Time Inc. is working on launching Maghound.com, a Netflix-like site in which consumers pay a monthly fee and have the ability to jump from one title to another each month. Sounds like a pretty cool idea, but you probably have some questions, right? Me too. So I headed over to their site and was all excited to dig in and check it out.
The site looks like it's up and running, but it's not. It's just up. I tried to click on the "How it Works" and "Find Magazines" link, but nothing worked. I must say this is very disappointing. Time is a great company with a lot of smart people, but they totally missed on this one. How can you have journalists, bloggers and others getting people all excited about this new, innovative product and then crush that enthusiasm by offering a site that does nothing? True, Maghound is not launching until September, but if the folks at Maghound are walking writers through a presentation of the site, they have to have the site ready for traffic. I just kept clicking and clicking on the links because I could not believe that it didn't work.
I like the Maghound concept and according to their early testing, they are not cannibalizing their traditional audience. I'm sure the people at Time looked at Netflix and saw that consumers often pay the fee and then let their usage slide. It's like a gym membership. Free money waiting to be grabbed. Whether it's successful as a model for getting people to read more, diverse magazines is up in the air, but the potential to make some serious cash -- something sorely needed by print media companies -- is definitely there.
Time Dogs it With Maghound Site
Hot Web Searches: Are You Cool?
The great thing about the Google guys is not just that they have figured out a multitude of ways to organize the world's information. They've also figured out a way to make it fun -- and that cannot be discounted in the rise of Web 2.0. The latest Google tool to destroy your work day is Google Trends.
Trends allows you to track top search terms and see the arc of their search terms. For example, search for the Boston Red Sox (a Baron favorite), you see a huge spike, as expected, toward the end of 2004 when the team won its first World Series title in 86 years. You can also search for Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton and John McCain's name together to see how they relate. By far the best part is the Hot Trends section, which allows to see what the top searches are. It's basically a snapshot of whether you're cool and in the know or lame and out of the loop. I won't tell you where I fit in, but let's just say that I wasn't one of the people searching for the Vern Troyer sex tape today.
Rupert is Setting the Pace; The Others Would Be Wise to Follow
What's so great about Rupert Murdoch is that he sees opportunity where others don't. It also helps that he's a self-promoting windbag who likes to talk about himself. Murdoch has always said content is king, but he has been smart enough to hedge his bets with tech-based investments such as MySpace and Hulu. Those projects have given Murdoch a broad portfolio and an understanding that while he may still love newspapers, not everyone does. This article gives further insight into the man and his (occasional) madness.
And though he doesn't have much company as a forward-thinking businessman who understands the journalistic desires of the masses, he is not alone. Gannett, though far more buttoned-down than the Australian cowboy, has made some shrewd online investments in the last few years, including CareerBuilder. Almost as important, Gannett is constantly looking for ways to embed itself in the lives of its readers. (The investments don't always work, but at least they're trying.) Last week they invested in Cozi, a web service that helps families manage schedules and stay in contact.
The rest of the journalism world would be wise to follow this model. Sam Zell bought the L.A. Times, Chicago Tribune and Newsday. He proceeded to slash the budget and battle with the Times editors and then he decided to sell Newsday. That's all fine and dandy, but why he is planning to sell the Chicago Cubs (who were owned by Tribune Co.), I have no idea. Look around: Regional sports networks (such as YES and NESN) are all the rage. Hey, I'm sure Zell is a smart guy -- or maybe just a guy who likes to curse at his staff -- but he should be watching what the other big players are doing and following their lead.
Political Ads: The More Things Change...
We mostly focus on mainstream media outlets, but we pay attention to media in all its forms. That's why we're focusing on political commercials today, as the maker of the famous "Daisy" ad died. Aside from being frightening and crossing the line by miles, the ad -- which only ran once -- is generally viewed as transforming negative political ads forever.
The ad is below. Click and cringe.
How We Use the Web
This is a few days old -- it has been a busy week in Baronsville -- but it's an interesting profile of who actually makes up the blogosphere. (Thanks to The Big Lead for pointing us to this.) Among the more interesting stats listed here:
• 24% of adults watched TV online. We've talked about this before, but it's not the number as much as it is the growth. This number could have been counted on one hand two years ago.
• 49% of 25-41's use online auction sites. I'm not surprised at the popularity of eBay-like sites, but what's interesting is that only 30% of 13-24's use the same sites. Five years ago, when eBay was taking over the world and doing those great ads, you would have predicted a much higher number.
