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Posted 4:04 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
The Ethics of Copyright
Rich Gordon on Napster, etc.
We may be close to a resolution of the legal issues involved in the Napster case, but it seems clear that in a digital world, the law of copyright can't keep pace with the technology. Ultimately, how much music gets downloaded or how much software gets copied will depend mostly on people's attitudes. A recent survey doesn't offer much comfort to the Recording Industry Association of America — or for that matter, Microsoft or other software companies. Only 18% of U.S. adults agree with the statement, "Free music downloading from the Internet is wrong. I would not do it." And 60% of adults would consider copying software not licensed for personal use either because "everyone does it" or "I don't think it is wrong."
Posted 3:57 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Who's Afraid of the Big, Bad Shakeout?
Amy Gahran on contentious advice
Earlier this week, I published the latest issue of CONTENTIOUS — and one article is proving especially contentious. Some content pros are rather appalled that I said the recent shakeout in the online content business is a good thing. (See "Tips for Online Content Businesses in 2001.") Well, I stand by that claim. A plethora of bad business models is discouraging and misleading for everyone.In contrast, I've had nothing but good feedback on the Quick Content Tip, "Despite the Dot-Com Implosion, Don't Cut the Content!" (Available only in the e-mail edition, not on the Web.) The bottom line: It's a big mistake for brick-and-mortar businesses to cut back on their online efforts simply because much of their dot-competition has recently vaporized. If they want to refocus their efforts, they should take this opportunity to create more effective content strategies.
Posted 3:49 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
What Makes a Good Online Business Model?
Amy Gahran on online business strategies
Check out this February 14 Industry Standard article: "Is Your Idea as Cool as You Think?" (by Jimmy Guterman). It includes five questions to ask yourself when trying to decide whether your idea would make a good online business. Although it doesn't specifically mention content-focused ventures, these considerations would certainly apply there.However, Guterman implies that venture-capital funding is the goal. I strongly disagree with that, when it comes to online-content businesses. I just don't think VCs understand the content industry, or have the patience for it.
Posted 3:41 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
P2P Freelancers?
Andrew Nachison on new revenue models
I love Web sites that do things differently, regardless of who's doing it and whether they make money at it. Friday morning at the Interactive Newspaper conference in Dallas, I moderated a panel discussion on lessons from Internet "pure play" companies, with panelists from CNET, Away.com, and a site that really piqued my curiosity and that I think online newspaper strategists and editors should study: Inforocket. It's a new twist on information gathering. In other words, it's a new twist on journalism. It blends Q&A with reverse auctions, and I think it hints at a new approach to the concept of stringers and freelancers.If you have a question, go to Inforocket and name your price. Is the answer worth $5, $10, or $100 to you? It may be worth $5, $10, or $100 to someone who will dig up the answer and sell it to you.
What does this have to do with newspapers? Imagine the hundreds or thousands of niche experts in any newspaper market, and the handful of people in those markets who might be interested in the same thing. Say, for example, the high school chess team. What happens if a newspaper reader wants daily, blow-by-blow coverage of a high school chess team? Today, nothing happens. They're out of luck. What if, instead, a newspaper's online reader offered to pay $10 per week, or per season, for complete coverage of high schol chess, and a stringer agreed to provide the coverage for that fee, minus the newspaper's 30% commission for brokering the relationship? Huh.
Posted 1:10 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
One of You Needs a Name Change
Steve Outing on name confusion
Here at the Interactive Newspapers show in Dallas, I was lured to the booth of Word of Mouth Technology for a demo of its intriguing interactive product. No, not Word of Mouth www.wordofmouth.com, but www.womtech.com. Word of Mouth is a Boulder, Colorado-based company that lets consumers post comments about local businesses. Word of Mouth Technology does much the same thing. There are differences in the models, for sure, but the name duplication is terribly confusing. One of those companies needs to change its name!
Posted 5:41 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Do You Look Good in the Nude? ...
Steve Outing on weird journalism
... and have news experience? Then a new Web site has a job for you! Actually, looking good naked is more important than the journalism experience. As Reuters reports, NakedNews.com of Canada is auditioning for new, nude newscasters for its Web site. Male and female applicants are welcome to apply, and should be "fit, attractive, articulate, and ready to live in Toronto." At first blush, the concept seems ridiculous — but similar nude newscasts have attracted huge audiences in Russia. And is this really much of a step beyond the "quality journalism" offered by some local TV news shows?
