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Friday, November 02, 2001

Posted 1:27 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Telegraph Pulls Pull-out

Andrew Stroehlein on the death of another new media supplement
The UK's Daily Telegraph newspaper has decided to axe Dotcom Telegraph, the broadsheet's new media and technology pull-out supplement. As Owen Gibson reports in The Guardian, the lack of advertising revenue in the new business climate simply made Dotcom Telegraph unviable.
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Posted 1:22 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Chop, Chop, Chop That URL

Steve Outing on Web publishing
Long URLs drive me crazy. They're especially bad when an e-mail newsletter publisher includes them and they break into two lines — so when recipients click on the URL expecting to go to a Web page, they instead get a "page not found" error. SearchDay this week alerted me to a handy little service that will take any long URL and create a short one: MakeAShorterLink.com. Tell it your long URL and it will return a succinct one for you to use instead — e.g., http://makeashorterlink.com/?C2931191. MakeAShorterLink is hardly perfect: it forces you to use a makeashorterlink.com URL, not your own, and users see an interim page for a few seconds before being redirected. So I can't say I recommend using it.

However, this service prompts me to get on my soap box and rail against use of long URLs. Never use overly long links if you're publishing them in an e-mail newsletter or e-mail sent to your users. And I urge you to keep them short always, whether you e-mail or not. Other sites might publish links to your pages in their e-newsletters, and their recipients shouldn't be forced to piece together too-long URLs in order to find your page.
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Posted 12:38 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

End of a Fantasy Deal

Steve Klein on online sports content
Back on Sept. 4, the real world was looking pretty good to Reston, Virginia-based Sandbox.com, a producer of fantasy sports Internet products that began as Wall Street Sports about five years ago. SportsLine.com announced that it has terminated its previously announced agreement to acquire the privately held Sandbox.com "due to Sandbox's breach of certain representations and covenants in the acquisition agreement." Sandbox has 5 million registered members and offers fantasy sports, sweepstakes, arcade, and play-for-fun games. Sandbox has been one of the online sports world's independent survivors, and the Sportsline.com deal appeared to be a well-earned reward for hanging tough. What happens next is anyone's guess.
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Posted 11:31 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Separatist Movements in Sri Lanka Use Net as Media Platform

Madan Rao on bypassing state control of media
According to Shyam Tekwani, communications professor at the National University of Singapore, small ethnic and political groups within nations have been quick to use the Internet to link together across regional, international, and national boundaries. The utilization of the Internet by terrorists and secessionist groups is a matter of great concern to governments the world over, especially at a time when developing countries across the globe, and Asia in particular, are engaging in the often messy process of attempting to redefine freedom of speech in the cyber era.

Most of the Sri Lankan media, for instance, are under government control. To counter this complete embargo on independent news distribution, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) was quick to grab the opportunity to tell its own side of the story with the emergence of the Internet. The Internet has emerged as the single most important weapon in the arsenal of Tamil militants and is an important means for the Tamil diaspora to keep abreast of events in the homeland. A politically mobilized Tamil diaspora that emerged after 1983 had a huge impact on the ability of the LTTE to generate finances for its war effort. A study by the Rand Corporation, titled "The Security Dynamics of Demographic Factors," noted the growing influence of the Tamil Diaspora in North America, Western Europe, and Canada.
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Thursday, November 01, 2001

Posted 7:52 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Post to AOL; Get Published; Don't Get Paid

Steve Outing with a Because We Are Americans follow-up
In an item posted earlier today, I mentioned the new book that features comments that America Online members posted to AOL chat rooms and discussion forums after Sept. 11. As a reader noted in the discussion area attached to that item, the publisher used those comments without permission and without paying the AOL members who wrote the words. To writers and journalists, this will probably seem like an eggregious breach in etiquette on AOL's part to allow this. It is not, however, illegal. The AOL terms of service that all members agree to in order to use AOL gives the company the right to do whatever it wants with words that users post to message boards and chat rooms. You can argue (and I would) that AOL ought not claim partial ownership on its users' words, but AOL does appear to have covered itself to use its members' words in this manner. (Click the Discuss link below, where I've posted the language from AOL's terms of service.)
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Posted 5:35 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Would You Pay for Newspaper Online? Most Say No

