At a time when any local or national news outlet can potentially become an international online brand, and as newsrooms adapt to a 24-hour news cycle, editors can learn from The New York Times' most recent attempt to 'kill' both birds with one stone.
Last week, top execs from The Times and the International Herald Tribuneannounced plans to mergeiht.com and nytimes.com into a co-branded international section, in order to increase both sites' reach and appeal to international advertisers.
In this two-part series, the Weblog spoke to Jim Roberts, Digital Editor at The New York Times, and Martin Gottlieb, who was appointed to the newly created position of Editor, Global Edition.
Through these moves, The Times intends to accomplish at least four ostensible goals:
Part 1: - Build an outpost for its Continuous News Desk in Paris, and eventually Hong Kong. - Integrate operations, streamline some resources by increasing efficiency and avoiding overlap.
Part 2: - Reinforce its international reach and further compete against the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal. - Use the strength of NYT's online brand while safeguarding the IHT's popular print brand name. IHT: an outpost for the Times' continuous news
Although the proposed changes are currently undergoing a consultation process with the IHT's works council, as required by French law, the process of integration of both papers began ever since the NYT acquired full control of the IHT in 2003, and has accelerated in past months.
In Feb., NYT executive editor Bill Keller had already announced plans to integrate operations and develop an "organic, global, 24-hour news operation," in order "to create a Continuous News outpost in Paris."
In May, the IHT dropped its 142-year-old logo from its nameplate to replace it with the phrase "The Global Edition of the New York Times."
"That says, we are one, and we are," although both arms are managed separately, said Jim Roberts, digital editor at The Times.
Video: Roberts talks about the 'integration' of both newspapers. Footage was collected during an interview at the 15th World Editors Forum in Sweden.
Thanks to this outpost and the six-hour time difference, the NYT is now able to upload content to its site nearly 24 hours a day (from about 6am to 1am, New York time). The paper eventually hopes to establish a similar outpost at the IHT's Asian headquarters in Hong Kong in the next six months.
The creation of these outposts does not mean that the IHT is becoming a full-blown Paris bureau for The Times. "We have a Paris bureau," said Roberts, "and the newsroom of the IHT still has a print edition and right now they still have a website." Integration, streamlining resources: evolution, no revolution
Since all proposed changes are undergoing a consultation process, editors couldn't give any firm preview of how workflows could be affected.
In the past, there has been "very regular contact between individual desks at the Times and corresponding desks at the IHT," said Martin Gottlieb, newly appointed editor of the Global edition. Many IHT editors come from The Times, regularly do edits on NYT pieces, and this past year IHT-written articles have appeared on nytimes.com with no distinctive byline.
However, there is no formal process of exchange between both newsrooms, and "There have been a couple of occasions when we've had IHT and NYT reporters covering the same thing," said Roberts.
The appointment of Gottlieb as editor of the Global Edition - note, no mention of the IHT in his title - is significant in that respect. In addition to fulfilling the role of editor of the paper, his mission will be to ensure that staff understands both papers are "two parts of one news-gathering operation, that should work in unison as much as possible in delivering the news 24 hours a day seven days a week," said Gottlieb.
A series of new editorial appointments at the IHT will be the symbols of this top-down integration. "There will be people coordinating the work of both staffs to, pretty much, make them as much as possible act as one staff," said Gottlieb.
For example, Alison Smale, who becomes European editor of the global newsroom, will be responsible for "coordinating the work of all NYT and IHT reporters in the region from the IHT newsroom in Paris," said the memo. To oversee the process, The Times also named Alan Flippen "Editor, Newsroom Organization."
It seems too early to say whether the planned reforms will lead to radical changes in workflows or content. Evolution, not revolution, said Roberts.
Currently, an IHT reporter based in Hong Kong might build upon a Times' story about the rise of airline fuel prices by interviewing Asian carriers, whose input might not have been as relevant to the core readership of the Times in the US. Likewise, an IHT story published in the Times might be fine-tuned to be more pertinent to the American audience (see the example of Der Spiegel in Part 2, looking at different newspaper approaches towards international editions).
Future workflows will likely build upon these current processes, rather than start from scratch. "It's continuing synergies that are taking place and maximizing them and regularizing them," said Gottlieb.
