Slack as a Collaboration Tool

After reading through the example articles on tools for journalism and storytelling, it struck me that there are so, so many resources out there for journalists. How do you keep track of all these items while collaborating with colleagues? Slack, a tool first widely adopted by the tech community, has features that will help journalists work together effectively and efficiently. It’s a messaging and collaboration tool for teams that is being rapidly adopted across industries.

  • Use channels for topic specific conversations – These channels could be specific stories or even elements within a story. They can be public with your entire team or private to a specific group of people.
  • Contact team members directly for one-on-one conversations using direct messaging and one-in-one calls.
  • Easily share and upload files.
  • Use search to easily find information. The files you upload are indexed, so search even works within PDFs.
  • Use Slack integrations, like twitter and google alerts, to quickly see relevant information in appropriate channels.

Slack is primarily meant for teams and workplaces, but can be used informally also, among just a few collaborators or across many dispersed journalists. Some newsrooms, including Vox and The Associated Press, are already using the tool for collaboration. Is can also be used more widely across organizations. For example, Muckrock created a Slack team, which has recently become very popular, to help investigative journalists to retrieve data and documents from the government through the Freedom of Information Act.