Like priests looking for someone to sacrifice, Alan Mutter, Steve Buttry, Howard Owens, and Steve Yelvington have been on the lookout for the sin that led newspapers astray. For Mutter, it’s not charging; for Buttry, it’s not innovating; for Owens, it’s tying online dingies to print Titanics (my poetic license); for Yelvington, it’s inaction.

But I think Owens hit on it when he wrote this: “I realized I needed to flip the expense/revenue picture upside down. Instead of thinking about how to generate more cash, I needed to figure out how to create a news operation that could exist profitably based on a reasonable expectation for local online revenue.”

Right. In other words, the sin was not running a business. It was not creating a sustainable P&L.

Newspapers have been too busy trying to protect specific budget lines that protected specific interests – the size of the newsroom, the ego expressed in gross revenue that yields stock performance and salary bonuses, the size of unionized staffs (up or down), the rules that governed advertising relationships even as they disappeared. They made preservation their mission.

What they should have done instead is rethink the bottom line: How is journalism going to be sustainable in new business realities?

Said Owens: “In a market where the newspaper newsroom might cost $10 million, I knew how to make $1 million online, or even $2 million, but I didn’t know — and still don’t — how to make $10 million. So if I can make a million online, why do I need operate a $10 million newsroom, especially given the greater efficiencies of online publishing?”

He built a realistic budget based on new business realities. Now picture news executives across the country hitting themselves on the head saying, “Damn, why didn’t we think of that?” They should have. But to do so would have required them to completely tear apart their businesses. Witness Detroit, banking, retail, advertising, insurance, and every other industry undergoing upheaval – nobody wants to do that.

Just as the bloggers linked above took their share of blame, so will I. Owens suggests that the problem with tying old and new operations together. At Advance, where I worked for a dozen years, we created separate online companies, which had some benefits: enabling the sites to build what was right for online (that is, interactivity), creating real value for advertising (rather than throwing in online as value-added), creating smaller and differently skilled staffs. But it also created problems: sites that were dependent on newspaper content, rivalries that killed collaboration and limited the responsibility anyone would take for the future. In the end, everyone needed to rethink what they were creating and what value it had, how they were creating it, how they related to their communities, and how the business could be run. But I didn’t see that happening anywhere in the industry. Everywhere, I saw people looking for someone to blame and somewhere to hide. I don’t put all the blame on the individuals because that’s how companies and industries operate.

Individuals who want to succeed in this upheaval become entrepreneurs. That’s what Owens – and many others – are doing. That, I’ve come to see, is the basis of the future of news.

In our New Business Models for News Project at CUNY, we threw out the old business assumptions with the old business. That’s why we tried to answer the tough question people were asking: What happens to journalism if the paper disappears? (their implied answer was that journalism does, too). What we came up with was one entity being replaced by well more than 100 entities – 1,000 entities, perhaps – each run according to new opportunities and needs, each smaller, each contributing real value, each sustainable (some very profitable; some choosing no profit). Everyone in this ecosystem has to think about running a business rather than preserving one.

Someone else looking for sinners is James Murdoch, whose MacTaggart Lecture at the Edinburgh Television Festival excoriated the BBC for bigfooting the news market in the UK and the government for enabling it and for regulating everybody else. I agree with him to an extent, this extent: that profit, in his words, will make journalism sustainable, independent, and innovative.

Except I doubt that this sustainable, independent, and innovative journalism will necessarily come from Mr. Murdoch’s father’s business and its cohorts because they are the ones that even today are trying to maintain the scale and models for their old businesses rather than inventing new ones. Look, instead, to the entrepreneurs who are starting over and rethinking the business from the bottom up, as Owens is.

How does an organization that trains professional journalists handle on one hand the radical disintegration of the professionalized class and on the other hand embrace the larger swing of online, openness, etc.

I think the semi-recent makover of their site late last year was a start. I’m also intrigued by Bill’s new blog that covers the business side of things.

Listen in…

[The video is a bit shaky but clears up after a minute].

Click To Play

(For those keeping track, that’s one video using Viddler, the other two using Vimeo and Blip. Have a video platform you want me to try? Let me know).

I was able to get a brief chat in with Bill who has also provided a brief write-up below.

From Bill Densmore

Thanks for all your work on last week’s “New Business Models for News” summit at CUNY; I was unable to attend. But your on-demand video archives are a valuable fill-in.

