Recently by Helena Deards

NYTimes.com recently ran an ad with a difference on its home page: a digital version of NYT's front page rolled over the screen, with a date from the year 2040 and a somewhat unusual headline, "President converses with dolphin, develops new environmental plan." According to Forbes.com, the NYT "is leading a charge among big newspapers and magazines to create gripping digital ads that interweave marketing images with editorial content and respected journalism brands."

The use of such advertisements creates debate over the normally definite line between editorial content and advertising. An Australian publication has managed to tread the line between the two by creating separate magazines of such 'advertorials' to avoid mixing it with their editorial content. Whilst newspapers need to innovate to continue to generate revenue, this mixture of editorial and advertising interspersed in the main product is a worrying grey area between the two.

Source: Forbes

Despite some of the hysteria and hype emanating from global coverage of the swine flu outbreak, a Pew Research survey has found that in the US, "the level of coverage was relatively moderate when matched up against the number of confirmed U.S. cases." Comparing the top three newspapers in the US between April 27th and May 10th produced a figure of one swine flu story per 225 cases in the US, less coverage than Canada, Spain, New Zealand, France and China. In Mexico, where the disease originated, there was one story for every 81 cases.

The survey revealed that there was no direct correlation between the number of cases and the extent of coverage - China, for example had very few confirmed cases, but had front page coverage equal to that of the US, which had 2000. It also pointed out that French paper Le Figaro was simultaneously restrained and controversial in its coverage, running just two stories on its front pages, but causing controversy with its description of the disease as 'Mexican flu'.

Source: Editor & Publisher

The Associated Press has recently announced two global additions: its newly created post of African editor, and a new bureau in Kabul due to open in August. Veteran AP correspondent Andrew Selsky has been appointed to the role of African editor and will be based in Johannesburg, overseeing the bureau there as well as those in Nairobi, Kenya, Harare, (Zimbabwe), Lagos (Nigeria) and Dakar (Senegal) and controlling a network of correspondents across 45 countries.

The new bureau in Kabul will open in time for the Afghan elections in August, forming part of existing newsgathering services in the region.  It comes under AP's outside broadcast production and transmission project, AP Global Media Services. It will provide studio space and house a team of engineers, camera crews and video editors, a good indication of the AP's range of multimedia coverage.

Several weeks ago, Robert H. Reid, Associated Press bureau chief in Baghdad, was appointed to a new position heading AP's coverage as news director for Afghanistan and Pakistan and bureau chief in Kabul. These recent moves display the AP's dedication to comprehensive international reporting; an area that has frequently been a victim of newsroom cuts in recent years.

Source: Guardian, Editor & Publisher

Former deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has lashed out at the British press and its reaction to the Telegraph's revelations on the MP expenses scandal, branding it "arguably the worst area of self-regulation of all." Prescott's article has met with heavy criticism from readers due to his personal embroilment in the scandal, but he makes some very valid points about the Press Complaints Commission nonetheless.

He asks how effective a regulator can be "when it is not only funded by the newspaper industry but also has senior editors sitting on the board adjudicating the editorial decisions of their colleagues?" Prescott points out that amongst the board members are Sunday Telegraph editor Ian MacGregor, Mail on Sunday editor Peter Wright and Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre (who is chair of the PCC committee that reviews the Code of Practice).

One of the most striking themes to come from the second day of the Power of Print Conference was the importance of newspapers knowing their audience. South Africa's Daily Sun, for example, grew rapidly to become the country's largest newspaper off the back of in depth market research.

Fergus Sampson, of the Daily Sun's owner Media 24 described how they discovered an audience of working class young black citizens who had come of age at the time of freedom, but who didn't have a newspaper, and set out fill the gap. "It does not try to be all things to all people. It does not include anything that wouldn't interest its people. The formula is dictated by the market and the needs of the market," said Sampson.

With newspapers working out how to simultaneously appeal to their readers, monetise their content and be successful businesses, some publications are taking unusual steps to do so. Speaking at the World Association of Newspapers' Power of Print Conference in Barcelona, Kylie Davis of the Sydney Morning Herald and Sun-Herald, and Rodrigo Fino of Garcia Media described what steps their publications have taken.

Davis discussed the "sacrosanct" relationship between editorial and advertising, and how the Morning Herald and Sun Herald have toed the line between the two and come up with a profitable solution. They create high quality specialised magazines of 'advertorials', bundled with the newspaper but clearly separated from the main editorial.

For two of the speakers at the Power of Print Conference in Barcelona, completely new approaches - and publications - were the required missing element of the newspaper industry. Peter Vandevanter, vice president of Targeted Products spoke about his company's personalised newspapers - for which he has coined the term 'Individuated'.

Readers receive home delivery of their 'Individuated' newspaper on the days they're free to read it, and personalised 'I-News' delivered digitally on the days they're not. 'I-News' is also available in a printable format for readers that choose to print it, alongside coupons for coffee or other products they ask for - an advertiser's dream! Vandevanter said that advertising rates for the I-product are ten times print advertising rates.

