Expertise and Subject Areas
Some key examples of the studio’s research linked activities and expertise are provided below.
Insight Journalism
Blending community-centred storytelling and journalism's critical and investigative approach with the skill sets of designers, makers and builders, Insight Journalism offers a radical approach to design and service provision for communities. The result is 'bespoke' design and service solutions that are both inspired and scrutinised by the communities involved. By fostering community action and innovation through storytelling and journalism, Insight Journalism moves beyond simply 'giving a community a voice'. Instead, it seeks to inspire action as a result of the journalistic stories that are told, whether they be through audio, video, image or text (or a combination of all of these mediums). A central aim is to connect communities to design and creative expertise, and produce innovative concepts and solutions specifically tailored to the storytelling communities. But the method does not simply end here. An integral part of the approach is that journalistic activity continues after the designs or services are installed. As such Insight Journalism provides a critical reflection emanating from the community on whatever design, service or 'innovation' has been created. This in turn constructs a revisioned 'fourth estate' between the communities and those who they partner with. The result is a design ecosystem where stories inform an iterative community-centred design approach that is relevant to the communities who participate.
Since its inception the Insight journalism method has been applied within a number of different research projects on India, the US and the UK.
The Civic Drone Centre
The Media Innovation Studio – in partnership with the School of Computing, Engineering and Physical Sciences and it’s Engineering Innovation Centre - has secured substantial funding to power the Civic Drone Centre. The centre brings together researchers, practitioners, industry and volunteer organisations to explore the potential for the use of unmanned vehicles for a range of real-world applications – from ‘drone journalism’ to underwater searches, pollution monitoring, aerial surveys and delivering medication to isolated communities. The Civic Drone Centre’s Flying High Challenge project is supported by Nesta’s Challenge Prize Fund, and with Preston City Council as a partner, the five-month project will explore Preston-specific use cases for drone technology. Engaging with local services, communities and industry, the project will create a range of recommendations that could be taken forward on both a local and national level.
Sustainability and the news business
Clare Cook and Dr Francois Nel’s expertise lies in the area of business models, entrepreneurship and innovation. This includes the Submojour database of sustainable business models on the web and Nesta study on hyperlocal revenue models in UK and Europe. Nel is a founder of the Digital Editors Network, UK, which is an academic-industry learning network for thought leaders and influencers that has been meeting since 2007. He is the principal investigator of the world news publishers innovation study initiated in 2009 in collaboration with the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA). The annual study is conducted globally in 10 languages and underpins a variety of scholarly and industry outputs, including WAN-IFRA’s new World News Publishers Outlook. From 2018, he will also be editor of WAN-IFRA’s key World Press Trends report, which has benchmarked the industry since 1989. With Dr Coral Milburn-Curtis of the University of Oxford, he is also a partner in the Innovation Research Group.
Media plurality and independent media
The studio embarks on multi-layered research on a variety of media contexts supporting independent journalism. These media exist within politically pressured systems or are small exiled or oppositional news outlets which are atypical, surviving at the edges of the political system and the economy. These can be described as politically pressured as a result either of the discouragement of specific media practices and developments by political authorities, or the forbidding and outright repression of the same. The research has been filtered into a number of impact channels, ranging from the production of advisory reports and mapping studies, the provision of research-informed training programmes and action research, through to direct involvement in the setting up of local news connectivity systems in the pressured political context of Armenia. CAST has pioneered novel wifi systems as an alternative distribution service in remote areas revealing new knowledge about data insights and hyperlocal demonstrators. Clare is also on the steering committee for the Independent Community News Network based from the University of Cardiff’s Centre for Community Journalism. Her work will feature in the impact case study for UoA34.
Internet of Things and News
Our research interests span journalism, the Internet of Things (IoT), augmented paper, mobile journalism, wearables, HCI, drone journalism and innovation theory. In recent years John Mills’ research has focussed on how news organisations could utilise physical platforms and experiences. Internet of Things (IoT) innovation can quickly spin out into digital ecosystems, app and service development, emergent business models or newsroom structure: digital-physical systems, smart cities, wearables, open source development and community engagement. Projects include Glass Journalism, interactive paper clip EKKO, Rare Occurrence and a Google DNI funded NewsThings project
Exploring Interactions of Objects and People through Meaningful Experiences
Dr Mark Lochrie heads up a team exploring how blending analogue and digital materials are formed to create novel experiences with objects and people. Derived from the initial work seen in DataMakers, Mark continues this manifesto of making things tangible by working across disciplines and sectors to emphasise, ideate, prototype and test for a range of applications, installations and services.
The DataMakers project explored ways of making the creation and use of data more accessible and most importantly real. Keen to seek new ways for individuals to be part of the process of collecting data and contributing in that decision making process. Mark’s portfolio of work ranges from project to project. Based on the collaborators involved. From example, working with artists in Homing and Skip, Play, Repeat to journalists and designers in NewsThings, to cyclists and researchers with the Desire Lines project and filmmakers, researchers and communities in StoryLab 2.0. Furthermore, Mark continues this work in other directions through nurturing new talent with the PhD and Internship programmes he leads. Projects including; the Sound of Colour, Sycamore, Nudgeables, Shogi, Objects for Air and just a few that demonstrate the need for bringing people together through various analogue and digital experiences.