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Mobile Media Services at Sub-Saharan African Newspapers

Making Media Mobile at Sub-Saharan Newspapers

A just-published guide from the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) is all about making media mobile, specifically at newspapers in Sub-Saharan Africa. The full report is available for download here.

Billed as a guidebook, and not a one-size-fits-all rulebook, the guide aims to help Sub-Saharan African news publishers develop and implement mobile services. The report is based on a series of on-site interviews with newspapers in Uganda, Kenya, and South Africa, including The Observer and the Daily Monitor in Uganda, The Standard and the Daily Nation in Kenya, and Grocott's Mail, Mail & Guardian, Avusa Group, and News24.com in South Africa.

Though the primary audience of the guidebook is media managers, there are lessons and tips for anyone interested in the current state of and potential future for mobile print media in Sub-Saharan Africa.

We would have wished that there was a greater focus on online media as the guide is almost entirely focused on print. Given the fast growth of online media outlets in a number of African media markets, this is an unfortunate limitation. 

At the same time, the guide provides a detailed landscape of mobile telephony in Africa, including usage and infrastructure and access points (including SMS, mobile Internet and data, Sim Tool Kit, USSD, voice and interactive voice response). See explanations and examples of these access points in the Mobile Media Toolkit Glossary, here.

Drumroll, please... It's the Mobile Media Toolkit!

Introducing the Mobile Media Toolkit, the newest project from MobileActive.org that is all about Making Media Mobile.

The Mobile Media Toolkit helps you make sense of the growing role of mobile tech in media. The Toolkit provides how-to guides, mobile tools, and case studies on how mobile phones can (and are) being used for reporting, news broadcasting, and citizen media. We cover it all, from basic feature phones to the latest smartphone applications.

It's an exciting day for us here at MobileActive.org as we launch the Mobile Media Toolkit. For the last year we have been interviewing people, researching projects, and testing tools, to bring you this free resource. It is designed to help you evaluate and effectively deploy the right tools for reporting and sharing content on and to mobile devices.

Please visit the Toolkit. Share it with others. Add to it! It's available in English, Spanish, and Arabic.  So, please join us and say Welcome, Bienvenidos, and مرحبا to the Mobile Media Toolkit!

Grocott's Mail: A Local Newspaper Embraces Mobile Phones

[Updated with images] In Grahamstown, South Africa, getting and sharing news is a mobile experience. Grocott’s Mail, a local paper, incorporates mobile phones into many aspects of its news service – from disseminating headlines via SMS, to encouraging readers to text in their opinions, to a Knight Challenge-winning citizen journalist training program.