumped in and are already experimenting with the automated technology. CNET for one has been trialling the tech and using it to help write news articles or gather information for stories.

Editor-in-chief Connie Guglielmo said their plan was to find out whether the tech could “efficiently assist” their journalists “in using publicly available facts to create the most helpful content so our audience can make better decisions”. She said the articles were always “reviewed, fact-checked and edited by an editor with topical expertise” before going live.

For now journalists with insider knowledge and a book of strong contacts can’t be replaced – I’m not sure the robots have learnt how to door knock just yet, and I feel we’ll still be yearning to read opinion pieces from actual real-life journalists. But this is just the beginning, and of course, it doesn’t just impact journalists. There’s thousands of other jobs this will have a huge impact on.

Writing in The Spectator, author Sean Thomas believes the end is nigh for writers. “That's it. It's time to pack away your quill, your biro, and your shiny iPad: the computers will soon be here to do it better. ... The machines will come for much academic work first - essays, PhDs, boring scholarly texts (unsurprisingly it can churn these out right now). Fanfic is instantly doomed, as are self-published novels. Next will be low-level journalism ... then high-level journalism will go, along with genre fiction, history, biography, screenplays. ... 5,000 years of the written human word, and 500 years of people making a life, a career, and even fame out of those same human words, are quite abruptly coming to an end.”

Sober reading but hopefully it will spawn a huge creation of jobs we'd never heard of (hopefully beyond just servicing the robots and machines), like many of the past industrial changes have.

Thanks for reading.

Susie

Don't Always Blame This On The Journalist

Image by Glenn Carstens-Peters

I grimace when I spot a typo, a grammatical mistake or another kind of error in my published work. Of course, the eagle-eyed amongst you will probably spot one or two in this newsletter, and I can just about live with that. But it's not just my own errors that can really erk me. Recently one of my case studies spotted that 10 years had been shaved her age. I was sure I'd included her correct age. I checked the filed copy. I had. Phew. In another piece the owner of a company grumbled that his company was named incorrectly. Mortified, I checked. Again the slip up hadn't been my fault. I was bewildered that somehow errors had somehow actually been injected into my copy. Of course I emailed the editor who apologised and the mistakes were rectified.

I just wanted to point this out for the next time you're emailing a journalist about an error in an article because there's a very strong chance it's not their fault (unless you know they're the chief writer, sub and editor, and then it's down to the fact that they're simply understaffed).

I don't mind people emailing when they've spotted an error but don't assume it's down to the journalist. And remember, journalists generally don't write headlines. Maybe that's a whole other newsletter.

Thanks for reading.

Susie

It's celebration time

Photo by Erwan Hesry

Hi everyone,

I hope you're all very well.

Celebration time is in order as this newsletter turns one next week! What started as a last-minute decision to throw into the void a newsletter demystifying the journalism industry and helping businesses and PRs understand the media more in the midst of the pandemic in April 2020 has led to a regular newsletter with thousands of readers and heartwarming engagement stats to boot.

Over the course of the past year, I've covered subjects such as how to build stronger relationships with journalists, the devastating impact of the pandemic on the industry, pitching, racism in the media, my advice to a budding young journalist, an exclusive interview with former female prisoners in Myanmar, and so on. I hope it's proved a useful resource.

So what's next? I'm bouncing around a few ideas on where I'd like to take the newsletter which of course I'll keep you up to date with. What I would love to know is what subjects would you like covered in the next year?

Also, fingers crossed, I'm hoping to restart my face-to-face workshops in the autumn. I'd love to return to gallivanting around the UK (and further afield when the time feels right) and meeting some of you. Please let me know if you're part of a group in an area that would like me to hold a workshop. What would you love a webinar or workshop in? What are your press coverage struggles right now?

Finally, I wouldn't have continued this newsletter without you. Thank you so much for your support over the past year. Thank you for sharing the newsletter with others so it can reach a bigger audience (you can do that by sending people this link), for writing testimonials on my social media pages, and for your lovely emails. It is all so so much appreciated.

Thank you for reading and your continued support.

Enjoy the long Bank Holiday,

Susie