Getting your local news was once a straightforward endeavour: delivered to your doorstep in the morning or purchased from a vendor on your commute. But the years have not been kind to the press. Its service to democracy has been crippled by shrinking newsrooms, a jumbled mess of advertising on websites and clickbait headlines that turn you off the whole business entirely.
Solutions have been offered by many think-tanks (charity status, tax breaks, more government advertising) but these approaches are always top-down. How do we make consuming local news a better experience for those it’s intended for?
Enter the growing trend of news curation, delivered via newsletter to your email inbox, no social media scrolling, or website navigating required.
The Glasgow Wrap newsletter is designed to help people access the best local news from reputable journalists and community organisations in the area. The curation is delivered to your inbox at 7am daily and can be read in five minutes or less.
At the helm of The Glasgow Wrap, I spend each morning scouring the web, braving the onslaught of clickbait and advertising to let you know the news of the day and where to click if you want to read more.
The aim is to combat news fatigue and algorithm manipulation to bring citizens what they need to know about their city in a format that feels like a newsstand for a digital generation.
I spent two years working as a reporter for the Glasgow Times witnessing (and participating in) the process of hunting down local stories. Brilliant local reporting is still happening in newsrooms day in and day out – curating it makes the work easier to find. The project is inspired by journalist Michael MacLeod’s Substack newsletter, The Edinburgh Minute, which has exploded in popularity since it launched at the end of 2022.
Michael started his career in local newsrooms two decades ago, going on to work for global brands including The Guardian, Vogue and Instagram.
“Local news has always been my passion, so I started The Edinburgh Minute a year ago and now it’s my job thanks to paying subscribers,” he said.
The Edinburgh Minute now has an audience of more than 8,000 free subscribers and 1,000 paid.
The idea to bring The Minute to Glasgow soon followed but Michael says partnering with local journalists was important to the integrity of the project.
Working with Newsquest, which owns The Herald, Glasgow Times and The National, to bring The Glasgow Wrap to life, Michael says he’s even seen crossover from the Edinburgh audience.
He said: “People care about where they live and need to know what’s happening, who takes decisions on their behalf and how the public pound is spent.
“Local news delivers that and so much more. It can surprise, delight and spread pride, joy and laughter.
“It’s so specific to each place that readers can easily tell when it’s not being written by local people with local knowledge.
“That’s why I think partnering with a publisher based in the city was preferable to starting my own Glasgow-based newsletter.”
READ MORE: The fall of Locavore - when a social enterprise collapses
READ MORE: Scotland and alcohol: bigger drinkers than on the Mediterranean?
He added: “People tell us they don’t know where to find news, and when they do, it’s often full of ads, pop-up autoplay videos and misleading headlines.
“Assigning trained and qualified professional journalists to wade through all the noise and share all the trusted sources - with links - each morning is important for our personal sanity as much as it could be important for democracy.
“Learning more about where we live and getting involved in things we care about ultimately makes our cities better.”
Delivering news free from social platforms and search engines is looking like a promising antidote to the looming threat of AI and deprioritisation. When social media sites decide that happy or divisive content will be seen the most, news publishers are pressured into only sharing that type of story. Council planning and budget stories don’t always make the cut.
Michael said: “Reaching millions of people shouldn’t be the goal of local news, where quality is much more important to readers than quantity.
“By just sending one email once a day, you can get up-to-speed in about five minutes instead of spending five hours a day on social media, distracted by the attention-sucking onslaught of content for the sake of content.
“Our cities are full of brilliant people doing wonderful things and we hope these newsletters restore some of the pride in Glasgow that everyone deserves to get from their news.”
So, what will I get if I sign up for the newsletter?
The Glasgow Wrap lands in your inbox at 7am each morning. The free daily newsletter rounds up the top news stories from across the city with a link and the original journalist’s byline.
Does it take away traffic from other news sites?
Quite the opposite – Michael has seen the newsletter sharing traffic with subscribers visiting sites and reading stories that catch their attention. So far, it’s been the same with The Glasgow Wrap.
What does it cover?
Local democracy updates, food and drink news, heartwarming community stories and grassroots initiatives – information that keeps you interested and informed about your area.
The Weekend Guide offers a range of different events and things to do.
As a hyper-local initiative, we want people to contribute by sending in tips, events, charities, anything that they have going on in the city.
How do I sign up?
Visit www.theglasgowwrap.co.uk
Based in Edinburgh?
Find The Edinburgh Minute here: edinburghminute.substack.com
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here