COMS 6003: WEEK_02
No class this week but Dr. Chesney posted the lecture slides to the student portal. I have scanned it several times while over-thinking the semester’s assignments. I have already committed to reviewing the Ian Alleyne Network (IAN) for our local news assignment but clicking between the independent network’s social feeds and the weekly lecture slides my mind wanders Why am I not reviewing one of my preferred news sources? Why not Mark Lyndersay’s TechNewsTnT, Prior Beharry’s AZPNews, and the Media Institute of the Caribbean’s Caribbean Investigative Journalism Network (CIJN)? The question briefly lingers and quickly circles back to IAN.
Choosing to review Ian Alleyne Network over my preferred news sources is intentional. As a digital and media consultant I usually have my eye out on the players in the industry and while I may not subscribe to every single brand and platform, I allow the social media algorithm to do its thing and surface the profiles and pages which have the most social clout. There is Triniglobe Media and a few others but Mr. Alleyne’s brand has the special kind of velocity to reach an audience of non-followers due to the momentum of engagement generated by his die-hard followers. Alleyne has expertly leveraged this circulation method without building a content-focused platform of his own. In other words, his people actively seek him and his content out. He has masterfully pulled his followers in and held their attention in the forum of social media comments. His Crime Watch TV programme also leverages same by way of its call-in segment. Alleyne wields his persona to dominate a kind of “stand-pipe” media distribution. Something I liken to office water-cooler chatter but for a more authentic Caribbean context. His caricature belies his savvy: he is a man of the people. Setting aside my personal interest/ taste, to focus on IAN is to review the aspects of disruptive content strategy and programming which I champion as a consultant.
In 2012, when I worked as a writer at MACO Magazines, my editor at the time did a cover story on Mr. Alleyne for MACO People Trinidad. At the time I didn’t understand what she saw in him or his story. However, what she revealed in her interview was the person who saw beyond limiting expectations. That person she interviewed appears to be the same man building an independent media network that now has distribution on AMPLIA! You can now view IAN TV in HD on channel 126. I cannot dismiss this achievement, even at its face value.
I must also state that brand IAN has outlived Toute Bagai Publishing (publishers of the magazine shown below).
Ian Alleyne photographed by Antony Scully, Scully Photography
I raise this observation (especially as non-follower of his brand) marveling at the heights he has climbed, doing what independent journalists with decades of industry experience fail to do. He is cutting road and proving that disruptive strategy is required for local media business to succeed. He is unconventional yet his execution is almost painfully obvious—one might say a common-sense approach. And sidelining him like that does not seem fair. What is also obvious is that he has found and maintained a winning distribution strategy that benefits his audience. His news (written and edited by experienced media personnel) is shared natively (in-platform) letting his audience read, watch, and comment in the moment of distribution versus via inconvenient click-throughs. If these pursuits lead to profit is a different story.
So the assignment that requires a review of IAN is due in a couple of weeks and is meant to be done with a project partner. Whomstsoever that person might be need to know that we following IAN. Like him or not.
