We usually spend time discussing new gadgets or the latest online or mobile usage trend, but today, we're going to kick it old school. One of The Baron's great pleasures in life is reading the work of Gary Smith. Smith has worked for Sports Illustrated for the last 25 years and is one of the greatest writers of his generation. I know what you're thinking. He's just a sports writer. Well, he is a sports writer, but he's so much more than that. If you don't believe us, check out this review from The New York Times. In case you're too lazy to click over, they refer to him as "the most decorated journalist you’ve probably never heard of."
Smith, who has won four National Magazine Awards, just released a new book, Going Deep: 20 Classic Sports Stories. In it, he compiles his 20 favorite stories. I don't know which of his stories are in there -- other than a few listed in the above link. My personal favorite? The story about the black basketball coach who broke down barriers in a Mennonite community in Ohio. If you have the next 45 minutes free, you can read it here. Enjoy.
Gary Smith: One of the Great Writers of His Generation
Newspapers Spar with AP over Rates, Coverage
First, let me say welcome to our friends at PoliticizeMatters. The blogosphere is a better place with you in it. Now, on with the show.
The Newark-Star Ledger today published an edition without any content from the Associated Press. There is some question as to whether this is a protest of new AP rates or simply a way to save some cash and see if any readers complain. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune recently told the AP that it will cancel its AP contract in 2010. In that case, the move was financially motivated. Interesting.
While newspapers have gone hyperlocal with their coverage, I always thought the AP model worked because papers could get a huge wealth of stories for a minimal fee. Maybe the fee isn't as minimal as I expected, though it's still cheaper than hiring large-scale staff. The rates themselves are based on what type of coverage the paper uses (breaking news, international, national, etc.). Ultimately, the AP needs these member papers as much as they need the AP, so I'm sure if several papers move to this model, then the AP will be forced to adjust its pricing structure.
The problem would be if the papers just decide to go with local and breaking news coverage. People already look only at the headlines -- if that -- as witnessed by the McCain campaign's effective headline-grabbing strategy. No one cares that McCain used the "lipstick on a pig" line to Hillary. They just know that McCain's people screamed about it when Obama used it on their campaign. This is a problem. Overall, we are no longer a society well-educated on the issues. We just know who we like and who we don't. That's what informs our decisions.
Certainly, if this no-AP policy were to come to fruition, people could go online and find out international news and major national stories and they can watch on TV, but I would argue that there is already a lack of awareness of what's happening in the world and in this global economy, America can't afford that.
Web-Only Series Only a Dream at This Point
One of the few places the web has not taken over is in producing original video content intended for large audiences. There have been no real web series of note at this point despite the hoards of folks who now watch TV shows online. Mike Hale had an article on this in yesterday's New York Times. Hale lists off some current web series and explains where they are lacking.
A few things to keep in mind here: The web's fragmented landscape could mean that it's difficult to gain a large audience. In addition, the strength of the web is its ability to allow anyone to create content. If you can't pull in the large audience, it may not be worthwhile to create high-quality content -- particularly when several quick entertaining clips were created by 100 other users. The only way to effectively distribute these series is through established studios and networks which have the money to produce a quality series, but if significant ad dollars aren't there -- and why would they be if the large audience isn't there? -- then it's going to be a struggle to get web-only series off the ground.
That said, as a laboratory for content, nothing beats what the web provides. The viral nature of content still gives young writers and creators a chance to produce something worthwhile of mass attention. It will be a while, however, before we see a breakthrough web-only series.
This Beam is Not Balanced
On the way back from a European vacation -- loved that movie -- with the Baroness, I was reading the International Herald Tribune when I came across a column from The Boston Globe's Alex Beam. I know nothing about Beam, but the column caught my eye because it was about Twitter, the social networking site on which a friend can send you updates on how the haircut is going. Basically it's a site to let people know what's up.
I doubt Twitter has much staying power, but I'm certainly no final authority on the subject. Let the Twitter folks do what they want. Beam took a decidedly less moderate stance, blasting the site and those who use it, including Barack Obama and the State of Rhode Island. Why does old media have to seem so old all the time? Clearly, Beam decided it would be amusing to write a column in short bursts like the copy used on Twitter, but what is the columnist's point? I have no idea. I may not be the smartest guy in the room, but if I can't figure out the point of the column, Beam is in trouble. Being a columnist at a major metro daily used to carry such weight, but it just doesn't anymore -- except maybe at The New York Times. There's too much great content out there in so many places that people like Beam have become less relevant and let's be honest, it shows in the work.