Posted 5:25 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Back to Print — Again
Steve Outing on digitized newspapers
Hi, from the Editor & Publisher Interactive Newspapers conference in Dallas (where several other E-Media Tidbits contributors join me). This year's event is a bit smaller attendee-wise than last (with the current state of the Internet economy, what would you expect?), but with more exhibitors. Among the exhibitors, NewsStand, a technology company that's starting to sign up periodical publishers and delivers digital reproductions of the print product to PCs. That is, exact reproductions; what you see in print, you see online.NewsStand's first marquee client is the New York Times, and this morning NY Times Co. chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. hyped his company's use of the technology in a keynote speech. I find it interesting that the industry continues to try to force the print product onto a PC screen. Frankly, I'll stick with the Times' Web site rather than read its content in newspaper format online. NewsStand is the latest of several companies that have tried to recreate the printed page online. Most of them have floundered. Also tricky is digitizing newspapers and delivering them digitally for remote printing. (PressPoint, started by two former NYT executives, tanked a few months ago; competitor NewspaperDirect, with a similar model, is still going.) NewsStand also has a competitor that does a similar (and technologically better) job of putting printed pages online in print-like format: Olive Software.
The idea does have its charms — but I think it's better suited for smaller-format magazines than for newspapers. The best thing: Publishers can charge subscription or single-sale fees to readers used to paying for the same product in printed form. This can work for a segment of a publication's readership. And it beats the ad-supported Web business model.
Posted 5:02 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Integrate or Separate? (Part 951)
Andrew Nachison on corporate organization
Fox and CNN recently scrapped their independent Internet divisions to make their digital operations part of cross-platform organizations. Will other big-name Internet divisions be rolled back into their parent org charts? No way, say honchos at Tribune Co., The New York Times Co., and Knight Ridder.Speaking at the E&P Interactive Newspapers Conference in Dallas Thursday, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., chairman of The New York Times Company, said New York Times Digital still needs the freedom and latitude to innovate rapidly, and that didn't happen when online operations were managed inside his newspaper division. David Hiller, president of Tribune Interactive, said his company still sees value in creative separation from Tribune's newspaper and broadcast divisions. Dan Finnigan, president of KnightRidder.com, said his company's independence enables the newspaper and online units to identify projects or strategies that benefit both. I don't know how that works.
Seems to me the argument that independence facilitates a more creative and aggressive approach to business still has merit, but that media and media companies are moving toward more tightly focused multiplatform strategies, and that these will be best served by tightly focused, multiplatform organizations. Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li, also at the conference, summed up the dilemma nicely: "If you are going to integrate, does the organization have the entrepreneurial chutzpah to make it happen?" Apparently, Fox and CNN think they have it. The New York Times Co., Tribune, and Knight Ridder aren't there yet. For now, they may all be right.
Posted 2:18 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Did Telcos Kill Content?
Steve Outing on content dot-bombs
The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz has a worth-reading column today, entitled "Online Media: Old News? Web Sites Struggle Financially Despite Millions of Visitors." Some of what he writes has of course been said before. But I nodded my head at this section:"One major problem, says (TheStreet.com's James) Cramer, is that telephone and cable companies have done such a poor job of wiring people's homes for broadband connections — making it impossible for most users to view video well. 'That, I think, is what really killed the development of the Web,' Cramer says. 'It's almost like we know how to do a talkie but the movie theaters won't put speakers in. The Web is like a UHF station in the '60s.'" How depressingly true. (So hang in there, folks. We'll get there eventually.)
