Trushar Barot

Trushar Barot is Mobile Editor for the BBC World Service Group. He has been leading innovative approaches on messaging platforms at BBC News since January 2014. His work has included the launch of the world’s first news service inside WhatsApp, during the Indian elections in the spring of 2014 and the subsequent Peabody award-winning Ebola WhatsApp ‘lifeline’ information service. He has also helped shape the broader media industry’s vision and strategy on messaging platforms through his open editorial experiments on a range of other chat apps: LINE, WeChat, Viber, BBM, Mxit and Yo. Trushar previously led the UGC and Social Media hub in the BBC’s main newsroom and has over 20 years of experience in the British media, covering newspapers, radio, TV, online, social and digital. His work in the messaging app space for news has been covered in a range of media blogs and publications, including: Nieman Lab, Digiday, TechCrunch, Journalism.co.uk, The Drum, Adweek, and Mashable.

Trushar worked on research paper with Eytan Oren to provide an insider’s overview of the messaging app landscape, exploring the most effective existing case studies from news organizations, and forecast likely industry developments over the next 12-24 months.

Tow Project: Guide to Chat Apps