1,000 subscribers: Twitter + foreign news + correspondents + subscriber zoom calls

I had a very pleasant video chat with a reader from Twitter on Friday. We talked about all sorts of interesting things, ranging across the past 10 years of Spanish current affairs and politics, foreign correspondence and the evolution of (social) media technology over that period.

You will remember perhaps that I criticised Musk’s takeover of Twitter last year, and I still think he’s done some stupid things with it, in the wrong direction for journalism. Between that and whatever it was that shifted the culture during the pandemic, alt-right influencer accounts now seem to be much more prominent in many countries, an impression that is probably exaggerated by lots of scientists or environmental researchers or journalists leaving to try things like Mastodon.

12 months later, however, Twitter, or X as is it now called, is still the only game in town for social media news and it still beats mainstream media with updates, images and analysis of whatever the latest shifts are, if you follow the right accounts or search in the right places with a critical mind.

During the video chat, we talked about what we would ideally want from reporters in Gaza or Israel today, with the latest crisis, and the answer was the same model I’ve been working on here for the past 10 years: someone who speaks the language, has many years of local or regional news, cultural and historical knowledge to offer context for all the shifts and who can try to go out and find things out and illustrate them for us.

Someone who like us is trying to work it all out but has those skills to help.

Spain and Spanish in my case. Correspondents and analysts with Arabic, Hebrew, Israel and Gaza for the current conflict in the Middle East. There are reportedly now 2,000 journalists held up on the Israeli side of the border.

The news reporting and analysis and scenario thinking and illustration functions or needs still exist. And I still think the best bet is reader subscriptions for making it work and maintaining that critical independence.

Only recently here in Murcia, a local radio reporter was booted out after 30 years of journalism because the political pressures finally got to her bosses.

I’m still here, you’re still here, we’re all still interested in a changing Spain.

The more of you who subscribe, the better this can still work. With 500-1,000 subscribers, we can do it:

PS: I also thought on Friday that it could be a great idea to do a group zoom call on Spain a couple of times a month or even once a week for subscribers, so you can ask questions and we can see where thoughts are going. Let me know if you would like that.