Damian speaks with founder of Journalism Mentors, Adriana Lacy, about how she turned her passion for student journalism into a career in digital journalism and consulting.
About Our Guest:
Adriana Lacy, an award winning journalist and consultant based in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the founder and president of Adriana Lacy Consulting: a full service digital consulting firm helping publishers and businesses to grow their digital audiences. She is also an adjunct lecturer in the Journalism Department at Brandeis University, and the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, in recognition of her work as the founder of Journalism Mentors, a website dedicated to advancing early career journalists through mentoring and paid media opportunities. Prior to this, she worked in audience and engagement roles at Axios, the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and The Nieman foundation.
Find Adriana Lacy Online:
- Website
- Linkedin
- Twitter
- Instagram
Show Notes
00:03: Guest Introduction
01:16: Adriana's journey to becoming a journalist
03:00: Importance of student media and journalism
05:19: Discovering digital audience engagement and unique paths in journalism
10:42: Trends in digital news and social media
13:21: Founding Journalism Mentors
19:06: How AI will change the landscape of journalism and social media
28:23: Wrap-up
Read the transcript for this episode
Want to listen to this episode a different way? Find us wherever you get your podcasts:
RSS Feed
Apple Podcasts
Google Podcasts
Stitcher
Spotify
YouTube
Amazon Music/Audible
Pandora
iHeartRadio
PodBean
TuneIn
Podchaser
Damian Radcliffe 00:03
Hello and welcome to the demystifying media Podcast. I'm Damian Radcliffe, the Carolyn S. Chambers, professor of journalism at the University of Oregon, and today we're going to be talking about audience engagement digital media and social media. To help us discuss this I'm joined in the studio today by Adriana Lacey, an award winning journalist and consultant based in Boston, Massachusetts. She is the founder and president of Adriana lacy consulting: a full service digital consulting firm helping publishers and businesses to grow their digital audiences. She is also an adjunct lecturer in the Journalism Department at Brandeis University, and the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree, in recognition of her work as the founder of journalism mentors, a website dedicated to advancing early career journalists through mentoring and paid media opportunities. Prior to this, she worked in audience and engagement roles at Axios, the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and The Nieman foundation. Adriana has joined us on campus throughout this week as a journalist in residence meetings with students, faculty, and student groups to talk about her work and career path. Adriana, thank you for joining us.
Adriana Lacy01:03
Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Damian Radcliffe 01:05
So I want to start right at the beginning something actually I've never asked you, which is journalism, why journalism? How did you get into it? Was it something you knew or you always wanted to do? Or did you fall into it by accident?
Adriana Lacy01:16
Yeah, that's such a great question. I think for me, I definitely fell into it. It was definitely not something that I wanted to do. Growing up, I didn't really know any journalist. I definitely grew up around, you know, the news and the media. I grew up in Philadelphia, so my parents would have a subscription to The Philadelphia Inquirer. So I would, you know, take a read of it every morning, mostly the comic section, but I would definitely look at it. But being a journalist is not something that I really thought about until I actually got to campus. I went to Penn State and was majoring in education. So that was my goal to teach elementary education. But as I got more and more involved in campus, I really saw just how powerful media was. And wasn't until my senior year that I actually switched my major to becoming a journalism major. So that was really exciting. And I think once I switched and started doing internships, and just learning more about the industry, I think I just fell in love instantly.
Damian Radcliffe 02:10
Fantastic. Was there a particular tipping point for you? Where you kind of realized this was what you wanted to do? Or was it more of an incremental discovery?
Adriana Lacy02:18
Yeah, I think it was incremental. I think there was kind of one event that definitely, I think started that I remember my freshman year on I was on campus. Soledad O'Brien actually came to campus. And she talked a lot about her journey, and just the power of diverse voices and storytelling, and I thought it was just really inspiring and interesting to hear her story, because she's someone who came up in legacy media, and then ended up you know, doing her own thing and starting her own company. And I just thought the work that she had done in media was really admirable.
Damian Radcliffe 02:46
So having made that switch in your final year, was a lot of catching up to do because you in terms of your career, as we've we've talked about you hit the ground running. So how did you kind of make up some of that that time in your final year?
