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International news outlet GlobalPost has released a free iPhone app. The news service, launched in January 2009, was founded to fill the gaps in international reporting that it feared were appearing as traditional media outlets cut down on foreign correspondents.

The app shows a list of top stories, and offers stories broken down by geographical area and topic. Stories can be saved and shared using Facebook or Twitter. 

NYTimes.com has announced that it will be collaborating with New York University journalism students to create a local community news site covering New York City's East Village area. It will be launched this autumn, according to a press release.

Students from NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute will develop The Local East Village site on NYTimes.com and Richard G. Jones, a former New York Times reporter, will serve as editor of the site. New York Times deputy metropolitan editor Mary Ann Giordano will also be involved in coordinating the editorial content. Community contribution will be encouraged. 

Carlo de Benedetti, president of Gruppo Editoriale L'Espresso, whose publications include the daily newspaper La Repubblica and weekly magazine L'espresso, spoke in Paris about his support for paid content online and his belief that both Google and Internet providers should be pushed to share income with content producers.

De Benedetti gave a speech at SciencesPo university entitled "Internet and newspapers: the voice of democracy against populism," in which he outlined his belief that the Internet is crucial for spreading information more widely and is a force to be reckoned with, but that this does come with definite risks to democracy.

In terms of democracy, the fact that the Internet gives a clear platform to public opinion and allows any citizen to contribute to this, constitutes "extraordinary progress," De Benedetti said. However, there are serious dangers that accompany such a transformation, said De Benedetti, as such a system also gives a voice to the uninformed and the demagogues.

The importance of newspapers over other media

The vast abundance of information available online (although in many ways welcome) also leads to a complete lack of hierarchy of information. The fundamental role of newspapers, to organize and analyse the public debate, is threatened by this 'open-source' landscape.

Expanding on the importance of newspapers to a democracy, De Benedetti explained how unlike Internet or television, newspapers are capable of offering their readers not only information but the structure and context to allow them to come to their own conclusions on issues and events.

De Benedetti expressed concern and criticism about the state of television in Italy: as prime minister Silvio Berlusconi owns or controls a significant number of channels, and "commercial television imposes a kind of cultural hegemony." A citizen who stays informed only via television is weaker, he maintained, However, as De Benedetti noted, "television is already last century. It will continue to exist, but as a part of the Internet."

He does not believe that the Internet will soon replace newspapers, but suggests that newspapers can retain their traditional role as the "sherpas of information" on the Internet. "The presence of islands of quality news in the ocean of fragments of information... is absolutely necessary," he said.

Paid online content

De Benedetti is a strong supporter of paid online content. Consumers need to pay for news, he argued. Without the readers who were paying €1 each day for the print copy of La Repubblica, the paper would not have been able to carry out its ten questions to Berlusconi campaign, to which the prime minister eventually responded in November, hence proving its validity, De Benedetti said. "News that is free is worth nothing," he said: if you want your content to be valued you have to charge for it.

He admitted that what people require from a newspaper is changing, and that newspapers must embrace these changes and adapt their offering. "Now news is a commodity. You don't buy a paper to learnt what has happened: rather to understand why it has happened."

 "The news that goes deeper, that explains clearly, that verifies sources and adds context, is news that costs and as such, must be protected... whether on paper or on the web, on television or on the radio," De Benedetti said. Although the web has allowed newspapers to reach a large number of readers, continuing to offer news free of charge will soon "annihilate" daily newspapers and all quality news, he maintains. "Anybody can understand that paying for a good product is reasonable, even if it is online."

However, to make online content work, payment must be simple, De Benedetti stressed, something like Apple's iTunes. "Simplicity and 'automisation' of payment is absolutely key," he said. Journalism Online's Press+ has potential, he believes, as "it is difficult to imagine that consumers will willingly purchase content from multiple publishers who all use different platforms," and Journalism Online is offering a single payment system.

Charging online might have to be a gradual process, he explained, first involving making users pay for content that is not currently available online, and for content that is specially created for this aim, "if possible exclusive and elite."

Contributions from search engines...

Publishers should take a strong stance against search engines, De Benedetti suggested. "Google cannot exploit the content created by others without giving anything in return," he argued. "Aggregators do not respect the rules which protect intellectual property rights."

He pointed to the UK's Newspaper Licensing Agency's scheme as something which could serve as a model for the industry regarding obtaining proper compensation for copyrighted content. The NLA works on behalf of the UK's newspapers and licenses businesses organisations to make paper and digital copies of newspaper content, its website explains. The collected fees are distributed to the publishers.

... and internet service providers

It's not just Google who should have to share revenue with publishers, believes De Benedetti, but also internet service providers, who he said "continue to exploit - just like the search engines - the traffic generated by quality news content." Paradoxically, he added, "the more content that is free, the more the revenue of internet operators increases, and the more that of the publishers who created this content decreases." Publishers must seek to persuade telecom companies to share some of their revenue linked to Internet access.

De Benedetti's views on the necessity for paid online content seem clearly in line with those of several other publishers as charging consumers online seems to be becoming an increasingly more attractive and feasible option, as the New York Times and other smaller newspapers jump on board.. L'Espresso group's star newspaper, La Repubblica, currently offers free online access, however, charging only for e-editions and archives. The paper just started to charge for its iPhone application, offering subscriptions for €4.99 per month or €44.99 per year.

His interest in coming to some kind of revenue sharing agreement with search engines and aggregators is also something which is shared by other publishers, some of whom are demanding more control over their content. As De Benedetti noted, Google has recently been presenting a more conciliatory face to publishers, by making its 'First Click Free' scheme more flexible, for example. The Internet giant also offers newspapers a revenue-sharing opportunity on Google News in the form of Fast Flip, and more user-friendly ways to display news, such as Living Stories or Timeline. But it seems unlikely that the company is planning to offer any direct cut of its main ad revenue to publishers in the near future.

Suggesting that ISPs also have an obligation to pay content providers appears more controversial, but it is an idea that has arisen before. Last year in France Laurent Joffrin, editor of Libération, suggested a kind of tax on ISPs which would then be distributed to content producers. The UK National Union of Journalists proposed a similar measure to support public service broadcasting in April 2009. Such legislation would be likely to face significant opposition, however.

From the loss of advertising revenue for newspapers to the emergence of a slew of multi-functional, deluxe e-readers, times are changing for the print industry - and they are doing so quickly.

So, what can we expect for the future of the printed word in the next couple years? Some media insiders spoke to CNN to offer some insight on what could be in store for newspapers.

As the debate between Google and news publishers rages on, an opinion piece in The New York Review of Books has proposed a different solution: that Google should fund a new journalism venture.

A variety of new ventures have been established in response to the tough times the newspaper industry faces. These include non-profit news publications such as the Chicago News Cooperative, California Watch and the Texas Observer. Other organisations including ProPublica, Spot.us and The Foundation for Public Interest Journalism receive funding from community or philanthropic sources, and use the money to support investigative or public-interest reporting.

Clay Shirky, journalism intellectual extraordinaire, was interviewed at Yale University for a conference on The New News Ecology: "Who will pay for the messenger?" by Leonard Witt for Sustainable Journalism. 

Last night's tension filled 2010 World Cup Qualifier between France and Ireland exploded in extra time when French captain Thierry Henry set up what would be the decisive goal after keeping the ball in play with his hand from an offside position.

The controversial result, which sees France heading to South Africa and Ireland heading home, has sparked outrage over the internet with many fans tweeting about the event and a 'Wiki war' breaking out over Henry's Wikipedia page.

Two German entrepreneurs are setting up a new kind of home delivered newspaper among worldwide news print failures. On November 16^th the brave young businessmen are venturing into the industry with an innovative newspaper service - the first of its kind in Europe - at arguably the worst time, and for a limited Berlin-only market. But its very unorthodoxy, the essence Wanja Oberhof's and Hendrik Tiedmann's Niiu personalized newspaper, could be its saving grace.