Steve Outing on an informal poll
WSJ.com today ran a story about paid online content. (It showed that there's still little creative thinking going on in the industry.) Accompanying the story is an informal (in other words, don't read too much into this) survey, asking the question: "Would you pay to read your favorite local newspaper online?" When I looked at the survey, about 100 people had responded. Results: NO = 60%; YES = 40%. (Take the survey.)
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Posted 3:48 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

About Kills Its US Newspapers Site

Steve Outing on a lost media resource
Jack Downs' "US Newspapers" site on About.com is history. The resource and news source about the world of American newspapers has been axed by the topical-website company. About's hundreds of topic sites are run by "guides," who write on their topic and link to relevant topical information around the Web.
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Posted 3:37 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Baseball Looks to the Internet

Steve Klein on online sports content
Are you ready to watch the World Series on your personal computer? It could happen as early as next season as MLB.com prepares to offer live broadcasts of games over the Internet. According to MLB.com spokesman Jim Gallagher, professional baseball's Internet division's "goal is to stream live games by next season." The problem, of course, is working out broadcast rights with national and local television networks broadcast rights. "Nothing is concrete, but, for instance, we could start with offering a Yankees-Red Sox game to fans west of the Mississippi so as not to infringe on the broadcast rights of either of the teams," Gallagher said.

MLB.com has about 120,000 subscribers paying for online videos of archived games for $2.95 each or $14.95 for unlimited access. The service is available on RealNetworks. MLB.com will continue to work with RealNetworks on the streaming service. No price for the games has been set. This past season, the first during which radio broadcasts were streamed for subscription on MLB.com, baseball fans complained loudly about an end to free audio broadcasts of Major League games — as well as the consistency of the service.
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Posted 3:31 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Is This Intrusive, or Customer Service?

Katja Riefler on new online advertising forms
Has anyone noticed the new ad formats at the New York Times website? From time to time when you log in you are confronted with coordinated banners and several other (big) ads on different locations on the page. The ads of the same company follow the user throughout the whole session. They may appear as a top and bottom banner on the page combined with a skyscaper ad, or on any other ad position. This new format will increase brand awareness a lot better than the usual banner ads, according to Christine Cook, vice president international at New York Times Digital in London. She spoke on trends in online advertising recently in Geneva, and said that there is a special price for these kind of "surround session" ads, and that they only bill customers when the ads have been seen by one individual user at least 15 times. Cook also predicted that we soon will see more large rectangle ads on the NYT site (the format originally introduced by CNET). The "Shoskeles" ads, which have been discussed here earlier this year, are said to be a great success on Boston.com.
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Posted 12:07 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

AOLiens' Words on Paper

Steve Outing on Sept. print book
A press release landed in my e-mail inbox today about another new book on the events of Sept. 11, Because We Are Americans. The book, from Warner Books "in cooperation with" America Online, is made up of the comments of AOL users who used the world's largest online service to talk about the tragedy. Content of the book includes: "heartfelt collection of personal messages and poems, as well as memorable quotes from prominent leaders, moving testimonials of survivors, and inspirational excerpts from writers throughout history." What I find most interesting about the book is that much of the content is pulled from AOL chat rooms and AOL message boards, where many people "congregated" to share their thoughts and emotions. I think it's fair to say that this is a new kind of journalism, made possible by the Internet. Because We Are Americans is being published in print and e-book form simultaneously, with profits going to charity.