Adriana Lacy03:00
Yeah, so I think a lot of it was definitely student media. Even though I wasn't a journalism major at the time, I had started my own news outlet on campus. So I wasn't an educator, I was an education major, but I was still doing journalism. So I was still kind of in the media space, but not officially. So I think that gave me a lot of experience. And then the summer after my junior year, I ended up interning at Axios, and DC. So that's where I got a lot of news experience. So I think those two things kind of really helped me really jumpstart my career.
Damian Radcliffe 03:29
And we often talk about the importance of the value of student media for people in terms of giving them a training ground and a sandbox to kind of learn and practice their craft. Is that something that kind of resonates both with you in terms of your experience, but also the students that you've worked with at Randy's and also at University of Southern California?
Adriana Lacy03:49
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think classes are so great, because you learn love fundamentals and basics. But I think when you're in, you know, student media, and you have to make editorial decisions, and you have to manage, you know, work life balance and dealing with students, I think that's when you really start to understand what it's like to be a journalist. And I think it's such a powerful place, because you can make mistakes and learn things and kind of do it in a place that is a pretty low stakes, I think compared to the real world. And I think that's really where you can grow and really learn in media. And I think, you know, even the students that I teach, and I work with a lot of them have the same experience where they're working in student media, and they're really taking what they learned in the classroom and really applying it.
Damian Radcliffe 04:29
And the publication you created. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? And what was the driver furred for doing it?
Adriana Lacy04:34
Yeah, so the name of it was Penn State underground, or we call it the underground and pretty much we tried to tell kind of the untold stories of Penn State. So we were really kind of interested in looking at, you know, why isn't the student media landscape as diverse at Penn State as it could have been? Why weren't there many international students represented? Penn State has a really large international student base, and we felt like there were just lots of stories there that could be told. So our goal was really of centralizing and really just focusing on kind of the stories on campus and making sure we could tell those.
Damian Radcliffe 05:05
And within that, did you also feel that you didn't see yourself represented in student media on campus? Was that a factor as well?
Adriana Lacy05:11
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I didn't know anyone who was even in, you know, the newspaper or any other outlet. So for me, it really was kind of a representation thing as well.
Damian Radcliffe 05:19
And then you talked about so at having graduated from that you went to work at Axios. And the focus of your work has been predominantly on audience development and digital and social engagement. How did you fall into that field or decide that that field was for you?
Adriana Lacy05:35
Yeah, so I had done a lot of work in sports. before I was even interested in journalism, I was always a big soccer fan. And that was really where I got a lot of experience. And when I was on campus, I had interned with the athletic department, and a bunch of different areas, the football team, soccer team, the basketball team, and I did a lot of social media. So I knew that kind of digital creation, content creation was something that was really interesting to me. But I didn't really know that that could be applied in a journalistic sense, I didn't really realize that until I actually had Internet access, and was the social media intern. And I realized, like, wow, there's this whole part of news that's not just being a reporter, or being an editor. And that's kind of really what got me kind of interested in that genre.
Damian Radcliffe 06:16
Now, my take on that is that I don't think enough students think of that as a potential career path. And yet they've grown up as digital natives. They're very immersed in this space, they have strong opinions about what they like on social and digital, and a lot of skills and experience, both in terms of content they're creating for themselves, or as demonstrated in terms of other work that they might be doing on campus. Is that a fair kind of summary? I mean, do you think most journalists, in your experience, still look at quite traditional career paths, rather than perhaps looking more widely at some of these other possibilities? And ones that might actually be a better cultural and skill fit for them?
Adriana Lacy06:54
Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of times when we hear the word journalists, we just think of a writer, you know, we don't even think of an editor, sometimes we just think of someone who's writing stories. And I think because of that we have such a limited view on what actually happens in media. And there's not really room for copy editors, designers product. And I think, more and more that we can start to kind of integrate these things in our curriculums and undergrad and start exposing students to these kinds of different paths. We can have people kind of do that, because most of the people I know, who work in, you know, audience engagement or social media, they kind of pivoted from being a reporter first and fell into it, because they kind of found it later on in life. And I think, hopefully, more and more, I think it's getting better, where students are starting to realize these are kind of very viable career paths early on.