Niiu Beginnings

The Niiu started with an idea, two and a half years ago, ultimately about information convenience. Having grown up in a newspaper-reading household, Mr. Oberhof became used to reading multiple papers to pursue the news and information he was interested in.  Having to juggle multiple national, local, and international papers to find one's interests would inevitably become a chore, especially vis-à-vis the speed and convenience of internet news. The same behavioral phenomenon is in fact the very reason why the internet seems to be ruining traditional newspapers; people, especially young adults and students, are tending find their news and information from a variety of sources on the internet rather than a single source that marked the newspaper's monopoly and success in the 20^th century. 

Oberhof's resulting idea was simple and clear: an individualized newspaper, composed of selected pages and sections from papers, delivered each morning to one's door just like a regular paper. This combination of paper format and internet convenience and accessibility found Oberhof a business partner in Hendrik Tiedmann, who shared the same idea. Together they founded InterTi GmbH, Niuu's parent company, funded out of their own pockets, and began doing their homework.

"The whole idea was based on our own behavior research and experience; [as young people] we're used to very different information sources. The main idea was to combine all the varying sources of news and information, because it is normal for young people who have grown up with the internet to have not one source of information but many," Mr. Obherof said in a telephone interview with The Editor's Weblog. But why a newspaper format? Surely a less risky and lower-cost alternative would be setting up a personal news aggregator.

Oberhof disagrees. "We asked this target group which is the most comfortable and which is the best distribution channel; is it an e-paper, is it only on mobile, is it printed or online? The feedback was that for now, paper is still the best distribution channel." Hence the simple combination of the internet and printed paper that is the essence of Niiu.

Interestingly, the founders have no particular allegiance to print, it just happens to be the currently favored distribution channel. "The vision that we offer is all the information that is relevant for the reader. As a next step it is the reader's choice which distribution channel they will use, whether it's a mobile phone, e-paper, the internet, or whatever else." Their focus is information amalgamation and distribution, the particular channel being largely irrelevant and ultimately the client's choice. This is quite an unusual position for a company entering the print industry, which these days seems to require a great deal of faith.

What Niiu is and How it Works (The Technical Bit)

On the client's side the process is very simple. After signing up for a short-term subscription (more on that later), they have until 2 p.m. to choose their news sources for the following morning's paper. On Niiu's website they can select from a wide variety of publications and online sources; from national, local or international newspapers like the New York Times, or internet news sources and blogs. A 24-page personalized paper, researched from and composed of their choices, then appears on the subscriber's doorstep the next morning.

"At this first step, for the reader it is only possible to select whole pages or sections," says Oberhof. From newspapers the readers can select pages or sections, from the internet providers they choose from over 600 very diverse rss feeds, from "Women's tennis blogs to local garden pages, we have lots of special interest content available." Clients currently cannot access their personalized paper online, as this would basically defeat the purpose of the delivered print format.

On Oberhof and Tiedmann's side, however, things are a bit more complicated. It is no easy feat to compile, print, and distribute thousands of individual papers. Over the past two years, InterTi GmbH has had to create a specialized software for compiling sources and setting the layout, arrange digital printing deals, close licensing contracts with news sources, attract advertisers, create a new business model and work out delivery schedules. So how did they do all that?

"We outsource everything," says Oberhof. "We don't have an editorial team, we don't have the printing machines, we don't have a delivery structure; we have partners. First we had to create software, so we got a partner with a Swiss web and print specialist service. They produced our software that combines all the pages and articles and news for each reader into a print-ready .pdf that is sent to the digital printing machines from the Netherlands, and a German copy house takes care of the actual printing. Then we have an agreement with a Berlin delivery service that delivers all the international newspapers that will also now deliver Niiu." Given all this outsourcing and subcontracting, one wonders whether circulation revenue will cover the costs.

Luckily there is another revenue source, the very one that is ruining traditional papers, and where the Niiu shines most brightly: it offers a space for highly targeted advertising, something already optimistic advertisers will pay dearly for. At first, during the 'trial phase' of the first few months, advertising will be more general because the Niiu is new and won't have a large circulation. But with an expanded subscriber base ads will become more targeted, focusing on neighborhoods their corresponding socio-economic groups.

Oberhof is confident of his advertising model. "We have had large amounts of positive feedback from advertising clients, and they have several different ideas such as at first only distinguishing between male and female readers, then differentiating by neighborhood and age in Berlin. Some big German car players are interested and have said 'different cars for different people' based on the interests of the readers, like the family man being interested in the new X5 or the young student being shown the BMW 1." Who the people are and more particularly what their interests are would be clear from their choice of news sources for their Niiu's composition.

Ignoring that their proclaimed audience is exclusively young students and not old people and family men, this raises some questions about whether using personal information for advertising violates some privacy protections. But this is doubtful as various advertisers and distributors have used similar techniques for years: think about those supermarket coupon promotional catalogues, also known as 'junk mail,' which you might get at your front door. They differ per neighborhood using the same concept (in my experience, I got Pioneer Supermarket rice coupons up in Harlem, while my friends downtown got brochures for Citarella).

Of course, a paper cannot live on adverts alone. In terms of subscriptions, Niiu continues to be innovative. The subscription packages are aimed towards young readers and students, the paper's perennial target audience (and probably one of the more difficult market sectors to enter, especially in media and technology).

Mr. Oberhof explains: "We have several different packages, not a traditional subscription but a pre-paid system. You load up money for packages, like the one-day trial, or the longer-term packages over 25, 75 or 150 days. It's not a classical subscription at all, that's an important point for us, because many young people, according to our feedback, don't want a subscription for a year because they do not know where they will be in the near future, whether studying in a different city, or doing an international internship or living at home, so they want short-term packages." Currently Niiu is priced at €1.80 per issue, €1.20 for students.

Is this really a good way to build subscriber loyalty? There is a risk of high turnover, potentially running through the market potential before they get established. However this model makes sense for their target demographic. Personally I find this an appealing arrangement. Not really knowing where I will be in six months has prevented me from subscribing to my publications of choice, so I read online news while I would prefer the print editions.

Challenges

One of the biggest questions I had for Mr. Oberhof was regarding the licensing and use of articles and content from news providers. In the context of the current debate over paid online content and the associated problem of the cost of news and journalism, this is quite a pressing concern and I was most interested in what Niiu's arrangements were. Surprisingly, it was unsurprising and rather simple.

Niiu has a contract with each newspaper and online provider, in which "we have a little license fee which we pay for every used page," Oberhof explains. The licenses, and thus the copies of Niiu itself, are based on pages: "we pay a fixed fee for each page we use...because we take one-to-one pages from each newspaper," meaning the pages of Niiu are exact replicas of the original page from the source. This setup will be the working model for the first few trial months.

"The newspapers give us access to everything they have. That means every page and article that is used in the New York Times we can have the next day in Niiu," although details on how blogs and internet sources would be presented are a bit fuzzy. It would be safe to assume that they would appear in Niiu as they would in your browser, albeit reformatted and resized.

An obvious question regards how newspaper publishers feel about Niiu and why they would allow access to their articles, when this could very well cannibalize their own sales. While some certainly think so, the majority of publishers approached by Oberhof and Tiedmann have embraced the idea and accepted licensing contracts.

"Most of [the news publishers] think it's an interesting new project for a target group which doesn't read much newspapers. The young people, the students, in Germany don't read that much newspaper so for [the newspaper publishers] it's an experience; they want to have a look at the feedback and to test it out. Most of them also don't think that we will take the long-term single paper reader away from them, since our audience is the reader who doesn't know which paper is right for them or likes a variety of news sources," Oberhof asserts.

So, in theory, there is no direct competition because they target different audiences. However, the Niiu provides the same service as the internet but in print form; it is hard to see why publishers who would blame the internet and the news aggregators (which is basically what Niiu is doing) as the newspaper's bane would embrace that service in their own industry.

Some industry experts are not so optimistic. Joachim Blum, a digital media consultant, voices 'considerable doubts' over Niiu's future. He says the idea is interesting, but it just won't work because the target audience has left paper behind: "People who read newspapers are office workers, not students," Blum tells Spiegel Online. This is similar to the problem discussed above, where it seems that the assumption has been made that students who are used to getting news quickly and for free online will suddenly start paying for it to be physically manifested; they surely won't be paying for the service, as they can do it themselves. They would therefore be paying for the physical product, the newspaper, and its aesthetic appeal. But we all know how fickle young people and students are when it comes to aesthetics.

