Monthly Archives: December 2006

NOTE: My goal with “MP3 of the Day” is to find great, free, non-DRM MP3 downloads. If you have a tip for a good source, leave a comment. Continue reading →

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Publishers who run AdSense should know about this: A service that blocks low-paying contextual ads called AdSense Blacklist. There’s a real problem with AdSense in that a lot of low-quality ads are running with increasing frequency (the built-for-AdSense-only business that bid high, but aren’t necessarily delivering a real service). If you’re interested in serving readers well with AdSense (advertising is, after all, content), then you want to block these sites from your AdSense rails. Continue reading →

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The is shocking: Social media is no mo. In the post, Steve Rubel proclaims that social media is dead. This has caused a stir in the blogosphere.

But you have to read the post to get what Rubel is saying.

There’s no point in differentiating any more. The story that Dan Gillmor chronicled in his landmark 2004 book We the Media has only accelerated. We are all one and it’s silly to classify us into two different species.

Rubel’s point is that with established publishers joining the conversation, and conversational publishers evolving into going business concerns, Packaged Goods Media and Conversational Media are converging.

There’s some truth there.

But it’s worth noting that what we now call social media is nothing new. Back when I was a young buck just starting out this business (11 years ago), we called social media virtual community. The web, with its hyperlinks and personal-publishing frameworks is by design social. In a way, you can’t enter web publishing without joining the conversation. It’s foolish to try and be a PGM publisher on the web. What 2006 wrought was a lot of light bulbs going off in a lot of publishers’ heads: “Well, hell, I ain’t growing audience no more with my shovelware. Guess I better get me a blog or two.” (And really, for most newspaper publishers, the thinking hasn’t gotten much more beyond that so far).

So Rubel is only half right. In a way, we’ve always been converged. In another, PGM publishers still only see through a glass darkly and haven’t fully grasped what it means to participate in the online world. In that last respect, Rubel is overly optimistic. It gives PGM publishes way too much credit for getting it and doing it.

The other key factor to 2006 was the vast improvement in conversational tools and models. The thing to keep in mind here though is that the web is yet but a mere decade or so old. The personal computer didn’t really become a household appliance until 20 years or so after is introduction. If that is the adoption rate of the web, what we know of the online publishing is probably only about half of what it will be. It’s a little early yet to say it’s all figured out and PGM and CM are so intermingled that there is essentially no difference. Continue reading →

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Wired’s predictions for 2007 read more like a nerd’s wish list (BitTorrent on TiVo, HD-DVD wins, no more dads, life on Mars, etc.) than an attempt at informed sooth-saying, but still, I had to comment on this one:

Print to Web

A major newspaper gives up printing on paper to publish exclusively online.

Ain’t happening. There’s still too much revenue tied up in print and not enough online. A major newspaper — I’m taking this to mean a major metro — couldn’t support it’s current news operation with a digital-only strategy. Not now. Not yet. Not for a couple to a few years. The only way I see a big city paper shutting down its presses is if it’s a weak sister in a JOA and is largely subsidized by its corporate parent as an online-only experiment (something I’ve long thought Scripps should do with the Cincinnati Post (I believe that JOA was slated to end, but I’m not sure of the current status)).

Here’s when newspapers will stop rolling presses: When digital delivery has become so much more efficient that the cost savings will entice publishers to essentially force subscribers to give up print. Revenue will have to get better of course, but what I’m saying is that the killer of print won’t be so much lost revenue or increased revenue opportunity, but cost savings — eliminate the press, the press men, the trucks, the drivers, the newsracks … all of those polluting, environmentally wasteful inefficiencies of print delivery. Some day, that will very much tempt publishers. But we’re still years away from that … say two to five years. But when mobile devices get better, or digital ink arrives, or households become widely wired at 10mb, then publishers might have the efficiencies needed to kill print. Continue reading →

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Steve Yelvington is encouraging news site managers with forums and comments on stories to make a special effort in 2007 to get rid of the bad actors, the guys and gals who start flame wars, get nasty, throw tantrums and are generally uncivil and uncouth.

He’s absolutely right, and I know for a fact cracking knuckles works.

Interactive features are far too important to your community and your business to be left unmanaged. They require staff guarding and participating. They sometimes require a heavy hand. And in the healthiest environments, the best participants help and are recognized and rewarded. But never, ever, should you leave the community to its own devices. The other option — not having forums or comments — is the worst possible option. So in 2007, suck it up, and get participation right. Continue reading →

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Greg Sterling:

I just spent an hour lost in YouTube, watching everything from Coldplay to Steve Jobs original iPod keynote to a Dutch TV interview with rising YouTube webcam signing sensation Esmee Denters. (This woman will become a recording star off her webcam appearances, which is amazing in itself.)

This is TV for the short-attention span generation.

The power of online video and YouTube in particular will force more and more “on-demand� style programming on conventional TV. Indeed, in a relatively short period of time most of the distinctions between TV and YouTube will disappear. There are now several ways to get Internet content/video into the living room (most recently SofaTube).

All of those who criticize my inexpensive, disruptive, “good enough” approach to newspaper video should pay attention to what Sterling is really saying about what’s good in online video. It’s not about big production. It’s about making it work and connecting with people and being relevant and entertaining.

Three years from now the $1.65 billion that Google paid for YouTube will probably look like a deal.

Did I say deal? I meant steal.

Scoff if you like, but I think he’s right. Continue reading →

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Network TV executives haven’t decided yet how exactly they’ll handle coverage of Saddam Hussein’s execution.

You know video of the execution will be widely available. There will be quality professional coverage uploaded to web sites, and a variety of citizen media coverage available all over. Newspaper site managers are also going to have a big decision — whether to make the video available via download, Flash, direct link, or ignore it.

The citizen journalism angle will be part of the story. This is the first head-of-state execution in the era of widely dispersed citizen journalism and easily accessible video cameras.

You could argue that you shouldn’t dilute your brand by going in for the sensational and the horrid. You could argue that since the video will be easily accessible all over the net (it will probably be the single biggest download by subject, if not for one single video, on YouTube that day) that you have nothing to gain by making the video available through your own site. Or you could argue that news is news, history is history, and it isn’t always pretty. You could argue that you have an obligation to deliver the news without fear or favor and that no matter the content, the story is too big to make nice with.

I know a number of people who will be involved with this decision for newspaper sites read this blog — so, what’s your decision? How are you going to handle Saddam’s death video?

UPDATE: It’s been about two hours since I posted this. Saddam was hung within the last hour or so. I’ve already been hit by more than 50 Google searches of people looking for video of his hanging.

UPDATE II: Well, a portion of this post is rather stupid. It wasn’t a public execution. Nevermind. However, Iraq is releasing video shortly.

UPDATE III: There was somebody with a cell phone video camera at the executiion and the video is now on the web (meaning, in part, this post wasn’t so stupid after all). Nick Belardes found it and embeds it on his site. I’ve been away from the computer all day, so I have no idea how MSM is handling this.

UPDATE IV: Steve Outing also did a post on this topic and says, “No brainer. Publish.” Continue reading →

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