Please explain what your Accelerator project is in as much detail as possible.
The power of Story Object Model (SOM) is as a shared, participant-neutral substrate for live story assembly. Rather than each vendor building point-to-point integrations, SOM lets participants using skills and applications publish and consume story state on one bus keyed by a durable story_id, with each contributor free to enrich a story with additional context to supplement a wire service minted story without owning the whole pipeline.
Leveraging this architecture, The Weather Company rapidly implemented a skill that retrieves wire stories, enriches them with rich meteorological context, and submits them in a pending state. To preserve absolute brand integrity, all automated outputs require human editorial approval before publishing. SOM is easy to adopt with a flexible schema that allows skills to incorporate updates when needed while continuing to interoperate without data loss or pipeline interruption.
Who is involved in the project?
A select group of partners/contributors, which includes The Weather Company, AP, Reuters, BBC, ITN, NBCUniversal, Cues, LiveU, etc.
Why do you believe the project is important to the media industry?
As the industry continues to evolve, this is the next logical evolution of the newsroom/production interconnection. SOM makes connecting otherwise unique/bespoke solutions to achieve a more seamless workflow. This enables a higher ROI for users of equipment that is SOM enabled. The SOM standard drives the “create-once, use everywhere” capability that is critical for all forward-looking Media companies and raises the bar on system interoperability.
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What’s been the biggest challenge you’ve faced as part of your project?
As an emerging technology, with a large group of contributors, there were lots of good ideas that needed to be explored. It took time to weed through the ideas, but as a group, we were able to hone in on the right schema and a set of best practices that inform our IBC demonstration and will serve as a useful reference design for early adopters who implement what will soon be an approved standard.
Why did you want to be part of this year’s IBC Accelerator programme?
The Weather Company recognises SOM as the future of newsroom integration. SOM addresses structural limitations inherent in legacy Media Object Server (MOS) protocol while preserving a clear migration path for organizations with existing MOS infrastructure. Purpose-built to support AI-enabled automation and skill-based workflows, SOM fosters cross-newsroom interconnectivity, streamlines topic history tracking, and maximises asset reuse across the media enterprise.
While weather systems have traditionally functioned as standalone silos, SOM establishes a unified architecture that aligns weather operations with the multi-platform demands of modern newsrooms. Powered by the Max Cloud Platform, SOM enables weather systems to respond dynamically to newsroom requests, effortlessly contributing high-value weather content to the broader media organisation.
What can IBC Show attendees expect to see from you in Amsterdam?
Centred on a Hurricane Melissa case study, IBC attendees will experience an end-to-end multi-vendor workflow demonstration. This showcase highlights how The Weather Company integrates meteorological expertise directly into the news ecosystem—guiding real-time editorial decisions and driving coordinated, multi-day coverage across the enterprise.
