It's official.
A new Pew report confirms that the inevitable intersection between declining newspaper audience and growing internet audience has happened.
In the Pew survey, 40% of the respondents said they got most of their national and international news from the Internet in 2008 compared to 35% using newspapers. That internet share was 24% in 2007, so 2008 marked a dramatic leap for internet-based news.
While print reach continued to decline, newspapers could find hope in the dramatic growth in audience share for the online version of their content. Newspaper web sites drew 69 million visitors in October 2008, up more than 60 percent compared to the comparable period in 2004.
Overall, TV continued its long-standing dominance as the number one source for daily news, with 70% naming it as their primary source. However, the devil is in the details for broadcasters who might think they don't need to fear newspapers' fate.
That 70% share is a drop from 74% last year and a bigger decline from the 2002 peak of 82%. Foreshadowing the demographic-driven losses of newspapers, TV has fallen into a tie with the internet among those under 30, with an equal number citing TV and internet as their primary news source.
This year, 18-29, next up, 25-54?
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Year in review, using multimedia storytelling tools
The "year in review" is a staple story of the news business. In the world of online journalism, it's also an opportunity to create a more rich, multimedia experience that includes text, audio/video and images from the big stories of the year.
Not long ago, only those with HTML and Flash coding skills were able to create high-end multimedia presentations. I've blogged before about one of my favorite examples, the Star Tribune's multimedia recap of "13 seconds in August", the story of the Minneapolis bridge collapse. The project is beautifully done. However, it took four months to create, and the most powerful elements required coding skills far beyond those of the typical journalist.
Barely more than a year later, much has changed. Web sites like widgetbox.com make it easy to create and embed widgets on a web site without any coding skills. And web sites have sprung up that enable non-techies to create multimedia content - for free - and embed that content.
Here is the Year in Review multimedia show I build for kgw.com in Portland using the free 'collage' feature on vuvox.com. The entire Year in Review page can be found at kgw.com.
Not long ago, only those with HTML and Flash coding skills were able to create high-end multimedia presentations. I've blogged before about one of my favorite examples, the Star Tribune's multimedia recap of "13 seconds in August", the story of the Minneapolis bridge collapse. The project is beautifully done. However, it took four months to create, and the most powerful elements required coding skills far beyond those of the typical journalist.
Barely more than a year later, much has changed. Web sites like widgetbox.com make it easy to create and embed widgets on a web site without any coding skills. And web sites have sprung up that enable non-techies to create multimedia content - for free - and embed that content.
Here is the Year in Review multimedia show I build for kgw.com in Portland using the free 'collage' feature on vuvox.com. The entire Year in Review page can be found at kgw.com.
Friday, December 26, 2008
2008 Year Ender, and New Media Predictions
2008 was a tumultuous year for those in the traditional journalism business: layoffs, bankruptcies, and reorganizations dominated the news - and this was all before the entire country was hit with the worst economic recession in decades.
What were the big take-aways from 2008, and how will the business and practice of journalism change in 2009. Here are a few of my thoughts, and a round-up of what other media bloggers are saying.
Frank's 5 for 2009:
1. Audiences will continue to shift toward consuming their news "on demand": online and, in 2009 more then ever before, via MOBILE devices. This will come at the expense of newspaper circulation; and, for the first time ever in 2009, more people will get their news daily from online than from local TV news.
2. Newspapers will continue to see declines in readership and revenue.
3. In 2009, with the election-year revenue bump behind them, local TV stations will experience the same kinds of deep layoffs newspapers have been enduring for the past several years.
4. Niche blogs and hyperlocal journalism will rise up, both as a competitor to and as a result of reductions at mainstream media outlets
5. Another year will pass, and we still will not have a sustainable business model answer to the question: How do we monetize the web?
Here's what some other media bloggers are saying:
On Poytner.org, Rick Edmonds offers journalists Four Reasons to be Hopeful about newspapers in 2009.
In newsless.org, Matt Thompson offers 5 Questions Worth Asking about journalism's future.
On his News After Newspapers blog, Martin Langeveld came out with his Predictions for 2009, then did a nice follow-up entry summarizing the other 2009 predictions by media bloggers.
What were the big take-aways from 2008, and how will the business and practice of journalism change in 2009. Here are a few of my thoughts, and a round-up of what other media bloggers are saying.
Frank's 5 for 2009:
1. Audiences will continue to shift toward consuming their news "on demand": online and, in 2009 more then ever before, via MOBILE devices. This will come at the expense of newspaper circulation; and, for the first time ever in 2009, more people will get their news daily from online than from local TV news.
2. Newspapers will continue to see declines in readership and revenue.
3. In 2009, with the election-year revenue bump behind them, local TV stations will experience the same kinds of deep layoffs newspapers have been enduring for the past several years.
4. Niche blogs and hyperlocal journalism will rise up, both as a competitor to and as a result of reductions at mainstream media outlets
5. Another year will pass, and we still will not have a sustainable business model answer to the question: How do we monetize the web?
Here's what some other media bloggers are saying:
On Poytner.org, Rick Edmonds offers journalists Four Reasons to be Hopeful about newspapers in 2009.
In newsless.org, Matt Thompson offers 5 Questions Worth Asking about journalism's future.
On his News After Newspapers blog, Martin Langeveld came out with his Predictions for 2009, then did a nice follow-up entry summarizing the other 2009 predictions by media bloggers.
Niche blogs: the future for laid off journalists?
The year 2008 saw widespread staffing reductions at newspapers across the country. Those cuts raise a macro and micro question, whose answers may be intertwined as we move into the next era of journalism.
The macro question is: What is the future of traditional journalism, now that the business model seems irreparably broken?
The micro question is (if you were any of the thousands of journalists laid off) : Where is my next job as a journalist?
The answer to both question may be: Niche journalism blogs.
As newspapers crumble under the weight of their financial debt and fixed costs for production and delivery, a content model that is more nimble and smaller makes sense. In Seattle, several neighborhood blogs have sprung up to meet the need for hyperlocal news.