Damian Radcliffe 07:37
And they're also arguably the areas where we're seeing the most growth the most opportunities, right?
Adriana Lacy07:41
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, as much as you know, reporting and editing will always have its place, I think, you know, really disseminating that writing is so so important that I'm it's one thing to write an article, but it's really now about distribution, you know, where does that article go? What does it look like on social media? What does it sound like? Audio wise, there's just so many different paths you can take.
Damian Radcliffe 08:00
And you mentioned that many of the people you work with started as reporters and then migrate over to those kinds of digital and social roles. Do you see a let's say, a snobbery for want of a better way of putting it if you come into those kinds of roles without that kind of traditional reporting background?
Adriana Lacy08:19
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think a lot of times, even still, in journalism, people see these social media roles as kind of like PR marketing, and not real journalism. But everyone I worked with all the colleagues I've worked with, who have had, you know, audience engagement roles, have worked in journalism, you know, have journalism degrees, master's degrees in journalism, as well and have the same skills. But I think so much of you know, what is journalism is focused on writing and reporting that we don't really see kind of these other roles, as, you know, actual journalists.
Damian Radcliffe 08:46
Right. And so we need to broaden that definition of what constitutes journalism. And also recognize that people in those roles are bringing journalistic and editorial sensibilities to the work that they're doing.
Adriana Lacy08:59
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, even you know, on the product side of things, like I've known so many places, where if you work in engineering or product, you know, you're on the business side, and you don't know anything about journalism, but there's so many journalists who are pivoting kind of to these roles. And it's great because they bring that knowledge and that expertise that those industries really need to really thrive.
Damian Radcliffe 09:17
Can you give us a couple of examples of things you've worked on, that you're particularly proud of which have kind of shown those those skills in action?
Adriana Lacy09:24
Yeah, for sure. Um, I think for me, a lot of the work that I did at the LA Times was things I was really proud of, especially around just Instagram and social media. When I got there, we had had some Instagram accounts where we really weren't super focused on Instagram. I'm not really focused just on social media at all. I think there was still so much of a focus on the print product. We're just something that we see so much. I remember going to Morning News meetings and every single story it was kind of like, you know, someone would ask you, oh, how long is your story? And they say, oh, it's six inches, or you know, six columns wide. And it's kind of like, oh, what does that mean? But it's just all like, you know, newspaper physical News. Before speak, when there wasn't really that focus on the homepage and the digital experience. So being there was really exciting because we got to test different types of accounts, not just kind of an LA Times, you know, Instagram account. But what does an LA Times archives account look like? How can we, you know, really bolster our food offerings or entertainment offerings on Instagram. So I think being able to kind of set up these different verticals and test and really take a lot of the work that the journalists were doing and package it in a way that we could reach out over more diverse audiences was really exciting. Right?
Damian Radcliffe 10:30
And that's obviously a good strategy go for pretty much every media organization wants to reach younger audiences, socially as a part of that mix. But what other things should they perhaps be thinking about?
Adriana Lacy10:42
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there's so many different types of things. Social media is a big one, I focus a lot on kind of, you know, referral traffic and aggregator. So places like Apple news, places like smart news, places like Newsbreak. People really love curated things. That's why I think homepage is kept kind of really come back in style for some places, because people are like, you know, there's so much information in the world, like, tell me what I need to know, have someone curate it. And that's kind of been a really great way to do that. So Apple news I see as a really big thing for publishers. I asked my students on before every semester kind of what their news habits are, where they read the news. So many of them always say we love app news, we love just seeing, you know, things that I like, and they curate it really well. So I see that as a really powerful tool, as well as newsletters as well. Newsletters are interesting, because there's just so many different things you can do with them. And I think just having that direct line to your readers is something that a lot of places really can replicate.
Damian Radcliffe 11:37
And are there... I also am a big fan of newsletters because it just takes all the hard work out for me. Somebody else has done all that sifting and curation. And it's a real skill and art. Are there particular newsletters that you are a fan of?
