After two years of research and development, WAN-IFRA and partners are proud to announce that the gaming tool NewsArcade is set for global launch – offering pioneering newsrooms a free, six-month trial run of the tool. To apply, just drop an email to newsarcade@in-two.com
In Public Perspectives on Trust in News, an extract from Reuters Institute’s latest Digital News Report, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen writes about news avoiders: “The challenge for news media with this part of the public is to overcome the distance and convince them that news is engaging, interesting, and valuable enough to spend time with – and on that basis perhaps over time earn their trust as well.”
Two years ago, WAN-IFRA applied to a call from the European Union, with an international consortium, to do just that. With funding granted by the European Education and Culture Executive Agency, we started developing NewsArcade, an innovative, interactive digital tool aimed at boosting media literacy and critical thinking skills in youth.
Now, WAN-IFRA is proud to announce that the gaming tool is set for global launch – and seeking early adopter newsrooms keen to push boundaries and pioneer gamified news formats. NewsArcade is offering pioneering newsrooms a free, six-month trial run of the tool. To apply, just drop an email to newsarcade@in-two.com
Revolutionising storytelling and engagement
The NewsArcade Authoring Tool is a web-based Content Management System that allows journalists and editors to repurpose existing content into interactive flows that are experienced as gamified news stories.
The only game on the market based on real, evolving news, NewsArcade curates a diverse collection of news articles from trusted sources across different domains – or, embedded, from across the selected news site.
The game itself is based on a set of provided News Values set out in the Copenhagen Criteria: and players can choose to craft stories based on those values.
The game starts by setting a challenge to the user in the form of an assignment from the fictional editor: they will play within a genre, from a range of news stories based on the seven news values.
All the example stories prepared by the consortium can be found here. Players who opt to play with an article on Disinformation and AI will be challenged to draft their version of the story with an Analytical point of view. Users with a special interest in the UK elections will be led to write an Impactful piece, while the global challenge of News Avoidance should be told in a Constructive way.
The genre is interactive, letting the user experience the editorial decision-making process, and deciding on angles, quotes, headlines and images to craft their story according to the news value assigned by the “editor” at the beginning of the game.
To facilitate newsrooms, the partners created an online training course tailored for media professionals, structured into “nano modules” (9 videos in total). These 4-minutes segments are ideal to quickly learn how to gamify news stories and integrate NewsArcade into daily newsroom tasks.
NewsArcade is seeking early adopter newsrooms and is offering a free, six-month trial run of the tool. If your organisation might be interested in hearing more, just drop an email to newsarcade@in-two.com .
Authoring an educational news experience
Designed by game developers in conjunction with researchers, publishers and educators, the NewsArcade Author tool is set to transform our understanding of news storytelling in an engaging, interactive experience.
The Tool’s benefits go beyond the newsroom, too: NewsArcade was initially developed as an innovative, interactive digital tool aimed at boosting media literacy and critical thinking skills in youth.
Stringent trials and pilot tests of the Authoring Tool highlighted a potent additional advantage: the game also effectively serves as an educational tool, providing a fresh approach to education and training for newsrooms and journalism educators.
In the months leading to its launch, NewsArcade developers hosted a Global Youth News Lab workshop at the International People’s College, comprising global newsroom leaders and students from the traditional Folk high school that boasts a current cohort of students from over 30 countries.
NewsArcade-Seriously Play the News was also presented to attendees at a World Editors Forum session on How to Sell Your Journalism to News Avoiders at WAN-IFRA’s 75th World News Media Congress in Denmark, as well as at YOUTHdig in Vilnius, Lithuania – and online, via webinars.
Now, NewsArcade is reaching out to early newsroom adopters, to help revolutionise news consumption via gamification, and is offering pioneering newsrooms a free, six-month trial run of the tool. To apply, just drop an email to newsarcade@in-two.com
NewsArcade’s immersive experience is geared to revolutionise how content creators, publishers and educators engage with their audiences, making storytelling more interactive than ever.
ABOUT
NewsArcade-Seriously Play the News is co-funded by the European Education and Culture Executive Agency as part of Creative Europe-Media, and involves eight partners from five European countries.
They are: DIAS Publishing House (Project Coordinator, Cyprus); IN2 Digital Innovations (Germany); Portaplay APS (Denmark); Sud Ouest (France); WAN-IFRA (France); L’Association de la presse d’information générale (APIG, France); The Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (NISV) Stichting Nederlands Instituut Voor Beeld en Geluid (the Netherlands); University of Southern Denmark (SDU) Syddansk Universitet (Denmark)
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