The West Seattle Blog and the My Ballard blog both regularly break news in their respective neighborhoods; they are frequently updated and often pilfered by the local MSM; and they have developed regular contributors. As Cory Bergman, MyBallard.com creator notes on Lost Remote, it's not quite a 'quit your day job' revenue model, and it's also a lot of hard work. But for journalists who have a passion for local news, it is also an opportunity. As Bergman points out - amazing things can happen if a local news blog reaches "a critical mass of an audience AND contributors in a dense geographic area."
(Full disclosure: I know Cory personally and professionally; he once worked for Belo, my current employer.)
Laid off St. Petersburg Times reporter Scott Barancik has come up with a different and creative business model for individual journalism. As Steve Meyers reports on Poynter, Barancik has launched Baylawsuits.com, "newsworthy cases from the civil courts."
Meyers digs through the court dockets and identifies cases that could be newsworthy, then does bullet point summaries. He then makes his research available on his password-protected site to media clients, who pay for access and then follow up and report on the cases he's found. Meyers, in effect, is the media middle man, using his journalism skills to identify and summarize newsworthy cases that staff-strapped media outlets might overlook. Meyers started with the idea of targeting media clients, but has since expanded to law firms and PR agencies. Again, the dollars don't yet compare to his previous salary, but the idea is creative.
A third approach, the niche blog, has perhaps the most promising business model. A great example of this is Portland's bicycle blog, BikePortland.org. Created several years ago by Jonathan Maus, the blog has grown to become the destination web site for all things bike related in Portland, a city known and nationally recognized for its interest in bicycling. By taking a topic rather than a location, Maus has had business as well as audience success. Specializing in a single topic, he's drawn all of those most knowledgeable to his blog, where they then become posters and tip contributors, making the blog even more of a go-to destination. I know from first-hand experience that the blog is checked regularly by the Portland TV stations looking for story leads. And, thanks to having a targeted subject matter, Maus also has an ad-friendly web site for those looking to reach that very well defined audience. Maus has been making the site work as his full time job for several years now, and while not all of the content is what we'd traditionally call 'journalism', Maus regularly breaks news in this niche category.
Journalists looking to answer the question, personally and professionally, "what next?" may want to think hyperlocal and niched.
The macro question is: What is the future of traditional journalism, now that the business model seems irreparably broken?
The micro question is (if you were any of the thousands of journalists laid off) : Where is my next job as a journalist?
The answer to both question may be: Niche journalism blogs.
As newspapers crumble under the weight of their financial debt and fixed costs for production and delivery, a content model that is more nimble and smaller makes sense. In Seattle, several neighborhood blogs have sprung up to meet the need for hyperlocal news.
The West Seattle Blog and the My Ballard blog both regularly break news in their respective neighborhoods; they are frequently updated and often pilfered by the local MSM; and they have developed regular contributors. As Cory Bergman, MyBallard.com creator notes on Lost Remote, it's not quite a 'quit your day job' revenue model, and it's also a lot of hard work. But for journalists who have a passion for local news, it is also an opportunity. As Bergman points out - amazing things can happen if a local news blog reaches "a critical mass of an audience AND contributors in a dense geographic area."
(Full disclosure: I know Cory personally and professionally; he once worked for Belo, my current employer.)
Laid off St. Petersburg Times reporter Scott Barancik has come up with a different and creative business model for individual journalism. As Steve Meyers reports on Poynter, Barancik has launched Baylawsuits.com, "newsworthy cases from the civil courts."
Meyers digs through the court dockets and identifies cases that could be newsworthy, then does bullet point summaries. He then makes his research available on his password-protected site to media clients, who pay for access and then follow up and report on the cases he's found. Meyers, in effect, is the media middle man, using his journalism skills to identify and summarize newsworthy cases that staff-strapped media outlets might overlook. Meyers started with the idea of targeting media clients, but has since expanded to law firms and PR agencies. Again, the dollars don't yet compare to his previous salary, but the idea is creative.
A third approach, the niche blog, has perhaps the most promising business model. A great example of this is Portland's bicycle blog, BikePortland.org. Created several years ago by Jonathan Maus, the blog has grown to become the destination web site for all things bike related in Portland, a city known and nationally recognized for its interest in bicycling. By taking a topic rather than a location, Maus has had business as well as audience success. Specializing in a single topic, he's drawn all of those most knowledgeable to his blog, where they then become posters and tip contributors, making the blog even more of a go-to destination. I know from first-hand experience that the blog is checked regularly by the Portland TV stations looking for story leads. And, thanks to having a targeted subject matter, Maus also has an ad-friendly web site for those looking to reach that very well defined audience. Maus has been making the site work as his full time job for several years now, and while not all of the content is what we'd traditionally call 'journalism', Maus regularly breaks news in this niche category.
Journalists looking to answer the question, personally and professionally, "what next?" may want to think hyperlocal and niched.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Shrinking to survive: Newspapers get smaller
Here in the Northwest, the largest daily papers in the region's two major markets - Seattle and Portland - announced within the past two weeks that they would shrink or merge sections and cut back on content in their papers. Two other local papers, the Tacoma News Tribune and the Bend Bulletin, announced similar changes.
Today, Nieman Journalism Lab picked up on the Wall Street Journal report that the publisher of the major Detroit daily - the Free Press - will announce Tuesday that the newspaper will halt deliver on all but the three most profitable days of the week: Thursday, Friday and Sunday. Readers presumably will be encouraged to pick up the paper at newsstands or read the paper online.
Last week Tribune declared bankruptcy, in what could be a ghost-of-Christmas future for other struggling newspaper companies.
The decision to halt delivery of a major news daily would be a watershed announcement, and could lead to copycat decisions elsewhere. Shocking as the decision might be to newspaper veterans, the alternative is worse.