We Like the Web, But That May Not Be a Good Thing
This just in: People like the Internet. Yup.
The latest evidence comes from a few places. In the news category we find that newspapers are reporting a 12% growth in online readership, amounting to a truly stunning 40% of all Interweb users. In the entertainment realm, a new survey claims that 20% of "TV" viewers are now watching shows online. The last number is certainly surprising, but what would be more interesting to see is whether people watch more TV than they did previously because they're watching online. DVRs have caused people to watch more, and overall media consumption keeps going up. The article alludes to some of that, but it doesn't address it head on. I would be shocked to find that people are replacing TV with online viewing and not just adding to their existing viewing habits.
This article actually brings up a larger issue. I searched for the survey results or some article not written by a wire service. Impossible. I got to the website for IMMI, the survey company, and everything they give for free (the deeper dive will cost you) was included in the wire service story. Is anyone actually reading/ordering the survey or are we content to read the executive summary and just post it everywhere? I don't even know if there are TV reporters working at newspapers anymore. If there are, they're either busy packing their belongings into a cardboard box or they have no idea how to use the Internet and they're still using AOL mail.
The problem in journalism these days is that there is no money or time to bring someone in to do analysis. Seemingly, it's the one industry where the amount of analysis and deep thinking has decreased over the last decade. Hopefully, some reporter out there will get ahold of the survey and educate the rest of us. No offense to the folks at wire services -- they do great work -- but their system is not built for enterprise work.
Somehow MSNBC Ranks at Top of News Sites
Nielsen is out with data on the top news sites on the web. A lot of what you would expect: The Huffington Post had the biggest gains since last year percentage-wise, Google and Yahoo are near the top of the list, etc. One of the most surprising revelations, though, is that the MSNBC Digital Network is the top news site. Maybe I'm biased because I don't see their promos during The Today Show (not a fan). How can they be the news destination on the web? I assume this has something to do with MSN Mail, particularly since Yahoo is right behind them, but it's surprising that MSN beat out Yahoo.
E-mail must be driving that train, which is why it's a bit surprising to see Google News behind some of the newspaper sites. Also surprising is that The New York Daily News' traffic is up 109%. They must have poached some of The New York Post's writers.
If these traffic figures could somehow translate into ad dollars, all would be right with the world, but that's not the case. The Baron believes that the ad dollars will be there eventually, though things could get worse in the news business before they get better. The New York Times is a great brand -- something Rupert understood about The Wall Street Journal -- and a great news organization. There's no reason to think it can't succeed online. It just may have to cut back -- or, gulp, give up -- the print edition. Maybe they should just start nytimes mail.
Changing the Online Newspaper Model
While we were enjoying a lovely 4th out in the wilderness with the family, we spied an insightful take on modern journalism from Timothy Egan (a favorite of The Baron's brother, if that matters at all). Writing for one of The New York Times blogs -- oh, the irony -- Egan points out that as newspapers reach more and more readers online, they continue to slash jobs. While he seems to veer off topic a bit at the end of the blog post, Egan's point is a good one.
So how do newspapers make money when online ad revenue is so puny compared to print ad revenue? One way is to get past the homepage model. The homepage should be a vehicle to the major stories a paper has to offer. Most papers, though -- and the Times is particularly guilty of this -- cram as much as they can on the homepage because they know readers won't go particularly deep. I think they need to change that model and flesh out the main stories ever more deeply with extra analysis and other content, while using the homepage as a gateway to the rest of the paper. Streamline the sites and make the content easily accessible through search and menus. That would offer a chance for readers to get deeper into the site, spend more time there and see more ads, mimicking the print experience. Of course, RSS feeds bypass this solution, but those are still only very popular with the tech savvy crowd.
Another problem -- and this is constantly being debated -- is what determines online engagement. Egan quotes a Nielsen stat about visitors, but visitors are no longer viewed as the default measurement in the digital research world. Folks there also focus on page views, time spent on the site and page views per visit. If newspaper sites looked at this information and created some sort of combined rating, they could determine how their sites are being used and they could optimize for that. It's a lot easier to say than to do, but there are a lot of people who care about this -- just look at how many comments his post received -- and the print industry should look for creative solutions from passionate readers, shareholders and staff members.
Time Dogs it With Maghound Site
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.
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.
Cable Companies Unhappy about Online Streams
Cable is one of the few monopolies left (largely because satellite hasn't yet figured out a way to keep your TV going in a rain storm), and the providers continually offer sub par service at an ever-increasing price. So The Baron wasn't shedding any tears for the cable companies when it was announced that some cable shows -- like those on Comedy Central -- would start to stream complete shows online on the same day. Obviously, cable is unhappy because it takes away from the exclusivity of their product so they don't want to pay as much.
