"Doing nothing is not an option" - I strongly agree.
E.g. I am working on a post about how it's crazy not to have 1) commenting 2) that is easy & OPEN (moderate later, filter only for offensive words & obvious multi-link spam) and instantly visible (without immediate feedback you are subtly disincentivising the behavior) on just about every single content item placed by your media outfit. In the age of blogs, people have quickly gotten used to and then come to expect this and other Web2.0 realities.
It feels downright strange now to read something where we can't comment, or only after running a gauntlet of sign-ups, then mostly unnecessary moderation hold-ups, only to be relegated to some labyrinthine sub-page.
ENGAGEMENT is the key. Embrace the new realities, anything else is madness.
I have had several conversations with a few newspaper editors and writers on this very topic. I think you missed one core point in this post, the true value of what traditional papers (particularly those that have been around for more than a century) is their historical content.
During the chaos periods, new approaches for news reporting will arise. The argument that we won't have investigative reports is bunk. Investigative reporting will move from a paper to some other media (I'm not sure it will be blogging or tweeting as we know it today). Papers will struggle to make money if they cling to that model.
What they have that few others have is a historical archive. The value of being in the moment, when something happened is far more valuable than just looking at the statistics and/or someone's current perception of that point in time. The trick is making those archives available and building a sustainable revenue model to match.
I think it can be done, but are they willing to change? The few that I've talked to don't seem to be.
@toddlucier
· 8 months ago
Best practices: Lose the last part of the name "papers" and move to include audio and video content alongside photos and text. Engage the best video journalists to put a flavor/style behind your video content. Plan a strategy for offering news quickly - or even live streaming, while at the same time engaging audience participation and offering solid commentary. The best newspapers have always done this.
Erskien Lenier
· 8 months ago
Excellent cutting edge topics you have here! I absolutely love it and will direct more traffic to your site!
jeff
· 8 months ago
Publishing facts as opposed to propaganda might help a snidgel. Lies upon spin upon halftruths is what newspapers peddle. It is pathetic. But who puts into place the editor? There is the problem. We get the news that "They" want us to get. The internet does not have the same constraints....... Yet.
These are all geat ideas, but you are missing the one thing that is killing newspapers more than anything: free content. Adapting to new content channels, no matter their form, is a non-issue. News organizations have been very adaptive.
If are paying professional writers to create the grist how can you compete with the countless blogs and other sites replicate, comment and improve that material for free? The legacy infrastructure of multiple bureaus, presses, and delivery chains only add to the burden. It was only a matter of time before free content -- coupled with declining ad revenue thanks to free classifieds -- killed the newspaper business model.
You are correct in saying that collaboration can save the news industry. They will need to collaborate on a micro-payment system similar to iTunes. An even playing field where all can compete and a news story costs you 0.25. Want the entire day's issue -- 0.50. Monthly subscription $12. But every newspaper would have to buy in for it to work. Going it alone would only send rational news consumers elsewhere. It's either this, or online ad rates go waaaaaay up.
swag
· 8 months ago
Clay is right, though. I'm not sure we want newspapers to survive, even if we want journalism to survive.
The standards of journalism have been on a long slide into the Dumpster(tm). That much has been entirely chronicled (no pun intended). But a large reason for that is that journalism has been chained to business models of business distribution (newspapers, even TV news) that have been sinking like a rock. It's gotten so bad that every Joe blogger thinks that his Wordpress account gives him the equivalent qualifications as a Columbia School of Journalism degree.
In effect, newspapers and TV have been killing journalism for years. Their failures are reflected in budget cuts, reporters being pressured to rip-and-read press releases, CNN firing anyone with any experience and replacing them with cheaper hair models and smiling ads for teeth whitener, etc.
Perhaps the only thing that can save good journalism is to jettison it entirely from the sinking ships of broadcast and print news.
robert ivan
· 8 months ago
This article is quite awful. You merely throw out 5 ideas that everyone in the industry has already explored and highlight them by using the very publishers as examples. What the what?