Posted 1:36 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
A Content Puritan Turns Libertine
Vin Crosbie on Napster
Last November, Norbert Specker (who also writes here on Tidbits) at the last minute invited me to speak before his Interactive Publishing Europe conference about Napster. "Do you want me to be for or against Napster?", I asked. But he left that decision to me. Although I'm a fifth-generation newspaperman, I decided to speak for Napster when I realized that Napster is simply a search engine that lists content on other computers and helps its users access that content. It's functionally not that different than Lycos, Alta Vista, Google, or Yahoo. Its only difference from them is that the originators of its content haven't given their permission. Nevertheless, I disagree with many other experts about Napster's revolutionary free-content model. Esther Dyson believes that in the future copyright will cease to exist. I believe that such ownership won't disappear unless we all agree to work for free. John Perry Barlow believes that "Information wants to be free." I think that people also want to be free, but they still have to live within some laws. Consumers have to understand that all content costs can't disappear unless the content itself evaporates.Will consumers pay for downloadable music or other content? Remember the anecdote about George Bernard Shaw: Sitting next to a beautiful woman at a dinner party, the author asked, "Madame, for a million pounds sterling, would you sleep me?" After a few moments the woman replied, "Why for such a price, I think I might." Shaw then asked, "Well then, Madame, would you sleep with me for only one pound sterling?" The shocked woman replied, "How dare you, Mr. Shaw, what do you think I am?" Said Shaw, "Madame, we've already established what you are; we're now negotiating a price." Getting Napster users to pay for content is a similar pricing issue, but in reverse. Users will sully themselves by paying for downloadable content, if the price is low enough.
(By the way, another reason why I decided to speak for Napster is that, though I used to condemn it, I'd meanwhile downloaded from it more than 800 tunes for my personal use. I'm a content provision puritan who's turned libertine.)
Posted 12:09 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Why Wireless?
Rich Gordon on content for wireless
Ever since the buzz began about the "wireless Web," I've been skeptical that it would have much significance for journalism. Maybe when we have portable devices with screens that can show more than a few words of text, or wireless bandwidth sufficient to download multimedia. The latest issue of mbusiness magazine has a good overview of the current state of the wireless content "industry," entitled "Does Content Have a Chance?" The story focuses heavily on CNN, which reportedly has the largest global penetration in wireless news. It notes that there is at least the potential for a new revenue stream associated with wireless, since some telecoms are willing to pay to have the rights to distribute premium content. Of course, there are some limitations: CNN limits its wireless feeds to 125 characters per item. (This Tidbits item is 932 characters.) Regardless, most major content companies are at least experimenting. "I think if we stick purely to content on a PC, we will be making the same mistake as newspapers who saw their only means of distribution as being a newspaper," said Andrew Ross, formerly of Salon.com.
Posted 11:59 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
No-nos for Big Banner Ads
Steve Outing on Web ad trends
Obviously, Web publishers are scrambling to survive, and an increasing number are starting to use large ads — a la CNET's huge Flash animated ads now inserted into the text of selected articles. This isn't a bad idea — since standard-size, small Web banners have failed miserably — but you've got to be really careful in how you use them. In my Editor & Publisher Online column this week, I offer some techniques and precautions for using big Web ads — without annoying your users.I should confess here to what a reader of that column pointed out to me this morning. I have a sentence that talks about using the big ads that reads, "Don't continue animation indefinitely. Animated ads are annoying to many readers, because it's difficult to read article text when your eye sees something moving or flashing off to the side. ..." Alas, Murphy's Law placed a (small) animated ad right next to that sentence. In my defense, I was talking about the big banners, and I as a freelance columnist have no control of ads that are placed on my column page. Still, this looks to be a case where I am not practicing what I preach.
Posted 1:51 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Free Syndication Tool
Steve Outing on Web syndication
Kinecta, the high-end name in online content syndication technology, is releasing a free-use version of what it calls Kinecta Syndicator Lite. The application allows Web managers to establish up to five dedicated channels for automating content distribution to other e-publishers. Kinecta is following the time-honored technique of offering a bare-bones free service as a sampler for paid services with greater capacity and capabilities. Here's a short story from Content-Wire about Kinecta's offering. (That story claims this is the first free content distribution application on the Web. Actually, I believe that distinction would go to OOiPTech.com's OOiP/Share Web syndication application, which has a limited free version, supporting only one distribution channel.)
Posted 12:54 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Layoffs.com
Jade Walker on content employment
PBS.org examines the latest trend of dot-com layoffs with this media report on the Internet news industry. If you're suffering from the "Net News Blues," this special section offers an online forum to chat with industry experts, a look back at how the future of online publishing appeared in 1999, and a Real Audio download of an interview with David Talbot (Salon.com), Neil Budde (WSJ.com), Martin Nisenholtz (New York Times Digital), and Hoag Levins (formerly of APBNews.com and now editor of Ad-Age.com).
