There’s something weird about the “seismic shift” in referrals experienced by the Guardian during the past couple of months. The shift, as described at the Guardian’s Changing Media summit, was that Facebook overtook Google as a referrer to the Guardian’s website in February. It’s a big deal. Not because social distribution wasn’t expected to overhaul search one day. [...]
When sharing turns bad
You don’t often see this on the Share Wars engine. The graph above shows one story dwarfing all others on the most shared list for the Daily Mail site last week. It was a cracker of a yarn about a proposed law allowing Egyptian men to have sex with their wives up to six hours [...]
The real Mark Britt article is here
For all those who clicked on “Four key trends to be watching” in the Mumbrella newsletter: this is where you wanted to go.
Share Wars takes the Knight News Challenge
Share Wars has entered the Knight News Challenge, a competition for technology-journalism projects seeking funding. This year’s Challenge theme is “networks” so it’s right up our alley. Our entry is below. Any hearts or comments on the entry would be appreciated as user interaction with the entry itself is one of the criteria for advancing. On the entry page, you will see [...]
Most-shared Australian stories last week
Last week’s most-shared stories list saw a cluster of industrious spiders from Wagga Wagga trump the social media phenomenon of the year, Kony 2012. Awe is a powerful force in sharing land. We know from Berger and Milkman’s work that a feeling of wonder compels people to share. The tiny spiders that spun web blankets [...]
Most-shared Australian stories this week
The tendency of social networks to promote themselves is seen clearly in this week’s most shared stories from Australian publishers. Stories about Facebook changing conditions of service, or intruding on privacy, always do well. Google’s pervasive use also guarantees it a top spot. One of the most interesting stories in this list is news.com.au’s “Meet the [...]
Hal Crawford’s Mumbrella interview
Are sneezing baby giraffes newsworthy? Does political speculation deserve a place on the front page? Are nipples incredibly boring? Check out this recent Mumbrella interview with Share Wars’ own Hal Crawford to find out. If you don’t have time, the answers are: possibly, no and yes.
The reverse
Around a third of ninemsn’s most shared stories of the last year contain “a reverse”: a situation where the opposite of the expected has occurred. There’s nothing deep or mysterious about the reverse. It appears in traditional journalism – “man bites dog” – and has a power that enhances all types of factual storytelling. Think [...]
Most-shared stories – Fri, Feb 10, 2012
Here’s a selection of the top trending stories today from the Share Wars Engine. This is your body on junk food – video (Huffington Post) Ron Paul secretly won the caucuses (Slate) Sick puppies walk to human hospital (Huffington Post) Argentine musician Luis Alberto Spinetta dies (Clarin – Argentina) Will Google ‘do no evil’?(CNN)
Most-shared stories – Thurs, Feb 9, 2012
Here’s a selection of the top trending stories today from the Share Wars Engine. Marriage ban violates constitution, court rules (New York Times) Map shows Ice Age-like Northern Hemisphere (Daily Mail) Why do people dress up their pets? (BBC) Drones to fly over USA (Washington Post) DeGeneres rips anti-gay group (Huffington Post)
The Share Wars team
Andrew Hunter is Head of Network at ninemsn, overseeing the homepage, video and social media teams. He is undertaking an MBA at Macquarie Graduate School of Management. Twitter: @Huntzie
Hal Crawford is head of news, sport, current affairs and finance at ninemsn. He began his career at The West Australian newspaper and has taught journalism at La Trobe University in Melbourne. Twitter: @halcrawford
Domagoj Filipovic is ninemsn's Commercial Development Program Manager. He has developed the Share Wars Likeable Engine, which tracks sharing of news stories in real time.
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