Periscope and Personalities

This week I’m going to take a look at Periscope. The app is actually owned by Twitter, the same way the Instagram is owned by Facebook. Essentially, Periscope is an app that exclusively lets users go live (similar to the new “live” feature on Facebook.

Periscope in it’s most basic form sees and hears whatever your camera is seeing. It is a relatively new app — only released on March 25, 2015. The idea came from one of the creators who witnessed an uprising in Istanbul. He live tweeted, but he thought that it would be great to be able to let people see what he was seeing.

The app has a multitude of uses, from marketing agencies, celebrities, and journalists. In the journalism field, I have seen it used in a multitude of ways. First is the “behind the scenes” videos. We in the industry know that a newsroom is nothing too wild, but it seems that outsiders view newsrooms as a sort of Willy Wonka Factory. They see the product, but they never see how or where it’s made.

With this app, anchors, producer, directors and meteorologists can give viewers an inside look at what goes on in those newsrooms. This can create a stronger bond between the network and the viewer, which can help increase ratings in the long run.

Additionally, Periscope can be used for breaking news. I have seen multiple reporters from back home use the app to broadcast a breaking news event, and it is great because you get to hear the natural sound and the raw video before it is processed into a package.

I think that Periscope is definitely still an up and coming app given it’s relatively young age, but make no mistake, it is here to stay.