The planned changes can also be seen as an attempt to streamline resources - terminology often equivocated with cost cuts and layoffs. But according to Gottlieb, there are no planned newsroom layoffs at this point (this is subject to change during the next six months). It is possible that an online merger of iht.com and nytimes.com could lead to redundancies for some technical Web production positions.
Editors couldn't comment on any upcoming changes concerning the IHT's planned print redesign.
Stay tuned for Part 2, which will examine The Times' international branding strategy, and how newspapers can grow a previously inaccessible international readership.
Source: New York Times - Media Bistro - Jim Roberts, Digital Editor The New York Times - Martin Gottlieb, Editor, Global Edition
According to News & Record editor John Robinson, Kubler-Ross' model of accepting death can be applied to the current state of the newspaper industry in the US: it is time for acceptance.
In Kubler-Ross' model, the five stages are denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
In April, Terry Heaton, AR & D's Media 2.0 senior vice president, said the industry was at the depression stage.
Now is time of acceptance - not of death though, but of the need for change.
Reporter and blogger Doug Fischer wrote that although it may seem that newspapers are dying, they would continue to "exist in radically different frequency and content."
Journalists need to deal with the economic reality and think about the challenges ahead, Robinson wrote.
"That means we understand how the world has changed, and we understand how our journalistic skills and assumptions must change. For instance, learning what it takes to be a digital journalist is vital. Reaching readers -- information consumers, really -- where, how and when they want it is good for journalism. Listening to and learning from them is even better," he said.
Two years ago, the Economist published a special report in which it said that the newspapers might survive in the long term if they "reinvent themselves on the Internet and on other new-media platforms such as mobile phones and portable electronic devices."
The situation of the US newspaper industry does seem critical, in light of the massive wave of layoffs in recent weeks and the overall advertising decline. But Robinson pointed out that future journalistic opportunities lie in microblogging, beat blogging and social networking. Journalism is, in his opinion, on the verge of attracting different customers.
In what could be a precedential ruling, the Press Complaints Commission (PCC) has upheld Carolyn Popple's complaint against the Scarborough Evening News for posting intrusive video material.
After accompanying a police raid on Popple's property, the Evening News published footage of the raid, including video and images, on its website. The paper also included a still image from the raid in its print edition. Popple, who wasn't charged with any crimes as a result of the raid, complained that the paper's footage was an invasion of her privacy.
The PCC agreed with Popple. In its adjudication the commission explained the ruling.
"Showing a video and publishing a picture of the interior of the complainant's house, without her consent, was clearly highly intrusive, particularly when the coverage contained information likely to identify her address."
The ruling could force other newspapers to more closely evaluate the video content they stream online.
In his blog, Steven Outingdiscussed the Global Conference on the Individuated Newspaper and the innovative approaches to personalized news that newspapers can adopt to attract more readers.
Key points of the conference included:
-using the available technology to give "individuated" news. This implies having a content management system that can handle personalized editions. -younger audiences experience individuated media through many platforms including Facebook, iTunes/iPod, mobile phones, etc. -individuated news is "inevitable" and newspapers have to evolve.
Rocky Mountain News reported that, due to the constraints of print, newspapers have provided people with a broad selection of content that might not appeal to every reader.
"It seems we can turn all the new-found power of the Internet - that so easily empowers people to personalize their news - and generate a whole new type of newspaper with greater relevance and value. Call it the reverse- published newspaper," said Dean Singleton, MediaNews CEO and chairman of the Associated Press board of directors.
Several examples of reverse-publishing have emerged in the US, with varied success, including the Rocky News' YourHub.com or the Chicago Tribune's Triblocal.
According to Rocky Mountain News, readers should participate in the journalistic process by specifying what it is they want to read about. If news organizations are to remain successful, they should look into customizing their content for each individual.
This makes some people worry that a lot of news might become focused on less serious issues like Britney Spears' latest misdemeanour. Journalism professor Vin Crosbie disagreed, because control of the news agenday will always remain divided between professional editors and users.
Following the International Press Institute (IPI) world congress in Belgrade, where a session focused on the limits of tolerance and the issue of publishing blasphemous content, such as the Mohammed cartoons in Denmark, IPI will make a programme-length video about the issue of blasphemy.
