Aug 28
Posted: under Digital Migration, Newspaper Deathwatch, Newspapers, This week in paid content, new media.
Tags: ad spending, Alan Mutter, Aspen conference, buzzmachine, Demotix, Doc Searls, e-reader, economic optimism, fast company, Jeff Jarvis, jilted journalists, Kindle, Mark Cuban, mediactive, new business models for news, New Media Migration, newsosaur, newspaper death spiral, Newspaper Deathwatch, Nieman Lab, recession, Rue89, Steve Brill
This week's debate is not as acrimonious as in the past (although there are exceptions to that, of course), and in the wake of the biz models released by the Aspen conference, some people are taking building new revenue streams seriously. At least, they say they are. It turns out that a lot of what has been reported in this paid content debate is a little like Microsoft software releases: trial balloon "vaporware." [...more]
This week’s debate is not as acrimonious as in the past (although there are exceptions to that, of course), and in the wake of the biz models released by the Aspen conference, some people are taking building new revenue streams seriously. At least, they say they are. It turns out that a lot of what has been reported in this paid content debate is a little like Microsoft software releases: trial balloon “vaporware.”
Page design at Rue89.com looks a little like what splatters on the side of the carny Tilt-a-Whirl after you load it up with a buncha 10-years olds who've spent the day eating cotton candy and mystery meat hotdogs. I think the boxes up & down the sides are supposed to be clickable ads, but they were inert when I tried them... (click for larger)
The illustration here is of a new French news site that is apparently taking off at Rue89; I can’t decide whether the chaotic design is totally off-putting, or intriguing because it basically violates every rule of page design. Also, I can’t hear the word “Rue” in a title without flashing to “Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Or some B-movie villain twirling a moustache and chortling, “You’ll rue the day, Rex Manly!”
As a bonus, this week I’ve broadened the focus a bit to include some big-picture thinking from some of the unusual suspects; Doc Searls has a post wherein it is posited that what we think of right now as the internet is just a finger pointing in the direction of what this thing is actually going to grow into. Which should fuel a couple of late-night dorm-room debates, if nothing else…
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Nov 13
Posted: under Digital Migration, Multimedia, Newspaper Deathwatch, Newspapers, Platform obsession, Webconomics, Wrongheaded solutions, monetizing mobile content, new media.
Tags: buzzmachine, new vs. old flamewar, newspaper death spiral
I've fallen prey to the digital triumphalism. I'll admit it. It's really easy to hang on the rim and hoot, when you're on the outside looking in. This provokes a reaction much like the one we're seeing here.
The digital enthusiasts feel like the crews on lifeboats, trying to pick up survivors after the Titanic has gone down, only the survivors are shooting at them with pistols, yelling "You smug bastards in the lifeboats! You don't know what it's like here in the freezing water! Sure, it's easy to be warm & dry when you're in a lifeboat! Bang!"
Meanwhile, to the guys in the water, what they see is the lifeboat crew saying "Sure, we'll give you a hand up. But first you have to sing a tune apologizing for how stupid you were while we pee all over your head. And maybe we'll smack you around with the boathook. But you have it coming."
And what both sides are missing is that while the lifeboat is a good stop-gap solution, the oars seem to be missing, and the crew in the lifeboat is arguing amongst themselves as to which direction they would row in, should the oars ever be found, while others say that rowing is so old-school, and that what we should concentrate on is inventing a nuclear reactor that would provide endless propulsive energy, while still others think that the whole lifeboat thing is wrong, and we should jump back in the water in the hopes of evolving gills. [...more]
Let’s set the stage.
First, Ron Rosenbaum unloads on Jeff Jarvis for being “increasingly heartless” about newsroom cutbacks, layoffs & the general death spiral.
A sampling:
Not all reporters had the prescience to become new-media consultants. A lot of good, dedicated people who have done actual writing and reporting, as opposed to writing about writing and reporting, have been caught up in this great upheaval, and many of them may have been too deeply involved in, you know, content—”subjects,” writing about real peoples’ lives—to figure out that reporting just isn’t where it’s at, that the smart thing to do is get a consulting gig.
But Jarvis believes the failure of the old-media business models is the result of having too many of those pesky reporters. In his report on his recent new-media summit at CUNY, he noted with approval one workshop’s conclusion that you’d need only 35 reporters to cover the entire city of Philadelphia. Less is more. Meta triumphs over matter.
It makes you wonder whether Jarvis has actually done any, you know, reporting.
Oh, that’s nasty. Shorter Rosenbaum: “Jarvis is an substanceless, fluffy airhead, taking advantage of gullible publishers, peddling his New Media snakeoil & banking fat stacks while real reporters who actually work for a living are being thrown to the wolves.” Read More