I’d like your community to know about the Information Valet Project, which takes a cue from Jeff Jarvis’ advice to start building new business models. Our first summit to define and plan launch of the Information Valet Service is Dec. 3-5 at the new Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Univ. of Missouri. We invite participants. (To register: http://www.ivpblueprint.org)

We’re pushing a fairly specific notion of how to build a shared-user network with a revenue model baked in — the revenue model is similar to the sort of reverse syndication which Jeff talks about, and embraces the networking concepts outlined by Tom Evslin at CUNY.

“Blueprinting the Information Valet Economy” is a strategy summit designed to blueprint the law, ownership, management, marketing and technology of a shared-user network for user-centric demographics, privacy-protected purchasing and advertising exchange and compensation.

Evslin noted that the former newsPAPER industry — because of its unique content and relationship with 50 million customers who pay for information daily — is in a unique position to provide the content seed corn needed to jump start a network business — if it comes together on a platform and protocols.

We’ll put forward fairly specific ideas for doing this forward as a point of departure — and expect to hear modifications. We’ll end up after 2-1/2 days with a commitment to form a collaborative that will move forward with whatever is the consensus approach.

I hope there will be other events like IVP Blueprint — at CUNY, and elsewhere — which advance specific projects for sustaining the parts of journalism which contribute to participatory democracy.

Opportunities:

1.  Local – While we didn’t get to the local discussion until the end, this was clearly seen as the biggest opportunity.  And not just because we want to help Google’s Eric Stein hit his numbers.  The reselling of AdSense by news brands who have local salesforces is a substantial opportunity.  Businesses like Reach Local are ready to cut out local newspaper salesforces.  And, there’s an opportunity even if you don’t have a salesforce to work through businesses like Clickable to help Joe the Plumber reach the local audience through the newspaper’s site.

2.  Data Sales.  It’s already a vibrant business for many publishers.  Whether it is through selling data to providers like Tacoda or Ascerno, using other data services to create B2B or local services, news publishers are sitting on top of a meaningful amount of data that can drive revenue.

3.  Ad Networks, when managed right, are also an opportunity.  When tied in with data, ad networks can unlock value that publisher otherwise can’t sell.  Whether this is good or bad over the long term is still a question.  Should sites follow the Washington Post and ESPN and cut out Ad Networks entirely?  Many in the room felt that Ad Networks allow the best news brands to focus on selling their high-value inventory themselves while delivering extra monetization for unsold inventory.   The other side of the argument – that Ad Networks create channel conflict and undermine brands – carries merit.  Success comes from managing what inventory is given to Ad Networks and what isn’t.

4.  The technology to create a totally effecient market exists today.  While online ads are now part of a big distributed network where frequently the seller of the ad isn’t the publisher of the conent, the market is still inefficient.  Only reselling AdSense has delivered on this promise.  The other parts of the chain, including Ad Exchanges, are starting to gain acceptance, but are not yet easy for publishers to scale.  In the future this will change and create more opportunities.

5.  Smaller scale opportunities include:  Subscriptions for specific high-value content, but not for general news; Branded content, but more of a niche solution; In Germany, Focus is directly selling products as well as doing lead generation; Virtual currencies may present an opportunity down the road; Video is an opportunity, but it’s comparatively small.

So, why isn’t this working?

Measurement.  The lack of reliable metrics are holding growth back (note, this is a challenge for everyone in online advertising, not just news).  This is an issue that lacks short-term solutions.  But, incremental progress keeps being made and eventually a solution should emerge.

The challenge of creating a growth business inside of a mature business.  For instance, objectively, reselling ad sense makes sense.  But implementation has been tied up with internally slow decisionmaking and technical implementation.

The mindset of replacing print losses with digital presents a fundamental challenge.  It doesn’t align with where consumer behavior is going to be.  And, the timeline for building digital value doesn’t line up with the realities of the declining print business.  Competitors by contrast, are able to focus on just scaling their digital businesses at their natural pace.  News brands that solve this problem will be the big winners.

And now the list of ideas we came up with for further discussion:  AdSense, Display, Online Video, Lead Generation, Direct Transactions/Retail, Conferences, Co-branded content, Subscriptions, Syndication, Data Mining, Product placement, Auction Model, Market Research, Licensing, Republishing web to print, Sponsored Feeds, Virtual Goods, Email.

This session features:

Jeff Burkett of WashingtonPost.com: Began from a series of blog posts Burkett wrote addressing the question of how to place advertiser’s content that doesn’t fit on the paper or website of a traditional news organization with its emphasis on reporting timely news. The Blogroll program that Burkett created matches ads with content produced by bloggers who write about every niche under the sun. “The thought is – we need them because they provide quality specific content that our advertisers want and they benefit from increased exposure, so it would be a win win situation,” says Burkett.

