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Posted 3:54 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Web's Days Are Numbered, But Not By Economy
Vin Crosbie on third generation online technologies
Forrester Research this week joins the analysts who are foreseeing that new forms of online technologies will soon overtake the Web, much as the Web overtook the early proprietary online services seven years ago. In a report issued Thursday, Forrester director and principal analyst Carl Howe warns against contemporary "Web-only thinking." Forrester's staff sees two forthcoming stages in Internet development: First, an "executable Internet" that utilizes disposable code downloaded to PCs and portable devices and that can deliver more than just flat Web pages; and an "extended Net" that uses cheap chips and the Internet backbone to connect nearly every wired or wireless appliance and device that runs on electricity. I think Forrester's vision is partially correct. Anyone who's suffered an e-mailed virus might be skeptical of an "executable Internet," but an "extended Internet" is inevitable.
Posted 3:28 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Amazon Does It Again
Rich Gordon on the continued transformation of "The World's Biggest Bookstore"
Boy was I surprised to get a personalized e-mail today about movie showtimes in my neighborhood. It didn't come from any of the sites I've visited to find out about entertainment (CitySearch, Moviefone, or RealCities). Instead, it came from Amazon.com. I didn't even know that Amazon had a section devoted to movie showtimes, though I would have if I'd read E-Media Tidbits this morning (see Andrew Nachison's item below). I'm not sure, exactly, how this will translate into revenue for Amazon, since as far as I can tell it is not selling movie tickets (unlike the online entertainment guides). But it's an interesting business strategy nonetheless. First, it shows the value of getting users to register and buy stuff online — that's how Amazon knows who I am and where I live (unlike, say, MovieFone, where I've never provided personally identifying information). CitySearch should know about me, since I've purchased from TicketMaster, but it's telling that Amazon beat CitySearch to my inbox with movie showtimes. I can only assume that Amazon hopes this weekly e-mail will ultimately drive me to buy tapes or DVDs from Amazon. I don't know that they'll win that bet, but certainly this shows that Jeff Bezos and gang are still thinking creatively.
Posted 2:20 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Publishing Precautions
Jade Walker on e-publishing
The Authors Guild has issued a warning to its members about Time Warner's new e-publishing venture, iPublish. "Established writers who are merely dabbling in a new medium may find they've inadvertently granted a laundry list of rights to Time Warner and agreed to a bargain-basement advance for print rights to their work. Worse yet, writers surrender rights to their next work as well, agreeing to sell the digital rights to iPublish for advances as low as $25 or less," the Guild notes on its Web site.
Posted 11:45 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
An Observation on 'Hard Times'
Steve Outing on getting paid
Have you noticed this, too? Now that the dot-economy has tanked big time, I'm noticing that I'm getting paid slower. Checks from publishers I write for, advertisers on my Web site, they're all coming slower than I ever remember. At least (knock on wood) I haven't been stiffed yet. And some organizations I do business with do still pay up quickly. Still, I'll be glad when this dot-mess is over and we're on the upswing again — and getting paid isn't a risky proposition. (Later this year, IMHO.)
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Posted 11:40 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
People in Your Zip Code are Watching...
Andrew Nachison on Amazon movies
Amazon.com has already re-defined the relationship between retail sales and consumer information publishing and user-generated content. Now it's integrated the fantastic Internet Movie Database into a service that provides local movie listings.That's right, Amazon now has its foot in the local entertainment info business, and, true to form, the characteristic Amazon interface is simple, functional, and powerful. As CBS Marketwatch notes, this is also the first Amazon service to include traditional fee-for-placement advertising. Are Amazon local restaurant and entertainment listings next? Forget crystal ball nonsense. Let's talk about today: what can a local Web site offer local movie viewers — or local advertisers who want to reach them — that Amazon can't offer?
Posted 11:37 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Hate Online Ads? Maybe They'll Go Away
Steve Outing on ad-blocking software
Web ad-blocking software is making a resurgence. But if you are tempted to use it, know that you'll be hastening the demise of content on the Internet. So says David Lawrence, the host of Online Tonight, in an editorial for TechTV. "If you employ technology to prevent ads from loading, you're slitting your own cheap throat. You're trading long-term health for a misguided, falsely clever present. And you'll get what you wish for: no ads. Because there will be no pages on which to place them," he writes. Well said, David!