"Twitter poses risks for papers" according to Edward Wasserman - but not in the way you might expect. Although much credit has recently gone to Twitter for its ability to break news and its real-time search function, Wasserman is looking at its threat from a different angle. The Knight professor of journalism ethics at Washington and Lee University describes how it is the use of Twitter within their newsrooms which is worrying news execs.

Wasserman describes Twitter as a "a dazzling social networking technology that allows you to stay in touch," adding that smart news organisations are encouraging its use due to its potential for sourcing stories and journalistic networking. Yet he also points out that "the potential is there for staffers to spout off, spill secrets, give away their journalism" - as happened at the New York Times recently.

A new portal supported by the European Commission "aims to get EU citizens across the 27 member states talking and reading about the same issues" by translating selected articles from 250 of the continent's newspapers into 10 different languages. Titles such as France's Le Figaro, Spain's El Pais and the UK's Guardian will be involved in the project, which will employ 10 journalists and receive €3 million of EC funds per year.

The site is lead by Courrier International, along with Internazionale in Italy, Forum Polityka in Poland and Courrier Internacional in Portugal, and hopes to have all 23 of the EU's official languages involved within the next five years. EU communications commissioner Margot Wallstrom explained that the site will "broaden, enrich and expand coverage of European affairs," allowing Europeans to read European coverage from other nation's perspectives, instead of being limited to their own national newspapers.

Newspapers really aren't doing as badly as media commentators would have us think, says Gavin O'Reilly, president of the World Association of Newspapers and CEO of Independent News and Media. He did not deny that the newspaper industry has difficulties, but said that these are shared by many other industries in a period of economic crisis.

Speaking at the WAN Power of Print Conference in Barcelona, he explained, "this is not to deflect the seriousness of the situation, and it is very serious, but it remains a fact - all major media are suffering alongside our colleagues in other major business sectors."

The New York Times is taking its use of social networks to whole new levels, and has announced the appointment of a social media editor for the publication. Jennifer Preston will concentrate "full-time on expanding the use of social media networks and publishing platforms to improve New York Times journalism and deliver it to readers."

Apt, then, that the news was revealed via Twitter by deputy managing editor of the NYT, Jonathan Landman - and ironic, therefore, that Preston's Twitter updates on her new account were set to private (although this has now been rectified, and @NYT_JenPreston is now tweeting freely). The NYT has been very much present on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook of late - the memo announcing Preston's appointment puts it in 2nd place on the Twitterholic rankings, although it is currently sitting in 14th.

Guardian Weekly has offered its readers a special subscription deal - via Twitter. Its marketing department announced that it would offer its Twitter followers the deal once it passed the 500 followers mark, which it subsequently did. Twitter users are offered four weeks for free and 50% off an initial three-month subscription.

Editor Natalie Bennett explains, "We started out on Twitter not quite sure what it was. But now there are a lot of people following us and we're picking up our kind of people." Twitter has become astonishingly popular incredibly quickly, and has been much praised as a source of stories and real-time news.

Source: Journalism.co.uk

An article in Le Monde has examined the role of so-called 'information convicts', the new breed of journalists who are "lined up in front of their computers like chickens in a battery farm". These journalists are described as a new race, 'geeks' aged about 30 and passionate about computers, who have followed the conventional route to having a full-time contract, beginning with an internship.

One such journalist, Sylvain Lapoix, describes the role as having no rights, on a social level. He envisions creating an association to defend the rights of his colleagues. Another such journalist, who previously worked at Nouvelobs.com, describes how speed was key, and how she often found herself re-working press releases without any attempt to check or verify the information she was publishing.

Scotland's six national daily and Sunday newspapers have seen a steep decline in sales over the past decade, with their combined figure currently standing at roughly half of the heights they reached ten years ago. According to the Guardian, now just half of Scots read a daily, compared with three quarters previously, and just one third of those are national titles.

Scottish newspapers hit their peak when the Scottish parliament opened in 1999, and at the time journalists such as Kenneth Roy saw this as the beginning of a golden era for the Scottish media. "I foresaw this great flowering of Scottish journalism which would accompany the devolution process," he now explains.

Martin Morgan, chief executive of the Daily Mail & General Trust has revealed that the group is considering methods of charging for its content, as well as devices such as Amazon's Kindle. Whilst he did say not to expect a "big initiative that is going to come out any time soon," he said that DMGT is "certainly looking at those models."

"The more specialised the information is . . . the more likely to you are to be able to charge for it," believes Morgan - DMGT's flagship publication the Daily Mail is particularly known for its celebrity coverage. The paid online content debate is rife, and Rupert Murdoch, head of News Corp has recently announced that the company will be charging for content on all of its sites within a year - could more publications be set to follow?

Source: Financial Times