This is a good initiative in the wake of the publication of satirical cartoons of Mohammed by 17 Danish newspapers, three years after the initial row.
"Deciding where to draw the line, or whether there should be a line, would be a major step forward, if it's done in a sensitive and sensible way," wrote the Guardian's Roy Greenslade.
The debate between proponents of unrestricted press freedom and those who advise cautious self-censorship will undoubtedly drag on, but IPI's initiative may help to throw light on these issues.
UPDATE: A Danish appeals court rejected today a suit filed by seven Muslim organizations against the editors of the Jyllands-Posten, which first published the Mohammed cartoons in 2005. The court found that the most controversial of the cartoons, depicting the prophet wearing a turban shaped like a bomb, was "of a satirical nature" and "does not refer to Muslims in general or to the (plaintiff) organisations or their members," reported the AFP. The court also stated "that terrorist acts have been committed in the name of Islam, and it is not illegal for these acts to be made the object of satirical representation."
According to award-winning newspaper designer Mario R. Garcia, fewer sections and decreased length may actually be an answer for weekday dailies - contradicting conventional editorial and reader wisdom.
Per Andersson-Ek, associate editor of the Göteborgs Posten, said that the paper's decision to shorten from a four-section to a three-section daily in 1994 proved to be successful, as readers reacted by saying it became a "more handy, structured and easily navigated newspaper, covering more of today´s topics and talk of the town".
Sam Zell, the chairman and chief executive of Tribune Co., declared that "500 pages of news" would be trimmed weekly from the company's dozen papers in order to have a paper divided "50-50 between news content and ads."
Such statements have in effect caused editors and readers to be concerned with the risks of decreased editorial quality. A Chicago Tribune reader posted on the chicagotribune.com comment board that she was concerned that "reducing the size of the newspaper might mean eliminating news and favoring more stories about R. Kelly and less about Tibet or Darfur."
But according to Garcia, "talented editors" are required for the task of thinning newspapers. Timothy McNulty, Chicago Tribune's public editor, says that one of the most difficult tasks for journalists today is to be able to adapt to changes in economy without losing traditions.
"I am convinced the newspaper of the next ten years will have fewer pages, published in a more compact format, with much greater coordination between online/print offerings, a more substantial local coverage, and with a design that emphasizes good navigation, clear hierarchy and service," wrote Garcia.
The copy editor's role in the newsroom, as the last set of eyes to read a story before it is published, is becoming obsolete, writes Lawrence Downes of the New York Times.
Copy editing was never a glamorous position, says Downes, but an invaluable one, requiring encyclopedic knowledge and an expert editorial eye.
"They [copy editors] are more powerful than proofreaders. They untangle twisted prose. They are surgeons, removing growths of error and irrelevance; they are minimalist chefs, straining fat," he writes.
But as newspapers place increased emphasis on their online operations, the scale of journalistic values is tipping. In order to compete in the online age of journalism, newspapers must publish stories in a hyper-timely manner. This rush to the press, however, may be compromising values such as quality and credibility - virtues of the copy editor.
"The job hasn't disappeared yet, but it is swiftly evolving, away from an emphasis on style and consistency, from making a physical object perfect the first time. The path to excellence is now through speed, agility and creativity in using multiple expressive outlets for information in all its shapes and sounds.
"But in that world of the perpetual present tense - post it now, fix it later, update constantly - old-time, persnickety editing may be a luxury in which only a few large news operations will indulge," Downes writes.
For Downes, the copy editor is a foreseeable casualty of journalism's shift to the digital era. It would be easy to mistake the tone of his conclusion - if copy editors vanish, "no one is going to notice" - for cynical; but it's more wistful than anything else. As journalism evolves, copy editors are becoming relics of a past age.
"It [copy editing] will be an artisanal product, like monastery honey and wooden yachts," Downes writes. "It would be nice, at least, to thank the copy editors on the way out."
For the last fifteen months, former journalists from the Journal du Québec have been publishing a rival free paper, in order to protest against the paid-for newspaper's plans for integration and the additional workloads of multimedia journalism.
The paid-for tabloid, Journal du Québec, published by Québecor, has enjoyed a comfortable situation in the sometimes grim North American print market. It has no website, a daily circulation that ranges from 105,000 copies to 200,000 copies, and churns out a few million dollars in yearly profit.