Posted 7:20 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Making Online Advertising Work
Rich Gordon on the effectiveness of banner ads
I keep reading the obituary of banner advertising, even though online ad spending continues to grow. I haven't seen much solid research about what online ads are good for, or what makes them effective or ineffective. I just stumbled across some fascinating academic research ("Internet Advertising: Is Anybody Watching?") by Xavier Dreze of the University of Southern California and Francois-Xavier Hussherr of the Centre Nationale d'Etude des Telecomunications in Paris. The study was done way back in 1998, but I think its findings are still relevant:
- Half of all banner ads are never seen by online users.
- Users consciously avoid looking at banner ads.
- Despite this, banner ads definitely do improve brand awareness, recognition and recall.
- The key to effective banner advertising is crafting a good message and repeating it frequently.
- Strategies to increase click-through percentages can actually make banner ads less effective. (For instance, most sites rotate ads so an individual user doesn't see a particular ad more than once — but this means the user isn't exposed frequently enough for the branding message to be effective.)
If you know of other well-documented academic research on banner advertising, I'd love to see it (richgor@northwestern.edu).
Posted 5:19 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
A Laugh a Minute
Andrew Nachison on layoffs in Miami
Just in time for Knight Ridder's 180-job "staff reduction" at the Miami Herald, announced today in the newspaper, hometown humorist Dave Barry takes a bittersweet shot at what's happened to the newspaper business in the United States. Oddly, the story is marked "Published Sunday, May 20 in the Miami Herald." Call me old-fashioned about reality and what not, but I read the story Thursday, May 17, on Miami.com.Well, wherever and whenever it was or will be published, read it and weep with laughter or sorrow. OK, independent, family owned dailies aren't entirely gone, and I worked for one and it wasn't exactly the most beautiful or socially redeeming experience of my life, and the family for whom I toiled didn't exactly live like paupers. But can anyone refute this (please?): "On behalf of the newspaper industry (new, cost-cutting motto: 'All the News That') I wish to announce some changes we're making to serve you better. When I say 'serve you better,' I mean 'increase our profits.'" Shame on you, Dave. Naughty, naughty.
Posted 11:50 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Kyrgyzstan: Up and Coming on the Net
Amy Gahran on Internet use in Central Asia
In the U.S., Europe, Japan, and certain other parts of the world, the Internet has become a fact of daily life. Meanwhile, most of the world is only just beginning to get online — but that doesn't mean they don't want it! A recent conference on "Media Survival" held May 10-11 in Bishkek (the capital of the Kyrgyz Republic) by the European Institute for the Media revealed the following points about Net usages in Kyrgyzstan:
- The continuation of the Soviet system of telephone charges means local calls are not charged individually (as they generally are in Europe, which seriously slowed the rise in European Net usage).
- All Kyrgyz university students have Internet access.
- Kyrgyz media professionals are enthusiastically using the Net. Not only does it provide more information and access, but e-mail is much less costly than long-distance calls.
See fellow E-Media Tidbits contributor Andrew Stroehlein's article from InternetContent.net earlier this week: "The Frontier of the e-Frontier."
Posted 11:44 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Salon on the Rocks
Steve Outing on webzine death watch
In today's San Francisco Chronicle, media columnist Dan Fost (whose work is definitely worth watching for) reports further on the troubles of Salon.com and its efforts to survive. Fost paints a dismal picture for the webzine. It's one of those situations where a company has spent so much money trying to build an audience and a brand, without a viable revenue model. Many other dot-coms in similar situations have expired. Can Salon beat the trend? It's looking increasingly doubtful.
Posted 11:26 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
And We Become One
Steve Outing on Britannica's corporate restructuring
Encyclopedia Britannica Inc. and Britannica.com Inc. have announced that they will consolidate their operations. While this can be viewed as a reaction to the dot-com depression, I think this would have been an inevitable development even with a healthy economy (though it might have occurred farther down the road). The media environment of the next few years will increasingly force all media companies to be platform-agnostic, using all of the traditional and digital media platforms to disseminate their core asset, their information/content. To operate an online division separate from an old-media division no longer makes sense.
Posted 5:37 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
And the Awards Are In
Steve Klein on online sports content
ESPN.com was the big winner at the Interactive Sports 2001 West Conference earlier this week in Los Angeles. The SportsBusiness Journal presented its New Media Awards for 2000 to ESPN Internet Group senior vice president John Skipper, Top New Media Executive; ESPN.com, Top Sports Web Site; Sportvision, Top Internet Technology Vendor; the Washington Capitals, Top Team Web Site; and Global Sports Interactive, Top Business-to-Business Sports Internet Company.
Posted 4:58 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Pay and Stop Complaining, Cheapskates!
