Inside Story: Welcome to @chroncourt
OVER the past year or more, all Chron news reporters have started Twitter sites linked to their work. So crime reporter John Harrison tweets predominantly on crime stuff, chief reporter Wayne Bontoft on local politics and Lei Chan on education, for example.
Whisper it quietly, there’s even a bit of friendly competition among staff about how many followers one particular person has or how many they gained by tweeting about a particular story. So for example, environment reporter Emma Clark grabbed a very large handful of followers by being an eyewitness to part of the roof collapsing a couple of days after the Fat Cats fire on January 2.
Which, coincidentally, was around the time the newest Twitter feed entered the fray. Step forward @ChronCourt, which after just a couple of weeks on the job, has attracted close to 600 followers. It’s even in danger of overtaking our front-runner, football writer Jefferson Lake.
@ChronCourt – penned by our veteran court reporter, assistant news editor Rob Middleton – is actually a pioneering approach to court reporting from a local newspaper, made possible by the very recent decision to allow reporters to tweet from within a court.
TV viewers may have seen how Sky News brilliantly covered the sentencing of the Stephen Lawrence killers, showing viewers a live Twitter feed from within court giving an “as it happened” account of proceedings.
Our website traffic indicates there has always been an insatiable appetite for crime news so the fact we now have a Twitter feed from within court has proved immensely popular. Many of the postings are genuinely news-breaking.
For example, in a Samurai attack trial this week, the postings gradually built up to a crescendo: “Jury out in John Nash Samurai sword wounding with intent trial. Claims self-defence”.
Then “Nash verdict due now”. Then “John Nash unanimous guilty. To be sentenced now. Likely to be many years” And finally “Nash jailed for 12 years. Judge Bray: ‘Jury completely rejected your defence, for brutal, premeditated attack with sword’.”
Within a couple of minutes, an extended version of that story was online and posted on Twitter and Facebook. It helped to turn around a story from court quicker than we would have ever have managed in the past.
One reason why Rob’s feed has proved popular is because it is not simply about lists of defendants and results of cases, however interesting they obviously are. It is also peppered with humour too so when a defendant appeared yesterday who also had the name of a former British Prime Minister, our resident hack tweeted: “Tony Blair is in court today. No idea what he’s charged with yet. Fraud, war crimes, deception?” Or this posting from January 5: “All the trials today involved sex. Not complaining but looking forward to tomorrow’s 26 cases. Doesn’t anyone rob banks any more?”
Twitter adds a really interesting dimension to court reporting, particularly at the end of a trial when the verdict is due. A few simple short and snappy postings can carry as powerful a punch as 500 words of prose and can reach an audience instantly. Just be sure when you hit the send button that what you’re posting is correct.
It’s still early days for @ChronCourt, but they’ve been impressive early days.
Its success is being watched keenly by other newspapers and quite rightly too.
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Comments
There are 4 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
Finker
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 10:31 AMWhat no response Jackson, surely your 'quality' degree should allow you to evidence and justify your comment?
Phil123
Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 11:13 PMHere here, c&e.
C&E
Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 03:05 PMEr, yes JACKSON - lots. Take a look at our contact us page if you really want to see a breakdown. We've had a hugely positive response to @chroncourt who will continue his great work - as will all our reporters.
Removed by moderator
Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 01:46 PMAre journalists not employed any more? Even from Croby University? You may as well read graffiti from the local brick wall.
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