Another issue is more topical as to how Niiu relates to traditional newspaper and the internet, its status in between and bridging these media forms. For all its supposed innovation, "Niiu shares the same dilemma of print journalism in the age of the Internet: every paper you read in the morning only contains yesterday's news," says Stephan Weichert, a journalism professor at the Macromedia University of Applied Sciences in Hamburg. "The Web offers news every second and gives the option to link to blogs and other websites. Why would people read and even buy a story or information, which they select on the Internet the day before? It's old-school journalism," he tells Time. Again, the same underlying problem is pointed out; the combination of paper and internet has great potential, but it also combines the weak points of both and confuses the primary audiences of both mediums.

Time will tell whether these criticisms will stand or whether Niiu will live up to its potential.

The Future!

For the time being it seems like the main challenges for Oberhof and Tiedmann have been surmounted. They are looking forward to the November 16^th launch, for the time being to serve Berlin only. The circulation scope for now is limited because of the high quality but rather slow digital printing. "You can't compare it to a classical offset machine that could print 200,000 copies of Niiu in an hour; our digital printers can only do about 2000 in an hour," Oberhof explains. "That means it is not possible to deliver from one printing machine to several cities, so we start in Berlin. But obviously it's planned to expand to other cities in Germany and Europe," if the paper gets off the ground with the aim of around 5000 subscribers by the first 6 months.

However Oberhof knows there is much to be done, and that the work is far from finished. "For the next month the biggest challenge will be whether the whole work flows as we want it to. The first actual non-test paper will [hopefully] have around 5000 subscribers and this will be a lot to handle since every newspaper is individual. We might not actually know or can't imagine what the real work flow will be, what will come, and that's definitely the hardest thing." Meanwhile, he already has plans for future products and services once Niiu gets going and is established in the market.

Oberhof and Tiedmann's mission is more about giving the market what it wants, i.e. providing whatever information the reader desires in whatever format they prefer, rather than innovating the newspaper industry (which seems to be a side effect of their project). So if the market preference shifts, so will their products and services.

Having recognized that newspaper may only be around for so long, InterTi GmbH is planning "to offer an e-paper as a second step, probably by the end of this year," Oberhof revealed. Other editions are in the works, but no plans have been formally announced given that the formal launch is still a few days away. "For the future, I think that things like the Kindle will be very interesting for our product developments, but for now its not actually enough, not many people use e-readers at all," Oberhof confides. However, given the company's service-oriented vision, we can reasonably expect an e-reader version once the market for them takes off.

Whether you think newspapers are doomed or just in a rough spot right now, there is no denying the simple ingenuity and appeal (however limited) of Niiu. Its combination of the strengths (and unfortunately some of the weaknesses) of printed news and online news could make it a product to be reckoned with, even for those newspaper publishers who feel no competition from it. The potential for newspaper innovation through individualization is huge, and it remains to be seen whether Niiu will capitalize and profit from that potential

The Editor's Weblog wishes the best of luck to Oberhof and Tiedmann. It is now up to the Berlin public to decide the fate of Niiu.

Mr. Wanja Oberhof will be speaking at the WAN 2009 16th World Editors Forum in Hyderabad

Sources: Personal interview with Mr. Oberhof.

Spiegel Online

PrintWeek

Time

It has been a rough couple of years for the newspaper industry with the recession taking its toll on the financial stability of many organisations. In the past year alone at least ten publications have filed for bankruptcy and many have been forced to close their doors. With newspapers treading fast to try to keep their heads above water many have cut back funding for more costly types of news. One of the first things to go has been investigative journalism, considered by many publications to be a luxury. The time and investment of multiple resources in a single issue is something that many publications simply can no longer afford.

These cuts have raised alarm bells. The potential loss of 'the fourth estate' and 'government watchdog' have united many in the cause to protect the practice of journalism, even if the business and profitability of it is doomed to fail.

One method suggested to preserve this type of journalism is to run as a non-profit organisation. Seeking the status under the claim that journalism is a 'public good' publications are free from commerical pressures and the disappointment of dwindling circulation figures, relying only on donations from those who feel the cause worthy enough.

It is at this point that the Texas Tribune enters the scene. The online-only news site launched early last week as a non-profit venture in an attempt to fill a gap in quality local journalism in Texas. The Editors Weblog spoke with editor-in-chief, Evan Smith to look at Tribune's website and non-profit ambitions in closer detail.


The inspiration:
The big name in non-profit news is ProPublica. Led by former Wall Street Journal managing editor Paul Steiger, the organisation began publishing in June 2008 and has consistently drawn in large sums of donations, with key sponsor the Sandler Foundation contributing annually. ProPublica, which will write an article then offer it to a newspaper to publish, has carried out some impressive investigative feats to date, most notably its collaboration with the New York Times, published in August. The 13,000 word article which cost an estimated $400,000 to produce examined the events that took place at the Memorial Medical Centre following Hurricane Katrina. The piece highlighted the importance of such investigative journalism and made the need to save it even more apparent.
 
The Texas Tribune aims to achieve something similar on a smaller and more political scale, offering Texans a news source designed to compliment local newspapers that already exist: "We've made a point of not presenting this as a binary choice: A or B. We believe it's additive: A and B. Read your local paper and read us. In fact read as much stuff as there is out there" says Smith.

"We're simply presenting ourselves as one in a series of things that you need to read and listen to and view and access if you want to be a thoughtful and engaged Texan." 

In his first posting on the website Smith talked about what the Tribune was attempting to achieve: "What we mean to do on an ongoing basis is right there in our stated mission: to promote civic engagement and discourse on public policy, politics, government, and other matters of statewide concern."

In ProPublica fashion, the Tribune has said that all the information published on its website is up for grabs for other media organisations as part of a content-sharing plan designed to aide other reporters who might not have the time to look into an issue in depth.  Matt Stiles, one of the Tribune's staff reporters writers told Poynter Online in an interview: "Ultimately, we'd like to tell every paper in the state, 'If you like this data set, just take it'."

"I hope reporters will come see the information, download it, remix it and be creative with it."

The build up:
In July this year Smith announced he was leaving his position as editor-in-chief of established Texas Monthly magazine to take up the post as CEO and editor of the Tribune. A few months later, the Tribune added Elise Hu, Emily Ramshaw and Matt Stiles to its list of experienced journalists.

In an interview with Poynter in September, Ramshaw talked of her decision to join the project: "I feel, and still feel, that the newspaper business is in serious crisis. I'm not content to cling to a deck chair and go down with a sinking ship."

Ramshaw worked for The Dallas Morning News for six years, the last three of which she was state investigative reporter.  "We're trying to prepare for the next incarnation of journalism. If this venture is going to work, it's going to work because serious, talented journalists were brave enough to take the risk," she said.

The Tribune has built up a selection of notable reporters willing to do this and Chairman and co-founder John Thorton had been quoted as saying: "We didn't hire journalists out of work. We hired reporters who their editors were pissed off that they lost them."

Smith and Thornton worked hard on securing donations, with Thornton himself donating $1 million to the Tribune. In early October the founders confirmed they had received a further $750, 000 in grants from the Houston Endowment and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The Tribune is now only slighty short of the $4 million target it needs to continue running for two years, with a current total of $3.7 million.

The sum is considerable for a start up website, as paidContent's Staci Kramer has noted: "Unlike some of the new crop of local and regional news startups, the Tribune is launching with enough money for a well-paid staff of 16, including 11 reporters," referring to salaries of $315K for the editor in chief, and up to $90K for seasoned reporters.

As for promotion of the site itself, Smith told the Editors Weblog just how useful social networking sites have been. Regular updates for the public on the status of the site via Facebook, Twitter and the site's own newsletter built up a sense of curiosity over what exactly they had in store for last Tuesday's launch.
 