Since last year though, the paper's plans to - finally - build a website and turn its reporters into multimedia journalists (and increasing working hours from 32 to 37.5 with no additional pay) have been the cause of internal upheaval.
In winter 2007, a group of journalists from Journal du Québec prepared to roll out a competing freesheet, dubbed MediaMatinQuébec.
"On the negotiation table, we saw the requests and the attitude of management. We wondered how we could counter this. We couldn't imagine going on strike indefinitely (...) so we had the idea to launch this free daily," said Denis Bolduc, editor of the free paper.
In April 2007, two days after the staff of Journal du Québec went on strike and Québecor called for a lock-out, Bolduc and his team launched MediaMatinQuébec.
Against all expectations, the free paper has now strived for 15 months, boasting 40,000 copies in daily circulation.
"In the US, when there was the integration of print and online, there were debates, but never a conflict like this," said Florian Sauvageau, director of the Center of media studies at the University of Laval.
It is "difficult to think that journalists will accept to work more hours and online," he said, but they "must accept that in 10 years newspapers will be online."
According to Agence France-Presse, Québecor's profits have yet to be hindered by the rival free paper. Yet the giant publishing house is reportedly preparing the launch of its own freesheet, to compete against MediaMatinQuébec.
Source : Voilà.fr through IFRA Executive News Service
During the seventh session of the 15th World Editors Forum, Raju Narisetti's, Managing Editor at Mint, India, asked the question, "Can ethics sell papers?" using the story of his recently launched paper as the answer.
Mint is a business newspaper which launched in February 2007, in a market that already had five national business papers. How was Mint suppose to survive this competition and establish itself in the market and among the readers? The answer was ethics.
Before the launch of Mint, Mr Narisetti and others working at the newspaper to be, spent six months talking to potential readers. According to their findings, readers noted the lack of credibility and clarity in Indian newspapers as their biggest problems.
So Mr Narisetti and Mint set out to change this by bringing transparency and accessibility to Indian news media. Policies were created, an extensive code of conduct written, all viewable on the website. Mistakes were corrected and analyses of how those were made was published at the end of the year in the paper. Adverts are always clearly depicted as that and nothing else.
So how has Mint managed in a competetive market? In only a year and a half the paper sells 120,000 copies a day. 87% of these are subscriptions. It has become the second biggest business paper in Dehli, Mumbai and Bangalore.
At the fourth session of the 15th World Editors Forum the question of how online editors view user participation in making news was partly answered thanks to a study. Two persons working on this study, called "Guarding open gates:How online editors view user participation in making news", were Steve Paulussen, Senior Researcher at Gent University, Belgium, and Jane B. Singer, Professor at the University of Central Lancashire, UK.
The study was based on analyzing five different news and publishing stages; the first stage being access and observation; second being selection or filtering; third being processing and editing; fourth being distribution and finally the fifth and last stage is that of interpretation.
For the study, editors of 15 newspaper online versions were interviewed. Perhaps the most obvious finding was that user participation tends to take place at the fifth and last stage, interpretation. The newsstory is already written, produced and published before the reader has a say, which usually happens through commenting and giving feedback below the article in a special comment field. The editors of all 15 online newspapers felt this was something necessary and positive.
What is worth pointing out about this kind of participation is that most comments posted did not revolve around hyper-local news but rather "big" news like the war in Iraq, the American election, the Israel-Palestine conflict etc.
As for the first stage, access and observation, editors believe users can contribute as a source, but not actually much more than before. They also thought that most of the news sent by users were "small news", stories from the margins.
The second stage, selection and filtering is the most controversial and journalistically territorial in a sense. From an editor and journalist's view, gatekeeping is still extremely important. It's definitely not the job of the user. Mr Paulussen quoted one of the editors as having said "Gatekeeping has become a dirty word, but it's still our job".
There was mixed answers about the third stage, processing and editing. Some websites like Le Figaro and El País have let users participate in this stage quite alot. El País lets readers publish their blogs and photos on their website and Le Figaro created a special site during the French municipality election where readers could discuss and rate their mayors. Other websites have not embraced this to the same extent .
Users participating in distribution was quite common and not deemed as negative. Readers can use recommendation tools to rate or tag articles. This could be shown internally on the news site or externally on sites as digg.com.
