Part 1.
To celebrate our 10000th follower we asked 30 journalism experts and digital wizards to choose 3 tools in their field of expertise.
The most useful, most innovative and one hidden gem.
This is part 1 of 3.
Most Useful
A few accessories will improve a smartphone noticeably so the content looks and sounds more professional.
So: get a light, a tripod and a microphone — and pretty soon, what you record will look much better.
Most Innovative
iBlazr: For its size and price, I’ve been really impressed with the iBlazr. It’s very small but gives off a really powerful light, ideal to boost what a smartphone can do on its own in low light.
Hidden Gem
Twitter lists. Not enough people use them and few use them well. But they can really help get useful information to you at speed.
Most Useful
Journatoolbox: Thousands of links and resources for journalists. I curate the site.
Most Innovative
Embedresponsively: Not a day goes by that I don’t use it.
Hidden Gem
Jamsnap: Tough one. Jamsnap as an app. Great opportunities for photos, audio. Cartodb’s animated torque maps are great, too. And the searchable map templates at Derekeder.com
Most Useful
Use /* in archive.org to filter queries.
Most Innovative
Facebook Graph because it combines 100.000+ personal details. (Henk is currently working on Graph Tips an experimental search engine for Facebook Graph.)
Hidden Gem
Echosec: Location based meta-data in digital publications allow you to search physical regions for messages, images, videos and more.
Most Useful
If you’re after what I use all day then (boringly) it’s Excel, text editors and Google Fusion tables and spreadsheets.
Most Innovative
CartoDB has transformed my relationship with maps — and the fact it allows anyone to do the same is really powerful.
Hidden Gem
So, my work colleague Nico Belmonte has built a great simple viz tool for us to use, but that’s no help for this list. I thinkRAW by density which enables anyone to make sophisticated vector charts.
Most Useful
Buzzsumo lets you search for your news outlet’s most social stories. You can also track competitors do an author search and backlinks.
Most Innovative
SAM Desk, a social asset management system. It allows you to work collaboratively and manage & make notes on social media assets. It also has an embed function.
Hidden Gem
Bioischanged.com OK, so not exactly hidden but few people know that if you add a Twitter user name to URL (bioischanged.com/sarahmarshall) you can see the revision history of a Twitter bio. Great for verification.
Most Useful
Workflowy: An idea outliner that makes it effortless to write, edit and organize organize thoughts, plans, content and tasks across multiple levels.
Most Innovative
Echo Studio: Easiest but very powerful social and content aggregation and curation platform.
Hidden Gem
Defcomb: Helps you monitor, track and filter your preferred news sources in real-time.
Most Useful
Tweetdeck: Because it allows me to monitor the real-time stream of exchanges.
Most Innovative
Wolfram Alpha: Because it is an extraordinary resource and fantastic computing engine
Hidden Gem
Gephi: Because it allows in-depth analysis of social relationships.
Most Useful
Google Keyword Planner: When I have an idea for a new blog post, I use Google Keyword Planner to research for a focused topic, to decide what keywords to include in the copy, and to track its performance with Google Analytics.
Most Innovative
Keyword Researcher: I use it a lot to identify long-tail keywords to target for new blog posts.
Hidden Gem
Canva: I use it a lot to create free images that go with social media postings.
Most Useful
Evernote: I use it on all my devices to keep notes about travel, work, and leisure pursuits.
Most Innovative
Instapaper: The most readable and seamless “read later” tool.
Hidden Gem
Pinboard: Fast and no-nonsense bookmarking.
Most Useful
Open Refine: Cleaning, scraping, converting, combining, APIs. Always comes in handy.
Most Innovative
Plague: Using the UX of dating apps for content = simple but effective
Hidden Gem
Detective.io: Build data, spot relationships, collaborate with others.