At a recent media conference, I was joined on the lunch panel by the former managing editor of the Spokane Spokesman review, who noted that only 17 cents of every dollar of newspaper spending goes to the content. The rest of that is burned up primarily in production (printing) and delivery (distribution) costs.
These 20th century sunk costs simply cannot be offset in a 21st-century business environment, and they are crushing a business already suffering from the 'Craigslist effect' of lost classifieds revenue.
Drastic times require drastic measures. Although newspapers will certainly have to make rate concessions to their advertisers to the extent that they halt delivery or publication of some days' papers, this approach is worth trying. As we noted at that same journalism conference, the "production and distribution" costs of the online version of a newspaper are almost zero.
That's a business model for journalism that has a future.
Today, Nieman Journalism Lab picked up on the Wall Street Journal report that the publisher of the major Detroit daily - the Free Press - will announce Tuesday that the newspaper will halt deliver on all but the three most profitable days of the week: Thursday, Friday and Sunday. Readers presumably will be encouraged to pick up the paper at newsstands or read the paper online.
Last week Tribune declared bankruptcy, in what could be a ghost-of-Christmas future for other struggling newspaper companies.
The decision to halt delivery of a major news daily would be a watershed announcement, and could lead to copycat decisions elsewhere. Shocking as the decision might be to newspaper veterans, the alternative is worse.
At a recent media conference, I was joined on the lunch panel by the former managing editor of the Spokane Spokesman review, who noted that only 17 cents of every dollar of newspaper spending goes to the content. The rest of that is burned up primarily in production (printing) and delivery (distribution) costs.
These 20th century sunk costs simply cannot be offset in a 21st-century business environment, and they are crushing a business already suffering from the 'Craigslist effect' of lost classifieds revenue.
Drastic times require drastic measures. Although newspapers will certainly have to make rate concessions to their advertisers to the extent that they halt delivery or publication of some days' papers, this approach is worth trying. As we noted at that same journalism conference, the "production and distribution" costs of the online version of a newspaper are almost zero.
That's a business model for journalism that has a future.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Grading Social Media coverage of Mumbai
The recent tragedy in Mumbai offered the latest chance to assess the continued evolution of the role of Social Media in the coverage of major breaking news stories.
As noted on the TechCrunch blog, in the early hours of the attacks there was more information on Twitter than on CNN, and photo sharing site Flickr had some of the first images from the scene.
On Poynter, Amy Gahran noted the diversity of Social Media coverage of the attacks, from Twitter Tweets to Blogs, Flickr photos and Wikipedia entries.
In the aftermath, CNN posted a story on "Tweeting the Terror" in which it correctly pointed out the pitfalls and failings of social media "coverage." The story notes how false rumors were posted, and then rapidly repeated, spreading like a 'Tweet' wildfire reminiscent of that old campfire circle game.
Professional journalists will appreciate how Social Media coverage of Mumbai illustrated the dynamic tension that always exists between being fast and being accurate. Clearly, social media - populated by 'civilians' - can easily err on the side of rumor spreading.
Following up on that point, Gahran authored a second blog post suggesting some "teachable moments" provided by the use of Twitter during the Mumbai attacks. For journalists, she throws down the challenge to teach/correct 'tweeters' who are merely repeating, by querying their source; and, when errors are found, tweeting the source of those errors to alert them.
Mindy McAdams, in her blog post Twitter, Mumbai, and 10 facts about online journalism now, nicely recaps some lessons reinforced by the Mumbai story, among them: In this era, major breaking news will be reported online before on-air; non-journalists will be the first to report it; cell phones have become the first-responder reporting tool; and, cell phones with camera/video/internet connection that can publish remotely are the reporting killer app when on location during breaking news.
Clearly, the general public - untrained in journalism - committed typical novice errors in repeating unconfirmed rumors during the Mumbai attacks. But no journalist interested in using all ethical means available to get the full story fast...can deny that Social Media represent both a resource and a publishing tool for a new era of journalism. Trained journalists are in the ideal position to use those tools well, and teach that practice to others.
As noted on the TechCrunch blog, in the early hours of the attacks there was more information on Twitter than on CNN, and photo sharing site Flickr had some of the first images from the scene.
On Poynter, Amy Gahran noted the diversity of Social Media coverage of the attacks, from Twitter Tweets to Blogs, Flickr photos and Wikipedia entries.
In the aftermath, CNN posted a story on "Tweeting the Terror" in which it correctly pointed out the pitfalls and failings of social media "coverage." The story notes how false rumors were posted, and then rapidly repeated, spreading like a 'Tweet' wildfire reminiscent of that old campfire circle game.
Professional journalists will appreciate how Social Media coverage of Mumbai illustrated the dynamic tension that always exists between being fast and being accurate. Clearly, social media - populated by 'civilians' - can easily err on the side of rumor spreading.
Following up on that point, Gahran authored a second blog post suggesting some "teachable moments" provided by the use of Twitter during the Mumbai attacks. For journalists, she throws down the challenge to teach/correct 'tweeters' who are merely repeating, by querying their source; and, when errors are found, tweeting the source of those errors to alert them.
Mindy McAdams, in her blog post Twitter, Mumbai, and 10 facts about online journalism now, nicely recaps some lessons reinforced by the Mumbai story, among them: In this era, major breaking news will be reported online before on-air; non-journalists will be the first to report it; cell phones have become the first-responder reporting tool; and, cell phones with camera/video/internet connection that can publish remotely are the reporting killer app when on location during breaking news.
Clearly, the general public - untrained in journalism - committed typical novice errors in repeating unconfirmed rumors during the Mumbai attacks. But no journalist interested in using all ethical means available to get the full story fast...can deny that Social Media represent both a resource and a publishing tool for a new era of journalism. Trained journalists are in the ideal position to use those tools well, and teach that practice to others.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Can 'new media' actually improve journalism?
That was the provocative question raised today by students in a Masters Journalism program at the University of Oregon.
It turns out the procession of guest experts who'd preceded me to the classroom had left the students with the impression that 'new media' was killing journalism.