Rick Waghorn of My Football Writer: Putting locally-sourced and respected sports reports in the palm of everyone’s hand, whilst at the same time giving local advertisers the chance to put their brand in front of their neighborhood audience. So far MyFootballWriter is sustainable, “at least that’s why my latest accountants forecast tells me,” says Waghorn.

Henry Copeland of BlogAds: We’re the blog advertising specialists. We pioneered blog advertising in 2002 and trail-blaze today.

Stephen Smyth of Reuters: Leads Reuters consumer mobile and emerging media businesses, and is responsible for maximising revenues and brand value from the company’s presence on these platforms.

As Oprah: Saul Hansell of Bits Blog at NYTimes.com: Insights and discoveries about technology from Times reporters in Silicon Valley and beyond.

9:56 Hansell: “How will all this get paid for when we don’t know what the econmics of journalism will be? ”

9:57 Waghorn: Spent 14 years as newspaper football (that’s soccer to all you Yanks) reporter in Norwhich.” The paper built my brand. Do I need to be involved with a bigger brand or can I leave and bring my football following with me?”

10:01 It isn’t all about the clicks. “For a month, for 150 quid, you can get a banner ad.”

10:02 Made 70,000 in first year.

10:02 After being made redundant, paper no placing ads on MyFootball.com

10:03 On to Burkett and Washington Post Newsweek Ineractice.

10:04 “We haven’t yet gotten to the point where we’re directing traffic back to them [the bloggers].”

10:05 Stephen Smyth and Reuters. “It’s almost impossible to sell brand advertising. Many of the sites were so small that we didn’t even know what their demographics were.”

10:07 Explaining Reuters partnerships, though very difficult to hear. Explaining that, like the Washington Post, they’re to create a network which will generate that will revenue for everyone, big and small.

10:10 Copeland and Blog Ads: “I can’t guarantee that you’ll make a living at it.” Leads with a joke: “My wife thought a blog was British euphimism for a toilet.” Commetn from the audience: “His joke tanked.”

10:11 “Dozens of bloggers are making money off it. I wouldn’t say hundreds.” Ouch.

10:12 Now the good stuff. Arguments about how to make money. Waghorn – Clicks ads don’t work. “Nobody buys car insurance when they’re reading a football site.” Local advertisers want to see ads.

10:14 Is anyone making money off of Google ads? A few hands go up. One audience member explains he has to tell Google which ads to post.

10:16 Hansell in summary: There’s no place like home. It helps to reach local advertisers.

10:18 Bloggers v. User Generated Content. Copeland: You can’t control comments. That’s the sandbox where people go nuts. Blogging is me expressing my opinion.

10:20 From the audience: Advocating for non-sustainable business models. “Some percentage of bloggers are not looking to be sustainable with income.” Burkett responds: Few people want to work for no money. They want to be discovered.

10:22 Lighting round begins. Question To Copeland: The type of bloggers that get ads have no comments. Doesn’t that get away from the early promise of the medium? Answer: People do good journalism and get noticed for it.

10:24 Question from Jay Rosen: Shouldn’t we be looking for new revenue streams aside from advertising? The Answer: Another question: How?

Burkett: Rates on blog network are close to, but still lower than, ad rates on the Washsington Post, etc. The only way to survive is to be part of a network that can sell advertising on a thousand blogs to an advertiser.

Question from Henry Abbot (?): Do video ads work? Answer: Not for MyFootballWriter. Consensus: Not sure yet.

Question: Is journalism worth anything? How do you produce journalism that you can sell?

In summary: We end where we begin. It’s all a work in progress.

Main Goal: Last October the changes were implemented across the country and as of May this year – all Gannett’s papers have fully transitioned. The shift to information centers has many layers – including the willingness and capabilities to work with members of the community on investigations. “This is not rearranging furniture – this is a shift in how we do our jobs,” says Carroll.

Notable Achievements: Carroll and Ganett have been encouraged on several fronts since the change. Using crowdsourcing along with database analysis Gannett has broken stories faster and working with communities has drawn conclusions that would have gone otherwise unnoticed, says Carroll. A new tool called “Get Published” let’s anybody upload content and many of Gannett’s papers have between 100-200 hyperlocal sites that are the result of pro-am reporting. “We provide the backbone and the tools and we welcome community involvement,” says Carroll.

The Cincinnati Enquirer recently launched The Data Center, allowing readers to search thousands of databases based on lifestyle and content information linked through home addresses. For example, readers can search records of crime in their neighborhoods, review trends and compare statistics throughout the metro area.

