In the past hour, I have “instant messaged” five people who live in three different countries. I learned that my friend in India just had a child, my college friends want to have a reunion next month in Bali, and I am late for dinner. WhatsApp, Gchat, Facebook Messenger, etc., have given us instant communication regardless of location. Language has also developed for chat similar to the way shorthand was used by journalists of yesteryears. Messaging someone ‘LOL,’ ‘ROFL’ or using emojis can convey a person’s emotional state, and the ability to send audio, images and videos attached to text has increased our use of multimedia in communication.

Dalet capitalized on the growing popularity of chat as a means of communicating by integrating it with Dalet Galaxy. Journalists and others working for the newsroom using phones, a web client and desktop computers have at their fingertips the ability to collect as much information, including various multimedia, about an event as possible, enabling them to form a viewpoint that is both informative and balanced.

With the ability to create chatrooms in Galaxy, journalists can collaborate with people in the newsroom about an ongoing story as well as with various bureaus and reporters on the road. What’s more, with XMPP technology, chat is no longer limited to one messaging app, as Dalet chat users can send and receive chats with multiple chat services including Facebook Messenger, Gchat, WhatsApp and many more. Whenever a story, planning event and new recording is created, everyone who subscribes to notifications from Dalet Chat will receive a message, even if they are offline, and with a click, a user can open the item, be it a textual story, video, image or audio recording.

Let’s go through the lifecycle of a story at a local TV news channel and see how chat is used in the newsroom:

[12:22 PM] Bob the Reporter receives a text from a source in town hall that Tim the Politician is stepping down.
[12:45 PM] Bob forwards this chat to the Assignment Desk Chat Group to find out more information.
[12:47 PM] Wendy on the Assignment Desk creates a Planning Event about Tim the Politician stepping down.
 [12:52 PM] As Phil, the Town Hall Correspondent, receives the chat, he looks up and sees Mary, Tim the Politician’s secretary, walking towards the cafeteria.
[12:55 PM] On the record, Mary confirms that Tim the Politician is stepping down because of personal reasons – a sound bite that is recorded as an audio clip on Phil’s phone, which is then automatically uploaded to the Newsroom.
[12:57 PM] Wendy on the Assignment Desk associates this audio clip with the Planning Event, and messages Phil to get a picture of Mary if he cannot take video.
[13:01 PM] Tom the Producer receives a chat notification that the story about Tim the Politician stepping down has been confirmed by a source, and Tom creates a 30-second story in the 2 PM News.
[13:02 PM] The 6 PM News chat group and other producers receives a chat notification of the upcoming story, and Kevin the Reporter sends a chat to Tom the Producer that he wants to cover the story as he golfs with Tim the politician’s friend Greg.
[13:04 PM]  Tom the Producer assigns the story to Kevin and the 6 PM News Chat Group is notified of this assignment.
[13:06 PM] Kevin clicks the chat notification on his phone about the assignment of the story and sees that Wendy on the Assignment Desk has set up a Twitter Harvester to collect Tweets using the hashtags #TimThePolitican and #TimStepsDown, associating tweets to the story along with Phil’s audio recording of Mary confirming Tim the Politician is stepping down.
[13:08 PM] Kevin sends a chat to Greg, Tim the Politician’s friend, who is on Facebook Messenger, requesting an interview.
[13:10 PM] Greg denies that Tim the Politian is stepping down, so Kevin sends him the audio recording of Mary confirming it.
[13:12 PM] Greg, caught in a lie, sends Kevin a guilty emoji and confirms an interview in the next 30 minutes.
 [13:16 PM] Kevin sends a message to Wendy on the Assignment Desk that an interview has been confirmed with Greg in 30 minutes at 123 Major Street.
[13:18 PM] Wendy updates the Planning event that a camera crew is needed in 30 minutes at 123 Major Street.
[13:22 PM] Neil the Cameraman receives the message about the interview while he is grabbing lunch and sends a message to Wendy that he is five blocks away from 123 Major Street and that he will take the job.
[13:24 PM] Tom the Producer receives the chat that the interview has been confirmed and moves the story of Tim the Politician to the top of the rundown.
[13:28 PM] David the Content Producer receives the notification that a big story about Tim the Politician is breaking at 6 PM and creates a headline for Christy the Anchor to read.
[13:33 PM] On her way to the studio, Christy the Anchor receives the text about the headline she has to read and on her phone changes the text slightly.
[13:30 PM] Neil the Cameraman and Tom the Reporter go to 123 Major Street to conduct the interview.
[13:33 PM] Wendy on the Assignment Desk, receives a text from Calvin the Reporter on the Police Beat, that Tim the Politician was arrested the night before for a hit and run.
[13:34 PM] Tim the Politician’s friend isn’t giving much information during the interview, so after receiving the text from Wendy on the Assignment Desk about the hit and run, Kevin the Reporter changes his line of questioning to Greg, Tim the Politician’s friend, to get information about the incident.
[13:37 PM] Chris the 1:30 PM News Producer, receives a chat notification that the interview of Greg, Tim the Politian’s friend, is turning into a good story, so Chris messages Patricia the Director of the 1:30 PM News, to make the story of Tim the Politician stepping down because of a hit and run breaking news for the 1:30 PM Show.
[13:40 PM] The story of Tim the Politician stepping down because of a hit and run breaks at 13:40 PM.

As you can see, Dalet Chat enables anyone working for the newsroom regardless of location to always be in synch, increasing the speed of breaking news while elevating the amount of information from sources, giving a more rounded viewpoint to the audience listening on the radio, watching TV or viewing content on the web.