Friday, December 08, 2006

No Innovation Without Communication


I recently advocated that innovation journalism is key for innovation communication and PR to become an integrated part of the innovation process (here & here). Communication and journalism have a yin-yang-relationship that help drive each other, adding energy to what I call the "innovation communication system" - the flow of communication and attention of the innovation ecosystem. The innovation communication system is the key concept for the intersection between the innovation economy and the attention economy.

The concept of "Innovation Communication" was coined by Claudia Mast, Ansgar Zerfass and Simone Huck, in 2004, laying the foundation for looking at how organisations communicate innovation with their stakeholders. Their new INNOVATE report shows what can happen if communication is not a part of the innovation process from the start:

Making innovations known to their publics is a challenge that is underestimated by many. It is not sufficient to consult communication and marketing professionals during the late stages of the innovation process. At that time press releases and polished publications cannot create an understanding of intricate issues anymore.
UMTS, WAP and MMS have failed, partly because these three or four letter long abbreviations did not meet the customers’ and the journalists’ needs for explanation and exemplification.
Relating to existing trends and topics and illustrating the usefulness of the new services is a useful strategy, as well as reducing complexity and considering personal interests, concerns and the existing knowledge of journalists addressed. The name of “innovation” itself should not be mentioned too many times.

These are some findings of the INNOVATE 2006 project, a joint effort by MFG Baden-Württemberg – Agency for IT and Media (Stuttgart, Germany), and the Department of Communication Studies and Journalism at the University of Hohenheim (Stuttgart, Germany)

Monday, December 04, 2006

Criticism - always good to get

(by Turo Uskali)

It is always valuable to get feed-back, and criticism. It keeps you awake and on the move, hopefully in the right direction. Colin Brayton criticized recently the innovation journalism initiative in his blog - the “virtual assignment desk”. Brayton, a journalist from Brooklyn, argues that the PR industry loves newspeak like "InJo" - the shorthand for "Innovation Journalism". Indeed, innovation itself is a word which is pretty positive in its nature. That is maybe why it is so popular among all the PR people as well as politicians. Usually, everyone is for innovations, not against them. Therefore, it is really important that journalists, like Brayton, and other intellectual language workers continuously monitor and pinpoint all the empty buzzwords, and try to replace them with better ones. Brayton wrote that the problem for a traditional journalist like he is “how to discover the pearls of true innovation in the flooded sump of newspeak that technology public relations has become.” That is what innovation journalism also tries to do, and, indeed, the task is not the easiest one.

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Dnevnik Introduces "Innovation" as Key Word for News


The second largest Slovenian daily, Dnevnik, has introduced "innovation" as a key word in their news archive search engine. They were given the idea by the Slovenian innovation journalism program. So as from now Slovenian news on innovation will be labeled with the key word "innovation". It might not seem very special, but it really is. Johan Boström, InJo Fellow 2005, looked into the issue - it is central and not easy looked Boström:"Innovation as a key word for news"). When the news agencies start using "innovation" as a key word, then it will be possible to subscribe to a newsfeed on innovation, and then it will be easier to make news sections on innovation.

PR and the Innovation Communication System


Here is an essay I wrote for PR people attending the 10th SKOJ conference in Slovenia.

The (non-academic) essay introduces the concept of the Innovation Communication System. The innovation system approach stresses that the innovation process is driven by the flow of technology and information between the actors in the innovation (eco)system. The innovation communication system approach suggests that the flow of attention is key to what gets done or gets dropped in the innovation system. There is a class of attention workers who are the key actors of the innovation communication system: journalists, PR & communication people, marketers, lobbyists, and others who have as they main job to create or broker attention. Intuitively, it is a quite well defined subsystem, as the attention workers very often interact between each other.

The main part of the essay pushes the point that public relations in innovation companies can strengthen brand value by communicating innovation processes and add value to innovation by developing narratives for new products and services in parallel with technological and business development. The development of innovation communication and PR will benefit from the emergence of independent innovation journalism. Such issues are being studied by the Innovation Communication group in Germany (see Ansgar Zerfass and Simone Huck, for example)

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Roundtable: The Future of Innovation Journalism


It’s innovation time for journalism! Traditional news media are being challenged by innovative sources of news on the Internet, such as blogospheres, or citizen journalism. Traditional journalism struggles when covering innovation as a topic.

