|
Posted 7:48 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Net Radio Is Dead: A Victim of Greed
Steve Outing on the Library of Congress decision
I was thinking about what to say here about the awful decision by the Librarian of Congress to set royalty rates for music use by Internet radio stations — then I saw Dan Gillmor's item in his eJournal weblog for SiliconValley.com. He said it perfectly, and I share Gillmor's sentiment: "... It's another victory for the greed-mongers who control popular music in America, and the hell with the rest of us. To claim this is anything but a disaster for a medium that had promised to provide an alternative to the absolute garbage on today's commercial radio is to deny reality. Cutting in half a royalty rate that would put Internet radio stations out of business immediately only means they'll go out of business slightly less quickly. So, another charade in Washington has turned in favor of entrenched interests. ..."
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 7:31 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
INT Buys Jupiter's Last Assets
Vin Crosbie on fall of the once mighty
For the paltry sum of $250,000, Jupiter Media Metrix (NASDAQ ticker symbol JMXI) today announced the sale of what are basically Jupiter's last remaining assets. The buyer is technology publisher and conference organizer INT Media Group (NASDAQ ticker symbol: INTM). The sale, already approved by Jupiter's board, is expected to close by the end of July, and is subject to the approval of Jupiter company shareholders. About 95 Jupiter employees will join INT and Jupiter will operate as its own division within INT. INT may even consider changing its name to Jupiter or some variation of it, reports Silicon Alley Reporter. Earlier this month, Jupiter sold its Media Metrix audience measurement service to ComScore Networks Inc. for $1.5 million, and last month sold its European measurement service to rival NetRatings Inc. for $2 million. (Disclosure: I write a column for INT's ClickZ.com in exchange for an honorarium.)
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 3:10 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
The NetMedia Finalists
Steve Outing on online media competition
NetMedia has announced its list of finalists for the 2002 European Online Journalism Awards. According to organizer Milverton Wallace, this year's contest attracted 785 entries (double that of last year) from journalists in 24 European countries. Prizes will be presented in 17 categories at a ceremony in London on July 4.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 2:50 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
The Power of a Bunch of People Griping
Steve Outing on the deep-linking controversy
National Public Radio has come under fire in recent days from many people (including me) for its policy of prohibiting deep linking by other websites to its Web content without written permission. The criticism and discussion were loud and vehement enough that NPR posted an update to its linking policy today. It says: "NPR also recognizes that the majority of the linking on the Web is not infringement. We are working on a solution that we believe will better match the expectations of the Web community with the interests of NPR. We will post revisions soon at www.npr.org."
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 11:00 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Reaching the Unreached: Marrying the Internet With Radio
Madan Rao on the world digital divide
An innovative approach to help bridge the digital divide has emerged in Nepal — via Radio Sagarmata's special segment on "radio Internet browsing." Only about 40% of the adult population in Nepal is literate, and teledensity (installed telephone service) is barely 1% — but radio has a very large reach. "During our radio program, we would select any topic, like world heritage sites, and take the listeners through the browsing process. In between, we explained about search engines, Web browsers, and other technical terminology. The program proved popular, and now is broadcast 30 minutes every week," according to Gaurab Raj Upadhaya, who spoke at the recent INET 2002 conference of the Internet Society in Washington, D.C.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 6:13 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
New GMs at Knight Ridder Websites
Steve Outing on changing strategies
Hilary Schneider's presence as the new CEO of Knight Ridder Digital is starting to be felt. Today KRD announced the appointments, effective July 1, of several new general managers (a new position) at some of Knight Ridder's largest newspaper Internet operations. New GMs are: Fred Mann in Philadelphia; Kim Marcille in Miami; Dan Peak in Kansas City; Regan Senkarik in San Jose; Dick Van Halsema in Charlotte, North Carolina; and Craig Diebel in Fort Worth, Texas. GMs are still to be named in Akron, Ohio; Contra Costa, California; and St. Paul, Minnesota. The new GMs will report to various VPs at KRD in San Jose.The change will give more control over local KR websites to executives at the papers. Earlier in the year (before Schneider's arrival), KRD instituted a site-wide redesign and implemented a new content management system — resulting in most of the KR websites looking alike. That generated much criticism and anguish from Internet managers at KR's papers. Today's move looks like an effort to extend more local control out to the newspapers — at least the largers ones.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 3:00 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Update on E-Paper
