Press & media

Run the press side of the festival from the same place as everything else: publish releases, hand journalists a self-service press kit, accredit photographers, field interview requests, and keep a clippings book of the coverage you earn — all without a separate PR tool.

This page covers the public press room, the private link-based press portal for accredited media, the accreditation workflow and press pass, interview requests, press releases, and the back-office media records (outlets, contacts, assets, coverage).

What's where

Surface	Who sees it	What it is
Press room — /press	The public	Published releases + the downloadable press kit.
Press portal — /press/portal/<link>	A named journalist	A private page with their accreditation status, the full press kit (including portal-only assets), and the interview-request form.
Accreditation form — /press/accreditation	The public	Where a journalist applies for a press pass.
Back-office — Festinato → Press	The organiser	Releases, accreditations, contacts, outlets, press kit, interview requests and coverage.

Two switches under Festinato → Settings → Press & media control the public surfaces:

• Press room — on by default. Serves /press and the release / press-kit feeds.
• Press accreditation — off by default. Serves the public /press/accreditation form and turns on the back-office approval queue and press-pass printing. Turn it on only if you run a formal press desk.
• Notification email — an optional address told whenever a new accreditation or interview request lands. Leave it blank for no internal notification.

The press room (public)

/press is your public newsroom. It lists every published press release (newest first) and the public part of your press kit, with a Request press accreditation button when accreditation is enabled.

• Releases show their title, subtitle, date and body, with an optional cover image. A release becomes visible once its publish from time has passed, any embargo has lifted, and its publish until time (if set) hasn't.
• Press kit lists each media asset marked public and currently within its publish window — logos, photos, fact sheets, stage plots — each downloadable, with a credit line where one is set.

The press portal (accredited media)

The press portal is a private, link-based page for one named journalist — separate from the artist/crew/venue portal at my.festinato.app. There's no password and no account: access is a single shareable link tied to a media contact.

Giving a journalist access. Open their record under Festinato → Press → Media Contacts and click Share press portal. Festinato mints a private link (valid for 30 days) you can send them. Re-share to refresh it; the contact's Revoked switch locks the link out immediately.

What they see depends on whether they're accredited for the current edition:

• Accredited (their accreditation is approved or issued): a greeting with their outlet, their accreditation status, the full press kit including portal-only assets (media assets marked not public are visible here but never in the public press room), every published release, and the interview-request form.
• Not yet accredited: the public assets, the published releases, a prompt to apply for accreditation (when it's enabled), and the interview-request form.

An expired or revoked link shows a friendly "link expired" page rather than an error.

Accreditation

Requires the Press accreditation setting to be on.

A journalist applies at /press/accreditation:

Field	Notes
Name	Required.
Email	Required.
Outlet	Required. Autocompletes against outlets you already know; an unknown one is created on submit.
Role	Journalist, photographer, editor, blogger, influencer or other.
Phone	Optional.
Access areas	Free text — e.g. photo pit, backstage.
Photo pass	Tick if they need pit access.
Guests	0–20, for a plus-one or a crew.
Message	What they're covering, deadlines, who they want to reach.

Each application is one request per outlet contact per edition — re-submitting surfaces the existing request rather than duplicating it. A hidden honeypot field traps bots.

Reviewing and the press pass

The organiser works the queue from Festinato → Press → Accreditations (it opens filtered to Pending). An accreditation moves through four states:

State	Meaning
Pending	Submitted, awaiting your decision.
Approved	You've granted the pass. The journalist's press portal now unlocks the full kit.
Rejected	Declined. Can be reset to pending later.
Issued	The physical pass has been printed / handed over.

From the form you can Approve, Reject, Reset to pending, or Print press pass (printing auto-issues an approved request). Each decision stamps who decided and when. Approving sets the access areas, photo-pass flag, guest count and validity window onto the record.

Print press pass renders a printable PRESS badge card — name, outlet, role, access areas, a PHOTO PASS flag where granted, the guest count, the validity dates and the edition.

Interview requests

A journalist submits an interview request from their press portal, optionally naming the artist they want to interview (leave it blank for a general / organiser interview). They give a requested window (e.g. Saturday afternoon) and a message.

The organiser manages these under Festinato → Press → Interview Requests. The workflow:

State	Meaning
Requested	Just submitted by the journalist.
Proposed	You've suggested a time and place.
Confirmed	The slot is locked in.
Declined	Turned down (can be re-proposed).

Set the scheduled time and location when you propose or confirm. If a notification email is configured, you're pinged when a new request arrives.

Press releases

A press release (under Festinato → Press → Press Releases) is distinct from a news post: it adds an embargo and a distribution list.

Field	Notes
Title / subtitle	Translatable.
Body	Rich text.
Cover image	Optional, shown in the press room.
Edition	Optional link to a specific edition.
Publish from / until	The visibility window in the press room.
Embargo until	Keeps the release hidden — even after publish from — until the embargo lifts.
Distribution list	Media contacts to email on distribute.
Attachments	Files sent with the distribution email.

Click Distribute to email the release to every contact on the distribution list that has an email address; the time of first distribution is stamped on the record and it can be re-sent.

The media records

Four supporting records back the press features:

• Outlets — a publication, station, blog or agency. Carries its medium (print, online, radio, TV, podcast, blog, agency, other), website, logo, country and an optional reach figure to help triage, plus the list of contacts who work there.
• Media contacts — a journalist, photographer or editor. The person's name, email and phone come from their contact card; the press record adds their outlet, role, beat (what they cover) and the press portal link.
• Press kit assets — the files in your press kit: logos, photos, fact sheets, stage plots. Each has a category, an optional edition, a credit line, a publish window, and a public switch — public assets show in the press room, non-public ones are reserved for accredited journalists in the press portal.
• Coverage — your clippings book. Log each article, review, interview or broadcast after the festival with its outlet, author, type, link, date and an optional sentiment (positive / neutral / negative) for a year-on-year record of the press you earned.