"We've been very aggressive on Facebook and Twitter both to promote the content and also to connect with our community of followers" said Smith. "We've also used both to aggressively push for funding. We've generated quite a lot of memberships in the Tribune which are much like memberships in public radio by pushing over Facebook and over Twitter messages that relate to our fundraising campaign, and they've been very successful," he says, citing the 1400 founding members who have given between $50 and $5000 to the Tribune out of their own pockets.

What does the site look like?
The website debuted with top stories on the mistreatment of disabled children in public schools, the Democratic lean of El Paso in an otherwise Republican state, and the results of a poll carried out by the Tribune and the University of Texas.

The site itself is divided into ten pages, the organisation of which differ from your average news website. Offering 11 databases under a section titled 'Library' for further reading, the databases contain information ranging from federal campaign donations, gubernatorial appointees and lawmaker spending. In addition to this there is a complete electoral directory of every Texan senator and governor- the site essentially offers a single space for complete personal and political data on the '242 occupants of the state's highest offices'.

It is clear that a lot of time has gone into collaborating this research, and according to the Nieman Journalism Lab, the Waco Tribune-Herald has already taken advantage of the new resource and published some Tribune content. 

Aside from the databases, the site boasts eight of its own blogs and links to some 25 others; has a 'topics' section where stories can be found based on theme; a calender, where information about local events can be found or submitted; and a 'Tweetwire', a Twitter feed from all Texan politicians on the website's front page.

Compared to the recent launch of another local non-profit news website, Oakland Local, the Tribune's website is much more sophisticated. The Texan team have embraced the capacities of the internet and technology to their full, utilizing social media, widgets, videos, blogs and mobile applications- something Smith believes to be key to the way in which the use of media is changing.

"In consumption of media people are paying more attention to online media today then ever before," say Smith. "I look at my almost 13 year old daughter and how she consumes media and it's not at all in print it's almost entirely online and I think that's the trend line."

Smith suggests that publishers need to adapt to measure up to this changed method of consuming news: "You cannot simply go out and record the news, present that to people and believe that that's going to be enough. You need to give them the tools to better understand their world, to better know their state, to better know the people they elected, to better hold them accountable and that often is all not simply conventional reporting but the amassing and presenting of data that allows people to access the world in which they live from a more detailed level."

Why will the Tribune succeed where others have failed?
Whilst successful local non-profit news publications do exists, the Voice of San Diego and the MinnPost to name a few- there are also notable failures such as the Rocky Mountain Independent and InDenver Times, two online start-ups founded by Steve Foster earlier this year. How will the Tribune ensure that it doesn't suffer the same fate?

Smith says that the Tribune essentially has a better business plan, arguing that the RMI and InDenver Times failed because they were run by journalists, not business people and "didn't really have a plan for how to make the model sustainable."

Part of the reason the Tribune is choosing to remain online-only is because "the cost of printing a print publication for postage and paper and print facilities is so expensive that you reduce your overhead dramatically and therefore make it much more likely that your business model will sustain."

Of course the Tribune's has also managed to raise a healthy budget, further insulating itself against some of the problems faced by other publications. "Money is, as in all things, the mother's milk of your operation," Smith says, continuing on to mention that the having the financial capacity to buy the latest technology and hire top journalists will "go a very long way to allowing us to do our best work."

Smith's views bear resemblance to industry commentator Alan Mutter, who recently critized many online non-profit publications for not being business-minded enough. Mutter accuses these publications of "a suicidally stubborn determination on the part of the organizers to be in the business they want to be in, instead of attending to the business they need to attend to," and he argued early last month that, "A business, especially a start-up, requires far more than passion for the work. It requires close attention to the nuts and bolts of raising money, making sales and controlling expenses."

How will the Tribune navigate ethical issues?
A nagging question over the non-profit model is how publications will be able to resist influence from major donors. Smith argues that the seperation between donors and the editorial team is no different to the situation between advertisers and editorial: "I edited a magazine for nine years in which we had big advertisers who also happened to often be the subject of stories and the transactional economy that supports the operations of a for profit publication has no relationship what-so-ever to the journalism inside, or it shouldn't anyway, not at a good magazine and not at a good newspaper."

"Just because someone advertises doesn't mean you go easy on them or you go hard on their competitors."

Nevetherless, the non-profit news model is still in early stages and very dependent on the income from donors. Even for-profit news publications have not been immune to advertsing clients flexing their muscles in tough financial times, with a Detroit paper recently being accused of reporting on private health care following a request from client Humana (who subsequently purchased an ad next to the story).

What would Smith do if he was approached by a donor to cover a particular story? 

"Donors don't expect that were going to write about their issues or about their enemy's issues in a negative way, they're not looking for us to take sides- they're supporting the principle that hovers above all this activity: that journalism in the public interest has value."

"Any donor who is unhappy with the coverage we provide because of such an expectation is welcome to his or her money back," he says, adding: "I'd rather lose my funding then lose my integrity."

So are non-profits the next incarnation of journalism?
The wider debate on whether or not non-profits are the future of journalism has been raging for a while. Online magazine, Slate's Jack Shafer has weighed in for the negative: "In the current arrangement, we're substituting one flawed business model for another. For-profit newspapers lose money accidentally. Nonprofit news operations lose money deliberately."

Thornton, the Tribune's chairman, hit back at the remarks: "I call it the Stockholm Syndrome. They are sympathizing with their advertiser-captors."

So who is right? Is the non-profit model the future of journalism?

Yes and no. It is unlikely to become a general solution for newspapers simply because of the huge sums of money involved, but for nieche reporting and more time/fund consuming journalism such as investigative reporting, it could definiatley be a viable option.

The idea compares favourably at least to the suggestion of government bailouts. As Thorton wrote of the "obvious fox-in-the-henhouse issues that arise--to mix animal metaphors--from government watchdogs funded out of government coffers."

As the first serious, state-focused news site with a decent enough amount of money behind it and what seems to be the right attitude toward embracing the capacities of the digital age and the changing face of journalism- whether or not the Texas Tribune succeeds will be key to the way in which the non-profit model is viewed.

As Tribune reporter Christe Hu suggests: "Journalism is at a crossroads right now. We're seeing not just survival of the fittest but a 'mutation of the species.' "

"I think the non-profit model has just as good a shot as anything else."

Allbritton Communication Co., owner of popular political news website, Politico, is to launch a website next spring that will cover local news in the Washington area, AFP is reporting.

In a memo released to staff yesterday, chief executive Robert Allbritton confirmed the venture, which will the run by ex-WashingtonPost.com editor, Jim Brady. Allbritton said the website "will harness the power of the Web, social media and new technology to connect Washingtonians with each other and with the information that matters most in their family, civic and work lives.

Spanish online-only website Soitu.es farewelled it's readers yesterday, announcing it would shut down after only 22 months of production.

In a post titled 'Hasta la vista y gracias', founder Gumersindo LaFuente thanked the half a million unique visitors a month the site had managed to attract throughout it's short life.

Poynter contributor Dorian Benkoil has written an article entitled Journalism Online: Not Just a Pay Wall, in which he tries to offer "a fairer portrayal" of what the start-up "says it intends to do," in reaction to much reporting on the venture which he believes has been incomplete. Journalism Online, due to launch a prototype in the near future, promises to facilitate charging online.

Benkoil stressed that rather than a simple attempt to put up pay walls around content, Journalism Online offers a more complex service, involving helping publishers figure out whether or not they can charge and if so, how. And the concept is very much designed around the idea of only charging for some content, and of providing data to publishers so that they can make the best decisions. Gordon Crovitz, co-founder of the venture and former publisher of the Wall Street Journal, told Benkoil that "we managed to talk a few of our affiliates out of putting a complete pay wall around all their content."

UK current affairs weekly the Spectator is to start charging online for content that is in the print magazine. Website-only content, such as the site's Coffee House blog, will remain free, Press Gazette and others reported.

The Spectator is currently offering an annual subscription to the digital editions of the magazine online for £67.50, exactly half the price of a print subscription at £135. UK readers can subscribe to the print edition at a special rate of 12 weeks for £12: both print subscriptions include online access. The Spectator also offers its US readers a Kindle subscription for $4.99 a month. Like the Economist, it allows one-off delivery orders. 