While there can be no doubt that competition from new media outlets and new media formats (online, mobile) are eroding the audience share of 'old media', it does not follow that new media is harming journalism. It may only be that it is harming the job security of traditional journalists.
In fact, it is possible that new media tools can significantly forward the principles of journalism for anyone willing to embrace these tools and technologies. Here are a few examples:
Aggregation
TheMoneyMeltdown.com is a great example of the use of aggregation to create a central location for information on a subject. The web site's creator didn't need to be the expert that wrote every article about our current economic meltdown - the value he performed was to go out and locate the best information about each aspect of the current economic crisis and aggregate all that content together in one well-organized web site. That a new-media application of one of journalism's oldest tenets: start with good research, then organize the information in a way that's useful to the audience.
Mash-ups
Data is everywhere, but data alone has no meaning. It once took reporting teams months to pour over data to give it meaning and then report the results. Mash-ups are a new-media tool for taking vast quantities of data, and empowering the public to be able to access the data easily to find out information they need. Chicagocrime.org pioneered this work way back in 2005, taking huge piles of crime data and making it searchable by location. The folks behind that initial project have since expanded their application to include location-based news stories, and also expanded to about a dozen cities with their application EveryBlock.com.
Audience Engagement
For too long, journalism has been a one-way conversation with the audience. Reporters report, readers read, and that's the way it's been.
New media tools make it possible for journalists to engage in a dialogue with the audience, which can make stories better from beginning to end. ReadWriteWeb has a great article detailing four ways they use Twitter to improve story-telling: Discovering breaking news; soliciting suggestions for interview questions for upcoming stories; quality assurance (readers catching/reporting errors), and even (gasp) promoting their stories so that their journalism reaches the largest possible audience.
Multi-Media storytelling
Perhaps the most exciting of all the advances offered by new media tools is the opportunity to provide a richer, more in depth and more compelling rendering of the most important stories of the day. The ability to richly interweave text, images, video, mapping and other media elements transforms yesterday's print or TV report into a powerful multimedia experience.
My favorite example of this is the excellent online multimedia report on the Minneapolis bridge collapse put together by a team at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, called 13 seconds in August. This is the 'New Media' equivalent of a long-form TV documentary, or a newspaper 'special section' - but frankly, is far more compelling. The ST team spent four months creating this compelling mix of mapping, images, text, video and audio.
We should all be encouraged by the possibilities of what journalism can become if we look at the new media tools as just that - new tools to continue the tradition of journalistic excellence.
It turns out the procession of guest experts who'd preceded me to the classroom had left the students with the impression that 'new media' was killing journalism.
While there can be no doubt that competition from new media outlets and new media formats (online, mobile) are eroding the audience share of 'old media', it does not follow that new media is harming journalism. It may only be that it is harming the job security of traditional journalists.
In fact, it is possible that new media tools can significantly forward the principles of journalism for anyone willing to embrace these tools and technologies. Here are a few examples:
Aggregation
TheMoneyMeltdown.com is a great example of the use of aggregation to create a central location for information on a subject. The web site's creator didn't need to be the expert that wrote every article about our current economic meltdown - the value he performed was to go out and locate the best information about each aspect of the current economic crisis and aggregate all that content together in one well-organized web site. That a new-media application of one of journalism's oldest tenets: start with good research, then organize the information in a way that's useful to the audience.
Mash-ups
Data is everywhere, but data alone has no meaning. It once took reporting teams months to pour over data to give it meaning and then report the results. Mash-ups are a new-media tool for taking vast quantities of data, and empowering the public to be able to access the data easily to find out information they need. Chicagocrime.org pioneered this work way back in 2005, taking huge piles of crime data and making it searchable by location. The folks behind that initial project have since expanded their application to include location-based news stories, and also expanded to about a dozen cities with their application EveryBlock.com.
Audience Engagement
For too long, journalism has been a one-way conversation with the audience. Reporters report, readers read, and that's the way it's been.
New media tools make it possible for journalists to engage in a dialogue with the audience, which can make stories better from beginning to end. ReadWriteWeb has a great article detailing four ways they use Twitter to improve story-telling: Discovering breaking news; soliciting suggestions for interview questions for upcoming stories; quality assurance (readers catching/reporting errors), and even (gasp) promoting their stories so that their journalism reaches the largest possible audience.
Multi-Media storytelling
Perhaps the most exciting of all the advances offered by new media tools is the opportunity to provide a richer, more in depth and more compelling rendering of the most important stories of the day. The ability to richly interweave text, images, video, mapping and other media elements transforms yesterday's print or TV report into a powerful multimedia experience.
My favorite example of this is the excellent online multimedia report on the Minneapolis bridge collapse put together by a team at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, called 13 seconds in August. This is the 'New Media' equivalent of a long-form TV documentary, or a newspaper 'special section' - but frankly, is far more compelling. The ST team spent four months creating this compelling mix of mapping, images, text, video and audio.
We should all be encouraged by the possibilities of what journalism can become if we look at the new media tools as just that - new tools to continue the tradition of journalistic excellence.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
State of the Mediasphere
Imagine if we had studied the adoption and development of the medium of Television from its very inception. What would we have learned if we could have tracked and interviewed those who used the nascent medium as it evolved?
That idea is behind an extraordary study underway at USC's Annenberg School for Communication.
That idea is behind an extraordary study underway at USC's Annenberg School for Communication.
Dr. Jeff Cole, Director of the school's Center for the Digital Future, has led a study begun in the year 2000 that includes panels of 2000 participants in 30 different countries - a global 'focus group' of 60,000 people tracking the evolution of the internet and mobile.
He gave a fascinating keynote at the Monaco Media Summit, posted on YouTube and embedded here.
Among his insights:
- Newspapers spend only 30% on their content creators - writers, editors, photographers. Most of the expenses of a newspaper are related to production and distribution, costs which could be virtually eliminated in a digital distribution model, for papers courageous enough to jump the curve.