Adriana Lacy11:50
Yeah, of course. Um, you know, I love the human foundation. So I love the Nieman lab newsletter, not even necessarily because of you know, the stories that they put out. And I mean, they add, you know, a story or two of their own reporting, but back to the curation point we just talked about, they do a really great job of curating, you know, here are the most, you know, 567 interesting articles of the day. And I just love that because I don't have to scour the internet and see, you know, what's the most important story. So those are things I really love. I also really love the local newsletters, I love the Axios Boston newsletter seeing kind of what's going on and around in town. The Boston Globe also has a very interesting newsletter that they're testing out called beside, which is kind of a fun kind of things to do around the city newsletter that I think is really fascinating. It's kind of a business product. That's not necessarily something that's from their editorial team. But I think it's such a great concept because it's just entertainment. And then here's kind of like, you know, it's kind of like the skim you know, it feels very, you know, 10 years ago, it would have been really great. And it's kind of cool to see that model come back.
Damian Radcliffe 12:52
It's a great name to exactly these things. And then let's talk a bit more about journalism mentor. So this is the project for which you were honored in the Forbes 30 under 30. This this year. And you mentioned earlier that you didn't grow up around journalists, and you didn't necessarily see when you were at college, the local media scene kind of really reflecting you and your life and those of many other people on campus. Were those principles, part of the drivers behind setting up this mentorship program?
Adriana Lacy13:21
Yeah, definitely. Um, I just remember, you know, even interning at the New York Times and meeting so many people, and so many fellow interns, and so many of them, were talking about how they, you know, we're cherubs at the Medill journalism camp for high schoolers. And I was like, I have no idea what you're even talking about. And I was like, this is fascinating, like, so many people have been editors of their high school newspapers and have been around news forever, and had so many deep connections, because they went to places like Northwestern places like Columbia, where they got to really be around so many world class journalists. And I think more and more as I kind of got in the industry, I realized, Wow, there's so many people who just don't have these opportunities, who just have never had a chance to be around these really big time journalists. And, you know, a lot of times networking and who, you know, is so, so vital in every industry, but especially journalism, and I just was really hoping we could find, you know, a way to kind of help level that playing field. So, for me journalism mentors was a way that we could connect, you know, first generation college students, people who go to schools that don't have a journalism program, to really kind of connect with people and really start that networking, even if their schools or kind of their situations can't give them those opportunities.
Damian Radcliffe 14:29
And so having come up with this, the concept of of this, how did you then go about launching it, finding a suite of mentors and indeed then getting people to realize this was a legit service and something that they could really benefit from?
Adriana Lacy14:44
Yeah, of course. So I was really inspired by there's a similar platform called Digital women leaders, which is started kind of, there's these really cool cohorts that exists where women can kind of be part of a Leadership Academy and one of the things that came out of it was kind of, you know this advice and mentoring platform for them. And basically, they could book calls and talk to people. And I thought that model was really interesting. And I wondered, you know, what that could look like on a larger scale where we're focusing on, you know, just early career college students. So got some really great advice from them just on how to do it. But you know, being a child of the internet, kind of just bought a domain name and set it up and did the website myself and just kind of recruited people to do it. I was really lucky people are really gracious and happy to do that. So I just kind of put a call out on Twitter, like, does anyone want to be a mentor? Does anyone want to volunteer their time and the applications were just rolling in. So it was really exciting to see.
Damian Radcliffe 15:38
I'm going to put you on the spot and ask if you can share any numbers with us in terms of number of mentors and number of people that you've worked with? That, of course, is not a proxy for anything, but I'm just curious.
Adriana Lacy15:49
No, of course. Um, so I think right now, we probably have like about 150 mentors on the site. There are so many more that we have of people who want to join. But you know, this is a passion project. And I think it's one of those things where wanting to get as many people on the site, but I would say there's probably 200 People even more, that are kind of doing it. We asked our mentors a few years ago, kind of how many people that they've spoke to, on average, a lot of them kind of said, you know, we've spoken to 10 to 15 people, so kind of just looking at that scale, there's so many people that have kind of been impacted by the program. I've just met people, you know, in various conferences, where it's like, oh, I talked to a mentor, or this person got me a job, or this person looked at my resume. So it's just so gratifying to see that the platform really has been helping people.