Useless.
Dan Pacheco
· 8 months ago
Great post. I'm one of the few people who can say I work at a newspaper that has already embraced "chaos" (we fragmented our own market by creating 8 of our own social networks), is partnering with its community (3,600 bloggers and 55,000 user profiles in a town of 300,000), and both partners for technology and develops its own. It's The Bakersfield Californian and we're independently owned.
You mentioned The Printed Blog. We have an even more radical approach than that with our Printcasting site (http://www.printcasting.com). It lets anyone become a local magazine publisher using either the newspaper's content, or content from their own blog or that of other bloggers. You give your publication a name, choose a ready-made template, and it self-updates. You and your readers can print it out if you like or read it online in a magazine view or web-friend view (like a blog reader).
Why are we doing this? The site as a self-serve advertising tool. We think the future of publishing is in micro-niche focus. Local businesses want to pay less overall, but will pay more for each targeted individual they read. And they still prefer advertising in print. Even if they use a web site that sell ads, they are more likely to buy an ad for a magazine that has the same brand and content as the Web site. I realize this flies in the face of the whole "print is dead" religion, but it's definitely true at a local level. I believe that's because the more local you get, the more you as a business depend on foot traffic for sales, so you want your brand to literally be out there on the street, in atoms as well as in bits.
This is a cheaper and more interesting way for us to create new niche "print" products. But it's also more efficient because only the highest quality content will ever be printed and distributed. Revenue will also be shared with the bloggers and publishers, although right now ads are free so that we can get local businesses to try out the ad tool.
christine francois
· 8 months ago
great article! very practical tips for publishers. what do you say however, to those in a country where internet saturation is very low and as one publisher voiced, "print still rules"?
Woody Lewis
· 8 months ago
Hi Christine,
In a country where internet saturation is very low, hopefully the business model is better. Whatever the revenue, certainly the newspaper itself can increase its news-gathering by using online resources. Presumably, it has sufficient bandwidth, and it can attract more international readers to its web properties, engage them, and perhaps raise subscription or marketing revenues as well.
/w
Colonel Tribune
· 8 months ago
Thanks for the digital ink, Woody. We're glad to be on board with social media, and we're even happier that our folks aren't just treating it as a shiny object.
am I the only one wondering when a major paper decides to partner with someone making a wifi updatable e-book reader and delivering the paper content via web? the hardware payoff should happen in the first year, and the printing costs saved in subsequent years should be a pretty decent stream. require a 2-year contract, don't lock the device down, let them place other content such as e-books, and whatever content is made avail to these things in the future accessible on them, and the buy-in for the device as itself, makes a 2 year committment pretty easy to take. I know I sure as hell would buy one. Especially as my local paper just went up 15% while cutting content a good 10%
All Comments
E.g. I am working on a post about how it's crazy not to have 1) commenting 2) that is easy & OPEN (moderate later, filter only for offensive words & obvious multi-link spam) and instantly visible (without immediate feedback you are subtly disincentivising the behavior) on just about every single content item placed by your media outfit. In the age of blogs, people have quickly gotten used to and then come to expect this and other Web2.0 realities.
It feels downright strange now to read something where we can't comment, or only after running a gauntlet of sign-ups, then mostly unnecessary moderation hold-ups, only to be relegated to some labyrinthine sub-page.
ENGAGEMENT is the key. Embrace the new realities, anything else is madness.
Follow me on Twitter, I follow back:
Twitter.com/AlexSchleber
During the chaos periods, new approaches for news reporting will arise. The argument that we won't have investigative reports is bunk. Investigative reporting will move from a paper to some other media (I'm not sure it will be blogging or tweeting as we know it today). Papers will struggle to make money if they cling to that model.
What they have that few others have is a historical archive. The value of being in the moment, when something happened is far more valuable than just looking at the statistics and/or someone's current perception of that point in time. The trick is making those archives available and building a sustainable revenue model to match.