Vin Crosbie on coming technologies
Shoppers in a Macy's department store might mistake its display signs as having been printed, but the signs are actually electronic paper, among the first commercial usages of material that should revolutionize the online publishing industry by the end of this decade. The 11- by 14-inch electronic paper sheets consume so little power that three AAA batteries could run one for more than a year, and its display is changed and updated wirelessly. Business Week reports on the commercial status of electronic paper displays developed by competitors Gyricon Media and E-Ink and backed by companies such as Philips, Motorola, Lucent, Eastman Kodak, Hearst, and Gannett.The publishers' interest is obvious. Imagine your laptop PC and its keyboard changed into a sheaf of flexible e-paper that wirelessly receives full editions of periodicals (in Adobe Acrobat or Microsoft Reader formats with screenmapped hyperlinking); that can display a touch-sensitive keyboard; that you simply roll up around its tiny battery/CPU/receiver cylinder and slip into your pocket or purse when done; and that lasts several weeks on a charge. The hardware manufacturers are interested in e-paper because it consumes 100 to 1,000 times less power than the LCD displays used on today's portable computers and cell phones, extending battery life by magnitudes. Philips plans to sell the first personal digital assistants using e-paper early next year. E-Ink plans to sell larger e-paper sheets for consumer devices in 2004 or 2005.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 12:48 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
There's a Word for It: Stupid
Steve Outing on deep linking, again
Yet another big media organization wants to prohibit "deep linking" — allowing others to put links on websites to content other than the media site's home page. This time it's National Public Radio, which has a policy on its website stating: "Linking to or framing of any material on this site without the prior written consent of NPR is prohibited." Anyone can get permission to link by filling out a form and providing NPR with information. As Wired News reports, this is not a new policy, but a bunch of webloggers just noticed it and started to make a stink.Prohibiting deep linking is, in my opinion, an incredibly stupid policy. If you're going to publish material that you let people read freely on the Web, then allowing links to any of your content is part and parcel of being a free Web publisher. If you don't want people to link, putting up legal notices "prohibiting" it is (there's no other way to say it but to be blunt) stupid. If for whatever reason a publisher decides it doesn't want to allow deep linking, then the logical solution is to use technical means to block referred requests for "inside" content and redirect the traffic to the home page. That's a dumb strategy as well, in my book, but not nearly as bad as posting legal notices that most people who want to link will ignore and that will create a public relations nightmare.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 12:22 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Earthquake in South America
Juan C. Camus on news coverage
An earthquake can change everything in just seconds. Chileans know that very well, as they live in a seismic country, but in Argentina it is very unusual to have the earth move. That difference was echoed in the way that newspaper websites covered the earthquake this Monday that affected both capital cities. In Buenos Aires, it was the first quake in five years, and La Nación and Clarin reported with photos and lots of features. In Santiago, there were just plain pages at La Tercera and El Mercurio. Also in Chile you can see how often the earth is vibrating, at an educational seismic service.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 8:51 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Quoting: Was It Fair?
Peter M. Zollman on AJC, OJR, and the Merrill Brown interview
As reported earlier in this weblog, Staci Kramer scored a solid interview with outgoing MSNBC editor-in-chief Merrill Brown for Online Journalism Review the other day. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution quoted from it extensively in a short article bylined by Matt Kempner, its media writer. (MSNBC competes with CNN; thus the connection.) The article was heavily based on Kramer's interview, and attributed twice. I'd link to it here, but OJR convinced the newspaper to take it down from AJC.com.OJR editor Larry Pryor felt that the AJC and AJC.com had ripped off the OJR interview. (The Kramer piece ran for two loooong Web pages; the AJC's article was just a few paragraphs, but was built almost exclusively from the interview with a wee bit of background thrown in.) But would OJR have been better off asking AJC.com to link to its original article? Especially a deep link? Or was it a rip-off? Should the article have been pulled off AJC.com? And what about the Kempner byline in the print AJC on such an unoriginal rewrite, one based essentially on someone else's work?