That book has a bit in common with another new book, 09/11 - 8:48 a.m.: documenting America's greatest tragedy, which was published in paper form within three weeks of the terror attacks. It too found its content from the online world, and was produced by BlueEar.com and the New York University School of Journalism. (I'll publish an interview with 09/11's editors, Ethan Casey and Jay Rosen, in the coming days on Poynter.org.)
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Posted 10:59 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

The Secret of Their Success

Steve Klein on online media mergers
Want to increase online site traffic and advertising revenue? (Isn't that what it's all about, after all?) Stephanie Miles of the Wall Street Journal reports that online media companies are learning that in some cases, two is better than one — especially since Sept. 11. Many firms are now demonstrating a new willingness to team up with other companies in an effort to cut costs and build market share.

In the last year, CNET Networks closed its acquisition of ZDNet's network of sites; MSN Money merged with CNBC.com; iVillage acquired the Women.com Networks; and DoubleClick has used the downturn to acquire online-advertising rivals. According to Miles, these companies say that by eliminating their main rival, they have been able to achieve faster growth. These companies also point out the benefits of cross-media promotion enabled by mergers. "It is immeasurably valuable to have cable channels to promote and cross program with an online news source," said Aram Sinnreich, a senior analyst with Jupiter Media Metrix.
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Wednesday, October 31, 2001

Posted 6:05 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

NBC and Amazon.com Deal

Steve Klein on online advertising
NBC has climbed into bed with Amazon.com with an exclusive marketing deal that will promote products for sale online that are featured on the network's programming. The network will air "bumpers" — short commercials promoting a site called www.amazon.com/nbc — when, for example, an author is interviewed on an NBC program. An Associated Press story reports that for NBC, the deal provides a detailed analysis of who's likely to buy what products advertised during its shows. For Amazon, the deal provides a low-cost way to advertise on television and bring traffic to its site.
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Posted 5:59 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Is Your Newsroom System Secure?

Steve Outing on virtual terrorism
News media have plenty to be worried about these days, from bacteria in letters to viruses in e-mail. Yesterday's denial-of-service (DOS) attack on the New York Times' computer network should indicate the need for newsroom systems and Web managers to take extra precautions in the months and years ahead. Was this some smart teen-age cyber-pranksters or another form of attack from the likes of terrorists who are sending anthrax in the mail and hijacking airplanes? Obviously, news media are a new terrorist target. News executives must further secure their computer networks, as well as their mailrooms.
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Posted 5:34 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

The Origins of 'Information Wants to Be Free'

Rich Gordon on new media's most famous aphorism
In preparation for moderating an Online News Association panel about paid online content, I decided I really ought to track down the original source of the quotation, "Information wants to be free." It appears to come from author and entrepreneur Stewart Brand, and, believe it or not, seems to date back to 1984. (The most well-documented source I found is a Web page prepared by Roger Clarke, an Australian technology consultant.) Anyway, I found that Brand's full quotation is both astonishingly prescient and much richer than the abbreviated version we've heard repeated over and over again. As we continue to wrestle with how to extract value from digital content, it's worth remembering the original paradox that Brand identified:

"On the one hand information wants to be expensive, because it's so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free, because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other."
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Posted 12:46 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Real Media Sale Price Reflects Banner Ad Depression

Vin Crosbie on online advertising
24/7 Media and Real Media yesterday announced their merger. The merged company, named 24/7 Real Media, claims it has the world's "largest online ad network, largest locally installed ad serving customer base, and the most extensive permission-based e-mail database," and that the merger will reduce its operating costs by more than US$10 million annually. Reuters reported that, under the terms of the merger agreement, stockholders of Real Media will be issued about 8.3 million shares of 24/7 Media stock, which closed at $0.23 cents a share on the Nasdaq market, making the deal worth about $1.9 million. 24/7's total market capitalization this morning was only $16.5 million. Yes, that's apparently the total worth of the world's largest online ad network, locally installed ad serving customer base, and most extensive permission-based e-mail database. A titanic plunge from what it would have been worth only two years ago. Do the world's financial markets have confidence in banner ads? Judge for yourself.
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Posted 12:45 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Broadband Changes Surfing Habits

