Wall Street Journal story outlines big media's "gamble" in relying on content. The story says big media, including it's own company, are making a "risky" bet that consumers will pay for content. Good roundup of the subject.
Story is balanced, reporting the doubters who maintain that the big money is in advertising, aggregating and distributing content. Of course, they sort of ignore where that content is going to come from.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Thursday, December 31, 2009
The more we change, the more we stay the same
Speaking of reinventing journalism, I'm struck by the frequent similarities to journalism's history and its basics in stories talking about new media. For example, this excellent essay by Amanda Ernst on FishbowlNY about the future of media. She talks with Jim Gaines, former managing editor of several magazines who now is chief of the digital publication FLYP.
Gaines talks about journalism as a conversation with traditional journalism starting the conversation and citizen journalists and crowdsourcing moving it along. That's not all that different from what I've been teaching about journalism my entire career with the difference being that journalism not only starts the conversations but move it along. The theory is that no story is complete unto itself so a report of something sets in motion continued reporting on other facets that tell us more about the story until we have a rounded and reasonably complete story.
Like many other new media folk (and far too many in old media) he believes the old system, as he put it, "We come from a model where you publish something once on paper and it goes into a library and it's basically dead." Of course the model was that something was published once, then more and more information was gathered and reported and the stories, far from being dead, were living, growing and becoming more complete.
Still, Gaines has several good ideas about how things might happen in this brave new world.
Hyperlocal news and the future
For those looking ahead at media, the watchword is hyperlocal. It's not just old media, but new media that is flocking to hyperlocal news as content. As this report in the Guardian indicates, it's not just big media like CNN, but all variations that are looking to hyperlocal reporting to build community. The report emphasises two important points.
The first is political reporting. Who has the money and staff to do the kind of reporting that is needed for our democracies?
The second is summed up in this quote: "The reporting of local news will be interesting for a journalistic reason. Local information is likely to be the first place of a reinvented journalism." Journalism is in the process of reinventing itself, and hyperlocal may well be one of its laboratories.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Newspaper ad reviews and the future
Years ago I was an obituary writer. I called funeral homes and families and wrote the stories of those who have died. One of the tricks of the trade was to contact people before they died to get details that would make obituaries of famous people more interesting. I thought of it as writing obituaries of the dying.
That leads into Eric Sass's column today. He writes about newspaper advertising reviews, which are continuing to decline. I've attached a chart from his column showing the decline over the past few years.
It sort of makes me think about my old job.
Steve Outing writes about newspapers and new media
Steve Outing, who has supported new media for 20 years, writes in what's probably his list column for the soon-to-end Editor & Publisher two lists of interest: (1) What the newspaper industry should have done, and (2) since it didn't, what will happen now.
Both are interesting since they reflect the basic new media mantra that newspapers were destined to die, are destined to die, and will die as consumers switch to other media. I wish I could be as confident about any of the options. Clearly they will continue to be change. I'm not convinced, as Outing seems to be, that mobile is really the way we're going to get our news. Sure, I'll get Tweets on my iPhone, but do I want to read all the details on a tiny screen? Nor am I convinced that online advertising is all that effective. I'm still waiting to read research finding that. It's cheap, but so is television advertising at 3 a.m., or direct mail in small towns where it's not read by many people.
Still, Outing has been right on many things in the past, and his columns have always been interesting, as is this one.
Both are interesting since they reflect the basic new media mantra that newspapers were destined to die, are destined to die, and will die as consumers switch to other media. I wish I could be as confident about any of the options. Clearly they will continue to be change. I'm not convinced, as Outing seems to be, that mobile is really the way we're going to get our news. Sure, I'll get Tweets on my iPhone, but do I want to read all the details on a tiny screen? Nor am I convinced that online advertising is all that effective. I'm still waiting to read research finding that. It's cheap, but so is television advertising at 3 a.m., or direct mail in small towns where it's not read by many people.
Still, Outing has been right on many things in the past, and his columns have always been interesting, as is this one.
More evidence that reading is growing
One of the points I like to make in classes is that newspapers may die but journalism will live. That's borne out by reports like this one reporting on a study that shows we've never read as much as we are now -- and someone has to write all those words we're reading.
A Wired report says: “Reading, which was in decline due to the growth of television, tripled from 1980 to 2008, because it is the overwhelmingly preferred way to receive words on the Internet,” found a University of San Diego study (.pdf) published this month by Roger E. Bohn and James E. Short of the University of San Diego.
If you have any doubts, read that again: "Reading . . . tripled from 1980 to 2008 . . . ." And, as I said, someone has to write all those words. Now we just need to get all those writers paid a fair amount.