Steve Outing on paying for online content
As I surf various Web news sites looking for online media coverage, I'm seeing the same story written over and over. The theme is: Web users who complain about free services that start charging for content are idiots, and people who use free sites and ad-blocking software are responsible for the downfall of free content. Sites that convert to the paid model typically get a firestorm of protest from a minority of users. An increasing number of commentators are blaming Web users for their attitudes that online content should be free, when the economic reality is that it's an unsustainable model for most publishers. It seems as though many online columnists and writers are getting testy about the Internet public's illogical feelings on free content. Hey, I feel the same way. However, we e-publishers can't dwell on that. We've got to figure out what model works for consumers as well as works for us. Your audience may be irrational, but deal with it!
Posted 4:50 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
A Good Kind of Virus
Rich Gordon on "e-mail story to a friend"
While most of the conversation among e-media types these days seems to be about charging for content, I continue to believe that the distribution problem is bigger than the revenue problem. Many sites are producing fabulous content, but it's seen by only a small fraction of the people who'd be interested in it. If we could solve the distribution problem, I think most sites that produce unique content could thrive on advertising alone. One piece of the solution: "e-mail this story to a friend" links. This article in the First Monday online journal analyzes ESPN.com's list of most frequently e-mailed stories. The author, a marketing professor, suggests that the traffic generated by such services is small. (ESPN.com has millions of visitors, but the top 25 e-mailed links never add up to more than 5,500 e-mails in a day). But when you consider that users can "pass along" links in other ways, and that your friends know your interests better than a publisher does, it seems to me that promoting this kind of "viral readership" makes a lot of sense. For exclusive or especially newsworthy stories, it might make sense for a publisher to give even more emphasis (for instance, on a section front, not just with the story itself) to the "e-mail to a friend" service.
Posted 4:06 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Bianca's Smut Shack Keeps Talking Dirty
Amy Gahran on online community
According to the May 16 edition of Wired News, Bianca's Smut Shack (a 7-year-old erotic chat and message-board system with a dedicated following) is louder than usual these daysNerve Magazine, which purchased the Shack in 1999, decided to close it on May 11 because Nerve could no longer afford its bandwidth. Participants apparently began screaming, moaning, and writhing in lusty protest and debate — using more bandwidth than ever. On May 10, the Shack's founder announced that a deal had been reached to keep the Shack bumping and grinding along ... but there might be some changes. See: "Bianca's Bandwidth Bitching Irony," by Farhad Manjoo.
Posted 12:52 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Aliterate Alert
Andrew Nachison on people who don't read
Here's another hint at the changing habits of media-saturated Americans. A study by NPD Group, described Monday in the Washington Post, shows Americans are reading printed versions of books, magazines, and newspapers less and less. This isn't surprising and adds additional context to the Scarborough Research report on American media usage described in a couple of other E-Media Tidbits items this week. The implications for the future of media are thought-provoking beyond the business-focused notions of media "consumption" and audience fragmentation. The Post listed a range of fields now attempting to communicate with aliterates — people who can read but don't bother — like highway designers and packaging designers, who find visual symbols, colors, and shapes more effective communication tools than text.The list included Web designers. We've heard for a long time how people scan, rather than read, computer screens, and that users prefer short chunks of information to masses of text. One explanation for this has been the low resolution of today's computer screens, which makes reading text difficult. Now we have another explanation to consider: people may be growing weary of text itself.
Posted 1:26 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Salon Hanging In There ... Barely
Steve Outing on premier webzine's survival
Salon.com is still hemorrhaging cash, as was reported in a conference call with CEO Michael O'Donnell today. (See this article on Inside.com.) Revenues are down (predictably) and profitability is as a result being projected even further out. Salon will need another infusion of cash from investors to survive — and in the current environment that's no sure thing. The only positive note is that Salon Premium $30 annual subscriptions are ahead of schedule in terms of the goal of attracting 50,000 paying subscribers in the first year. O'Donnell wouldn't part with exact numbers. Salon's survival looks tentative at best.
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Posted 7:00 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Dot-com Coverage Declines
Kerry Northrup on technology coverage
As dot-coms decline in financial interest for the average person, it appears that dot-com news coverage may suffer a parallel fall-off. The Times of London has discontinued its once highly touted Interface section. Advertising, or the lack thereof, is blamed. But in fairness, Times editor Peter Stothard also notes that technology issues are now covered throughout the newspaper, diminishing the need for a dedicated section.
Posted 2:21 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
New Media Conference Webcast
Paul Grabowicz on new media business models
A webcast of five of the panels at the new media conference held April 7at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism is now available. The conference, entitled "After the Fall: New Media Publishing Strategies," focused on the business of online publishing and was co-sponsored by USC's Annenberg School for Communication, which also produced the webcast.