Steve Klein on another broadband study
Did we really need another study (this one by McKinsey, Jupiter Media Metrix, and Vividence) to learn that online consumers want "a faster, more intense experience?" In the report, the companies asked what happens to consumers who have switched from a narrowband connection to broadband. They found that as the proportion of time spent online Web surfing drops, the hours actually spent on the Web increases. They also found that broadband is being adopted by a broad cross-section of age, family composition, sex, and income, with penetration rates as high as 20-30% in some parts of the U.S. Also, once users have set up their broadband connection, they spend 27% more time online overall, average 37% more sessions a month, and view 17% more pages a month. In other words, as any NASCAR fan knows, it's all about speed.
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Posted 9:26 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Debate Goes on About Big, Flashy Ads

Vin Crosbie on online advertising.
Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal held a roundtable discussion about the future of online advertising. The participants were executives from CNET Networks and the Interactive Advertising Bureau, Gartner Research's online division, Silicon Alley Reporter, Slashdot, a rich-media technologies development company, and a major advertising agency. The transcript shows the debates about "breaking the user experience in order to get a sponsor's message across" versus being "full of Flash or rich media ads that make it nearly impossible to read the stories," or about whether or not consumers have agreed to a "social contract" involving acceptance of advertising in exchange for access to content, certainly haven't abated.

By the way, Gartner's executive noted the following changes after the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks on America: 545 new ads were posted to U.S. websites on Sept. 5 (a typical day of online-advertising activity), but by Sept. 17 that number had dwindled to 184; and that last April the number of new brands posting ads online to U.S. sites was 69 per day, but had decreased 41 per day after Sept. 11. Gartner predicts that the number of banners placed online will grow at only 4-5% for the next four years, although some of that small increase will be due to the larger advertising formats endorsed by the IAB earlier this year. (Note: The transcript is available online only to subscribers of the WSJ.com.)
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Tuesday, October 30, 2001

Posted 2:35 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Are Wireless Device Publishing Experiments Underway in the UK?

Vin Crosbie on wireless delivery of newspapers and magazines.
Several American newspapers had to abort pioneering experiments at delivering live editions to PDAs and other handheld devices this summer when bankrupt Metricom shut down its Richochet network. Though such wireless networks are taking root in the United Kingdom, I haven't seen wireless publishing experiments by periodicals there. Most UK wireless networks still use the WAP protocol, which can't deliver much more than live headlines. However, Bluetoothand 802.11b wireless LAN (WLAN) protocols are beginning to be built in the UK. Unlike WAP, either Bluetooth or 802.11b can deliver existing websites, HTML e-mail, or PDF-based editions live. For example, an urban wireless network based upon Bluetooth is being built in Manchester, where it's being installed in hotels, restaurants, and universities, and 70 other sites across that city. Have any UK newspapers or magazines begun experimenting with delivery through Bluetooth or 802.11b? If you know of any, please let me know so that I can report it.
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Posted 2:34 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Internet Ads May Be Effective – Except for Banners

Paul Grabowicz on online advertising
A new survey by Harris Interactive and Jupiter Media Metrix has found that companies using the Internet for advertising are generally pleased with the response they're getting, according to a Wall Street Journal story on the study. Highly targeted e-mail messages and pay-for-placement ads in search engine results are proving most effective, but there is much less satisfaction with the performance of banner ads.
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Posted 1:08 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

The Broadband Divide

Steve Klein on making high-speed access available
It has been six years since the U.S. government issued its first report on the digital divide, "Falling Through the Net: A Survey of the 'Have-Nots' in Rural and Urban America." Since then, the gap has narrowed — but it could widen again as a result of access to and the cost of broadband, Ann Grimes writes in the Wall Street Journal (requires subscription). Race, education, and location still determine who has access to and uses the Internet, writes Grimes. Minorities, the disabled, and rural residents still lag behind in their use of computers, as does much of the rest of the world.