This survey is interesting, but incredibly general and some of the categories cover two vastly different user groups. Those who read message boards and those who post on them would seem to be very different groups, but they're lumped into one category. One more question: Does the first category ("Watching and Reading Content Created by Others") include MSM like The New York Times? That's a very vague category also.
Long Live The Long Tail of Cable Networks
We've never been big on snarky. Sure, we can be critical of people sometimes, but snarky? Not our style. We spend most of our posts giving our take on things happening in the media and techosphere. We criticize angles or points, but rarely do we take on an entire article for being off base.
Why did I feel the need to disclaim? Because today, we take The New York Times to task. As we've mentioned, we eagerly await their advertising and media coverage each Monday, but lately, the coverage has been rather lackluster. Exhibit A is this article on cable vs. network TV. This is a topic that has The Baron fascinated so you can imagine we get uber-disappointed when the story flops. And this one did. The first third of the article discusses Kimbo Slice, who made his mixed martial arts debut nearly 10 days ago and was widely panned as being a one-trick Internet pony. OK, I guess leading with something that hasn't been water cooler conversation in more than a week isn't terrible, but it's not the best start either.
My main problem with the story is that it would have been more effective if it had been written in 1993. The author goes on and on about how cable has long been disrespected and is rarely seen as having top-notch programming. Let me tell you this: That perception is so hopelessly out of date, the guy might as well have been talking about what it would be like if we ever landed on the moon. More people watch cable in primetime than network TV, TV news is an absolute joke (which the author correctly points out) and there have been several successful cable shows over the last several years. There's a reason CBS wanted to put Dexter on broadcast TV.
Cable is not king. It does not bring in broadcast-like ratings, but no one views it as the poor step-child. If anything, cable is a great testing ground that has pushed the broadcast networks to take more chances and in the end, improve their own programming. Long live the long tail.
Hyperlocal May Be All Hype
Some concepts take off in mind long before they do so in reality. Mobile advertising is going to take off this year (ongoing since 2006). Everyone with a DVR is skipping through ads. Newspapers need to go hyperlocal with their coverage. The last one is particularly interesting because it is the buzz concept in journalism these days. Since consumers now have access to the nearly any paper, broadcast clip around the globe, the thought for several years has been that hyperlocal news coverage could save community journalism.
If this story on The Washington Post's hyperlocal online endeavor is any indication, hyperlocal coverage may be a lot of hype and not much else. Apparently, The Post put a lot of resources into the project and a year later, it has yet to make a splash. The Baron, in general, dislikes generalizations, so I don't want to paint with too broad a stroke here, but it may be that this type of hyperlocal coverage works in small towns and not in large cities (the story has some evidence to that) or that hyperlocal coverage works only in certain parts of the country. Not enough has been done yet to figure that out.
That said -- and this is speaking as someone who worked for a small-town paper -- I can only see Mr. Wilson painting his fence so many times before I go insane. The hyperlocal movement has to be about more than what people do. It has to revolve around the issues that are important to that community, and when it's done well, that is usually how things work. I just had to make sure to get that warning out there. I saw so many snow-shoveling pictures when I worked in Smalltownsville, I almost developed a rash every time I saw rock salt.
Who Likes Big Cable? No One.
We love the DirecTV ad mocking big cable. You know, the one where the fictional cable company decides to raise prices because it determines that people have disposable income. I love the line that goes something like, "I learned that in business school ... when I read about business school in a book."
With that in mind, today's post ... So much for unlimited broadband access. Time Warner Cable is testing a plan to limit the amount of downloads before users -- already paying a monthly fee of at least $29.95 -- get charged extra. Not surprising, but the bloggers plain don't like this move. Nothing goes over worse in bad economic times than cable companies trying to raise prices. People already dislike the cable companies -- we wrote about this in our last post.
If this is rolled out widely, Time Warner may come to regret this move. Verizon and other telcos have plans to move in on the cable world and finally deliver some level of choice beyond satellite. This lack of unlimited service could be a real differentiator for Verizon in the marketplace. Look, it's just not a good idea to give consumers something and then abruptly take it away. That's why the DVR has not yet been overthrown by networks and advertisers. It got out there too quickly and now they need to figure out a way to solve the problem (free on-demand content with no fast-forwarding, for example) other than simply taking it away.