A roundtable discussion about the future of journalism with the
“Father of the Internet” Vint Cerf (Google /ICANN), Whitfield Diffie (SunMicrosystems), Amy Bernstein (Business 2.0), Lee Bruno (Red Herring), Dan Gillmor (Bayosphere), Anders Lotsson (Computer Sweden), Frances Mann-Craik (Tornado Insider, Addison Marketing), Harry McCracken (PC World), Tony Perkins (AlwayOn Network), Jan Sandred (Biotech Sweden), Richard Allan Horning (Tomlinson Zisko LLP), Charles Wessner (National Academies) and Stig Hagstrom (Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning). Producer and moderator: David Nordfors (Stanford / VINNOVA). Editor: Robert Emery Smith (Stanford), Recording Team Director: Mauricio Quijano (Stanford Video), Engineer: Gordon Gurley (Stanford Video), Cameras: Steve Schecter, Tamsin Orion, Mark Whelan (Stanford Video), PA: Austin Brizgys (Stanford Video), Text Editor: John Joss

Hardcopies of the DVD can be ordered from Amazon.com or VINNOVA
DVD, 120 minutes, All regions, UPC 837101387

Slovenian TV Runs Story on Innovation Journalism



News story from the Slovenian E+ TV show covering the First European Innovation Journalism Workshop at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, EU. The reportage is made by Maja Nemec and includes interviews with Marko Milosavljevic, Violeta Bulc and David Nordfors. It was broadcast by Kanal A on 20 Oct 2006.

Friday, October 20, 2006

Kick-Off for Innovation Journalism Initiative in the Balkan

Things are catching on pretty quickly in Europe now. The First European Workshop on Innovation Journalism was held at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, on Oct 18. The entrepreneur behind the initiative is Violeta Bulc and her company Vibacom, spearheading the introduction of Injo in Slovenia, which now is beginning to reverbarate also in other parts of the Balkans.

I was very happy to note that InJo attracts positive interest from journalists, companies, government and academia alike in Slovenia. They all seem open to the idea that this is a new playing field with something in it for each one of them as independent players.

The conference was opened by John Hagard, Swedish ambassador to Slovenia. Some of the key people in the conference (from left to right on the picture):
* Jan Sandred, VINNOVA (Sweden), fmr founding Editor of Biotech Sweden, the first documented case of targeting an innovation system as a readership, implementing InJo as a business model.
* Mateja Dermastia, economic strategist, managing director of Anteja ECG and fmr State Undersecretary in the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Slovenia.
* David Nordfors (i.e. me), Stanford and VINNOVA, introduced the concept of innovation journalism, continously working on developing the concept and community around it.
* Violeta Bulc, president Vibacom, opinionmaker spearheading InJo in the Balkans, writer, fmr journalist and telecom intrapreneur.
* Dusan Snoj, CEO of Vigeo Consulting, fmr editor-in-chief of Gospodarski Vestnik Publishing Group and of GV Group; fmr Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary Ambassador of the Republic of Slovenia to Russian Federation, Belarus, Kazahstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan and Turkmenistan.
* Marko Milosavljevič (not on the picture), Assistant professor in Journalism at the University of Ljubljana, regularly contributing and writing comments and analysis on media and journalism issues for leading Slovenian daily Delo, Razgledi, Novinar, Balkanis, Emzin, and Media Watch. Chairman of Expert commission for radio and television programmes at Slovenian Ministry of Culture.

Some of the key comments and observations from the workshop are listed here.

The workshop was organised by Vibacom in collaboration with VINNOVA, TIA - the Slovenian Technology Agency - DG Marta Svetina participated in the workshop discussion panel, the University of Ljubljana, Stanford. Media partner was Finance, the largest Slovenian business daily. The event was sponsored by thirteen Slovenian companies.

(News Release from VIBACOM)
http://www.vibacom.si/injoworkshop06/materials/pressENG.pdf

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Independent Journalism Recognized as Key for Innovation Economy


Innovation Journalism is becoming a recognized concept in innovation policy circles.

It was in focus at Clusters2006 - The Ninth Annual Global Conference of The Competitiveness Institute. The three day conference in Lyon, France, dedicated an afternoon to a plenary session and a breakout session on the interplay of journalism in innovation ecosystems. The conference was attended by 425 delegates from 62 countries, mainly cluster and innovation professionals from government, academia and expert organisations.

