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Collaborative Journalism Summit

May 15, 2025

Rapid, radical transparency: �Building trust with unconventional apps

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Overview

Three text messaging projects for building trust

    • Connecting news skeptics to the newsroom in Texas
    • Engaging with politically interested Chicago residents around major political events
    • Using technology to answer questions from the Chicago migrant community

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Common themes

  • Transparency
  • Personalization
  • Meeting people where they are through technology
  • Commitment to advancing generalizable knowledge

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About the projects

Collaborative Journalism Summit

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‘Radical transparency’ with skeptics

  • Recruited 123 participants from across Texas
    • Below average trust in news, levels of news consumption
    • Surveyed just before and after election 2024 (late Oct/Nov)
    • 110 completed full study

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  • Randomly assigned to control or treatment group

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Slack channel communication

  • We used Groundsource to connect a Slack channel where questions were submitted and answered by our editor-in-chief, senior editor, and director of audience.

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  • Focused on the 2024 election
  • Shared voter guides

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What people wanted to know

  • Why do we vote for judges?
  • What does the Texas Railroad commission do?

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  • We focused on helping people understand the voting process in Texas.

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Events-specific texting in Chicago

  • Recruited people to sign up during the DNC
    • Continued through election, Madigan trial
  • Conversational style
  • Very politically engaged audience

Surveyed participants about why they signed up and about their experiences

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Fielding questions from Chicago immigrants

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Fielding questions from Chicago immigrants

  • Meeting immigrant communities where they are

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WhatsApp Channel Talk to the bot

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Preliminary findings

Collaborative Journalism Summit

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‘Radical Transparency’ Study

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‘Radical Transparency’ Study

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Events-specific texting in Chicago

  • Small sample (N = 163)
  • Somewhat older (51% were 55+ years old)
  • Highly politically interested (52% “extremely” and 41% “very”)
  • Already engaged with news (61% “knew a journalist personally”

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Events-specific texting in Chicago

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Events-specific texting in Chicago

  • Overwhelmingly said they thought Ellery was “authentic,” “friendly,” and “professional”

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Questions?

Collaborative Journalism Summit