new media models

Newspapers, Paywalls and Core Users

Stevie Converse — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 09:18:54 -0500

Full article: Shirky.com
Clay Shirky
This may be the year where newspapers finally drop the idea of treating all news as a product, and all readers as customers. This may be the year where we see how papers figure out how to reward the people most committed to their long-term survival. For the moment, at least, the most promising experiment in user support means forgoing mass in favor of passion.

Philanthropist Funds Australian Public Internet Journalism Site

Stevie Converse — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 08:25:57 -0500

Full article: Guardian
Roy Greenslade
An Australian philanthropist is funding a not-for-profit online startup that is pledged to publishing public interest journalism. The new venture will not charge readers, will not sell ads and is not seeking more donors.

Don't Think of It as a Newspaper -- It's a Data Platform

Stevie Converse — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 11:33:51 -0400

Full article: GigaOM
Mathew Ingram
Few news organizations are thinking about their businesses in radically different ways -- as content-generating engines with multiple delivery methods, or as platforms for data, around which other things can be built. But some are moving in that direction.

Why the 'Scoop' Mentality Is Bad for News

Stevie Converse — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 09:41:49 -0400

Full article: Knight Digital Media Center
Amy Gahran
The direct risk of the scoop mentality is when news organizations rush to publish information that hasn't been sufficiently vetted. But there's a more insidious danger to the news ecosystem: The idea that being first to cover a story is sufficient "reward" which negates the need to better serve audiences and communities.

Chats Don't Have to Be Online: A Newspaper Finds Success with Its Downtown News Cafe

Stevie Converse — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 09:34:41 -0400

Full article: Nieman Journalism Lab
Tim Currie
The <em>Winnipeg Free Press’s</em> cafe has increased reader engagement, helped social media efforts, and apparently made some fine sandwiches. The cafe is about being present in the community and turning the organization outward.

ProPublica Launches New Investigative Project

Stevie Converse — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 12:24:02 -0400

Full article: Editor and Publisher
Heidi Kulicke
For more than three years, ProPublica has been producing investigative journalism in the public interest and has been rewarded with two Pulitzer Prizes for its efforts. Now the nonprofit has created a forum for other news organizations to share their investigative work.

Take Back the Media

Stevie Converse — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 07:39:53 -0400

Full article: Orion Magazine
Josh Stearns
Years of runaway media consolidation have diminished the diversity of voices on the airwaves, gutted our nation's newsrooms, and wrested more and more media out of the hands of the people. But a rising wave of new nonprofit journalism efforts, new opportunities for local radio and digital justice coalitions are planting the seeds of a movement to take back our media.

Cheezburger CEO Planning WordPress-Style News 2.0 Software

Stevie Converse — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 08:28:28 -0400

Full article: ReadWriteWeb.com
Marshall Kirkpatrick
Once you've built an empire of funny cat pictures and other user-generated comedy ephemera, what do you do next? Ben Huh, CEO of the sprawling Cheezburger network of comedy websites, has begun discussing a side-project he's working on: Rethinking how we read breaking news.

Why We Need the New News Environment to be Chaotic

Stevie Converse — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 08:29:53 -0400

Full article: Clay Shirkey Blog
As the business environment for newspapers continues to be grim and digital revenue is not replacing lost print revenue, we need to be experimenting with all kinds of new journalism models. There are three things that must hold true for success: News has to be subsidized, and it has to be cheap, and it has to be free.

FCC Says News Outlets Could Make Money from Online Ad Tracking

Stevie Converse — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 13:41:07 -0400

Full article: The Hill
Sara Jerome
An FCC report encourages policymakers to see the benefits in behavioral advertising to help local journalism enterprises, despite a raging debate in Washington on how to regulate online tracking to protect the personal data of consumers. Privacy experts questioned the plausibility of such methods in terms of consumer privacy and a new kind of digital divide -- one that will create a gap in who has access to quality content and who are not worth targeting.