The concept of Innovation Journalism was presented to the conference: the thoughts on its interaction in innovation ecosystems as an intermediating actor connecting innovation to public interest, suggesting some guidelines for innovation policy addressing independent journalism.

The bottom line:
1. For Democratic Society to focus on the Innovation Economy, Independent Journalism needs to cover it.
2. therefore, journalism is an independent actor in innovation systems.
3. therefore, it's a good idea to support development of independent innovation journalism when working on developing innovative business clusters.

The talk was followed by a panel:

Jan Sandred, fmr InJo Fellow and founding editor of Biotech Sweden - now with VINNOVA, explained the facts of life of journalism, and how the case of Biotech Sweden showed that innovation journalism is not only a way of covering clusters and innovation systems, but mainly a good business model for news publishing, which is key, as journalism is a business and must be loyal to the readership - not the sources. Journalism must always be independent and never neutral, he stressed.


Per Eriksson, founding DG of VINNOVA - the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems, and first in the world to support the launch of an innovation journalism program, pointed out the importance of not compromising journalistic integrity. When VINNOVA supports researchers, there should be no involvement in or bias of the research done. The situation is no different for journalists, Eriksson said, there must be no VINNOVA involvement in or bias of stories produced by journalists involved in the innovation journalism programs. The PR department is therefore not permitted to participate in the program activities.

Marta Svetina, founding DG of TIA, the National Slovenian Technology Agency, and Arthur Bayhan, founding Director of The Competitiveness Support Fund in Pakistan, described their national initiatives for supporting the development of independent innovation journalism.


Seppo Sisätto, democracy and media pioneer who founded the first commercial news radio station in Finland after the fall of communism, presented the Finnish national innovation journalism initiative.

Willi Rütten, Director of the European Journalism Center EJC, announced that EJC has selected innovation journalism as a focus area, regardless if there is funding available or not at the present time.


The session was chaired by Antoni Subira, Professor of Financial Management at the IESE Business School in Barcelona, Spain, former Minister of Industry in Catalonia, among the first to implement cluster theory for building competitiveness.

After the plenary session I had the pleasure of chairing a breakout session, where project leaders from countries implementing innovation journalism initiatives presented plans and results: Jan Sandred and I from Sweden, Seppo Sisättö from Finland, Amir Jahangir from Pakistan, Patricia Valdenebro from the Basque country in Spain, and Willi Rütten from the EJC.

More on the conference blog of Clusters 2006.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

YLE Broadcast Corporation Research Ex-Director Wiio: Finland Needs More InJo Courses

The Report on "Media in renewable society. The changing rules of the media" issued by the Finnish National Fund for Research and Development (Sitra) includes recommendations for better understanding of innovation ecosystems and promotes the role of media. It highlights the Finnish innovation journalism initiative. The report is made by ex research director of Finnish Broadcasting Corporation (YLE) Juhani Wiio.

"Short innovation journalism courses for media professionals have been organized by the University of Tampere. The course aims to educate journalists in order that the participants will have better than average knowledge on developments in innovation society. Moreover, it is supposed that during the course the journalist are able to comprehend the meanings of different social openings and initiatives. The results of the courses, so far, have been promising. However, one short innovation journalism course is not enough. The need for this kind of experience is far greater in media. Therefore, it is proposed that the central actors of innovation systems should support the continuation of the innovation journalism
education
". (p. 82)

Here is the reference and a link for downloading the report:
Wiio, Juhani. 2006. Media uudistuvassa yhteiskunnassa. Median muuttuvat pelisäännöt. (Media in renewable society. The changing rules of the media) Sitra Report 65. Sitra, Helsinki. (p. 79-83)
http://www.sitra.fi/julkaisut/Raportti65.pdf?download=Lataa+pdf

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Innovation Journalism Gets Academic Research Funding

VINNOVA is funding a literature study on published research that is relevant for understanding innovation journalism and its role in innovation ecosystems. This is the first study of its kind, providing a base of academic research that research on innovation journalism can build upon. So now there are three fields of activities supporting the development of the concept and community of Innovation Journalism: The development of a professional community, the development of an academic community, and the development of a public policy community.

