WE CAN BE POSITIVELY INFORMED

I love news and current affairs, i love to keep abreast of what's going on in my community and the world around. But honestly, it can be grim - that's why my new favourite general information platform is 'aplus.com', delivering positive journalism. I wont write anymore about their phylosophy and ethos - because frankly, i couldn't do better than they.

Here's what 'aplus' say...

Who We Are

A Plus is a technology-based digital media company based in New York City. We strive to deliver positive journalism to readers, with the intention of making a meaningful difference in the world by highlighting our common humanity, promoting personal growth, and inspiring social change. Our growth has been powered by our technology, which underlies all aspects of content creation, optimization, and distribution. In less than a year we‘ve reached an average of 30 million monthly readers, and according to Quantcast are currently a top 100 website in the United States.

About Us

The exemplary A Plus story will make readers feel better about themselves or the world around them after they’ve read it. We accomplish this through pictures, through words, or through lists, but in the end our stories must inspire readers to take positive action. This can be as simple as a smile, a share, or as great as the causation for personal or global change. We do this in several ways:

• Highlight social issues across the globe

• Motivate actions of positive change

• Inject joy into people’s lives

• Enable people to think, dream, learn, and imagine

• Inspire emotion that encourages people to feel more connected to one another

• Provide resources for personal growth

• Offer the opportunity to discover and appreciate our amazing world

A Plus furthers readers’ sense of connection with their community, their neighborhood, their enemy, or their world. Our stories encourage readers to see themselves in others and reveal their secret selves. Our stories highlight moments of courage, humiliation, anger, folly, but the ones that hit home are the ones that cause readers to feel that they are not alone with their imperfect selves. We do not make fun or put others down; we find ourselves in them!

A Plus inspires readers to be better people through behavioral change. Whether it’s habits to improve their lives, their productivity, or the way they think about the world, readers should be left with a push to be a better version of themselves. It’s easy to build momentum with violence, anger, fear, rumors, salaciousness, but it will generally leave people feeling paralyzed. Our stories should point to solution or action.

Most news organizations fall down when they overcomplicate things that they ought to make simple. Being simple is actually quite difficult, and makes organization essential. Whether it’s through words, pictures, or graphs, we must ensure that we tell the story through the optimal medium, and craft it so that the main ideas can be consumed quickly. Perhaps most importantly, we must focus on creating stories that readers will feel proud to share on their social feeds and send to their friends.

PS did i mention that the co-founder and chairman of the board is non other than social activist, Silicone Valley start-up entrepeneur, Ashton Kutcher :-)