Last week Josh Cohen, Senior Business Product manager at Google, published a response to newspaper publishers' Hamburg Declaration which was made public on 9 July. The Declaration states that "going forward we no longer wish to be forced to give away property without having granted permission." It discusses ACAP, or Automated Content Access Protocol, which is a tool created by WAN-IFRA and the European Publishers Council to enable content providers to communicate their copyright terms and conditions online in a machine-readable way. Cooperation from search engines is essential for such an initiative.

Cohen contends that publishers do in fact have to give permission before their content appears on search engines, pointing to a technical standard known as the Robots Exclusion Protocol which tells search engines what can and cannot be crawled. He points out, correctly, that news organisations make their content available because they want it to be found and read via Google, which does deliver many consumer visits to newspaper websites each month.

The dilemma

The Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is embarking on a study of online news distribution amid rising concern about the news industry's financial troubles which have been exacerbated by the global economic downturn. It is part of the Working Party on the Information Economy's ongoing work on Digital Broadband Content. Last month, to launch the study, representatives from OECD countries and interested organisations heard four several presentations on how news production and distribution is changing, and what the future might be .

Crises and a broken business model: how a news agency reacts

Eric Scherer is director of strategy and external relations at Agence-France Presse, and founder of AFP's Mediawatch blog. He explained to the OECD the nature of the crisis which he believes is taking place, and the steps that an outlet such as AFP is taking.

He sees a situation where five simultaneous crises took place, in terms of economics, business model, attention, training and authority. The economic value of the traditional press is going down as the mainstream tries to adapt to new trends. The current business model is "broken," he believes: it was based largely on advertising and a small amount of circulation revenue but in the past two to three years there has been a "historic decoupling" of advertising and newspapers as classified ads have moved online. The old media now has to run after attention as it faces competition from new. Training is a "huge problem" according to Scherer: it has to be done quickly but people at the top are not sufficiently aware of the challenges. And finally, the authority of old media is declining quickly as the top-down relationship falls apart.

What is more, Scherer believes that a process of disintermediation has taken place in news: the media has been cut out, as those who want to get their message out go straight to the people. He cited Obama's election campaign and use of new media as a "symbol" of this, pointing out that the future president used every single internet and Web 2.0 tool to communicate with the public. And the people responded: at every Obama demonstration there were attendees talking photos with their digital cameras or phones which they then uploaded and posted online. Sports stars are also speaking directly to the people, Scherer pointed out. This is the main development in the media in recent times, that the people who were deprived of production and distribution tools now have them. Hence, old media's monopoly is over, what used to be scarce, is now abundant.

The Internet has led to the "atomisation of content," meaning that readers can 'snack' on content as they are always one click away from something else, according to Scherer. Print and online are mutually conflicting business models, but going online-only is not necessarily the best idea, he explained, referring to a City University study on online-only Finnish paper Taloussanomat. 

These problems have all be exacerbated by the financial crisis, Scherer said, which makes it so much harder to finance the transition period and find a business model. Before the crisis hit, it seemed as if news outlets would have time to adapt, but now they are "below the poverty level."

So, how can news organisations finance their work? Is it possible in the current climate to find a way to finance an investigative journalism network and a Baghdad bureau? Scherer described how AFP has been tackling these challenges of the new news ecosystem. AFP produces all the main "bricks of content" and now needs to be able to link them together an add technical context. Rather than just providing editorial content, the agency now offers its traditional media customers both content and services, such as video, mobile or user-generated content platforms.

Due to the increased competition for breaking news, as the Internet means that newspapers and other outlets can effectively act as wire services and AFP's competitors are no longer just Reuters and the Associated Press, AFP has chosen to increase its national and international coverage and rely and focus on its branding. Amongst all the "noise on the internet," Scherer believes that people feel safer when they know their news comes from a trusted brand.

The Internet has also meant that AFP has become not just a business to business operation, but also has a direct relationship with the consumer, as its articles are available online under the AFP brand, via search engines such as Google or Yahoo. Incidentally, the Associated Press, which has also traditionally kept the audience at a distance, is going a step further and seeking to create search "landing pages" on news topics for its readers.

The evolution of the Internet as a journalistic tool

Thomas Crampton's presentation on the value of new technologies for communications was delivered true to style: it was recorded on a mobile phone video application while the writer went through security in a Hong Kong airport. 

Crampton's career path has developed simultaneously with the evolution of new technologies as a communications tool: as a correspondent at the International Herald Tribune and the New York Times, he always tried to capitalise on available online and digital tools to ensure that his reporting was always at the cutting edge of news provision. Nonetheless, frustration with the reticence of the traditional media to embrace alternative outlets to their full potential pushed him to leave the print industry for fear of "being left behind".  He is now the Asia Pacific Director of Digital Influence at Ogilvy. 

The responsibilities of this position convey Crampton's conviction and "passion" for the new media. In this role he works with multinationals to tap into new technology, which enable companies and individuals to reach and communicate with a huge audience. The progressive outlet of other industries reinforces Crampton's dismay with what he sees as the reluctance of news providers to work with these possibilities. 

To illustrate his conviction that technological evolution is a great but unavoidable asset for news provision, Crampton outlined the developments of the relationship between news reporting and the Internet:

• - 1995-99 Communications: During this period, the Internet facilitated the internal communications of news providers; for example correspondents could communicate with the home bureau through email, greatly reducing time. The web, however, was not at this point seen as a way to distribute or research news.
• - 2000-2004 Research: The Internet developed into an information finding tool, enabling reporters to assemble facts for stories that would otherwise be unattainable. Applications such as Google Cache allowed correspondents in the field to find elusive information and file updates, reducing their previously pressing need to continuously collaborate with the home office. Moreover, as information became accessible from anywhere in the world once connected to the web, newsrooms found that they could function without some foreign bureaus or correspondents. 
• - 2004 to present Social Media: The emergence of social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter have affected not only the way news is reported, but how information is distributed.  As a result, traditional roles in the information stream dynamic are merging: the audience are now sharers, publishers and broadcasters as much as they are consumers of information.

It is in this current situation in which Crampton suggests news providers have lost their direction, apparently overwhelmed by the challenges thrown up by the proliferation of platforms and the attendant dissolution of information monopolies. To surmount these problems, news providers needed to proceed with a flexible, open attitude to the creation of new business models. However, Crampton indicates that their wariness led to the internal creation of limitations, citing the ongoing debate about online subsidies and paid for content as a detrimental and futile drain of resources.

Crampton felt that the traditional frameworks were restricting journalists from making "headway" in the wider field of communications and reporting. He began to "push boundaries, both externally and internally". The launch of his own blog enabled him to create his own "digital identity", establishing a persona beyond that of his employer. Indeed, the importance of 'branding' in the journalism professional was highlighted by the anecdote that when Crampton's name was typed into a search engine, whilst still at the IHT, his personal blog was listed before that of the publication. Once Crampton had left the paper, he devoted himself to diffusing information through new technologies, unrestrained by company rule and protocol. The results have been 'liberating', allowing the writer to establish a "complex and rich dialogues" with otherwise "unreachable audiences". 

Crampton offers a shining testimony to the current and potential value of new technologies in communications. It is a strong message to news providers that innovation is necessary.  Due to the use of multiple media outlets, Crampton perceives himself to be at the "front line of communication". Yet, whilst Crampton's departure from the printed press has produced exciting results, the feasibility of this as a career pathway for the majority of journalists, especially those just starting out is questionable. 

Before becoming digitally "independent" Crampton had established a reputation as a reporter, during a decade of front line correspondence for prestigious titles. These experiences, gained thanks to the printed press, would have allowed Crampton to obtain a readership, a sum of which have presumably continued to follow and recommend him as changed outlets. It may be that if reporters are to succeed on the digital and online scenes, without having the safety net of affiliation with an established publication, they need to have more ammunition than just writing ability. With the abundance of breaking news online, there is increasing demand for critical, in depth pieces written by experts.  In short, there are signs that markets are becoming more "niche" which is requiring journalists to assert their value by finding a speciality.