- TV, by contrast, has a great future, according to Cole. He believes that mobile technology will "allow Television to escape from the home." TV content will be ubiquitous in a mobile broadband world: "It's going to be our constant companion."
- Paying for content on the web is a dead model. Users are willing to accept advertising on the web to get free content...and thanks to Google the marriage of contextually relevant ads to content will unlock real advertiser value in new media.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
The Future of News - SPJ video now online
Last month, the University of Oregon hosted the fall conference of the Society of Professional Journalists. Along with a number of workshops on specialized topics, there was a lunch panel where I joined two newspaper managing editors for a spirited discussion (argument?) over the future of media and journalism.
Not long afterwards, the Portland Business Journal followed up on one comment by panelist Steve Smith with a page one story predicting an impending plunge in local TV news revenues, and potential layoffs that could mirror those that have plagued newspapers in recent years.
Now you can enjoy the entire luncheon chat online. SPJ has posted the video on the SPJ web site.
Moderated by Rob Smith, editor of the Portland Business Journal, the discussion featured Steve Engelberg, managing editor of ProPublica (and former managing editor of The Oregonian), Steve Smith, former editor of the Spokesman-Review, and myself, online editor at KGW
Not long afterwards, the Portland Business Journal followed up on one comment by panelist Steve Smith with a page one story predicting an impending plunge in local TV news revenues, and potential layoffs that could mirror those that have plagued newspapers in recent years.
Now you can enjoy the entire luncheon chat online. SPJ has posted the video on the SPJ web site.
Moderated by Rob Smith, editor of the Portland Business Journal, the discussion featured Steve Engelberg, managing editor of ProPublica (and former managing editor of The Oregonian), Steve Smith, former editor of the Spokesman-Review, and myself, online editor at KGW
Friday, November 7, 2008
Election Night 08: Tipping point for New Media?
On the surface, it would seem like great news for a beleaguered industry: Wednesday's "Obama Wins" newspaper editions sold out their runs. Here in Portland, The Oregonian sold every copy and could have sold more. Likewise for the Washington Post. Copies of the New York Times edition are already on eBay earning $150 bids. But, as Ken Sands opines on Poynter, it's quite likely that "the print edition is more of a souvenir than ever before in a presidential election."
More than ever before, public turned to newer media. Mediaweek reported record tune-in across the major networks for TV and Cable coverage of the election.
The online story was even more dramatic. According to Akami, Internet News use reached its highest one-day total ever. CNN.com was among the many online networks setting one-day records. Lost Remote captured the web site home pages of a number of major online news sources, and the diversity of content and links helps explain why audiences flocked to the internet for continuing coverage and user-directed depth. Twitter also reported a 43% bump in traffic.
Perhaps the most interesting development was the anecdotal but undeniable increase in importance of mobile as an information delivery platform. At party headquarters here in Oregon, many in attendance had their faces glued to their phone screen.
In an era where the audience can read the New York Times in their hand, moments after a new President is elected, while attending an election celebration, the traditional newspaper seems like a souvenir. That's only bad news if your image as a journalist is tied to a specific 'platform', like 'print'. After all, someone has to write those stories that appear minutes later on the internet and mobile phones.
More than ever before, public turned to newer media. Mediaweek reported record tune-in across the major networks for TV and Cable coverage of the election.
The online story was even more dramatic. According to Akami, Internet News use reached its highest one-day total ever. CNN.com was among the many online networks setting one-day records. Lost Remote captured the web site home pages of a number of major online news sources, and the diversity of content and links helps explain why audiences flocked to the internet for continuing coverage and user-directed depth. Twitter also reported a 43% bump in traffic.
Perhaps the most interesting development was the anecdotal but undeniable increase in importance of mobile as an information delivery platform. At party headquarters here in Oregon, many in attendance had their faces glued to their phone screen.
In an era where the audience can read the New York Times in their hand, moments after a new President is elected, while attending an election celebration, the traditional newspaper seems like a souvenir. That's only bad news if your image as a journalist is tied to a specific 'platform', like 'print'. After all, someone has to write those stories that appear minutes later on the internet and mobile phones.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Covering the election in a digital age
It wasn't that many years ago when election coverage was pretty straightforward.
We would go to the polls, and hurry home by 8 p.m. to gather around the TV to watch the national networks collect and report the results. It might be several more hours before the winner was sure. The next morning, we would dive into the newspaper to read all about it.
That was election coverage.
Fast forward to November 4th, 2008. At KGW-TV here in Portland, NBC called the presidential race for Obama the second the west-coast polls closed, at 8:00 pm on the dot. But the speed of reporting wasn't the biggest change.
Our election coverage included an unprecedented depth and diversity of content made available on every conceivable platform:
We would go to the polls, and hurry home by 8 p.m. to gather around the TV to watch the national networks collect and report the results. It might be several more hours before the winner was sure. The next morning, we would dive into the newspaper to read all about it.
That was election coverage.
Fast forward to November 4th, 2008. At KGW-TV here in Portland, NBC called the presidential race for Obama the second the west-coast polls closed, at 8:00 pm on the dot. But the speed of reporting wasn't the biggest change.
Our election coverage included an unprecedented depth and diversity of content made available on every conceivable platform:
- 'Mainstream' new media content, like constantly updated text stories and videos, and real-time election results on kgw.com
- Breaking news emails pushed to subcribers alerting them to the results
- Continuous "tweets" on the KGW Twitter feed, reporting local race results as they came in
- Stories and election results updated in real time and available on the go on mobile phones via kgw.com/mobile
- Live blogging analysis from Portland's top political blogger, Jack Bogdanski of Jack Bog's Blog.
- Interactive polls, both yes/no and open-ended, with viewer and user questions posed to studio political analysts
- Continuous live video streaming coverage of the local election while NBC network coverage kept us off local TV
The 2008 election truly represented a new level of multi-platform journalism, and the winner was an informed electorate!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Widgets bring National election home
Here is the MSNBC widget for Election Night coverage...a great example of how 'widgets' make it easy for local and smaller news outlets and blogger/journalists to enrich the quality and content of their own coverage, without added staff or even technical coding skills.
