SoGlos.com Blog

SoGlos.com shortlisted for EDF Energy South West Media Awards 2012

Following its 2010 award win, and being highly commended in 2011, SoGlos.com is delighted to reveal that it has just been shortlisted for the 2012 EDF Energy South West Media Awards - up for Website of the Year.

‘The awards, held in association with HoldtheFrontPage, are designed to honour the best in print, broadcast and online journalism in an area stretching from Wiltshire to Cornwall’. The full shortlist for this year can be seen at holdthefrontpage.co.uk - with SoGlos.com up against last year’s Website of the Year winner, Bristol 24-7.

Fellow Gloucestershire award nominees include Laura Shack from the Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard, up for Newcomer of the Year; Nick Purewal from Gloucestershire Media, up for Sports Journalist of the Year; Joyce Matthews from Gloucestershire Media, up for Designer of the Year; and The Citizen, up for Daily Newspaper of the Year.

Priding itself on editorial quality of a national media standard, with all content being written by a small but experienced team of journalists, the team here at SoGlos.com HQ are honoured to be part of the prestigious South West awards for another year running.

An awards ceremony will take place in Bath on Thursday 28 June 2012, when the winners will be announced.

SoGlos.com Cheese Rolling video featured on BBC Newsnight

If you tuned into BBC programme Newsnight last night you might not have been surprised to see Jeremy Paxman and his team reporting on everything from FIFA corruption to China as a green superpower – but you’d be forgiven for doing a double-take when Gloucestershire’s very own cheese rolling action took over the small screen.

After seeing SoGlos.com’s Cheese Rolling 2011 video, the show’s producers contacted the team to use footage of the women’s race – and we were only too happy to help. And while Paxman described the annual event as ‘utterly pointless’, it was undoubtedly a perfectly light-hearted end to the hard hitting news show.

The last 48 hours have also seen SoGlos.com’s video of the unofficial event featured by a plethora of other leading media including Wired UK, Metro and press agency Small World News Service.

SoGlos.com founders named leading innovators in journalism and media

SoGlos.com’s founders Michelle Byrne and James Fryer were today named amongst the UK’s leading innovators in journalism and media by journalism.co.uk.

The influential website for journalists compiled the ‘J-List’ as a rundown of the individuals it sees as those helping to build the future of the industry.

Michelle and James are both extremely proud to be included alongside the industry’s cream of the innovative crop – with fellow J-Listers including industry commentator Charlie Beckett, the Times' Joanna Geary and TheBusinessDesk.com’s Marc Reeves.

Don’t miss the full J-List over at Journalism.co.uk for yourself.

SoGlos.com wins a Business Excellence Award

SoGlos.com is delighted to have been selected as a Cheltenham Business Pride Business Excellence Award winner at the official Mayor-Making ceremony, held on Monday 17 May 2010.

Selected as the winner of the Best eBusiness in Cheltenham category, the award recognises SoGlos.com ‘for becoming the online resource for Gloucestershire’.

SoGlos.com’s editor Michelle Byrne was officially handed the award by Cheltenham’s brand new mayor Anne Regan and the deputy chief executive of Cheltenham Chamber of Commerce Jon Leamon at the glittering Cheltenham Town Hall ceremony.

SoGlos.com was one of just four local businesses honoured in this year’s awards, which also recognised Matthew Birch for the success of the Bath Road Traders’ Association; Commercial Group for its commitment to green corporate social responsibility; and Holiday Inn Express for the hotel’s contribution to the community.

The team are all delighted to see the award now hanging in pride of place at SoGlos.com towers, and are extremely proud of the recognition given by Cheltenham Business Pride.

SoGlos.com shortlisted in South West Media Awards

It’s been champagne all round at SoGlos.com towers this week (okay, cups of tea and posh biscuits), following news the online magazine has been shortlisted for the prestigious EDF Energy South West Media Awards 2010.

Having been reviewed by an expert panel of judges, SoGlos.com is now up for Website of the Year alongside the likes of thisisbristol.co.uk and bbc.co.uk/Bristol, with the winner due to be announced at an awards ceremony in June 2010.

While fingers are firmly crossed, it’s a great achievement to have got this far, fly the flag for independent media and gain recognition for the team’s hard work.

