Project:
Direct Publishing
With Google News Initiative
A new and innovative content delivery service via rich instant messaging
Direct Publishing allows newsrooms to reimagine editorial products and storytelling in a way that is engaging, rich and conversational. It uses a technology that is widely available and used by billions of people around the world every day: instant messaging.
In partnership with Google News Initiative, we are leading a Direct Publishing pilot project working with three leading African newsrooms: Premium Times in Nigeria, The Standard in Kenya, and Daily Maverick in South Africa.
Instant messaging apps have become increasingly popular across the world and present a huge, largely untapped growth market for the media industry as an innovative channel for news.
This first-of-its-kind pilot enables news organisations to tap into the opportunities offered by RCS (Rich Communication Services), the new messaging protocol that is replacing SMS across all Android phones.
RCS allows users to receive news content directly from publishers at their convenience, while publishers access real-time data and performance metrics. Our pilot project explores the ways that messaging can deliver new narrative formats that drive audience engagement and create monetisation opportunities.
Project type: Journalism, Innovation, Technology
In the press: Direct publishing: what you need to know about this new technology