Damian Radcliffe 16:33
So we'll put links to it in the in the show notes. But for people who want to get involved, either as a mentor or a mentee, what would they need to do?
Adriana Lacy16:41
Yeah of course, um, if you're someone that wants to be a mentor, we have a really quick and easy Google forum, on our website, journalism mentors.com, you just apply, we pretty much just asked you for your name, a headshot, what you want to talk about, and just some information about you. And then if you're someone who wants to be mentored, all you have to do is just go on the website and take a look at the different people that we have and book a call with them. Obviously, we're looking at professional journalists who are very busy with very, you know, intense deadlines and things, but a lot of them really do put a lot of time on their calendars to be accessible to students. Great.
Damian Radcliffe 17:14
And you've been very accessible this week, you're three quarters of the way through your engagement with us here as a journalist in residence. I'm curious, what are some of the things that you have learned or taken away from your interactions with with students? And what do you want them to take away from you?
Adriana Lacy17:31
Yeah, that's such a great question. I mean, I think for me, I've just been so honored to hear from so many students. I mean, it's so interesting kind of seeing the things that students are thinking about in this day and age, so many of them are just so passionate about how they can make news work for them make news interesting, that's interesting to their friends and interesting to the world that we live in. So it just been so fascinating learning from them about what they love and what they're interested in. Because I think it makes me a better journalist, hearing kind of what people want to consume. I think when you're a journalist, and you're working in the industry, you're very easy to think that this is what people need to know, or this is how people need to consume news. But then when you hear from people, you kind of realize, you know, maybe we're not doing it correctly, you know, maybe we do need to tailor our content more towards, you know, Gen Z audiences and learning more about that. So that's been really great. And my hope is just was like a giant focus group almost exactly. Yeah. For me, it's like, I'm learning so many things. And, you know, I think for me, my hope is just to leave them with as much advice and information as I can. I've been trying to give them all email addresses, and I tell them, you know, feel free to reach out, I'm happy to look at resumes. And my hope is that they can really use me as a resource as they navigate their careers. Great.
Damian Radcliffe 18:39
And well, and hopefully many of them will take you up on that. Oh, good. Good. Because sometimes, I think students hear that message, and they're slightly they don't know whether it's genuine or not, or they still feel nervous about putting themselves out there. But I mean, my advice would be would always be I'm sure you would echo this, like when people say that, do it.
Adriana Lacy19:01
Yeah, absolutely. It's like the worst they can do is not respond, but they probably will, you know, yeah.
Damian Radcliffe 19:06
And then just looking ahead to the to the future, you set up your own consultancy, during the course of around about the last year, I think, and you've said a few times in in classes that you've spoken to that the big thing, not surprisingly, that all of your clients want to talk about is AI. So we should talk about about that. So what are the things that are keeping your clients awake at night in this space?
Adriana Lacy19:29
Yeah, I think so many of them just want to do something in the space. I think it's kind of one of those things where it feels like a really popular trend, and you just need to do something. It feels very reminiscent of, you know, what happened with Facebook and video, you know, a few years ago where people are like, okay, video is really popular, so we need to do something. And I think right now, you know, it's just not it's not as straightforward as you know, oh, make some videos and post them on Facebook and see what happens. So I think a lot of people are just kind of figuring out like, we know these tools exists, we know that chat GPT is a thing like, what's next? How do we use this? How do we leverage it. So I think that's just been a big thing. It's just honestly interest from people. But I think there's also just a lot of concern. I actually just did a seminar recently with a bunch of journalists about AI. And so many of them were just very hesitant about it, they kind of felt like, you know, you're telling me about tools that will replace me in the next five years. And I think there's a lot of insecurity from journalists that really feel like their jobs are in jeopardy. And what I've been trying to tell them is, you know, I think there will be jobs that will be augmented, there will be roles that change. But I also think that there still be a need for news and information, especially accurate information, we're seeing, you know, so much misinformation, so much disinformation in the world, specially on social media. So that kind of pursuit of truth will always be necessary. But I think just the way in which we report in the ways in which we storyteller will be just so different, and really being able to know how to leverage these tools, I think will be really vital.