Could stakeholder journalism be the future?

Mark Hunter, a founding member of the Global Investigative Journalism Network and Senior Research Fellow at INSEAD spoke about what he sees as the declining credibility of traditional news and the subsequent rise of 'stakeholder journalism.' He believes that concentration of ownership has contributed to reduced credibility of traditional media as readers will increasingly question whether owners have their own agenda. Hunter sees the news industry's current problems as a vicious circle starting with this: declining credibility leads to declining audience, leading to declining revenue and hence declining capacity.

Investigative journalism is a field which is already moving out of the grasp of the media, Hunter pointed out. Sixty per cent of investigative journalism is funded by foundations rather than media, and this which leads him to suppose that stakeholder media - in other words, news generated by organisations that have an interest in the story - might be taking over the role of watchdog. Greenpeace, for example, has a long history of such journalism, such as during its confrontations with Exxon.

Stakeholder journalism differs from traditional journalism in several ways, Hunter explained. For one, it targets a different audience, focussing on informing particular communities and insiders rather than a general audience. Its expertise is narrower but deeper, concentrated on environmental or political issues, for example. Stakeholder reporting aims to accomplish a different objective: telling people what they should do, rather than just what to think about. It is transparent about where it is coming from and what it thinks is 'right,' rather than trying to present a balanced argument.

Hunter believes that the news industry will continue to shrink, and that government bailouts, for example, will not bring the public back. This will leave a growing void which stakeholder journalism will fill, heralding the return of partisan media, according to Hunter. With this comes a need for new journalistic training, as it dispels with the idea of objective media, and the need for enhanced legal knowledge. This is where OECD analysis and policy can help, he believes.

In terms of research requirements, Hunter believes that there is an "urgent need" for investigation into new business models for watchdog journalism, something which the INSEAD Social Innovation Centre and the Global Investigative Journalism Network are looking at. He also sees an "urgent need" for new codes of ethics and professional standards adapted to stakeholder media, where objectivity is no longer a core value.

Few would deny the importance of investigative journalism and the need to find a business model to sustain it. Public interest journalism, exposing wrongdoing and corruption, is clearly crucial to a democratic society. But could this be effectively carried out by interested groups rather than by an objective media presence? Stakeholder journalism has the benefit of being clear in its motives, and transparent about the fact that it is not offering a balanced argument: its bias should be obvious to readers. And more investigative stories are undoubtedly beneficial to society if they are from respectable organisations. However, it is important for the public to be able to understand both sides of a case and this is when independent, neutral third party reporting is essential. Stakeholder media can be an extremely useful supplement, but it should not replace traditional media coverage.

by Emma Heald and Christie Silk

There is a crisis in trust and communication between the British public and the mainstream media, a new report has concluded. The gulf between public expectations of news provision and the actual nature of articles, which oscillate between esoteric or irresponsible, leaves readers feeling confused and excluded.

The report, entitled 'Public Trust In The News' was conducted by researchers from Manchester and Leeds Universities and was published by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. It investigated the dynamics of news production and consumption, to ascertain if there is a difference in what "the public expects from news media and what journalists mean by serving the public".  The paper highlights the underlying causes of an apparent widespread disenchantment with the media and the detrimental effects this is having on the standards of reporting and civil participation in democracy. Thankfully, the report offers several propositions for a new journalistic direction, which could refresh the reader-writer compact.

As online news becomes more and more prevalent, with an unimaginable amount of information available at users' fingertips and Internet now ranked as US consumers' top way to access their news, how can media organisations make sure that readers find their articles?  Part of the answer is search engine optimisation, which is becoming an essential part of the daily life of a newsroom. For the printed product, newspapers must try to sell the paper as a whole; online, articles can attract traffic individually as readers come across them while searching for specific topics. It is therefore important that each story, rather than simply the site as a whole, is 'optimised' to appear higher in search results. Aside from highly technical aspects like HTML meta tagging, URL structure or site navigation, what can a newspaper do to optimise its content for search engines?

How to introduce SEO to the newsroom

One major potential stumbling block is that journalists might view SEO as a way to manipulate their stories and take away their true value. So the way it is presented to staff is extremely important. And indeed, it is crucial that newspapers do not get carried away with prioritising SEO above all else. Even Google advises creating content "primarily for your users, not search engines:" it is important to make your site easily accessible to search engines but still remain focused on your visitors' needs.

Clearly, it is important for all reporters to be aware of the ways that they can make each individual article more search-friendly. After all, journalists have always wanted their stories to be as widely read as possible, in print as well as online, and are likely to be willing to help make that happen. And often, the principles of SEO echo the principles of writing a good story: such as the idea that the first sentence should be a summary of the rest of the article, containing relevant concepts or keywords. One difference is that less generic, more specific works for SEO in terms of names or concepts. Google recommends shorter rather than longer titles.

Esa Peltonen, who has been working as a web analyst at the largest Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat for three years, said that he has worked extensively with editorial staff, for example on how to use Google, to get an idea of how users will be searching and what kind of search words people are using. Head of audience development at the Telegraph, Julian Sambles, said in March that the paper was trying to give journalists "the knowledge and understanding that they need so they can apply it to their daily production process and make informed decisions about content when they're writing or publishing it." Thinking about SEO should be second nature, he added.

Papers must also consider their goals in optimising content for search engines. As Drew Broomhall, head of search at the Times explained, if you rank success by sheer volume of traffic, then you should "write the same as everyone else but more of it and more frequently updated." However, if you are looking to increase engagement on a specific subject you need more detailed keyword analysis and niche research.

One straightforward course is the need to stay ahead of the trends: predict what people are going to be talking about in upcoming months and provide appropriate content. "Fix SEO requirements into the editorial calendar," Broomhall suggests. Obviously much news is unpredictable, but there are some events that are year-in-year-out, or which are easy to prepare for in advance, such as an election or a festival. It is necessary to consider both specific, distinct events, such as religious holidays, and longer, less defined periods such as winter travel. Articles that contain links and that have been linked to by others appear higher in search results. Therefore, with annual events, it is beneficial to link to last year's coverage and make use of old content that already has inbound links to help promote the new content.

Hiring a SEO specialist?

As well as training all reporters to be aware of the principles of search engine optimisation, many newspapers have taken the step of hiring an in-house specialist. Ideally such a person would have deep technical knowledge combined with considerable journalistic experience, but such candidates might be hard to find. Peltonen comes from a business background, Broomhall from journalism and technology.

There are also many third party services available to news outlets, supplementary to the guidance of an in-house expert, such as Thomson Reuters' OpenCalais which recently announced deals made with the Huffington Post, DailyMe and the Mail Online. OpenCalais offers an 'Archive Express' feature which can tag an archive of up to 20 million documents in 24 hours. The service 'reads' and breaks down articles into their essential elements - who, what, when, where, how - and tags and sorts them so that it is easier to bring archived articles into 'related stories' sections and improve their search relevance.

Analysing traffic

A SEO specialist would be responsible for analysing traffic to a news outlet's site, looking at how readers find content, readership patterns and what methods of optimisation work best. Peltonen explained how he started off looking at basic data such as what are the top news stories, how many people are going where on the site, and started to work out how to increase traffic. His paper partnered with Microsoft to further analyse traffic data. Such traffic data analysis can be used to spot and develop potential niche verticals to focus on, for example, by looking at repeat visitor figures.  

Google keywords

Purchasing Google keywords to guarantee that news articles appear higher on search results is one of the more costly ways for news outlets to promote their content. Peltonen said that his paper frequently buys specific words, for instance for sports events, but stressed that it would be cheaper to improve the paper's SEO. Buying keywords could also raise ethical issues, depending on the words and their context. The Sun, for example, reportedly purchased the key words 'Natasha Richardson' immediately after the British actress's sudden death in March, in what appears to be a blatant attempt to profit from the tragedy. The Guardian came under considerable criticism last August when, apparently accidentally, it purchased the Google keywords "Madeleine McCann," giving any searchers the link to its coverage of the child's disappearance. The Guardian promptly relinquished the rights, and said it would review its list of keywords. Purchasing Google keywords in order to promote a product is common practice, but is it ethical for newspapers?

