Telstra launches new blogging site

Putting the troubled history of its nowwearetalking website behind it, Telstra has re-launched its efforts to communicate with customers and stakeholders online, focused on a new blogging site dubbed "Telstra Exchange".

The site launched today, to coincide with the telco's annual general meeting being held in Sydney this morning. It features a news section, as well as blogs that Telstra promised will be about technology "from every view".

"Within this structure we're hoping we can inform the online conversation by introducing the people behind Telstra. People like our senior leaders David Thodey, David Quilty or Michael Lawrey, or hands-on employees like internet guru Jono Haysom and social media guy Mike Hickinbotham," wrote Telstra's head of social media and online media relations Kristen Boschma on the site.

Boschma added that she would be the overall leader of conversations on the site, which appears to take the form of a traditional blogging platform of the sort popularised by WordPress and Movable Type. Telstra's previous nowwearetalking site was much more complex, featuring several sub-sections.

Telstra chief executive David Thodey has also posted a welcoming video on the site, saying the site was more than just a corporate blog.

"Telstra Exchange is a blogging website... But it's more than that. It's a symbol, too, of our new approach to communications here at Telstra," he said. "That means it's a place for you to tell us how you feel, especially about innovation and technology."

The telco shuttered its previous nowwearetalking site in early September after its new chief executive David Thodey took the reins, ending its four-year attempt to change the nature of discussion in the telecommunications industry, spear-headed by former public policy and communications director Phil Burgess.

At times the site had become controversial, with Telstra using it to allege bias on the part of some telecommunications journalists, as well as attack rivals such as Optus and even the regulator, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Thodey's ascension to the CEO role has been broadly interpreted as bringing a less adversarial approach to the telco's relationships.

The telco also attracted a small flurry of interest today as it emerged that Boschma had only joined Twitter last week. However, the telco has a number of other prominent Twitter accounts with thousands of followers, including official Telstra and BigPondTeam accounts, and one popular account held by its social media senior advisor Mike Hickinbotham.

Disclaimer: the author of this article caused much of the interest in Boschma's Twitter account.