Open The Dialogue

Last week a report was released showing the extent to which reporters and traditional journalists felt their field was being impacted by bloggers, citizen journalists and other new media creators.

According to the survey that formed the report, 74 percent of journalists say new media outlets have "very" or "somewhat" effect on the speed of the reporting they do. So we can conclude from that, it seems, that journalists are feeling the eyeballs being trained on them and are speeding up their processes in order to make sure they get the story first.

But only 43 percent (and I say "only" lightly since that's a pretty good-sized chunk of respondents) say that new media has had similar levels of impact on the quality of news coverage. 56 percent say little to no impact on quality has been felt.

The story ends with the author of the study saying journalists are at the very least turning to blogs for context and new ideas or angles for their own coverage, a topic I opined on before, bemoaning the fact that while they may get ideas and information on blogs, they rarely link out to or otherwise credit the bloggers.

Whatever impact journalists might feel blogs and new media in general is having, the tea leaves are aligning in such a way that it's impossible to not see the tidal wave rolling around the bend.

(Mixed metaphor skillz: I haz dem)

Consider that political blogger James Pindell is leaving the Boston Globe for ThePoliticker, a new national network of such blogs. At the site a series of state-specific blogs will be brought together to form national coverage of the political arena.

Or that The New York Times of all papers is now openly soliciting for user-submitted photos of polling places during the primaries.

Or that magazine publishers are increasing the number of online features like social networking, games, and videos they roll out each year that not only make the sites more sticky but also allow for some creation of content by the visitor.

Or that this election cycle is featuring an incredible amount of new-media/old-media partnerships as each outlet looks to tap the other's audience.

In an interview with New York Times "Bits" blogger Saul Hansell, he makes the case that blogging is not so very different from traditional journalism, at least not in the tools themselves. It's the person wielding the tools and how they're used that make some blogs - or even individual posts on a blog - what they are. Hansell acknowledges that the journalism world has changed to some extent because of the ubiquity of online publishing tools but that the worth of the outlet is determined more by the content than it is by the platform that content is published through.

Former Newsweek CEO Rick Smith, on the other hand, isn't thrilled with how so many people with such easy access to publishing tools has devalued the news his magazine and others traffic in. Smith says that so much of the media people are now consuming is made up of opinion and not facts that the reporting is losing importance to readers - and the advertisers who want to be attached to breaking news.

I find more agreement with Hansell's comments then I do with anything else. It's always the content and the intent of the writer that trumps everything else. If someone puts out good stuff - be it audio, video or text - it will gain an audience and be taken seriously. If the content they're producing is found to provide better context, be more relevant or in some other way more deeply and meaningfully connect with the audience then it will win the battle for eyeballs.

Instead of complaining over the injustice of consumer-generated content taking readers away from the reporting an established outlet does, it would be better for those editors to look at what they might not be providing to the audience and seek to address that shortcoming. Change. Adapt. Improve.

But still let your readers and other experts participate in the conversation. Allow comments on story and look to see who's linking to you. Despite all the resources a newspaper or magazine might have (at least those resources that have survived the most recent round of budget cuts) there's still going to be someone out there with a different take on any given story. They might live in the neighborhood you're covering and know what their Alderman has just said on an issue. They might work in the industry and know that X was a direct result of W.

Traditional media no longer exists in a vacuum. They have to compete harder than ever for readers and advertisers. But there's too much "Well we're better" being proclaimed and not enough "Well we're better" being practiced. The determination of your quality - whether it be media, consumer-packaged goods or anything else - comes from the number of people who shell out their money for what it is you're producing.

(Afterward: I had this all written when I saw this pop-up - "How to get a job in journalism." Lots of good stuff in there for the aspirational.)

Posted by Chris Thilk at 02:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As I get back into a regular swing of things as far as blogging goes on this site, I'm attempting to clear out all the things I've tagged and bagged to post about soon, and I'm just about cleared out at this point. One last item I had sitting in FeedDemon was this post from Robert Scoble from *way* back on September 28 (gasp!) regarding the "success" - or not - of the Diggnation video podcast, and he is asking what readers think of comments made here by WaggEd's Frank Shaw on the subject. Frank asks:

If "Diggnation" were on a national cable or broadcast feed, would 250k viewers be seen as success or the road to to cancellation?

I'll answer first with my initial thoughts on the subject. Who cares if it would get cancelled on regular television? Frankly, we live in a world now where shows - take NBC's Kidnapped, for instance - are cancelled at the first threat that they could potentially suck in the eyes of viewers. And to think, a show was put together with Timothy Hutton, Dana Delany, Jeremy Sisto, Delroy Lindo, and others turned out to be, more or less, an abject failure. How much money went into the production of the thirteen episodes we'll see, plus the significant dollars that Sony Pictures Television put into promoting it, along with two of its other shows on the networks this year? And still, we have a group of television developers who don't know what people are going to like, and even if they do, television executives are sometimes quick on the draw, not realizing that they have maxed out the potential audience for that particular program. The latter part of that statement is what's most important.