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 6:15 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Despite Good PR, Salon Continues to Sink
Vin Crosbie on Web content
Salon today announced that it lost 76% less money and that subscription sales generated 41% of its gross revenues last quarter. Unfortunately, its gross revenues from both advertising sales and subscriptions were a mere $951,000 last quarter, and its annual revenues during the past four quarters had declined to $3.6 million from $7.2 million during the previous year. Salon says it has 3.6 million monthly readers, of whom 39,500 are paying $30 annual subscriptions for access. In other words, only 1.1% of Salon's readers have agreed to pay to read its content. Many media companies are valued according to multiples of their gross revenues. Salon's situation has declined into the inverse: all of Salon's outstanding shares are actually worth less than the company's already-thin revenues. Salon Media Group's stock (ticker symbol: SALNC) was trading today on the NASDAQ Small Capital exchange for $0.10 per share, down from $0.65 in September and an initial public offering price of $10.00 in 1999. At the current price, Salon's market capitalization value is only $1.4 million, equal to about 19 weeks of Salon's gross revenues.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 5:17 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
The E-envelope, Please
Steve Outing on the Webbies
The Webby Awards were handed out last night. (List of winners.) In the news/journalism/media-related categories, the winners were: BBC News Online (News); WashingtonPost.com OnPolitics (Politics; "People's Voice" winner, not first prize); Salon (Print + Zines); BBC Radio4 (Radio); and ESPN.com (Sports). It's always useful to pore over the list of Webby winners to get ideas for your own site(s).Definitely some interesting stuff. My favorite: LegoDeath, obviously created by talented Web designers with too much time on their hands.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 3:25 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
What Are People Asking Google?
Vin Crosbie on Internet information usage
Americans want to know about the U.S. Open, interactive Fathers Day cards, and the ominous geopolitical term "counterstrike." Germans are more concerned with Muttertag (Mothers Day), the city of Karlsruhe, and the film Star Wars. Spaniards also are querying about that movie, plus about their reality TV program, Gran Hermano (Big Brother), and SMS messaging. The French are asking about their own reality TV show (Loft Story), plus about Britney Spears. Britons, perhaps worried about their match with Brazil later this week, are querying about the World Cup, their star player, David Beckham, and about their domestic team, Arsenal. And people worldwide are becoming much more curious about Natalie Portman than about Kirsten Dunst.Am I reporting results of some global survey? No, not what surveyors are asking people, but what people themselves are asking Google. Those are some of the most popular search subjects by country, as reported in Google's Zeitgeist. Operated by Google's press office, the Zeitgeist Web page also shows what query subjects are ascending or descending, plus a variety of other information and also queries from previous weeks and months.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 2:10 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Bye-bye, TV News; Website Can Stay
Steve Outing on news industry trends
My Poynter colleague Al Tompkins points out a surprising recent news item. Here's Al: "You may have heard, WPXT-TV in Portland, Maine, has shuttered its news department. But GET THIS. The WB station's website, OurMaine.com, will remain open. How's THAT for a strange reversal?" Local TV stations closing down news departments is a current trend — though not yet a major one.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 11:46 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Fabric of Web Vision
Carla Passino on the National Gallery's rich media microsite
While news sites, constrained by ever-shrinking budgets, are struggling to exploit the Web's rich media potential, British museums and art galleries have taken huge step in this direction. First came the Imperial War Museum, whose excellent online exhibitions feature sound clips alongside photographs and text. Now the National Gallery has launched a companion microsite to its newly opened Fabric of Vision exhibition, which offers audio comments to some of the most interesting paintings on display. I would be very interested to find out whether the use of rich media is having a positive impact on ticket sales.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 11:29 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
You Can Be Successful – Why Aren't You?
Katja Riefler on local media convergence
Convergence is still a buzz word, at least when you talk to newspaper publishers, as the recent Congress of the World Newspaper Association in Bruges, Belgium, has shown. Recent data from The Media Audit now seem to prove that convergence between local TV stations and newspapers really could work: the TV-affiliated sites with the largest local-market reach are produced in conjunction with newspapers. (See Media Life Magazine for details.) Media Audit examined a total of 474 television station websites in 85 metropolitan markets. More than half, 273 of them, attract fewer than 4% of the adults in their markets. Just 55 sites bring in more than 10%. The two most effective "converged" sites seem to be MySanAntonio.com (27%) and Oklahoma City's NewsOK.com (24%).But convergence doesn't attract all publishers. According to Canada.com, smaller newspaper groups are leaving convergence to the bigger chains that have enough money to create print-broadcast combinations. And Media Life is still skeptical that the financial side will work for both parties.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:43 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Content Only Possible on the Web
Steve Outing on interactive media
One of my favorite topics is content presentation and storytelling techniques that are unique to the online medium. I'm writing a series of articles on this topic for Poynter.org. (The first is on "immersive" content.) Here's another good resource if you're interested in this topic. Michelle Nicolosi of Online Journalism Review, and an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California, has produced the page, "StoryTelling Online: Just few of the many fine things you can do on the Web that you can't do with paper, radio, and TV." Nicolosi's page includes lots of great examples. It's worth a look. (I will quibble slightly with the title of this page. Most of these examples also would be possible on interactive TV — not that we have that yet in a serious form, but someday. ...)
