As journalists are under increased pressure to produce stories for a 24/7 news cycle and discussions about churnalism, filter bubbles and fake news raise questions about the possibility to do so, finding ways to continue producing original and quality stories is more urgent than ever.

With the tools developed through INJECT, WAN-IFRA hopes its member publishers will be at a distinct advantage over those who simply own the production and platforms of news gathering and distribution. “The EU funded Horizon 2020 programmes create an opportunity for traditional publishers to disrupt the earliest digital startups that were born out of the portal and search eras, and we are proud to be an engaged player in that process,” says Vincent Peyrègne, WAN-IFRA CEO.

INJECT will officially launch at the Cass Innovate conference in London on the 4th May 2017.

INJECT: Technology meets journalism

Exploring the ways in which technology can support journalists' work, INJECT uses creativity techniques based on Natural Language Processing (NLP). The toolkit includes a creative search engine that reporters can use to search relevant databases for new angles, and to investigate further and deeper into the background of the stories they are working on (JUICE), as well as a functionality that brings articles to life with interactive fact cards (EXPLAAIN). INJECT also scans texts for keywords and automatically links them to additional information. In order to make it easy for journalists to integrate the toolkit into their work practices, the software will be built directly into content management systems.

George Brock, Professor of Journalism, City, University of London, said: "INJECT aims to do something which no other software for journalism attempts: to combine creative search techniques and ways of telling the reader more about background and sources. And this help is easy to use and fast."

Neil Maiden, Professor of Digital Creativity, City, University of London, added: “This is the first tool that seeks to integrate productivity and creativity support directly into the digital work of journalists. It builds on successes in other domains to deliver key innovations in journalism. 

Innovating together

INJECT is a collaborative innovation project joining journalists, academics, research centres, developers, media organisations and business organisations. WAN-IFRA joins the international consortium with the support of its Global Alliance for Media Innovation (GAMI).

GAMI, with its network of international affiliates, will actively participate and support INJECT to advance rapidly the solutions created by the consortium. Together with its partners, WAN-IFRA will contribute to increase the competitiveness of one of Europe’s most important creative industries: journalism.

The INJECT project incorporates the Google-funded JUICE project that began in 2016 at City, University of London, as a collaboration between the Centre for Creativity in Professional Practice at the Cass Business School and the Journalism Department. Broader research into new tools for journalists won an EU Horizon 2020 grant of €1m, and the INJECT project started its work in January 2017. 

Official launch in London, May 4

Registration for the official launch: http://www.cass.city.ac.uk/news-and-events/conferences/cassinnovate-2017

Contact - Inquiries

Stephen Fozard, Project Director, Global Alliance for Media Innovation, WAN-IFRA (Paris, France) stephen.fozard@wan-ifra.org 

WAN-IFRA is the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers. Its mission is to protect the rights of journalists across the world to operate free media, and provide its members with professional services to help their business prosper in a digital world and perform their crucial role in open societies. It derives its authority from its global network of leading news publishing companies and technology entrepreneurs, and its legitimacy from its 80 member publisher associations representing 18,000 publications in 120 countries. 

GAMI is the Global Alliance for Media Innovation, a WAN-IFRA initiative to create a global multi stakeholders network to serve the need for a sustainable innovation ecosystem for the news media industry. GAMI supports and coordinates international research and innovation programmes, develops platforms for news publishers to better work and engage with emerging technology entrepreneurs and innovation centres. Its goal is to rapidly advance new technologies and talents to the market and lead to better economy of scales for news publishers and tech companies in developing and acquiring the next level of innovation tools.

INJECT, Innovative Journalism: Enhanced Creativity Tools, is a European project uniting 14 partners in 6 countries. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. INJECT’s objective is to transfer new digital technologies to news organisations to improve the creativity and productivity of journalists, in order to increase the competitiveness of European news and media organisations. For more information about the project visit: http://www.injectproject.eu

Keywords : Journalism, news and media, creativity support, inspirational search, productivity support, content reuse, spin-off business, news ecosystems