A Wired report says: “Reading, which was in decline due to the growth of television, tripled from 1980 to 2008, because it is the overwhelmingly preferred way to receive words on the Internet,” found a University of San Diego study (.pdf) published this month by Roger E. Bohn and James E. Short of the University of San Diego.
If you have any doubts, read that again: "Reading . . . tripled from 1980 to 2008 . . . ." And, as I said, someone has to write all those words. Now we just need to get all those writers paid a fair amount.
Monday, December 28, 2009
Yet another reason to hate progress
One of the reasons I'm not totally convinced that online is the future of media is because of the stupidity of web site operators and advertisers. For example, I just now attempted to view the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel site, and they have a banner across that top with a rollover that totally obscures the screen whenever my cursor hits it, meaning that to navigate the site I have to carefully pull my cursor around the bar.
It's stupid of the site since it makes visiting unpleasant and even more stupid for the advertiser who is paying good money for a gimmick that is guaranteed to make me LESS likely to go to my local Honda dealer than I would be without it.
It's the same "if we can stick in this operations we will" that makes users dislike Microsoft and its ilk for all the unnecessary junk they have cluttering their products. A rollover -- and they'll all over the Internet -- makes it much less pleasant an experience. At least with my printed newspaper, I don't have to move my eyes only in a selected path to move from one area to another.
It's stupid of the site since it makes visiting unpleasant and even more stupid for the advertiser who is paying good money for a gimmick that is guaranteed to make me LESS likely to go to my local Honda dealer than I would be without it.
It's the same "if we can stick in this operations we will" that makes users dislike Microsoft and its ilk for all the unnecessary junk they have cluttering their products. A rollover -- and they'll all over the Internet -- makes it much less pleasant an experience. At least with my printed newspaper, I don't have to move my eyes only in a selected path to move from one area to another.
369 magazines closed in 2009 -- so far
It's sort of staggering to see yearend lists of struggling media properties. The latest is a listing of 369 magazines that have closed during 2009 -- not counting the 64 that went online-only. Still, it's an improvement over the 526 that closed in 2008 or the 573 that closed in 2007.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Upturn seen for newspapers
Just in time for the holidays, an analyst says the bottom is in sight for newspapers, and predicts things are going to get better -- slowly (with more advertising drops), but surely.
The comeback will happen in part because of "relentless" cost cutting, but more because newspapers remain a monopoly and have learned to leverage their content into more revenue streams.
As mixed as the analysis was (it shows 8 percent ad revenue drops), it did create a small boomlet for newspaper stocks. I believe they've been discounted so much that they now are bargains.
The comeback will happen in part because of "relentless" cost cutting, but more because newspapers remain a monopoly and have learned to leverage their content into more revenue streams.
As mixed as the analysis was (it shows 8 percent ad revenue drops), it did create a small boomlet for newspaper stocks. I believe they've been discounted so much that they now are bargains.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Social media and marketing; it affects us all
Media analyst Joe Marchese offers "10 things changing marketing in 2010," a perceptive blog posting. Perhaps of most interest is his view of new and much wider roles for social media with all their implications for marketing. The same holds true for news and the rest of media as well.
More on digital media and reading
The print revolution from paper to digital is not only casting doubt on the future of many forms of print, but also on the very concept of reading.
The Christian Science Monitor offers a look at the complex issue of reading, especially reading e-books, at this time of revolution.
Perhaps it's tell that I printed out the story and read it over coffee rather than scrolling through it on a computer. Yes, I don't have a Kindle. That doesn't mean I won't ever have one; just that I have enough to read now and already am spending far more time in front of a computer screen than I like.
The Christian Science Monitor offers a look at the complex issue of reading, especially reading e-books, at this time of revolution.
Perhaps it's tell that I printed out the story and read it over coffee rather than scrolling through it on a computer. Yes, I don't have a Kindle. That doesn't mean I won't ever have one; just that I have enough to read now and already am spending far more time in front of a computer screen than I like.
Friday, December 18, 2009
The newspaper shell game
Jennifer Saba at Editor & Publisher (still there, online) correctly calls out the newspaper publishers for their shell game of charging readers more and offering them less. It's a strategy that probably will doom the industry, I believe, despite plenty of evidence that readers still like, desire and will pay for newspapers. In fact, my belief is that many advertisers will soon become weary of getting no results from their ultra-cheap online advertising, and look at print as a proven model. Of course, that doesn't include classified advertising lost to Craig's list and its ilk, but I'm predicting that some sectors may well return.
Anyway, Saba's comments indicate that she also sees the obvious weakness in a strategy of bleeding resources from a product that you want to sell for a higher price. If only newspaper publishers would.
Anyway, Saba's comments indicate that she also sees the obvious weakness in a strategy of bleeding resources from a product that you want to sell for a higher price. If only newspaper publishers would.
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