Here is the full news flash ( available in PDF in the innovation journalism archive):

How does journalism link innovation with the public interest? How do innovation ecosystems engage journalists? These questions are at the heart of a research initiative recently funded by VINNOVA, the Swedish Government Agency for Innovation Systems. The project will set the agenda for an international research workshop scheduled for February 2007 at Stanford University.

The academic research study is led by Professor Marc Ventresca of Oxford University (PI, coordinator) and Dr. David Nordfors at Stanford University and VINNOVA (Program Director), with Dr. Turo Uskali from the University of Jyväskylä, visiting scholar in innovation journalism at Stanford, and Dr. Antti Ainamo at the Helsinki School of Business.

The group of researchers standing behind the mission, which includes faculty and expert practitioners from leading U.S. and European universities, convened in April 2006 for a workshop hosted by the Innovation Journalism program run by Stanford and VINNOVA. They recently co-published an essay identifying ‘Innovation Journalism’ as a useful theme through which to explore the interplay of journalism in innovation ecosystems.

Nordfors noted, ‘While academic work on innovation involving journalism has been done, journalism’s role in innovation ecosystems remains to be established as a research theme within the academic community.’

Uskali added: ”Few studies have focused on how journalists contribute to the innovation process and how public interests engage innovation.’ No distinct ‘beat’ includes innovation, for example.”

According to Ainamo: ”We want to understand how journalists cover innovation processes and innovation ecosystems, the incentives that drive innovation journalism and how news organizations may be organized to cover the innovation process more effectively.”

Ventresca, a strategy professor and cultural sociologist, noted: ”Recent studies of innovation and entrepreneurship reveal complex social and institutional ecosystems that shape the way in which inventions become innovations, transforming industry landscapes—indeed entire societies. We know too little about social and political intermediaries of all sorts in processes of technological and social innovation.”

VINNOVA will fund a focused literature review of existing studies in strategy and organization studies, entrepreneurship and innovation, in journalism as a profession and the social organization of news media. This project will provide a necessary base for designing relevant research to develop the research agenda around Innovation Journalism and the Role of Journalism in Innovation Ecosystems.

Monday, October 02, 2006

The European Journalism Centre InJo Workshop

Willi Rütten, Director of EJC - European Journalism Center, on the concept of Innnovation Journalism: It will change the way journalism education is organized in the long run.

The European Journalism Centre (EJC) arranged an Innovation Journalism workshop in Amsterdam 29 September 2006 at the Picnic 06 crossmediaweek conference. I was a speaker at this event together with Daniel Sokolov, IT Journalist, Heise Online; Prof. Dr. Gundolf S. Freyermuth, International Film School, Cologne, and Raymond Frenken, Editor-in-Chief & Managing Director of EUX.TV. It was an excellent discussion and I am looking forward to working more with the EJC!

The European Journalism Centre (EJC) is an independent, international, non-profit institute for further training of journalists and media professionals, operating across the EU, based in Maastricht.

Willi was appointed Director of the EJC in March 2006. He is a seasoned journalist, with long experience as a reporter and producer in German public and private broadcasting (ARD, RTL-Group), as well as in journalism education. Before joining the European Journalism Centre he was the head of school for "digital television" at the University of Applied Sciences in Salzburg/ Austria. Willi has a background in research, where he was working on a Ph.D. in metaphors before he chose to dedicate himself to practicing journalism.

It strikes me that research on metaphors offers a very interesting angle on innovation journalism. Metaphors are an important starting point for forming new concepts, and journalism is a power player in creating the metaphors that will shape the public perception of an innovation, and the language around innovations in general.

Friday, September 08, 2006

Fourth Round for Swedish InJo Fellowships



If you are a Swedish journalist or know any Swedish journalists who might be interested in the Innovation Journalism Fellowship program, now is the time.

VINNOVA has officially announced it's call for applicants for the fourth round of the Innovation Journalism Fellowship Program (click here to apply). Last application day is October 13. Applicants must be Swedish residents.

The selected participants will participate at two workshops and the Fourth Conference on Innovation Journalism at Stanford, and be hosted by leading newsrooms for 4-6 months this spring and summer, where they will be covering innovation issues.

Those who are interested in knowing more about it are welcome to get in touch with me or any one of the previous fellows. (They are listed on the "about" page on the innovation journalism web site.)