Let's get back to Diggnation here. So if there are 250,000 downloads (!) of the podcast (which is in both audio and video versions, btw), let's say most people watch at least part of it. Just as the commenter's on Scoble's site are saying, it's not about "broadcasting" here, even though the show is out there for anyone to view and download. It's not even about "narrowcasting" here either, as the show is clearly getting the same kind of viewership as daytime cable news might be getting. If we were able to measure exactly who would be the "target" audience for the Diggnation show, and 250,000 were 50% of that audience, would it be a success? What defines success, anyway, that a certain number that makes sense to someone who is counting beans says is a good amount of viewership / listenership? It just seems so random, when you try and look at the "big media" numbers and apply them to something like a video podcast, and say "well, that would have failed if it were on television." Who cares? A medium that can't measure properly (sorry, start counting time-shifted / DVR'd programs properly and then we'll talk) shouldn't be used as the measuring stick for other media. Ever.

Something that I have a had a pretty good amount of success educating colleagues and clients on, when it comes to blogs (that we're outreaching to or developing for them) is not to look at the numbers as too high or too low. The example I use is something like the $10,000 / year journal that is printed four times, and goes to 500 people, worldwide. In that case, forget the cost, and look at the number. If I'm an advertiser or someone looking to get a client or piece of information into the editorial, that 500 can't seem small, if it encompasses the entire group or population that is interested in said topic. In that same vein, there are blogs that are about marketing, for instance, that are read by either a) the entire audience (or the bulk of it) that are interested in reading about it from that perspective, or b) the other "thought leaders" within the space. Ignore the fact that it might get 1,000 visitors a day. 1,000 doesn't mean it's a small readership. Compare it to passalong rates, if you are looking for something similar.

My colleague and fellow blogger here, Chris Thilk, had some thoughts that I wanted to drop in here as well.

It’s all about the niche. What’s the difference between Diggnation and USA Today if each one only reaches ¼ of your target audience?

I think the most effective product releases or announcements are going to be the ones that target the people who are already engaging in a conversation about that industry/product. That means giving people who might not be in the Technorati 100 access to something new and then working with them to make the announcement as effective as possible. Not everything is going to have a wide audience and Diggnation, USA Today and TechCrunch all are models of mass-distribution in their particular media.

Chris wanted to take a little bit different of tack on this, saying that while Diggnation might have a significant reach within the online / tech space, it doesn't mean it's the end-all, be-all, for what you might be trying to get out there, news-wise. Same with a TechCrunch. Sure, get your story on TechCrunch, and you're *going* to get attention, but that doesn't mean that your conversation will start and end on that particular site. At the same time, he echoes what I was suggesting about Diggnation - to some, it represents a "mass" distribution opportunity, rather than having something show up on 50 blogs that all get a few thousand visitors each. Sometimes, "breaking" news on a TechCrunch, PaidContent or somewhere else with a wide audience is your best bet. But, as we have discussed before, sometimes you get a much better effect in the long run if you have a stack of people - all who are read by those particular sites or the site you are "aspirational" to reach - all write about what you have to say.

At the end of the day, I'd have to give Diggnation a thumbs up when it comes to being a success, because I don't believe that something has to be on television to be that huge of a success in the world today, and comparing it to television isn't apples to apples. If all television content were "on demand," as it were, this might be a different discussion. I'm a subscriber, regularly describe the show as "hysterical" to anyone I've shown it to, and explain to people that it's pretty similar to any kind of roundup-type show that you might see on television, this time giving the nod to big stories that have been on Digg recently - oh, and there's beer.

Moral to the story? Let's forget about trying to compare model to model, and look at what a particular marketplace is on its own merit, and how any particular instance of reach into that market compares to another in the same space. It might be sheer numbers of reader/listener/viewership, it might be products sold, dollars spent, or whatever. But please, stop making everything sound like "well, 2 million people watched so and so on NBC last night."

Posted by Tom Biro at 02:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The tech, blog and vlog worlds have been turned upside down today with news that Amanda Congdon is leaving RocketBoom. The news was apparently broken this morning by Congdon herself who left a video post on her own blog explaining that, in her words, her partner in RB Andrew Baron simply didn't want to be her partner anymore. A good number of bloggers ran with the story based solely on that. Congdon = good and Baron = bad in most of their posts.

As with any major news story, the reality of the situation isn't always right there on the surface, though. Soon word came from Baron that he learned of Amanda's departure via the video and was as surprised as anyone. Matthew Ingram provides a bit of context for this side of the story. According to an email exchange he had with Baron, Congdon had been wanting to move from New York to Los Angeles for some time. He and the rest of the Rocketboom team had been working on a way to make that happen but, according to him, Congdon decided to make this move unilaterally. That leaves him and the rest of the team to figure out what to do next.