Evidently, SEO strategies are necessary in today's media landscape, not only to make more money but also to spread awareness of stories and help readers find what they are looking for and therefore should be embraced by journalists and editors as well as publishers. Search engine 'friendliness' should not be prioritised over good, accurate stories but it should be used to promote such content. Journalistic training is vital in order to optimise each individual article, and larger strategic steps should be taken by editors in conjunction with SEO specialists.

On Tuesday 23 June at 14.00 London time, Drew Broomhall, Head of Search at the Times of London will be speaking at a WEF webinar on "How to teach your journalists to write for the web." More details here.

Pess freedom in Italy has come under international scrutiny in recent weeks as a down-grading of the press's freedom status by US non-profit Freedom House has coincided with an increase in prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's aggression towards media outlets which oppose him. Leading left-leaning daily La Repubblica has even attempted to take on the premier directly, publishing a list of questions concerning his relationship with a young girl, to which it believes he owes answers. A Dutch politician has threatened to take action in the European parliament against the Italian leader because of journalistic constraints. Should a newspaper be demanding such information which concerns a politician's private life? Is the press freedom situation as bad as it seems?

The La Repubblica crusade

On May 14 La Repubblica journalist Giuseppe D'Avanzo published ten questions directed at the prime minister concerning his involvement with 18-year-old Noemi Letizia. Berlusconi's relationship with the girl gained mass media attention when, four days after the prime minister dropped in on the girl's 18th birthday party in Naples, his wife issued a press release accusing him of "consorting with minors" and pressing for a divorce. Berlusconi promptly went on a late-night political chat show to defend himself, but the holes in his story which have gradually emerged have attracted even more attention than the original incident. D'Avanzo's questions address these holes and ask the premier to come clean about the nature of his encounters with the girl. Berlusconi has not yet answered the questions and has given no indication that he intends to. The paper has put a timer on its website to indicate the days, hours, minutes and seconds since the questions were issued, and even offers them in English.

Berlusconi himself has tried to present the left-leaning paper's campaign as a left-wing plot to undermine his authority, accusing the paper of lying and adding in an interview on TV-channel Sky that he believes many readers will abandon the paper because of this. His office issued a statement saying referring to the "campaign of denigration" and saying that the paper is driven by "jealousy and hatred."  The prime minister has fought back as the story developed, with his lawyers applying for the seizure of photos taken at his Sardinian villa (where Letizia reportedly attended parties with other young women) before they could be published, and a journalist from Berlusconi's brother's Milan-based daily Il Giornale posing as a member of the foreign press to get an interview with Ms Letizia's former boyfriend in an attempt to discredit him.
 
 
The international reaction 
La Repubblica has defended its actions, with editor Ezio Mauro saying that "There are contradictions here and when the powers that be don't explain something, journalism has a job to do." And foreign journalists seem to agree. The paper also featured an interview with Bill Emmott, former editor of the Economist, who said that "for a newspaper, asking a political leader questions is not only legitimate, but part of its mission to inform the people." According to the International Herald Tribune, "for the first time in recent memory, the Italian press is shining a bright light into the dark recesses of a politician's personal life." The Times wrote that the premier's campaign against La Repubblica "looks ominously like an attempt to cow dissent rather than protect a private reputation" and that "his newspaper critics are performing a public service for a badly governed populace." A Financial Times editorial criticised the way that Berlusconi turned on La Repubblica following the questions, and stressed that part of the "danger of Berlusconi... is that of the media sapping the serious content of politics, and replacing it with entertainment."

Berlusconi has reacted with anger and scepticism to such foreign criticism. He seems to refuse to believe that papers might be acting of their own accord, announcing that "the international press's campaign is being orchestrated by an Italian group" and referring to it as a left-wing "plot." He insists that the foreign press is misrepresenting the Italian situation, and a rift in his relationship with Rupert Murdoch seems to be further deteriorating following the Times' article and others. He has accused the Times of writing critical editorials about him because his government is in dispute with News Corp. Il Giornale, owned by the prime minister's brother Paolo, ran a story discussing the FT editorial entitled "The left has also enlisted the Financial Times."

One of a newspaper's main goals should be to act as a watchdog over the government, but it is unusual for a paper to take on a country's leader so directly, particularly over a matter which is largely private. In the UK, the Daily Telegraph's recent campaign over MPs' expenses was firmly in the public interest, as it dealt with public money being used by members of parliament for personal gain. Berlusconi has been derisive of the media discussing what he says is his private life. Should a paper be putting so much focus on an issue that is arguably unrelated to the prime minister's ability to govern the country? Is this indicative of media trivialisation?

The Times editorial does not see the questions as intrusive, as they relate to Berlusconi's "public roles as politician and media magnate". The Independent's Peter Popham said that the media "cannot be accused of muck-raking on the issue because it was Mr Berlusconi himself who drew attention to the relationship" by attending the 18-year-old's party and not only posing for photographs but publicly giving the girl a 6000euro gold necklace. And the fact that a politician might have lied to the public is probably enough of an incentive to investigate.
 
Press freedom in Italy
 
Italy has a fairly unique media situation, which makes confrontation between a newspaper and the prime minister even more pertinent. The country's press freedom status is clearly in question. A Dutch politician who is leader of the Green Left party in the European Parliament, Judith Sargentini, has said that her party is considering taking legal action against Berlusconi because of the press freedom constraints in his country. Amongst her complaints is the fact that the premier blocks critical questions at press conferences. If a majority of the European Parliament were to agree to the initiation of legal proceedings, then the matter would come before the European Court of Justice.

US-based nonprofit Freedom House recently downgraded Italy's press freedom status from 'free' to 'partly free' for 2008. In conversation with Karin Karlekar, editor of the report, she explained that the main reasons given for this were the unusually high level of media concentration, particularly in broadcasting, threats from organised crime and others, and attacks on journalists, mainly from far right groups. During Berlusconi's former term as prime minister, the country was also given partly free ratings, and Karlekar added that the media concentration was "one of the highest levels anywhere in the world."

Daria Gorodisky, a veteran Corriere della Sera journalist who is also a union representative for the paper, told the Editors Weblog that she believes there is a "truly enormous press freedom problem in Italy" which will be "extremely difficult to resolve." She does not place blame for this directly on the government but on the fact that there are no "pure" newspaper owners, rather, those who publish newspapers also run other businesses and therefore have aims and interests aside from their papers. She also believes that the quality of Italy's journalism schools have deteriorated as more and more have sprung up. She did, however, point out that this is not the first time that Berlusconi has threatened the press.

Internet penetration is low in Italy in comparison to that of its Western European neighbours: about 48%, compared to 72% in the UK or 66% in France, for example. This low figure would suggest that many people are more likely to get their news from television and one or two newspapers, rather than the range of sources that online readers might visit. Despite this, however, Karlekar noted the country's "very vibrant and influential" blogosphere, particularly politically-orientated blogs.

Gorodisky commented that although some journalists were "very worried" by the situation, she did not think that there was enough widespread concern about Italy's press freedom status. Karlekar said that her organisation's report had sparked considerable debate and she had received both praise and hate mail from Italians. Niccolo Ghedini, lawyer to Berlusconi, dismissed the report on a TV show called Anno Zero, saying it was a private organisation and took its information from only two sources, La Repubblica and Corriere della Sera. Karlekar responded that she was "not sure where he got that" and was clear that "the range of sources is large and our authors would never just rely on one or two." She added that it was "interesting that the government felt compelled to respond in some way."
 
Karlekar did say that Berlusconi did not seem to be "exerting the same amount of influence over the broadcast media" as he did during his previous term as prime minister; there seems to be less "overt political manipulation." She was also clear that she did not think that the high media concentration had "stifled" the whole media, and drew attention to the diversity in terms of political opinion in the print sector.