The program call will be announced in the Swedish journalism newspaper Journalisten on Sep 18. You can download the ad (in Swedish) in PDF here: annons-journalisten.pdf

Thursday, September 07, 2006

Good Thoughts and Words


SRI International President and CEO Curtis Carlson and co-author Bill Wilmot have good things to say about InJo in their new book Innovation: The Five Disciplines for Creating What Customers Want. In the section "Innovation in the Media" they don't take any prisoners when pointing out the need for innovation journalism, praising our InJo program at Stanford:
"Over the next decade, the mainstream media will spend a great deal of time talking and writing about the consequences of our lack of competitiveness and its impact on bid companies. They will be concerned when Chinese firms buy big United States Companies, when software jobs move to India, and when protectionism becomes a political issue. But these stories, absent the bigger context of innovation and competitiveness, represent a disservice to their readers and listeners. The action is not just with the larger companies, which, as we discussed in Chapter 2, are finding it increasingly difficult to survive, but rather at the grassroots level, where new company formation through innovation thrives. The mainstream media are basically missing the story. Perhaps each media-outlet science and technology editor can change his or her job description to "Science, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship Editor".

More generally, the mainstream media can increase their active role in helping communicate the challenges, opportunities and excitement of innovation and entrepreneurship in our time. This could help stimulate a productive discussion about how the United States needs to improve its schools, tax policies, government regulations, and research agencies. They too could use innovation best practices as a ruler to measure the United States' performance against that of others. Ultimately, they could help promote and examplify the skills and attitudes needed to thrive in the exponential economy. For example, maybe he creative staffs of the major television networks could make this the ultimate 'survivor' show.

One bright spot is a program at Stanford University called Innovation Journalism. It is not about innovation in journalism but, rather, it is a journalism program about innovation. The program is led by David Nordfors with the goal of advancing the public debate about this critically important topic. He has assembled journalists and students from many countries to be part of the program, who then become innovation-enlightened journalists at major publications around the world."

The book, which has received a positive review by Business Week, describes how a disciplined approach to innovation—the successful creation and delivery of a new or improved product or service—will provide value for customers and organizations alike and offers a systematic way to make innovation practical and sustainable for any enterprise. Carlson is an innovation guru with a lot of personal experience. Before heading SRI International he started and led the team that set the US standard for HDTV, for which his team shared an Emmy.

Friday, August 25, 2006

Swedish Innovation Journalism Program Growing Up


The Swedish Innovation Journalism program has matured, and the Director General of VINNOVA, Dr Per Eriksson, has now decided to endorse it as a part of regular Swedish innovation policy. I will be shaping the long term program together with division directors at VINNOVA as from this autumn.

Per Eriksson was the first policy maker in the world to support the concept of Innovation Journalism. I started the initial Innovation Journalism program as a pilot directly under him in 2003.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Slovenia's First InJo Projects - Press Conference



The Director General of the National Slovenian Technology Agency (TIA), Dr. Marta Svetina, has decided to support three specific projects as a start of the "Innovation Journalism program in Slovenia". I have received an inspiring letter from Dr. Svetina, where she states her hopes and intentions to support the development of independent innovation journalism, and to strengthen the interaction between Slovenia and the program at Stanford. I am looking forward to it.

The projects were announced at a press conference in Ljubljana today, writes Violeta Bulc on her Slovenian Innovation Journalism Blog. Violeta is the entrepreneur behind the InJo push in Slovenia. The projects:

1. The prize contest “The Best Innovation Journalism Media Contribution in 2006”,
2. “Innovative Local Community (Pilot Project in Slovenia)”
3. “First European Workshop on Innovation Journalism”, 18th October 2006 in Ljubljana.

Violeta reports that "..more or less all national and local media were present at the press conference. 11 reporters and their teams were from the national TV station, local TV stations, national radio, 2 national newspapers…"

InJo Workshop at PICNIC Conference, Amsterdam Sep 29



The European Journalism Center will be hosting a workshop on Innovation Journalism at the PICNIC Conference in Amsterdam. I will be speaking at the event.

