BreakingNews, the team of curators behind the @BreakingNews Twitter account and Breaking News Facebook page, has announced today that it’s going international. The U.K. MSN homepage now features a BreakingNews widget, and the new London-based arm of the team has launched a @BreakingNewsUK Twitter account.
The BreakingNews team manages a round-the-clock firehose of the day’s biggest stories using a deft mix of automatic and manual curation tools. What results is a feed of the major headlines from around the world right as they happen. The full feeds are available on BreakingNews.com and mobile apps for iPhone, Android and Windows Phone 7, while the Twitter feeds offer a tighter stream of the world’s top stories.
When we first covered BreakingNews, the Twitter account had a little over 800,000 followers. It’s over 3,275,000 now, and the startup team is now under the arm of MSNBC’s digital network. Using Twitter analytics, BreakingNews determined that the U.K. was the place to go next. About 350,000 people in the U.K. follow the main @BreakingNews account already, its biggest audience outside the U.S.
“From the riots to the News of the World scandal, the U.K. has experienced a tremendous amount of breaking news this year,” says Cory Bergman, director of BreakingNews. “Our London team will help strengthen BreakingNews’ overall global coverage, including the European debt crisis and continuing unrest in the Middle East and North Africa.”
BreakingNews watches the Twitter accounts of news organizations and whitelists the ones they find reliable. When those sources include #breaking or #breakingnews in a tweet, it tips off the BreakingNews editors. Over 160 organizations, including ABC News and Huffington Post, currently participate. Users of BreakingNews.com can also tip the editors by submitting links.
U.K. residents will find the BreakingNews widget on uk.msn.com, and you can follow the brand new @BreakingNewsUK Twitter account.
Do you follow @BreakingNews on Twitter?