Widgets: Add rich content without being a coder
For news reporters and bloggers whose focus is on content, HTML and RSS and Javascript can be scary words. "Widgets" are a great way for content creators and publishers to enrich their own stories and blogs with content from other sources, without needing to be an expert in code-writing.
My favorite tool for this is the web site widgetbox.com, where easy tutorials guide the user in how to create a widget and generate the necessary code that can then be simply pasted into a web site or story for easy embedding. On Widgetbox, you can either search for a widget application you'd like (say, a countdown clock), or create a widget.
Here in Portland, the big news is the return of #1 Trail Blazers draft pick Greg Oden from season ending injury, so I found a widget that enables me to embed Greg Oden's blog onto my web site. I clicked on the widget, clicked on "Blogger" as my publishing platform and the widget placed it in the right column of my blog. Take a peek in the right-hand column to check it out.
Alternatively, you can simply go to a web site that has content you're interested in and see if they already offer it in widget form.
Want to embed automatically updated gas price information onto your web site? GasBuddy.com has a localizable gas prices widget. You can see an example here, on the web site I manage, the "Portland Gas Prices" page of kgw.com.
How about the Presidential election? Downloadable widgets are available from both CNN and MSNBC that enable local media and bloggers to pull the content & resources of these large national networks into localized web pages. I've added the CNN widget here, and the NBC widget in a separate blog post above this one.
A poster to the New Media Blog, JMK, recommends another great web site for getting and building wigdgets: http://www.go2web20.net/
The journalistic power of utilizing widgets is two-fold: non-programmers can now add complex multimedia content to their story pages without needing to know or even understand the underlying coding (it's all done by the widget); and, local news outlets and even bloggers can take advantage of the resources and expertise of larger or distance content creators to enrich and add substance to their local coverage. So, go forth and embed!
My favorite tool for this is the web site widgetbox.com, where easy tutorials guide the user in how to create a widget and generate the necessary code that can then be simply pasted into a web site or story for easy embedding. On Widgetbox, you can either search for a widget application you'd like (say, a countdown clock), or create a widget.
Here in Portland, the big news is the return of #1 Trail Blazers draft pick Greg Oden from season ending injury, so I found a widget that enables me to embed Greg Oden's blog onto my web site. I clicked on the widget, clicked on "Blogger" as my publishing platform and the widget placed it in the right column of my blog. Take a peek in the right-hand column to check it out.
Alternatively, you can simply go to a web site that has content you're interested in and see if they already offer it in widget form.
Want to embed automatically updated gas price information onto your web site? GasBuddy.com has a localizable gas prices widget. You can see an example here, on the web site I manage, the "Portland Gas Prices" page of kgw.com.
How about the Presidential election? Downloadable widgets are available from both CNN and MSNBC that enable local media and bloggers to pull the content & resources of these large national networks into localized web pages. I've added the CNN widget here, and the NBC widget in a separate blog post above this one.
A poster to the New Media Blog, JMK, recommends another great web site for getting and building wigdgets: http://www.go2web20.net/
The journalistic power of utilizing widgets is two-fold: non-programmers can now add complex multimedia content to their story pages without needing to know or even understand the underlying coding (it's all done by the widget); and, local news outlets and even bloggers can take advantage of the resources and expertise of larger or distance content creators to enrich and add substance to their local coverage. So, go forth and embed!
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Christian Science Monitor discontinues daily
Is this the tipping point for print?
The announcement by the Christian Science Monitor that it will discontinue its daily print operation, shifting to weekly print editions with an online-first focus marks the first major national daily newspaper to take the leap.
Newspapers continue to be beset by a brutal combination of declining subscriptions, loss of ad revenue, and an onerous production/distribution cost structure for printing and delivery of their core product. Gannett newspapers has announced an additional 10 percent reduction in staff at its community newspapers by year-end, after already eliminating 1000 jobs earlier in the year.
The economy is tough for everyone, inside and outside of journalism. Of greatest concern should be newspapers' continuing loss of audience. Subscriptions have fallen just under 5% in the past year.
We all know the audience is migrating online. Perhaps the CSM decision to take the leap to weekly and online-first is the only way to shed the burdensome production cost structure and survive in the new media world.
The announcement by the Christian Science Monitor that it will discontinue its daily print operation, shifting to weekly print editions with an online-first focus marks the first major national daily newspaper to take the leap.
Newspapers continue to be beset by a brutal combination of declining subscriptions, loss of ad revenue, and an onerous production/distribution cost structure for printing and delivery of their core product. Gannett newspapers has announced an additional 10 percent reduction in staff at its community newspapers by year-end, after already eliminating 1000 jobs earlier in the year.
The economy is tough for everyone, inside and outside of journalism. Of greatest concern should be newspapers' continuing loss of audience. Subscriptions have fallen just under 5% in the past year.
We all know the audience is migrating online. Perhaps the CSM decision to take the leap to weekly and online-first is the only way to shed the burdensome production cost structure and survive in the new media world.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Can a blogger also be a journalist?
Can a blogger also be a journalist? The answer appears to be: It depends who you ask.
At the fall conference of the Oregon chapter of the Society for Professional Journalists, I shared a panel with two former newspaper managing editors. Like many traditional reporters, their disdain for blogging was thinly veiled.
Since the topic of the panel was purportedly the future of journalism, and my panelists represented the end of the biz seeing the sharpest declines, I found myself using bloggers as an example of the hope for journalism's future.
My view is that blogging is just another method of publishing content, like printing a paper or broadcasting a newscast. The transformational power of blogging is that it is so easy that anyone can now be published. No wonder traditional print editors hate it. For decades, those who controlled the printing presses controlled the definition of what was news. Blogging gives publishing to the masses.