Workshop: Innovation Journalism
Time: 9:00- 13:00

Event Description: Workshop for journalists on how to cover innovation and identify and report on key issues in the innovation systems, from main actors to their agendas and their interactions with each other.
Partner: European Journalism Centre
Contact: Emma Elliott
Email: Elliott@ejc.nl
Telephone: +31 43 325 4030

Monday, May 22, 2006

InJo Fellows Delegation Study Tour



The Innovation Journalism Fellows visited the U.S. East Coast last week. The mission of the Delegation was to meet with hosting publications on the East Coast (Wall Street Journal), study the stock markets and public innovation policy. Among many other visits, we were invited to the residence of the Swedish Ambassador to the US Gunnar Lundh (picture) for a reception where the US journalist Jerry Hagstrom of the Congress Daily was awarded the order of the Polar Star.

Delegation program:
InJo-delegation-060515.pdf

Monday, May 15, 2006

The Innovation Journalism Best Practice Wiki


At the InJo workshop, we set up the Innovation Journalism Wiki: innovationjournalism.stanford.edu The wiki is an experiment - we are seeing if we in this way can produce a best practice manual in an easier way than with the conference papers.

Other innovation journalists are welcome join! Go to innovationjournalism.stanford.edu Please register a user name.

The InJo Fellows Review the InJo Fellowship Program


On their their second workshop at Stanford May 10-12, the Innovation Journalism Fellows summarized their impressions of the fellowship program. All of the fellows have appreciated the fellowship program and say that they have improved as innovation journalists. Several report on a culture shock entering the hosting US news rooms. The US news room culture is much more competitive than the news room cultures in Sweden and Finland. It has taken work to get in, but there have been good results - on average ten published stories per fellow. The contact with Stanford has been very appreciated and several fellows wish for more lectures on campus, involving leading innovation researchers.

Here are the suggestions for next years program:

- Add and introduction to how a US news room works and how US PR agencies work (as told by a journalist)
- Expand the number of activities at Stanford
- Place the conference at the end of the program, in May
- Make a year review book. The InJo Fellows will be the editors. Fellows will set up sessions at the conference and be moderators, writing up stories on the sessions. This can replace the journalist's research-style conference papers.
- Announce best InJo article of the year award at the conference.

Saturday, April 29, 2006

Innovation Journalism in Slovenia


I have received a letter from the President of the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, Prof. Andreja Kocijancic, who wants me to collaborate with them on setting up a Slovenian innovation journalism initiative. Behind her stands two strong people: Marta Svetina, Director General of TIA, the national Slovenian technology agency, and Violeta Bulc, the entrepreneur who has spearheaded the introduction of the concept of innovation journalism in Slovenia. InJo should have a large potential in Slovenia with these people involved.

The letter of intent was signed after the innovation journalism workshop with Slovenian decision makers arranged by Bulc and partners last week. Swedish Ambassador John Hagard opened the workshop and I presented the Innovation Journalism program. Jan Sandred, former InJo fellow now with VINNOVA was also one of the main speakers (His comments are available on his Innovation Journalism Blog.)

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Innovation Journalism as a Research Theme


Innovation Journalism is a new concept in journalism. It's also a new concept in innovation research. There has not been any systematic work done on the role of journalism in innovation systems. This is needed.

Last week a group of innovation researchers gathered at a workshop that I organized here at Wallenberg Hall@Stanford together with Marc Ventresca (Saeid Business School@Oxford) and Antti Ainamo (SCANCOR@Stanford + Helsinki University). The other participants: Stine Grodal, Stanford; Andrew Hargadon, UC Davis; Stefan Jonsson, SCANCOR@Stanford + Stockholm School of Economics; Turo Uskali,InJo@Stanford + University of Jyväskylä; and Alisa Weinstein, InnovationJournalism.

We discussed Innovation Journalism and the Role of Journalism in Innovation (Eco)Systems as themes for scholarly research. The opinion was positive! We are writing up a workshop report that will present the case.

I believe that innovation researchers need to introduce journalism into their models. Journalism is a powerful actor. Also, academic research offers tools for looking into best practices of innovation journalism, which is good for journalists.

Research can analyze interdependencies between journalists and other actors in the innovation systems, sorting out situations where journalists run into conflicts of interest, or where journalists may be tempted to be loyal to other parties than the readership or the publication. Reserach can uncover hidden dependencies that journalists may not even be aware of that they are influenced by. All of this should be potentially useful for practitioners.

The Innovation Journalism Program network of practitioners that has been built up so far should offer attractive possibilities for the researchers to partner with practitioners. If both practitioners and researchers will enjoy meeting each other through the program, then it will happen.