Damian Radcliffe 20:58
And is that a similar message that you would want to convey to students, because I think the anxiety and the concerns that you have described that you're seeing with your clients are also very prevalent amongst the student population as well. And paying all this money to go to college to do a degree in something, which is going to be redundant in five years time, because a robot would have taken my job.
Adriana Lacy21:17
Yeah, no, it's tough. I mean, I think a lot of people are just like, really worried, like, why am I why am I doing this, but what I've been really trying to encourage students is really figure out, you know, what are the ways that you can leverage it? You know, I think a lot of people just immediately think, oh, like, we're gonna just use these tools to read our essays. And I think that's just a very, you know, narrow way to look at it. I'm sure, it could probably write an essay, but it's pretty obvious. When the when it's written, you know, no, very good. Exactly. Not very good at all. So for me, it's like, you know, explore, you know, practical ways you could use it, it can help you with outlining your paper, it can help you with organizing your research, it can help you with finding new sources, the same way that the internet did. I remember, someone was telling me a few days ago, you know, when Google came out, people were super nervous people were like, you know, this is so bad for for academia, you know, no one's going to the library anymore, no one's going to read books. And now it's like, the idea of not having Google seems so silly. And the idea of even using it as not using it as a tool seems absurd. And I think we're gonna kind of feel that same way with AI really soon.
Damian Radcliffe 22:18
Right. And I guess, arguably, that has always been the response to any kind of new technology. I mean, when television came along, it was going to kill radio and radio and audio in the form of podcasts is still going strong.
Adriana Lacy22:30
Yeah, it's just a different, you know, a different way of doing it, you know, this idea of like telling, you know, stories and talking and things and communicating, the audio is still very popular, just augmented, which I think is what we'll see with journalism as well.
Damian Radcliffe 22:41
And so it sounds as if one of the things that you would encourage students to do, and indeed your clients is to just kind of experiment and play around with this space, I certainly get a sense that people feel overwhelmed by the implications of this technology and almost don't know where to start is that what you're kind of seeing in the conversations that you're having is that you just need to kind of almost take people gently by the hand and walk them through it?
Adriana Lacy23:05
Yeah, definitely. Um, a few weeks ago, I actually did a similar thing with my students, where I kind of had them create prompts to kind of get information from chat GPT, and a lot of them had never really played with it, um, they knew about it, but I think so many people, especially in academia, are scared to use it, because they're like, I'm going to get in trouble for plagiarism, I'm going to get expelled for even just playing around with the tool. And that's one thing I've been really like, encouraging, you know, professors and educators is like to embrace it, you know, don't make it seem like it's a dirty thing that students shouldn't use at all. Because they will have to use it when they get into the real world. And people in professional jobs are using it all the time. So I've been trying to encourage people, you know, play around with asking it prompts, and I had them play around and they were like, yeah, so interesting. Like when you kind of guide it and ask it very specific questions, it gives you better answers, and just being able to just have that experience, I think is really important.
Damian Radcliffe 23:55
And do you think that we are starting to see a shift in that space? Or is it still too early in terms of a willingness for both students and faculty to embrace this technology?
Adriana Lacy24:06
Yeah, I think it's starting to change slowly. I think it's just becoming so obvious now that you kind of have to do it. I think in the early days, you know, check. GPT was just something that was used by like a very small bit of the population. But I think more and more people are learning about it and seeing it that it's just starting to grow. So I think now, you know, it's probably the most popular it's been, but I can imagine in the next few months, it'll be something that everyone's using everyone's adopting, which is why I'm encouraging journalists now to really start thinking about where they want to use it, and how before someone else decides for them
Damian Radcliffe 24:37
right no, that's such a good point. And it's worth remembering this technology, in terms of it being public is not even a year old. We're talking. And yet it already has, chat GBT alone has a user base that's as big as LinkedIn, LinkedIn on I think, on a monthly basis on Reddit and so forth.