SoGlos.com featured in Press Gazette

SoGlos.com’s founders Michelle Byrne and James Fryer are honoured to have been featured in the recent issue of Press Gazzette – the UK’s most prestigious media industry title – as part of Jon Slattery’s feature about journalists as entrepreneurs.

The article explores SoGlos.com’s three-year history, ongoing innovations, editorial ethos and business model, offering advice for would-be journalist entrepreneurs across the country.

While the industry continues to experience challenges and a move away from the traditional media model, it’s a pleasure to gain recognition as one of the UK’s only commercially successful examples of independent online media.

SoGlos.com in .net Magazine

The SoGlos.com team is honoured to be the subject of a double-page-spread feature in this month's .net - 'the world's best-selling mag for web designers' - which has just hit shelves across the UK.

The March 2010 issue sees SoGlos.com receive a design audit by one of Head London's top dogs, Andy Bennett, as part of the magazine's regular /makeover series feature.

While it's a pleasure to receive such high profile national media coverage, the feature also comes in perfect time as SoGlos.com begins work on its 2010-planned redesign, providing plenty of food-for-thought for the team.

Reflections on Journalism.co.uk news:rewired event

Celebrating Journalism.co.uk’s 10-year anniversary, the inaugural news:rewired event on Thursday 14 January 2010 saw around 150 journalists, trainees, journalism students and academics descend on City University London – including SoGlos.com’s co-founders Michelle Byrne and James Fryer.

While the day – structured around individual sessions, where delegates could pick ‘n’ mix from topics including everything from social media for journalists to crowdsourcing – saw plenty of informative talks and heated debates, James Fryer had the honour of giving a presentation about SoGlos.com as a media model, during the final ‘new journalism and making money’ session of the day. The session was also filmed by the BBC:

SoGlos.com News Rewired Journalism.co.uk Presentation

View more presentations from SoGlos.com.

While joining the small but seasoned panel – including online entrepreneur and (now) former head of digital media at Telegraph.co.uk Greg Hadfield, reputed media law lawyer Caroline Kean from Wiggin and CEO of B2B publishing company Sift Ben Hadfield – was no mean feat, a presentation of five dos and don’ts of online publishing garnered a good response from the discerning audience – judging from the flurry of Twitter activity at the time, and subsequent coverage.

Freelance media, technology and journalism writer Patrick Smith has produced a rich roundup of James Fryer’s presentation, as has Adam Tinworth on his blog One Man and His Blog, and Alex Waters on the Journalism.co.uk site – with additional commentary also coming from The (e)Grommet, Jon Slattery, Iain Hepburn, Freelance Unbound and Alexandre Gamela.

Having attended sessions held throughout the day, James Fryer and Michelle Byrne’s personal highlights included Adam Westbrook’s stunning multimedia work, Malcolm Coles’ humourous examples of online publishing bloopers, and hyperlocal insights from Guardian Local’s Sarah Hartley, the Lichfield Blog’s Philip John and times web development editor Joanna Geary.

While award-winning videojournalist David Dunkley Gyimah’s upbeat presentation proved the perfect mid-afternoon pep for conference delegates.

It was a little disappointing to not hear about more examples of independent online media launching in the UK, but news:rewired nonetheless packed a good practical journalism punch for everyone in attendance – with, no doubt, wide scale hopes that the event will become an annual calendar highlight.

Visit newsrewired.com directly for full information and commentary, and check out the essential catch-up guide on Journalism.co.uk.

SoGlos.com featured on Journalism.co.uk

SoGlos.com has the pleasure of being featured on leading journalism website Journalism.co.uk this week, in an article entitled SoGlos.com: When start-up mentality meets traditional journalism. It's a fitting piece in advance of the news:rewired event next week, and a credit to the SoGlos.com team's hard work over the past four years. We hope you'll enjoy it as much as we did.

SoGlos.com Q&A on news:rewired

In the run-up to the anticipated news:rewired event later this month, SoGlos.com's deputy editor James Fryer has has the pleasure of taking part in a Q&A with Journalism.co.uk's Laura Oliver - published on the news:rewired website over the festive period: Speaker Q&A: James Fryer, deputy editor, SoGlos.com