In another example: Florida Today received an email tip by way of the “Blow the whistle” button. It was from an appraiser who said thousands of local homeowners were getting ripped-off by insurance companies that inflate the replacement value of homes on paper and, consequently, overcharge for hurricane insurance. Insurance policies are not public record, and there would be no way to report that story authoritatively without asking as many residents as possible to share private documents. So the paper posted an item to the Brevard Watchlist asking readers to “join the investigation” by doing just that. The countywide investigation yielded a front-page Sunday newspaper story and an online report on how to estimate a home’s replacement cost.

Gannett is reporting traffic increases across the board, from visitors to time spent on sites, frequency in visits and pages viewed per visit.

A Surprising Realization: The biggest surprise is that we didn’t do this earlier, both in the company and in the industry, says Carroll. If journalism at its core is to serve the public, then it has not been taking advantage of all the new tools that can help perform this function, says Carroll. “But if we think about how to use them creatively, we can get back to the things that those of us who grew up in the business in our hearts truly believe in – that we can work with readers to inform and engage and shine light on wrongdoing,” says Carroll.

Biggest Practical Lesson/Mistake: Carroll admits that Gannett underfunded not just research but technology and infrastructure. Many of Ganett’s papers responded to the changes from headquarters not with disdain – they were behind the changes, but didn’t have the technology or infrastructure to make it happen. It requires more than just talk – but capital investment in laptops, video equipment, trios, the ability to transmit digitally, etc.

Money: The editorial changes are working in tandem with revenue teams at Gannet that are exploring new ways to monetize the product. An advance data team is not only exploring content – but also how to engage readers online with mapping software and other areas that traditionally hasn’t been explored in advertising.

“We will only move forward and build on what we have done.” Gannett is very encouraged by the possibility of becoming sustainable, says Carroll. Many of these concepts have been tested at the 12 original Gannett papers to make the shift and they have developed over the past year and Gannett is seeing strong results.

Future Goals: There is no endpoint in Ganett’s transformation. “I see us only building on the research and reaction that we’ve gotten,” says Carroll. There is still an imperative to be nimble and invest in the types of technology that is needed, from social networks and beyond, but right now Gannett is ready to pounce on what is next. “We as an industry have not been as serious as being early adapters — and now I see us positioned in the front row so we can react quickly,” says Carroll.

What do you hope to get from people attending this conference?

I am very very interested in all the experimenting that is going on across the industry — We need to do more R&D. I spend as much time as I have looking at experiments that people are involved in — That’s what I want to get out it.

The WPNI Advertising Sales Department sells advertising packages for the 100+ bloggers who are part of their network. The bloggers, chosen from over 1,500 applicants, have the ability to accept or reject the ads and receive 60 percent of the money that is made from the sales. Advertising sales have been made to Luftansa , Marriott, Slingbox, etc. “It’s a way for bloggers to make some revenue — and it’s an opportunity for them to get on our homepage,” says Burkett.

Main Goal: The number one goal is to acquire content for advertisers that washingtonpost.com normally wouldn’t editorially produce. The bloggers who are part of the network have no editorial restrictions. The second goal is to experiment and build relationships within the blogosphere.

Notable Achievements: The number of applicants: The Blog Ad Network received 1,500 applicants in the first two weeks. Today it has garnered over 2,000. But it remains a side project, a test to see, across the company, if it should be something that should move beyond a side project.

A Surprising Realization: Beyond the number of people that initially applied, Burkett was surprised to find that most participants weren’t interested in the money. “It’s not about it being an advertising network, for them it’s about being associated with us and getting a little bit more traffic. So many people were willing to work with us, a traditional news company,” says Burkett.

Biggest Practical Lesson/Mistake: Burkett underestimated the amount of time it would take to get blogs up and running in the program. Reviewing the blogs for acceptance, answering questions about the agreement and getting the ad tags installed took a lot more effort than originally thought.

Money: Compared to what has been invested into it, the program has been profitable. The success of it is primarily based on The Washington Post’s brand. “It didn’t take us much to get this thing started,” says Burkett. “But I’m not running around telling everyone this is something they should definitely do.”

Now washingtonpost.com knows what it might take to get it to the next level but currently the Ad network remains an experiment to learn from.

Future Goals: The program is still up in the air. Burkett continues to advocate it and use it in his sales process and build relationships with the bloggers that are part of the network. But a lot of the future is still to be decided.

“This would all sound crazy if I was running a business unit, but our goal when we started was really just to see what we would learn and what would happen and then maybe take those learnings and do other things,” says Burkett.