You know what? Now you know how everyone else feels. The average cable home gets about 110 channels and watches about 15, but we still have to pay for all of them and the bill still seems to go up more often than any other household bill. Why? Because there's no competition. Maybe this will level the playing field a bit. I doubt it will make much difference in the grand scheme of things, but I do enjoy watching them squirm a bit. Is that a bit schadenfreude-ish? Yup, but the cable companies don't care at all about customer satisfaction or customer experience. Now that this has happened and, far more important, the telephone companies are getting into cable, we could see some real change -- in about 5 years.
Going Mobile: Web Use Differs Depending on Access Point
Though I gave myself the title of Baron, I certainly don't think I know everything about technology usage and media usage, but I do know a bit. That wisdom is what I try to impart here. That said, it seems completely obvious to me (and I would hope to you too, loyal reader) that the PC web experience and the mobile web are very different. Apparently, based on the tone of this BusinessWeek article, it's not that obvious.
Is it such a surprise that people don't want to set up blogs on social network sites via their mobile devices? Until the iPhone, most mobile devices delivered a poor browsing experience that could not handle high-level activities. Is it a surprise to learn that people use their mobile time on weather forecasts and airline information? Without sounding too snooty (too late), the answer is no. I have done some work in the mobile space so maybe I'm biased, but the underlying theme -- that mobile is used for convenience and shorter sessions while PCs are used for more in-depth functions -- just seems very basic.
One thing to keep in mind regarding this research: early adopters almost always use new technologies differently than the masses. (That's what happened with DVRs and ad avoidance habits.) The iPhone, which has raised consumer awareness about the mobile web, has given rise to smartphones that deliver a true web experience, but current mobile web users -- about 30 million people in the U.S. -- probably won't predict the pattern for the rest of us.
Hop into The TimesMachine
The great thing about the Web is its ability to make mass amounts of information easily accessible. Hell, Google built an empire on that principle alone. The latest addition is the cleverly named TimesMachine, the archive from The New York Times that allows users to see the paper and read articles from 1851-1922. (The dates cover the public domain archive of the Times. This blog post explains the process of how TimesMachine came to be, but it doesn't tell you if/when they might put more recent content online.)
The user interface is very well designed and easy to use. There are a few small nitpicks I have, but none seriously affect performance or usage. The first is the inability to click on an article when you scroll over it. The article highlights in blue and a box pops up, but you have to click the link inside the box to get to a PDF of the article. The other bummer is that you can't click on the ads. It would be fun if users could zoom in on those. They add a tremendous amount of historical value. On the plus side, most of the large ads can be viewed just fine as is.
SI Vault, the Sports Illustrated archive, is a similar tool that allows users to flip through as if they were reading the magazine (so you can check out the ads). The site only has some issues available with the "reader," but does contain complete archives (some are text only).
Cable Networks Keep Gaining on Broadcast
Cable networks have been gaining on the broadcast nets in terms of overall viewership for years. When reality TV made a big splash several years ago, the cable networks even passed The Big Four for primetime viewership. The latest chapter in the story comes from the growth of the cable network audience since the writers' strike. The strike sent people to cable and since most cable networks don't have much content, they just replay their core programs endlessly -- an advantage to a viewer who tunes in late and wants to catch up. (That's one of The Baroness' classic moves with Top Chef.)
What's interesting here is that the broadcast networks still let the cable nets own the summer. Granted, the cable networks do not need the kinds of ratings to justify what they charge (like the broadcast nets), but how can broadcast just cede the summer season? In the last few years, cable has had great success with new summer shows and the broadcast folks are getting left behind. People watch more TV now than they did a decade ago, and they want something new and compelling. A summer full of reruns is not cutting it.
Be Careful with Results of AP "Survey"
I saw the headline, "," and immediately thought that this is the kind of the thing I should be blogging about. I took a look at the article, which explains that young media savvy consumers have no media consumption rituals and that they often get their news information via e-mail (as opposed to the Internet). The article also noted that the survey found similarities between young media consumers in America, India, England, etc.
Just one problem. They only "surveyed" 18 people living in six different countries or regions! That's not a survey -- it's a questionnaire given out to some friends. How can you possibly draw any conclusions between habits of people in different countries when -- at most -- 12 people are from that country? The Baron usually doesn't focus too much on methodology, but this has to be a typo. It's completely absurd.