Broadband will be the next challenge. Nationally, 12% of urban households have high-speed access, compared with 7% of rural households. "A lot of people may have rudimentary access," says Andy Carvin, senior associate at the Benton Foundation, "but if broadband is only available in more affluent households, that means it will divide the types of opportunity available to people — especially as a lot of the content being produced for the Internet is broadband-enabled." There's still plenty of time to deal with the broadband divide, of course, since high-speed access never seems to arrive as quickly as the experts predict.
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Posted 1:03 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Scandinavian Money Making

Katja Riefler on more discussions on paid content
The discussion on paid content goes on. Now every newspaper company here in Germany looks to Scandinavia. Two big papers just announced that they will switch to a paid content model on Jan. 1.: Aftonbladet, the most visited news site in Sweden, and Dagens Industri, that country's biggest financial paper. As the German financial newspaper Handelsblatt reported on Monday, 30 regional Swedish newspapers are supposed to follow the trend in springtime. The favorite method of payment seems to be by micro-payment, which is not very popular in Germany. But some newspapers have contracted with "Spacecoin," a company in Uppsala that sends a single invoice to registered users about all chargeable visits to websites of their customers.
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Posted 12:22 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

How to Deliver Bad News

Amy Gahran on business communications
The economy's down, and bad business news is commonplace. Then why are so many companies still screwing up when it comes to 'fessing up about business downturns and blunders? A recent Fast Company article offers clear-headed advice from marketing and technology consultant Chris Lochhead on how not to deliver bad business news. Lochhead lists 13 blunders in crisis communications, most of which I agree with — especially "Don't lie, mislead, and otherwise obfuscate." Right!!! See: "Beware of these Blunders." The article layout is a little confusing because the subheads imply positive rather than cautionary advice, but it's still well worth reading. For a longer exploration of these 13 missteps, see the pdf version on Lochhead's site. (Which is great, but why not put it in HTML format?)
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Posted 12:04 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Laid-Off Columnist Asks Readers to Pay Her

Steve Outing on an online solution to job loss
Columnist Donna Laframboise was laid off from the National Post of Canada in September. She still wants to be a columnist, but "given the politically-incorrect flavor of my work, few newspapers are likely to hire me." So she's devised an alternative. Via her website, she's asking readers who like and want to continue to see her work to pay a voluntary subscription fee directly to her, so she can keep writing her columns. She writes: "I need to decide whether to remain a journalist or to pursue another line of work. In theory, the Internet gives me a new option: online commentator." Laframboise is asking for readers to pay $10 or $15 per year, and if she raises enough to be the equivalent of Cdn $600 per column, she'll keep writing sans newspaper backer. (Her self-imposed deadline is to raise one-third of the money she feels is necessary to continue by Jan. 5.) Should the experiment not work, she says she'll abandon the project and give the money raised to charities (instead of sending out refunds, which would be too expensive). The fledgling online columnist will report the first results of her personal fund-raising campaign each Friday beginning on Nov. 9.
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Posted 11:35 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Charging for Streaming Content: Too Early?

Steve Outing on Yahoo!'s plans
Yahoo! announced yesterday that it would begin charging fees for some broadband video content by the end of the year. Examples might include streaming video of music concerts, conferences, food preparation demonstrations, etc. At the same time, it will give some video content away. (CNET's News.com reports.) This is a noble idea, but frankly it's too early to charge for such broadband content. Broadband penetration to the home is still insignificant, and telecommunications companies are slowing down on expanding broadband coverage because of the current dire economic conditions. The market will be ready for this when broadband is ubiquitous, and the content can be viewed at full-screen size and not today's postage-stamp online video format. Eventually, there should be a sizable market for paid video content delivered via the Web. But it's further in the future.
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Monday, October 29, 2001