Posted 12:49 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Where Are the Women?
Jade Walker on conferences
At heart, I'm more of an equalist than a feminist. Yet something in me rankled when I saw the "Roster of Heavyweights" scheduled for the Publishers Weekly/Inside Book Summit. The guest list for the March 16 summit is impressive, but it is also mostly male. How can a conference designed to address the urgent issues facing publishing today seem to lack such balance?
Posted 12:20 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Tough Week for Sports Sites
Steve Klein on sports content
Talk about a California earthquake. Last week was not a good one for online sports pure-plays. California-based Broadband Sports, perhaps best known for its highly regarded RotoNewsDirect, was the latest sports-content site casualty, closing the doors on about 160 employees as of February 23. The company "positioned itself as the 'ESPN of the digital world ... (but) got caught in the current advertising squeeze that has hit the sports-content market. ... Revenue from e-commerce, ads, subscriptions, and content syndication were not enough to sustain it," writes Terry Lefton in TheStandard.com. The company will no longer maintain its high-profile athlete sites, but RotoNewsDirect will remain live while the company pursues a sale. The company lost about $40 million last year on revenues of $18 million.Also biting the dust: SportsHuddle, another California-based network of high school sports Web sites. (It sold its assets to Waveshift, which has plans to relaunch the sports publishing system for its newspaper customers.) San Francisco-based Quokka announced a major restructuring by cutting its workforce of 369 by 59% by the end of the second fiscal quarter this year. Quokka will relaunch its golf.com, NCAA basketball championships with associated conference and college coverage, and Major League Baseball sites (all obtained in its buyout of Total Sports), in addition to its Olympics site. Hit particularly hard was the Raleigh-based Total Sports unit, which will eliminate 54 of 84 jobs. According to the Raleigh News & Observer, the "deeper-than-expected cuts" have remaining employees "speculating that the Raleigh operation will be shut down soon." The 15 million shares of stock that Quokka paid for privately held Total Sports were valued at $132 million when the sale was announced in July, but "their value had plummeted" to $34 million by the time the deal was closed in the late fall. At Quokka's current trading price, those shares are worth about $2.85 million now.
Posted 11:38 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Search Engines Search for Profits With Paid Links
Paul Grabowicz on search engine ethics
When the search engine Open Text started selling "preferred listings" in keyword searches to advertisers back in 1996, the plan was roundly criticized and quickly abandoned. But now the scramble for increased revenues has prompted almost all major search engines to include "sponsored links" in their search results, according to a recent San Jose Mercury News story.
Posted 11:20 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
More Industry Coverage From Ethan Casey
Steve Outing on content journalism
BlueEar.com editor Ethan Casey has been writing a monthly column called The Online Publisher for my newsletter, Content Spotlight. That's ending, and starting next week he'll be offering up a bi-weekly column called The Online Editor instead. His new column takes the premise that the online medium is an editor's medium — and among other things he'll be interviewing distinguished online editors. "I hope that my interviews with them will constitute a sort of 'oral history' of the fascinating collective work in progress that is the Web," he says.Ethan's expertise as an online editor and publisher also is starting to appear at InternetContent.net. He has a new column, Casey's Briefcase, that will appear bi-weekly. That column will focus on business-side issues facing online publishers. His first InternetContent.net column debuted yesterday, "It's Pay-back Time," which he subtitled, "If you respect yourself as a for-profit publisher, have at least some content that you make people pay for."
Posted 10:58 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Content Is Not King
Norbert Specker on controversial ideas
Andrew Odlyzko is the head of the mathematics and cryptography research departments at AT&T Labs. Now with that provenience you will not be surprised at his stated "primacy of connectivity over content" and his conclusion that "Content Is Not King." I warmly recommend reading the paper as it collects and restates an amazing range of arguments, numbers, and deductions that the content industry has grappled with over the years. It also does put the role of content into perspective: historically, technically, and most of all in regard to human behavior. It leaves the eager content developer with a range of new ideas, the broadcasting champion with some doubts, and the analyst with a backpack full of arguments. "The huge sums being invested by carriers in content are misdirected." Go find out why. (Tip o' the hat to Monique van Dusseldorp for the pointer.)
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