Teletruria has spent its entire history pioneering innovation. This station has continuously evolved, overcoming challenges through a blend of technological adaptation and community engagement. Teletruria’s started to be an accurate, reliable, news source to the people within Arezzo and the surrounding Tuscan area. Throughout our time at Teletruria, we got to see this change while also being on the live show ourselves. 

Teletruria’s studio

“During the last year, we have been working hard on innovation. [Innovation] is indispensable: Not only the innovation of the camera or phone, but now multidisciplinary innovation with different media.”

Teletruria showed that innovation is beyond just equipment and physical upgrades. Instead it focuses on the integration of various different forms of media: From television to social media platforms. This vital integration of technology with their mission of sharing the news lets them reach a variety of people, deepening its commitment to the Tuscan community. 

“The future of television is this: The possibility to use multi-plane media to spread our message, so social media, television, radio, YouTube, everything.”

The editors and journalists of Teletruria believed that the power of journalism lies in easy accessibility for their readers. This belief has fueled an approach to journalism where the local stories on Teletruria are easily accessible around the region, but also globally. Their motivation lies beyond just traditional success, but also allowing for community input and questions while live on air.

“ We now use WhatsApp, with a QR code, and during the live telecast it’s possible to invite questions from the people.” 

This approach emphasises community engagement: They are driven by the community and local stories. This transforms the user experience and the way news is consumed: It provides a new avenue for the audience to feel engaged with what’s going on on both the TV, and in their own community. 

Personally, we saw this while going on the live show. During our time at Teletruria, we were toured around the station and welcomed with open arms. We were taken around to the offices, the various studies, and met many members of the Teletruria production team. While we were taken around, one of the journalists was using a new swivel camera that could capture 360 degrees of footage: Showing their further dedication to combining journalism with state of the art technology.

In their production room, we were able to view their live view as the news was on: How they determine when to switch cameras, the live countdown from commercial back to news, and just the overall management of the program.


Live production room

After our tour, we were taken on live air. For me, this was a little unexpected. I expected to be interviewed by the journalists, and maybe in front of a camera, but not on live TV. Not only was it live TV, but it was right around the time that people would start watching the news, so we would have a larger audience. I didn’t speak any Italian, so we relied on translations for our questions. During this time, we saw the Whatsapp questions come into play.  While live on air, audience members were able to ask questions about our experience in Arezzo and time at the University of Oklahoma: They asked if they could tour our campus, and how they can get involved with what we do. 

OUA on live TV

It was a cool experience, and while I was nervous, I am glad I did it. Watching in real time how Teletruria connects their live audience to the story was super interesting. It felt as if they were actually involved in the story telling that the journalists were trying to create. 

During the hour and a half we were at Teletruria, we saw all the effort it took to maintain a 24 hour news station: There was constant effort and we were quickly ushered around. They took their commitment to the community seriously: Every effort was meant to engage the Tuscan community, whether that was through technology, social media, or interactive displays.

“It’s not the equipment that makes the station, it’s the people.”