But as Steve Engelberg, managing editor of ProPublica, noted at the SPJ conference, the American revolutionary pamphleteers were the "bloggers" of their time, finding a grass roots way to publish views excluded from the official state press.
This issue stopped being academic in Oregon recently, where a local blogger was denied access to closed-door meetings because the city deemed him to not be a member of the "press". The blogger, on Loaded Orygun, argued that he shouldn't be denied press status merely because he did not work for some large media organization. Not surprisingly, in an Oregonian editorial, Bob Caldwell worried about who would hold an individual blogger accountable for journalistic misdeeds, the implied promise being that no reporter for a mainstream news organization would violate the principles of journalism. (Does anyone else immediately think of NY Times plagiarist Jayson Blair?)
In German last year, a blogger was named journalist of the year. It seems clear to me that some bloggers are engaged in journalism and others are not, and it is the content that they create, not the backing of a media monolith or the 'publishing platform' used that should define them. Professor Jack Balkin suggests exactly this kind of practical test for bloggers as journalists.
A post in Media Shift documented the continued blurring of the lines between bloggers and journalists. Although it clearly torments some traditional print reporters, a number of new voices have emerged thanks to the blogosphere, voices that were not previously heard when a few dominant media companies did most of the talking in their local markets.
Some of these blogging voices are original, knowledgeable, and add to the conversation as watchdogs and protectors of the public trust. That sounds like journalism to me. What do you think?
At the fall conference of the Oregon chapter of the Society for Professional Journalists, I shared a panel with two former newspaper managing editors. Like many traditional reporters, their disdain for blogging was thinly veiled.
Since the topic of the panel was purportedly the future of journalism, and my panelists represented the end of the biz seeing the sharpest declines, I found myself using bloggers as an example of the hope for journalism's future.
My view is that blogging is just another method of publishing content, like printing a paper or broadcasting a newscast. The transformational power of blogging is that it is so easy that anyone can now be published. No wonder traditional print editors hate it. For decades, those who controlled the printing presses controlled the definition of what was news. Blogging gives publishing to the masses.
But as Steve Engelberg, managing editor of ProPublica, noted at the SPJ conference, the American revolutionary pamphleteers were the "bloggers" of their time, finding a grass roots way to publish views excluded from the official state press.
This issue stopped being academic in Oregon recently, where a local blogger was denied access to closed-door meetings because the city deemed him to not be a member of the "press". The blogger, on Loaded Orygun, argued that he shouldn't be denied press status merely because he did not work for some large media organization. Not surprisingly, in an Oregonian editorial, Bob Caldwell worried about who would hold an individual blogger accountable for journalistic misdeeds, the implied promise being that no reporter for a mainstream news organization would violate the principles of journalism. (Does anyone else immediately think of NY Times plagiarist Jayson Blair?)
In German last year, a blogger was named journalist of the year. It seems clear to me that some bloggers are engaged in journalism and others are not, and it is the content that they create, not the backing of a media monolith or the 'publishing platform' used that should define them. Professor Jack Balkin suggests exactly this kind of practical test for bloggers as journalists.
A post in Media Shift documented the continued blurring of the lines between bloggers and journalists. Although it clearly torments some traditional print reporters, a number of new voices have emerged thanks to the blogosphere, voices that were not previously heard when a few dominant media companies did most of the talking in their local markets.
Some of these blogging voices are original, knowledgeable, and add to the conversation as watchdogs and protectors of the public trust. That sounds like journalism to me. What do you think?
Saturday, October 25, 2008
SPJ at UO
Carla Savalli, author of the Newsroom of the Future report, speaks at a Multimedia storytelling workshop at the University of Oregon. The Oregon chapter of the Society for Professional Journalists held its fall conference Saturday in Eugene.
Savalli, a career newspaper journalist, described how she transformed the Spokane Spokesman Review's process from a once-a-day print cycle to a 24/7 news cycle, including introducing a Breaking News team that started each day at 5 a.m. Savalli said she expected print reporters to continue to be expected to develop 24/7 reporting skills for online, while the likely future for print editions was as a source of depth, content and context.
Joining Savalli on the panel, I shared some of the multi-media tools detailed here, including blogging, hyperlinking, mapping the news, and embedding slideshows
Friday, October 24, 2008
A Picture is Worth...a Slideshow
Slideshows are one of the most powerful ways to enrich a text story. Just take a look at this slideshow from the Dallas Morning News after Hurricane Ike pounded Texas.
The good news is, building slideshows is also surprisingly easy, and is an effective way to increase views for a story.
Traditional reporters who once relied on a print or TV photographer to take care of collecting images and video in the field for them now need to develop visual storytelling skills themselves.
Cost-cutting has reduced the number of photojournalists; 'one man bands' require story-tellers to collect the pictures as well as to write the words; and, camera-enabled cell phones give first-on-the-scene reporters the opportunity to collect and publish images from the field long before video or still images can be driven back to the newsroom.
Composing and capturing compelling images is a skill in itself. Legacy photojournalists can be an invaluable resource in learning the basics of shot composition and lighting. The National Press Photographers Association web site has multiple resources for developing shooting skills.
Once the shots are taken, manipulating those images doesn't have to require an advanced degree or a big software budget. Irfanview is a free downloadable image manipulation program that can be used to crop, resize, and adjust images quickly. Photoshop Elements from Adobe is the simplified, lower-cost version of the industry standard Photoshop imaging software.
Building slideshows and publishing them to the web doesn't have to be hard, either. While many media companies have proprietary tools within their own content management system, Soundslides is a popular, low cost ($39) and easy to use product that enables swift creation and publication of slideshows, with the option of adding narration or music audio track.
The good news is, building slideshows is also surprisingly easy, and is an effective way to increase views for a story.
Traditional reporters who once relied on a print or TV photographer to take care of collecting images and video in the field for them now need to develop visual storytelling skills themselves.
