These are some of the things that have caught my attention lately. It’s a more eclectic mix than just the news business, but then so’s life:
- Journalists will No Longer Have Access to Trial Documents | Khaleej Times Online — “Trial documents would from Sunday go off limits for journalists as part of the judicial authorities’ efforts to protect the privacy of those standing trial.
No case documents would be given to crime reporters any more as they would be treated as confidential.Though journalists would be allowed to enter court offices during certain periods, they will not be allowed to attend court hearings.”
- Too Much News? | NYTimes.com — Beyond parody: “Jeff Slate, a songwriter who lives in Manhattan, said that he has found himself logging on to the Internet in the middle of the night to check the Asian financial markets, something he had not done for years. And a quick scan of the headlines usually leads him down an information rabbit hole, since almost every blog or news article links to a half-dozen others, which link to others. Even music blogs these days are filled with links to political news and commentary.
“There’s just been a glut of information that even four years ago that wasn’t the case,” said Mr. Slate, 41. In times when people think their fate is tied to enormous events that are out of their hands, stockpiling information can give some people a sense of control, social scientists said.”
- Robert Scoble, please get back to work Twittering | Valleywag — “Followcost, a website which quantifies just how annoying a particular Twitter user is, has adopted the “milliscoble” as a metric. One-thousandth of Scoble’s average daily output on the 140-character-update service equals one milliscoble.”
- Econ 101: To preserve Gannett Blog after Dec. 31, I begin testing journalism’s new business model | Gannett Blog — “Compared to many blogs, I’ve got good traffic. My readers are well-educated and engaged; look at all the comments you write! Plus, I’ve basically got zero competition. All that suggests a blog primed for financial success.
Yet, publishers rarely sell enough advertising online to pay the full cost of putting out a news website with its own staff. In my case, I’ve taken in about $69 from advertising sales in the first 24 hours since I started publishing ads. True, do the math, and that clocks in at $25,000 a year. But the first 24 hours’ sales must have been inflated by a one-time curiosity factor.
And as for subscriptions? Doesn’t happen in the real world.”
- The Tragedy Of Business Media | Gawker — “[T]here are lots of business publications out there that (shhh!) make more money off their events than they do off their publication. In some cases, a shitty magazine is just a loss leader for a moneymaking side business of awards shows, seminars, and other branded events that companies will shell out for in order to “network” and have allegedly independent awards to use in their marketing materials.
But when the businesses themselves tank, the business media tanks harder. It’s as if Sports Illustrated saw all of its ads evaporate at Super Bowl time. It sucks, but it’s a fact of media life. The survivors will come out stronger than ever, and can feast on the carcasses of their dead competitors, picking off choice talent at low prices.
Journalism!”
- Newspapers’ Web Revenue Is Stalling | NYTimes.com — ‘Mr. Frelinghuysen said limiting the ads on a page can be smart. “That high level of unsold inventory often creates a real challenge in terms of sustaining pricing or growing pricing,” he said. “In most media, especially in television, the traditional model has been that you drive sellout, and that gives you the ability to drive pricing over time.”’
- Link By Link — Spinning a Web of Lies at Digital Speed | NYTimes.com — “Markets exist to convert good information into profitable investments. And, in their deep agnosticism, they also exist to allow false information to create quick profits. During that brief window, false information may in fact be easier to exploit — it shows up just in time, and purports to answer the questions on everyone’s mind.”
- Creating a handmade newspaper | The Manual — “We hope to show that handmade qualities can transform newspapers from ‘junk’ to collectable. We also want to demonstrate the power of print as a medium by using ink and paper in a manner that emphasises their unique touch, smell and texture.”