Arguably there are far more important questions that the Italian press could be asking its country's leader, rather than focusing on the somewhat sordid details of his involvement with a teenage girl. But as a vital part of the press's role in a democracy is to play watchdog on the government, the fact that a paper is challenging the prime minister to clear up inconsistencies is something that must be welcomed. And even though the original issue may not be crucial in itself, the other questions it has brought up concerning use of government planes for private use, for example, are very pertinent. Given how much of the media the prime minister does control, and the fact that even the journalists who do not currently work for Berlusconi know that they may well some day, the press freedom situation could undoubtedly be worse than it is, and it is important that journalists keep fighting.

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.

The Internet has affected newspapers in many ways, and though recent focus has concentrated largely on falling revenue due to reduction in print advertising, it has also given papers the chance to greatly expand their story-telling capabilities. As well as just words and pictures, there are now numerous different ways to enhance a story: through video, audio, slideshows, interactive maps and graphics, and more. But are newspapers making full use of the opportunities that the Internet offers to change the way that they produce their stories?

Upendra Shardanand, CEO and founder of Daylife, wrote in Paid Content about his belief that journalistic storytelling is "stuck in a rut." He describes how publishers he meets are eager to revamping many parts of their business such as distribution, and how do generate revenue, but "one aspect of their businesses that very few seem to question is the actual craft of writing and telling stories." The Internet offers so many opportunities that he feels journalists do not take advantage of, rather they leave it to sites such as Outside.In and Everyblock who "treat content like data and tear it apart just to reassemble it into infinitely browsable, non-linear experiences." He compares this process to the way that Amazon has "revolutionized" shopping.

An experienced radio journalist, having worked at Radio France Internationale for 20 years, Anne-Laure Marie decided to launch what she describes as "participatory online investigations" (or enquêtes participatives in French) using citizen contributions to look into technological issues in Africa. RFI, whose target audience is Francophone Africa, is widely respected as an independent source of news, and as well as the radio station, offers an extensive website. Marie has carried out three investigations so far, combining her professional journalistic experience with information from people in Africa who have the capability to offer first hand accounts of the situation. The Editors Weblog spoke to her to find out more about her investigations and how she is making professional-amateur journalism work.

How it started

Marie was given the task of working on interactivity of the website, but as most of RFI's audience is based in Africa, she was not sure how effective this would be due to people's difficulties in getting online. This concern itself gradually developed into the topic for her first project: why is the Internet so expensive in Africa? Using the l'Atelier des Médias community, which she described as a space in which people can "not only relate to journalists, but relate to each other," Marie sought contributions from people with first hand experience of this topic, asking questions such as how much people paid for an hour in an Internet café. She also contacted experts and found official figures.  L'Atelier des Médias has an hour and a half long radio show as well as its website, and its host Philippe Couve asks the community what questions they would like to ask guests on the show, and what subjects they would like to hear discussed. Collaboration between the two projects is working well, giving Marie a good base to work from and increasing the size of Couve's original community.

The benefits of participatory journalism

So far, Marie has carried out two further Africa-based projects, on the role of the mobile phone and on computers in classrooms. She is in the process of launching a fourth investigation, the subject of which she is letting her community choose. The advantages of seeking information from a community 'in the field' are numerous. For a start, it allows a journalist such as Marie to obtain contributions from many different countries, such as Benin, Cameroon, Senegal, Madagascar and the Congo: it would have been financially and practically impossible for one reporter to visit all of them in a short space of time. Looking at a range of countries allowed her to draw more general conclusions about the problems, and identify the causes more accurately. And as she said, her point of view would have always been that of a foreigner; "The people who live in the place always have another way of seeing the problem."

Marie explained that one of the most rewarding aspects of the investigations was coming across the unexpected: being prompted to pursue angles she had never considered. For example, one of the contributors to the first investigation accused her of being naïve for not realising that the problem was a north-south divide. Marie was not convinced by his argument, believing it to be too simple, but in following it up she realised that in fact it was largely true. "That is what's most interesting about carrying out this kind of journalism rather than working alone: it makes you think about different questions you wouldn't come across otherwise," she explained. She said that the way she works means that she has to trawl through a lot of material to find what is actually useful, and that it would probably be more efficient to ask people to contribute to specific points, but that then "all the surprise and the unexpected would be lost."

Participants

To participate, people must be a member of the community, and Marie stressed that it is very simple to sign up and takes less than five minutes. They must provide their name, location, job and phone number, so that can be contacted. They can then take part in any debate they want, or even start their own discussion. For the third investigation into the presence of computers in African classrooms, Marie received 244 responses from about 150 people. "There is a regular group who contribute frequently," Marie pointed out, and added that participants to the last investigation had said that they had located others in the community who worked in the same field.

Marie explained that in terms of participation, the projects have been working very well. She asks for documents and details as well as pure reports from her participants, and described how many people send very long contributions: because their time online is often limited, when they get connected they write as much as they can. One issue, however, is that because of people's limited contact with the Internet and even with phones, it is sometimes hard to reach people a second time to follow up on a contribution. From a journalistic point of view, Marie commented on how stimulating communication with the people is, and how much closer she feels to the people she is writing for and about than in previous projects. "It really creates trust between journalists and the people," she added, "and we create stronger bonds of citizenship."

Fact-checking

One of the major issues that arises with participatory or citizen journalism is how to verify that the information provided by the public is true, and this seems particularly pertinent when the participants are on a different continent. Checking every citizen's contribution would be a fairly daunting and possibly fruitless endeavour, and Marie relies instead on comparing information with that from specialists or officials, and with that of other participants. She asks a series of questions until she gets enough corroboration to ascertain that something is true. It is a tactic that works for this kind of in-depth investigative journalism carried out over a longer period (usually two months in this case) but not one which Marie thinks works well for breaking news, as there is just not time to present a full picture using citizen material. She also stressed that the value that citizens provide is their ability to witness, rather than their opinion on what is going on.

Moving into multimedia

Marie records some of the conversations she has with participants so that she can add some audio to the investigations. For the second investigation, on different uses of mobile phones, she started to make maps that showed the location of the participants, so that readers could click on a country, see who participated and listen to sections of interviews. "People liked it a lot," she commented, and added that she is very keen to make a "truly multimedia story with sound, pictures and video." The problems are that it is extremely time consuming, and she has learnt that it is difficult for people in African countries to get good quality pictures.



Funding

Carrying out these projects is extremely time-consuming, Marie explained, adding that she often produces about six articles over a two month period. For now, RFI are willingly funding her to start more investigations, but she does not know how long this will continue, and although she would like to see this sort of journalism grow, she is not sure whether it would be possible could find another media organisation who would be willing to pay journalists to do a similar thing in this economic climate. Investigative reporting is suffering at many traditional news outlets. Another option she mentioned would be to seek funding from NGOs or international organisations and investigate topics about which they wanted to know more.

Value of investigations, goals moving forward

The investigations are filling an important role in identifying and exploring some of the African continents technological obstacles: as Marie commented, she has "information you couldn't get another way." And some of the discoveries she has made have the potential to make a significant impact, if enough attention can be drawn to the subject. The investigations have revealed, for example, the extremely high costs that foreign telecoms providers such as France Telecom charge for Internet access in African countries, and the fact that there were new computers locked away unused in some African classrooms. The press response to the investigations has been positive, with a extract of the third report recently published in French paper Vendredi in its 'best of the Internet' section. NGOs have also been enthusiastic, Marie said, agreeing that the investigations were accurately portraying the situation in the field.

Marie's goal is to find a way to communicate with people who are not connected to the Internet, as evidently, it is a minority who have web access on a regular basis, as well as making the form of the reports more interesting with an increased multimedia focus. It is by no means 'popular' journalism; Marie herself admitted that many people outside the continent "just don't care" about Africa, but it is bringing attention to issues that matter and giving a voice to people who would be unlikely to have had such an opportunity otherwise.

Ana Bernal Triviño recently completed her doctorate at the University of Malaga, Spain. Her choice of thesis, entitled "Design preferences of the young regarding journalistic information on the internet" has already attracted some interest from media commentators and professionals alike.

Bernal's research throws some light on the relationship between the young and their preferred choice of medium - the web - in particular, addressing issues such as the relevance of design, content and layout in attracting younger readers to websites.