There's plenty of speculation about what the next step for both Congdon and RocketBoom will be. Will Congdon go mainstream on TV? Will RocketBoom hire an unknown redhead as a change of pace? Thankfully both parties have Robert Scoble's support. Speaking of Scoble, Om Malik thinks he should hire Congdon for PodTech.

Here's my question: How many people who consider themselves big shakers in the blogosphere ran this story before trying to get a reaction from Baron or at least waiting until they found one somewhere else? That sort of context is what I thought we were supposed to be doing on blogs. That's what set us apart - I thought - from the evil mainstream media that was simply concerned with ratings. Instead, though, it seems all we're worried about is Technorati timestamps.

--Chris Thilk

Posted by Chris Thilk at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In case you're wondering what I've been up to of late, you'll be happy to know that I've made sure and include some fun and games with all of my activities. On Sunday, I co-hosted the latest episode of the Across the Sound podcast with Joe Jaffe. We talked about Sportsline's online NCAA tournament viewing, product placement on the Sopranos, and a bit more. Head on over and check it out!

Posted by Tom Biro at 11:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Business Week's Stephen Baker writes today about the chance for advertisers to get their claws into either the data of users on the iTunes service, or into the podcasting realm. He's suggesting the possibility that iTunes could offer a different "level" of service, where people could essentially pay for anonymity.

This of course, takes into consideration the belief that Apple would only be in it for the money. Do we think that the folks behind the iTunes Music Store would give advertisers access to demographics about the users on the system unless they were paid hush money by the public? It's a directory, for one thing, and it's not like ITMS is going to start hosting advertising on its system from anyone, perhaps, other than the music labels who might want to have a say. They're not in that business right now, and I don't see why they would need to be. Having podcasts in iTunes software isn't the differentiator in using the software in the first place. The UI and ITMS as a whole is, IMHO. They're not going out of their way to host a directory of podcasts, and I don't see them looking to drag a bunch of animosity into the picture anytime soon.

Posted by Tom Biro at 04:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Chris Thilk IMed me on Monday with a link to this post at Signal vs. Noise about how Creative has backronymed "podcast" with "Personal On Demand broadCAST." It's unclear what the timing is on this, as in when Creative posted this (one commenter says it was sometime last year, another mentions late 2004), but I'd have to say that the "generally accepted" concept behind podcasting is that it's not an acronym for anything.

This is, IMHO, one of the better examples of how the thinkers-at-large get frustrated with marketers attempting to co-opt, rather than just join in the fray, to new trends. It's great to be a thought leader, it's another thing to try and pull the rug out from a generally accepted principle or concept.

Posted by Tom Biro at 10:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

ClickZ's Pamela Parker reports Thursday that Lexus is going all new media on us with its latest campaign, LexusFusion.com, which is using podcasts and video to market the new IS model. This marketing effort is specifically aimed at the African-American community, and features music selections in the hip-hop / jazz fusion genre. In addition to the above-mentioned elements, Lexus is also advertising widely on blogs.

[via Marketing VOX]

Posted by Tom Biro at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Interested in podcasting about technology-related stuff but aren't sure where to start? Check out Ben Bishop's list, the 10 Best Tech Podcasts of 2005.

Posted by Tom Biro at 02:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Over the weekend, it was noted that iPodder had changed its name to Juice Receiver. On the podcasters Yahoo! Group that Scoble links to, developer Scott Grayban talks about how Apple was claiming that the use of "iPod" in the software's name was "decieving users that our software was connected to Apple's iPod device." While most of us know the difference, obviously, it's not surprising to me one bit that Apple made this move. Frankly, I'm surprised no one has gone after the fact that "podcasting" as a whole is only deemed that because of the ubiquity of iPod in our lives. If and when the iPod doesn't exist any longer as the portable audio device of choice for many, will the name change from "podcasting" to something else? Doubt it - but what we're seeing here is how something is named and remembered as lore after some time - leading to lots of "why is that called that, anyway?" questions years down the road.

Posted by Tom Biro at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

One of the hardest things to convey to those who are skeptical of the digital world is the number of people who are interacting and using these tools on a regular basis. And with various statistics showing low numbers - of overall Internet users - who read or write blogs stalling efforts by companies and other organizations to jump on board, it's important to really get to the nitty gritty with these numbers. Dave Winer links this morning to a NYTimes item this morning from Tom Zeller, Jr. about what those stats look like when sliced down to those between 12 and 17 years old who are "active online." Zeller cites a Pew Internet and American Life Project survey that shows that within that demographic, a whopping 57% of individuals "create digital content."

Posted by Tom Biro at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last night, Dave was hinting at a "major" site going live sometime around midnight Eastern. Of course, I spent my late-night hours searching for something of an RSS ilk, only to find nada in that area. Turns out that the provider I was checking out was the right one, but the service was wrong. Now, Yahoo! has launched a podcast directory, one that is set up with tags - not just categories, though it has those too - and yet again a technology that might not have been as easy for the average user to get into is made available in a point-and-click manner.

Posted by Tom Biro at 10:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)