I think it can be done, but are they willing to change? The few that I've talked to don't seem to be.
Lose the last part of the name "papers" and move to include audio and video content alongside photos and text.
Engage the best video journalists to put a flavor/style behind your video content.
Plan a strategy for offering news quickly - or even live streaming, while at the same time engaging audience participation and offering solid commentary. The best newspapers have always done this.
Erster deutscher Twitter-Report.
Excellent cutting edge topics you have here! I absolutely love it and will direct more traffic to your site!
If are paying professional writers to create the grist how can you compete with the countless blogs and other sites replicate, comment and improve that material for free? The legacy infrastructure of multiple bureaus, presses, and delivery chains only add to the burden. It was only a matter of time before free content -- coupled with declining ad revenue thanks to free classifieds -- killed the newspaper business model.
You are correct in saying that collaboration can save the news industry. They will need to collaborate on a micro-payment system similar to iTunes. An even playing field where all can compete and a news story costs you 0.25. Want the entire day's issue -- 0.50. Monthly subscription $12. But every newspaper would have to buy in for it to work. Going it alone would only send rational news consumers elsewhere. It's either this, or online ad rates go waaaaaay up.
The standards of journalism have been on a long slide into the Dumpster(tm). That much has been entirely chronicled (no pun intended). But a large reason for that is that journalism has been chained to business models of business distribution (newspapers, even TV news) that have been sinking like a rock. It's gotten so bad that every Joe blogger thinks that his Wordpress account gives him the equivalent qualifications as a Columbia School of Journalism degree.
In effect, newspapers and TV have been killing journalism for years. Their failures are reflected in budget cuts, reporters being pressured to rip-and-read press releases, CNN firing anyone with any experience and replacing them with cheaper hair models and smiling ads for teeth whitener, etc.
Perhaps the only thing that can save good journalism is to jettison it entirely from the sinking ships of broadcast and print news.
Useless.
You mentioned The Printed Blog. We have an even more radical approach than that with our Printcasting site (http://www.printcasting.com). It lets anyone become a local magazine publisher using either the newspaper's content, or content from their own blog or that of other bloggers. You give your publication a name, choose a ready-made template, and it self-updates. You and your readers can print it out if you like or read it online in a magazine view or web-friend view (like a blog reader).
Why are we doing this? The site as a self-serve advertising tool. We think the future of publishing is in micro-niche focus. Local businesses want to pay less overall, but will pay more for each targeted individual they read. And they still prefer advertising in print. Even if they use a web site that sell ads, they are more likely to buy an ad for a magazine that has the same brand and content as the Web site. I realize this flies in the face of the whole "print is dead" religion, but it's definitely true at a local level. I believe that's because the more local you get, the more you as a business depend on foot traffic for sales, so you want your brand to literally be out there on the street, in atoms as well as in bits.
This is a cheaper and more interesting way for us to create new niche "print" products. But it's also more efficient because only the highest quality content will ever be printed and distributed. Revenue will also be shared with the bloggers and publishers, although right now ads are free so that we can get local businesses to try out the ad tool.
In a country where internet saturation is very low, hopefully the business model is better. Whatever the revenue, certainly the newspaper itself can increase its news-gathering by using online resources. Presumably, it has sufficient bandwidth, and it can attract more international readers to its web properties, engage them, and perhaps raise subscription or marketing revenues as well.
/w
By the way, where's your hat?
1. Use emerging internet technologies like http://www.feedjournal.com and twitter and social networks.
2. Focus on local News and investigative reporting
3. Shy away from opinion reporting, Just the facts man, just the facts.
You can check out my custom online newspaper I created with the Feedjournal application at:
http://www.Libertynewsprint.com
~J
1. Embrace chaos
It way cheaper just open http://digg.com or http://WirePost.com and leech the news for free...
Robert Quigley = smart guy