What do you hope to get from people attending this conference?

“I’m on the commercial side — I’d love to hear more ideas from business people about how they are using and benefiting monetarily from citizen journalism — how they are growing audience and any crazy ad ideas they have.”

]]> http://newsinnovation.com/2007/10/02/jeff-burkett-washingtonpostnewsweek-interactive-blogs/feed/ 2 http://newsinnovation.com/2007/09/28/jane-hamsher-firedoglake/ http://newsinnovation.com/2007/09/28/jane-hamsher-firedoglake/#comments Sat, 29 Sep 2007 02:05:21 +0000 David Cohn http://newsinnovation.com/2007/09/28/jane-hamsher-firedoglake/ Introduction and Narrative: FireDogLake is an unabashed liberal blog that started in the wake of the 2004 election. Jane Hamsher, a movie producer, created a simple blogspot blog to collect the posts she had written on her personal Daily Kos blog. “That was all it was supposed to be,” says Hamsher. Today, however, her blog is used “as a means to organize the left.” Over time FireDogLake picked up a strong audience, specifically around its coverage of the Plame Affair, which would later involve Scooter Libby.

As the blog picked up readers Hamsher added Christy Hardin Smith, a former legal prosecutor, and the two began doing traditional reporting. This included live-blogging the Scooter Libby trial from inside the courtroom with full press credentials. Online sponsors paid for travel and rent expenses, as FireDogLake continually provided coverage of the Scooter Libby trial.

Today FireDogLake has a team of close to 20 part-time bloggers in addition to Hamsher and Smith, who continue to do on-the-scene reporting. Hamsher also published a book with Vaster Media, a company she has in partnership with Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos. The book, “The Anatomy of Defeat,” was written by Marcy Wheeler, who did the actual liveblogging of the Libby trial. Today, FireDogLake pulls in between 80,000 to 100,000 readers a day according to Hamsher.

Main Goal of FireDogLake: To combine online organizing with media criticism, activism and original reporting. “We are trying to influence the political process, promote progressive values and candidates,” says Hamsher.

Notable Achievements: FireDogLake received huge accolades for their coverage of the Libby Trial. New York Times reporter Scott Shane noted “With no audio or video feed permitted, the Firedoglake “live blog” has offered the fullest, fastest public report available.” FireDogLake also raised $550,000 last election cycle and has produced commercials that were adapted by over thirty candidates for their district. FireDogLake also has a regular “Book Salon” where the blog gets behind a specific book, often driving it to the top of Amazon in 24 hours.

A Surprising Realization: When Hamsher first got involved in blogging it was on the Daily Kos community where she regularly argued with people in the comment section. “That was fun to me,” says Hamsher.

This continued on FireDogLake, but after it received a critical mass of readers people accused Hamsher of indulging in a power imbalance. “I didn’t recognize that things had changed,” says Hamsher, but as the head of the FireDogLake community, she learned that she could not engage people in the same manner that she could when she was a regular participant in the Daily Kos community.

Biggest Practical Lesson/Mistake: “That you can’t create the news — you have to stay responsive to it,” says Hamsher.

An example Hamsher gave on the day of our interview: (August 27th): Today a small headline is that a man, Kenneth Foster, is going to be put to death in Texas. “There is no way I can get anybody to pay attention to that,” says Hamsher. So FireDogLake has to work with what is already in the news cycle, shaping it and providing alternative interpretations. “We have to ride the news.”

Blogs don’t determine the news, but stay responsive to readers, they determine what they want to focus on.

(See post script)

Money: FireDogLake has traditional advertising, but doesn’t generate enough to cover expenses. Individual donations are also used to cover travel and lodging expenses while reporting on stories like the Scooter Libby Trial. When there isn’t enough money for that, Hamsher will finance investigations herself, but “I’ve had to do that less and less.”

Future Goals: In addition to more original reporting, FireDogLake wants to create a stronger dialogue with people that it helps to elect, to remind politicians of claims and promises they make while in the election process. In the past, elected officials have explicitly said they would vote for bills, like hate crime legislation, only to blatantly disregard that promise, says Hamsher.

What do you hope to get from people attending this conference?

“I think I dwell in the liberal blogosphere, but there is a larger context that I’m not always in touch with — a greater story of Internet culture and I would like to explore that through the eyes of other people.”

p.s.: In an email from Hamsher Sept 28th: “As it turned out, people did pay attention. We asked people to call to ask that Kenneth Foster’s death sentence be commuted and in a surprise move, governor Rick Perry of Texas did so. “I didn’t think it was going to happen…I think everyone was surprised.”