Cost-cutting has reduced the number of photojournalists; 'one man bands' require story-tellers to collect the pictures as well as to write the words; and, camera-enabled cell phones give first-on-the-scene reporters the opportunity to collect and publish images from the field long before video or still images can be driven back to the newsroom.
Composing and capturing compelling images is a skill in itself. Legacy photojournalists can be an invaluable resource in learning the basics of shot composition and lighting. The National Press Photographers Association web site has multiple resources for developing shooting skills.
Once the shots are taken, manipulating those images doesn't have to require an advanced degree or a big software budget. Irfanview is a free downloadable image manipulation program that can be used to crop, resize, and adjust images quickly. Photoshop Elements from Adobe is the simplified, lower-cost version of the industry standard Photoshop imaging software.
Building slideshows and publishing them to the web doesn't have to be hard, either. While many media companies have proprietary tools within their own content management system, Soundslides is a popular, low cost ($39) and easy to use product that enables swift creation and publication of slideshows, with the option of adding narration or music audio track.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Mapping the News
Where is the world is a story taking place? It's one of the fundamental "W's".
In the world of online news, there's no reason not to answer that question visually, and interactively.
Quikmaps is a simple, free online tool that can be used to create an embeddable map in a matter of minutes:
For more elaborate features and functionality, Google maps offers zoom, pan, linking and more.
Here's a simple application KGW.com built to tell the story of a homeslide: SW Portland home slides 300 feet down hill
Mapping the multi-media elements of slideshow, video, 911 call audio, and additional background took about an hour.
Going forward, geo-tagging stories by location (embedding meta tags that capture address/location information) and automatically being able to map those stories so users can choose their news by location is the exciting and logical next step.
In the world of online news, there's no reason not to answer that question visually, and interactively.
Quikmaps is a simple, free online tool that can be used to create an embeddable map in a matter of minutes:
For more elaborate features and functionality, Google maps offers zoom, pan, linking and more.
Here's a simple application KGW.com built to tell the story of a homeslide: SW Portland home slides 300 feet down hill
Mapping the multi-media elements of slideshow, video, 911 call audio, and additional background took about an hour.
Going forward, geo-tagging stories by location (embedding meta tags that capture address/location information) and automatically being able to map those stories so users can choose their news by location is the exciting and logical next step.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Hyperlinks: The world beyond words
Traditional TV journalists who are asked to write "online versions" of their stories tend to simply make a few stylistic changes - switching present tense to past, placing attribution after quotes, converting to AP style for numbers - and submit the story. For traditional print journalists, the process of 'writing for web' is sometimes no more than the keystrokes 'copy', 'paste', and 'send.'
Simply repurposing the original story to the web misses out on the "world wide" part.
Adding relevent hyperlinks, both in the flow of content and in sidebars, can transform a traditional media report into a much richer, deeper, online version.
1. Hyperlinks can be used to provide background/chronology by linking to previous reports on the same topic: Mayoral candidate to stay in race despite loss of funding (kgw.com)
2. Hyperlinks in-content can offer pathways within the flow of a story to learn more about a related person, place or event: Wikipedia entry on Britney Spears
3. Hyperlinks as sidebars or end-bars can add depth and context, allowing readers to explore a story as deeply as they choose: TheMoneyMeltdown.com
Reporters routinely use the web to research their stories. In traditional print or TV newsrooms, those links were often discarded when the final story was written. In the online world, including those links can significantly enhance the depth and breadth of a story.
Simply repurposing the original story to the web misses out on the "world wide" part.
Adding relevent hyperlinks, both in the flow of content and in sidebars, can transform a traditional media report into a much richer, deeper, online version.
1. Hyperlinks can be used to provide background/chronology by linking to previous reports on the same topic: Mayoral candidate to stay in race despite loss of funding (kgw.com)
2. Hyperlinks in-content can offer pathways within the flow of a story to learn more about a related person, place or event: Wikipedia entry on Britney Spears
3. Hyperlinks as sidebars or end-bars can add depth and context, allowing readers to explore a story as deeply as they choose: TheMoneyMeltdown.com
Reporters routinely use the web to research their stories. In traditional print or TV newsrooms, those links were often discarded when the final story was written. In the online world, including those links can significantly enhance the depth and breadth of a story.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Blogging 101
Whether you are a 'mainstream journalist' being asked to contribute to your company's web site, or an independent journalist trying to carve a nitche, a blog is the basic publishing tool for simply and quickly getting information out.
Compared to a traditional reported story, a blog entry should be:
- shorter in length
- more conversational in style
- more personal in content
The best blogs are updated frequently, ideally several times daily.
Blogs should also be set up to also allow comments, as this feature often enables in-the-know readers to contribute to advancing a story or topic.
This article on EchoDitto.com has many more 'best practices' tips. More tips here at Poynter.org.
Popular blogging tools include blogger, Word Press, and Moveable Type. Even a beginner can create a free blog and begin posting within minutes. It took less than 15 minutes to make this New Media blog.
Compared to a traditional reported story, a blog entry should be:
- shorter in length
- more conversational in style
- more personal in content
The best blogs are updated frequently, ideally several times daily.
Blogs should also be set up to also allow comments, as this feature often enables in-the-know readers to contribute to advancing a story or topic.
This article on EchoDitto.com has many more 'best practices' tips. More tips here at Poynter.org.
Popular blogging tools include blogger, Word Press, and Moveable Type. Even a beginner can create a free blog and begin posting within minutes. It took less than 15 minutes to make this New Media blog.
Welcome to the New Media blog
Traditional print and TV journalists who wish to "write for the web" must do more than simply copy and paste a text version of their original story into a web page.
There are an entirely new set of tools available to help journalists tell the story in an online world. In this blog, I'll post information on some of those key tools, and ideas on how to employ them, and examples of best practices being used by both traditional and new media outlets.
There are an entirely new set of tools available to help journalists tell the story in an online world. In this blog, I'll post information on some of those key tools, and ideas on how to employ them, and examples of best practices being used by both traditional and new media outlets.
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