Posted 7:33 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Inspiration for Online Journalists

Steve Outing on ONA presentation
Online News Association president Rich Jaroslovsky gave a brief but stirring speech at the group's annual conference in Berkeley, California, last Friday. Excerpt: "In the aftermath of Sept. 11, we've seen people come online for news in unprecedented numbers. We are now a major source of news and information for millions of people across the nation and around the world. More than that, we've begun to see where we fit in in the journalistic landscape: More timely than print, more in-depth than broadcast, more interactive than either. People expect more from us now. They aren't just intrigued by us — they NEED us." Online news professionals will want to read Jaroslovsky's words; they're inspiring at a time when the world of online journalism continues to trod through dark times. The transcript of his remarks is published on Poynter.org.
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Posted 2:22 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Stars Reach Out to Touch Someone

Steve Klein on online sports sites
The NHL Dallas Stars, through their website, have entered into an Internet-only sponsorship with AT&T that truly reaches out to touch someone, according to Art Garcia of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. According to Garcia, it is the first naming-rights deal in professional sports for a team's website. The Stars get revenue that "is estimated to be substantially more than traditional online deals." AT&T gains direct access to potential consumers within their target market through "sniffing technology," which detects the user's bandwidth. If the bandwidth is less than broadband, the user is offered the option of signing up for AT&T broadband. Also, fans can sign up for wireless alerts and updates of Stars games on their wireless phones.

"In a time when people are claiming that Internet dollars are drying up, we've both found a way to be creative without subsidizing the sponsorship with offline activity," said Bryan Perez, executive vice president of the Southwest Sports Group. The Stars were able to put the deal together because the rules for NHL online sponsorship are less restrictive than other professional leagues. Southwest Sports Group couldn't put together a similar deal with its other franchise, the Texas Rangers, because of the control MLB.com keeps over individual team sites.
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Posted 11:21 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

What the ONA Awards Tell Us

Rich Gordon on the top online news sites
The Online News Association's 2nd annual conference and awards ceremony (this year, in Berkeley, California) was a great place to be on Friday and Saturday. At a time when global news events and "business model challenges" have turned the focus away from the unique capabilities of interactive media, the conference celebrated innovative journalism that can only be delivered online. Among the highlights:

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Posted 12:25 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

Waging War Online

Andrew Stroehlein on Web war
The UK's Independent on Sunday newspaper reported on the way USA and UK intelligence services are cracking down on websites allegedly related to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network. Several Islamic charity sites that the authorities claim are fronts for terrorist operations were recently traced to the small town of Woodbridge in Suffolk, England, and arrests have been made of people associated with these sites. The sites in question are now offline, but according to the IoS, American intelligence sources say such websites are now "central to the efforts of Muslim fundamentalist groups not only bringing in funds but also being used to promote extremist opinions." The USA and UK intelligence communities have increased their surveillance of these websites and read e-mail traffic associated with them. Interestingly, however, the same intelligence services also are having to deal with hundreds of hackers who have been vandalizing Muslim sites since the Sept. 11 attacks.
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Sunday, October 28, 2001

Posted 1:41 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below

BBC, Slate Are the Big Winners

Steve Outing on Online Journalism Awards
Microsoft-backed webzine Slate and the website of the BBC won the top awards in this year's Online Journalism Awards, which were announced Friday night in Berkeley, California. Slate got the nod for "General Excellence in Online Journalism: Independent," while BBC got the comparable award for "Affiliated." The BBC additionally won in the Breaking News category (Concorde crash coverage), and Slate also won in Enterprise Journalism and in Commentary. This gives Slate bragging rights over archrival Salon.com, which didn't win any awards (though it was a finalist). I was happy to see that several winners were not household Web names, but rather small sites that have succeeded in producing solid journalism. Here's the full list of winners.
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