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:26 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Whither Online City Guides?
Steve Outing on online publishing trends
Writing for Online Journalism Review, J.D. Lasica has produced a new look at online city guides. Remember city guides? They were so hot for a while, back in the heyday of Microsoft's "Sidewalk" network of city sites (dead), CitySearch (alive but changed), and AOL Digital Cities (now AOL Local). Major media companies like Knight Ridder and Cox are still trying to make a go of city guide networks, but those companies' strategies recently saw abrupt changes. Cox Interactive, which operates the Cox city sites, was folded back into its parent company. KR is changing its strategy away from having its biggest newspapers emphasize city.com sites (the Real Cities network) instead of their online news services. No one's yet found a way for online city guides to make serious money — though I believe that as Internet usage becomes even more ubiquitous, the concept will become viable.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 7:59 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Huddling Together to Stay Warm
Norbert Specker on online advertising
NYTimes.com, CBS MarketWatch.com, Weather.com, USAToday.com, and CNET have launched the "At Work Brand Network," signing AT&T Wireless as their first advertiser. (Here's a report.) The consortium of sites claims that it reaches 43% of the total online work audience and is selling advertising across its online media properties. It's part of a continuous industry-wide trend of huddling together ever more closely to keep out the cold.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 7:50 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
We Need a Good War Blog
Steve Outing on weblogs
Lost Remote's Cory Bergman thinks (as do I) that more journalists should have their own weblogs. Big media companies are slowly starting to catch on to the weblog craze, but they still don't take full advantage of the potential. Wouldn't it be great, Bergman suggests in his weekly essay, if a war correspondent like Christiane Amanpour of CNN produced a personal weblog containing her thoughts and observations about and tidbits from her daily reporting? Yes, it would be a fantastic idea that would go far to humanize Amanpour and let people get to know her better, and experience more of what she sees in her role as war correspondent. This would be simple for someone like Amanpour to do — she calls in to the home office and leaves a voicemail with a short item, which a staffer then publishes to the weblog. And it would spark more interest in Amanpour's TV work, as weblog fans sought out her televised reports.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 1:49 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Music and the Copyright Debate
Rich Gordon on the impact of music downloading
An interesting interview on Salon.com with Stan Liebowitz, a professor of managerial economics at the University of Texas. He has been studying the music industry and brings some much-needed perspective to the debate over the degree to which digital downloads threaten content industries. A few months ago, the Cato Institute released a paper by Liebowitz that predicted that downloaded music would significantly reduce music industry revenues. But now he's having second thoughts, because of two salient facts: (1) there is 10 times as much music downloaded as purchased on CD; (2) CD sales don't seem to be affected. He wonders if these patterns will hold once more people have home CD burners, but he is beginning to think that most people won't take the time to burn their own CDs and, as he puts it, "They like holding these things (CDs)." He notes that the movie industry initially resisted cut-rate prices for videotapes, thinking that people wouldn't want to buy them — and now video sales revenues exceed box office receipts. Whatever kind of content you're interested in, if you want people to pay for it, it makes sense to keep an eye on the music industry — and on Liebowitz's writings.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 9:02 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Audience That Matters
Juan C. Camus on website and print edition relationships
A new way to use audience tracking numbers from a newspaper website is in practice at Las Ultimas Noticias. The Chilean tabloid is using the online numbers to help choose what stories will get more room in the print edition the next day. According to Andrea Fuentes, a journalist who took part in a seminar for digital journalists in Santiago, Chile, this last Friday, those numbers are used by print section editors in round-up meetings to plan the next day's edition of the newspaper. So, every day they get an idea about what stories will have the largest audience. She explained that it helped to focus the newspaper, which has mostly put magazine news on its front page since the system was implemented.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 8:50 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Biting Your Nose to Spite Your Face
Steve Klein on online journalism
When it comes to guild contract negotiations, I guess you gotta do what you gotta. do. Washington Post reporters have tried withholding bylines in their current spat with management; there's nothing new about that. But withholding stories from the newspaper's website? Now that bites. In a bylined story by Frank Ahrens in the Post over the weekend, he writes that "newsroom union leaders have asked reporters to stop writing for the paper's prize-winning website, Washingtonpost.com, until further notice."The Post automatically posts all of its stories on the paper's website. But in a hard-earned evolution, important news events are reported by Post staffers during the day for the site. They "are not paid extra for these stories and can decline to file them, though they rarely do," according to Ahrens. Is it working? Writes Ahrens: "On Thursday, the first day of the tactic, about 18 extra staff stories were filed for the Post's website. Three reporters declined to file stories when asked and three others filed but withheld their bylines, as requested by the Guild. (Friday), 14 stories were filed to the website and none withheld. Two reporters filed without bylines." Management's reaction: "It is irresponsible because it could diminish our ability to deliver journalism in the way we have done over the last two to three years," said Steve Coll, the Post's managing editor. "Withholding work from the paper's website could put (the Post's) core mission in jeopardy."