Posted 11:43 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
UK Net Use Skyrockets
Amy Gahran on UK Internet usage
As I prepare to spend part of June in London, I was pleased to learn that in the UK Internet usage has recently surged. A May 9 Cyberatlas article ("Net Catching on with UK's Young and Old") found that between October 2000 and March 2001 the number of at-home UK Internet users under age 17 grew by 44% over the last 6 months.And at the opposite end of the age spectrum, an April 2001 survey by the UK group Age Concern found that UK seniors who use the Net believe this strengthens, rather than weakens, their family ties and friendships — contrary to the myth that the Net fosters "social exclusion."
Posted 10:16 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Scarborough, Take 2
Kerry Northrup on the Scarborough Research results
With a friendly wave to my E-Media Tidbits colleague Andrew Nachison, who writes in an item below about the Scarborough Research report on American media usage, the study offers a more fundamental insight for the news business than just which media are up and which are down according to this week's statistics. Scarborough's underlying message is that news consumption is broadening, and that the average American is adopting an increasingly diverse mix of formats and sources to satisfy what appears to be an increasing total demand for information. "...The fact that substantial percentages of people report altered behavior is evidence to the continuing evolution of consumer habits," said Bob Cohen, president of Scarborough Research, in announcing the report. This is a troubling trend only for those media organizations that resist joining the Information Economy, refusing to diversify their news distribution channels and convert from a product to a service mindset.
Posted 11:09 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Revenue, Revenue, Blah, Blah, Blah
Andrew Nachison on online newspapers
Two weeks ago at the Digital News Management seminar that I moderated for The Media Center at the American Press Institute, 19 online newspaper executives and two journalism school professors, most with news backgrounds, returned time and time again to talk of revenue, business models, and "making it pay." Even during a session about novel online story-telling techniques, cost-benefit questions seemed to overshadow some phenomenal journalism, like this chilling Web documentary about lynching postcards.One speaker (sessions are confidential, so I won't name names) suggested that online editors need to become more involved in the business operations of their Web sites. I couldn't disagree more. It seems to me that editors need to become more involved with the news and telling great stories. Most online newspapers still lack the voice, vision, and creativity they need to define themselves.
Posted 7:12 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
MLB.com Still Fouling Them Off
Steve Klein on online sports content
Baseball on the Internet was supposed to be a whole new ballgame this season on MLB.com and RealNetworks. But some users think it's been one foul ball after another six weeks into the season, according to an article by Larry Stewart in the Los Angeles Times. Just one of the complaints in the "Fan Forum" section of MLB.com: "Nice going MLB. Lousy service, no decent tech support, and no recourse." Said Bob Bowman, MLB's CEO of advanced media: "Maybe we should streamline things and make it easier to sign up." When the service works (and I have found it to be reliable), however, it's a real walk in the park for baseball fans.
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Posted 5:26 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Web vs. Old Media
Andrew Nachison on audience behavior
A Scarborough Research study released last week suggests that the Web is taking substantial time away from U.S. TV viewing. The study found that 23% of online Americans say they watch less TV as a result of the Internet. Similar declines were reported in magazine reading (20%), newspaper readership (15%), and radio listening (9%). However, a small percentage of users said that they consume MORE traditional media than they used to — radio (11%), newspapers (9%), magazines (8%), and TV/cable (7%). The study also found that 27% of online 18-34 year-olds "always" or "often" surf the Web while watching TV. That should be good news for broadcasters, a troubling trend for all other media, and perhaps more fuel added to the media consolidation and convergence movement.
Posted 5:20 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Beta Test
Andrew Stroehlein on news agencies facing the Internet
How can you survive as a news agency when potential subscribers are getting your output for free on the Internet? This is the situation facing Ljubica Markovic, director of the Beta News Agency in Belgrade, who described Beta's predicament to me last week. Beta's material goes out to subscribers and then appears on Web sites; other media outlets come along and simply pull that material from those sites, not paying Beta a penny. Sometimes Beta is not even credited by the third party. It is horribly frustrating, says Markovic, and although their subscriber contract sets out rules against online reprints, some outlets don't follow them and post material online anyway.Beta is big in this part of Europe and famously provided a vital information alternative, both nationally and internationally, to official Yugoslav sources during the Milosevic era. But Beta is not a Reuters or an AP. While media outlets around the world will subscribe to those mega-agencies automatically as item one in their budgets, Beta and other more localized services have to fight for their subscribers. And especially in these difficult economic times, no one is going to pay for something they can get for free. Beta's search for a solution goes on.
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