Adriana Lacy24:53
And this changed so much even the past few I mean, like, chat GPT you know, 3.5 to four, I mean radically different and you're seeing It just like advanced so quickly sounds like a imagine where we will be in a year from now. Yeah.
Damian Radcliffe 25:04
Gosh, that's a big question to kind of be a little scary it is. But I think part of that conversation feeds into a lot of the negativity that we often hear about journalism. There are many negative things. I mean, right now, we're in an incredibly complex geopolitical situation. News avoidance is at all time highs. mistrust in media is at all time lows. And there's a lot of kind of negativity about the profession and the industry. But there's also lots of really great work and great opportunities taking place, too. So I wanted to kind of wrap up by that by asking, like, what's exciting you about journalism and the news media today?
Adriana Lacy25:43
Yeah, you know, it's so funny, you asked you that, because I think a lot of people are really so kind of like doomsday about journalism right now. But I do think it's a really exciting time. I mean, I think we're at a place where we have to start really making some radical decisions about how we want to reach our audiences. I think for so long social media has been a bit of a crutch for journalists, where you didn't really have to do that much work to reach your audience, you post the link on Facebook, it goes viral, everyone reads it. But now we know, none of the social media sites really want you to leave the platform, they don't want you to click links and read articles. And we have to be really, really creative and how we reach our audiences. And I think that's really exciting. Newsletters are becoming super popular, people are using WhatsApp people are being just a lot more experimental because they have to. And I think being forced to kind of experiment and be put in these places where you really have to think critically and do research and serve your audience is something that I'm really excited to see.
Damian Radcliffe 26:37
And that's going to be the main theme of your talk tomorrow, right? Your public lecture looking at the future of engagement and audience development?
Adriana Lacy26:43
Yeah, definitely. I'm really interested in like private messaging right now. I think that's something that's really fascinating. I know, Nieman lab had just released that piece yesterday on WhatsApp and how more people are using that. So for me, I'm just kind of really interested on like, what are these communities that we can create online? And how does that work at scale?
Damian Radcliffe 27:01
So can you just quickly give us some examples of of those work? Because not everyone listening will necessarily understand what we mean by private messaging?
Adriana Lacy27:08
Yeah, for sure. Um, when I think of private messaging, I think of so many different things. You know, I think that kind of at its simplest thing is text messaging, you know, just simply subscribing to a text message line from a newsroom, and someone's telling you, you know, breaking news, this thing just happened. Click here to read the story. I think it's so valuable, not just on a news and information kind of way, but just giving people information as quickly as possible. Now, if something happens in your neighborhood, the power's out, there's no electricity. SMS is always really, really reliable in those situations. I think about the Texas Tribune, who use it a lot during a lot of the ice storms in Texas. And it really became a really valuable tool. But then there's places like telegram and WhatsApp, where these are apps that are used a lot around the world, but have never really caught on in the state yet. And I see these kind of places that can work really well for journalism. Mark Zuckerberg had just said a few days ago that he was really focusing more on WhatsApp as kind of the future of Facebook and Mina, I think WhatsApp has always been part of their arsenal, but it hasn't been something that they've prioritized as a big kind of social media product. It really was just a messaging product. But I think now it's really just becoming a community. And just being able to talk to people all around the world, you know, without having to you know, over Wi Fi is something that's really cool.
Damian Radcliffe 28:23
Yeah, absolutely. Well, we should say that your lecture is going to be recorded and will also be available wherever you found this podcast. So for more examples, be sure to download and listen to Adrianus talk, which he's gonna be doing tomorrow. So we could continue on this vein, but I think we probably draw to a close there. So Adriana, thank you so much for joining us today and for joining us on campus this week. It's been a delight to have you here in Eugene, Oregon. Do keep an eye out on our website demystifying.uoregon.edu For more details from Adriana is visit and for all of the archive talks and lectures that you can find from this series. Just reminds me to thank one more time our guest today Adriana Lac