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 4:56 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
I'll Tell You My Secret ...
Steve Outing on a hot Web idea
Every once in a while I hear about a website with a concept that I think is simple yet brilliant. This one is called ConfideInMe.com, and it does nothing more than provide a venue where people can share their secrets. It's a fascinating read, and I dare you to visit the site link and not waste at least a few minutes. (You've been warned.) I'll also warn you that some of the secrets — but certainly not all — are graphically sexual, so don't click if you're squeamish.Why do I like this so much? Because it's another great example of the power of user-generated content. I'm convinced that this site will grow to have a huge audience, and it should attract significant advertising interest. Meanwhile, the site itself takes nothing more than setting up a database and letting it run, and having an editor to screen each day's submissions. Low costs, high revenue potential.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 1:35 PM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Dutch Newspapers Outsource Rather Than Close Sites
Vin Crosbie on international online publishing
When PCM Uitgevers, owner of four of the five national Dutch newspapers, six months ago announced that it was terminating online editions due to insufficient online revenues, the newspapers' editorial boards protested. PCM insisted that the newspaper websites were merely marketing efforts. Editors countered that the sites were necessary to serve young people who don't read newsprint editions. PCM ultimately compromised, this month agreeing to outsource online publication of such newspapers as De Volkskrant, NRC Handelsblad, Algemeen Dagblad, Trouw, and the Amsterdam regional newspaper Het Parool. It signed a contract with PinkRoccade, an Internet company that will assume hosting, operation, management, and webmastering of those sites. PinkRoccade also will hire six employees from PCM Interactive Media.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:58 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Covering the Cup Coverage
Norbert Specker on online sports content
Further articles covering the World Cup online coverage: Online Journalism Review, The Guardian, and Neue Zürcher Zeitung (German). (Please do point me to further articles in any language and send me links. This is very much appreciated.)
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:47 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Selling Infographics Online
Katja Riefler on e-commerce reaching the wire services
As Eva Domínguez mentions in the item below this, infographics are getting more and more important online. The German Globus Infografik GmbH, a subsidiary of the news agency dpa, has just started selling still and animated infographics for both print and online clients on the Internet. Unfortunately, you can only see thumbnails unless you are a registered customer — but this is quite easy, and registration and usage is not restricted to media companies. Reuters in Germany also lets you download graphics through the Internet and AFP generates animated Flash graphics for use on the Internet. But in regard to accessibility you really can't compare those services.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:24 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Scoring Goals With Flash
Eva Domínguez on animated graphics for the World Cup
Spanish supporters can't get enough of watching goals of yesterday's match against Ireland. On the Internet they can be seen at any time and in a different way: with animated graphics. El Mundo, El País, and the sports newspaper Marca have been the fastest and most prolific in showing with Flash how the goals were scored. Infographics showcases have become a must in any special coverage by online media in Spain. The World Cup is taking a great multimedia effort.
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
Posted 10:14 AM US Eastern Time | perma-link to item below
Ha-ha, Free Online Content, Ha-ha
Steve Outing on cartoon view of Web content
Today's Zits comic strip is a good one. (Here it is on SFGate.com. This link will only be good today, June 17.)
[ Discuss THIS item | See ALL Tidbits discussions ]
|