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Arizona's oldest community newspaper, the Tucson Citizen, finally printed its last edition on Saturday with the headline: "Our epitaph". Owner Gannett Co. had initially threatened to close the newspaper back in March, bu this was delayed when two potential buyers came forward. Unfortunately, negotiations fell through and unable to find a buyer, Gannett has proceeded with the closure.

The Bangor Daily News has announced its intention to launch a free weekly newspaper from May 21st. Entitled the Midcoast Beacon, the publication is based on a Bangor-based paper called the Weekly, also published by the News. It aims to target 43,000 Maine residents and businesses via post, and will also have an online component.

Executive editor of the News, Mark Woodward, explained that the Beacon is "designed to reach a broad audience in a targeted geographic area". Given the current well-publicised struggles of the US industry, the launch of the Beacon could be seen as a very small light at the end of the tunnel.

Source: Editor & Publisher

This June the Chicago Tribune will launch a new website, Chicago Now, which will combine social media, e-commerce, blogs, news content, and advertorials to "connect Chicagoans through a network of niche sites." According to its promotion video, the project will be "Huffington Post meets Facebook for Chicago" and aims to attract new local audiences who will engage with each other as well as advertisers.

Chicago Now does not intend to replace ChicagoTribune.com, which will continue, though it will replace the Tribune's web site for RedEye, its free daily targeted to a young urban audience. The new site's goal is to build an authentic and engaged local community quickly and to secure 35% of local web traffic.

Following the launch of an English-language paper recently launched by the Chinese government, a monthly newspaper for English-speaking expatriates in France is due to launch in June. Nicki Wade aims to make The French Post a paper that will enlighten expats with "what's being debated around French dinner tables." The ex-Emap publishing director has chosen Michael Streeter, a former news editor of the Independent on Sunday and other UK dailies, to edit the new paper.

About 40 former members of the Star-Leger staff who took buyouts last fall, joined together to launch newjerseynewsroom.com. "We had started talking about doing this even before the buyouts were made," said Matt Romanoski, former deputy sports editor at the New Jersey daily.

It has been two weeks since the website launched and it receives 10,000 page view per week. The only advertising so far is from Google. Newjerseynewsroom.com focuses on news that pertains to the state of New Jersey and any other news that may interest its residents. There are also links to other news sources, which include the Star-Ledger itself.

Even though newspapers are closing in some parts of the world, new ones are opening in others. Both Zimbabwe and Taiwan are expecting new papers to open in 2009 hoping to promote freedom of speech, spread the news as it is and also generate new jobs.

This week the New York Times launched two new hyperlocal news sites entitled The Local in New Jersey and in Brooklyn, each supervised by an NYT staff member with content provided by local citizen journalists. According to the Local sites, they will provide "news, information, entertainment and informed conversation about the things that matter to you, your neighbors and your family, from bloggers and citizens who live, work and create in your community -- as well as journalists from The New York Times."

Senior editor of Editor and Publisher Joe Strupp, who reported last week on the launch of the local sites, discusses the New Jersey site in an article yesterday. The Local covers three communities in New Jersey, including Maplewood, the town where Strupp and his family reside. The Maplewood site provides daily updates by local residents and includes children's artwork, comments, and photos.

As the financial climate forces many local newspapers to cut jobs or shut down, news teams search for a rescue solution. Many publications are debating the non-profit model and the micropayment model to sustain newspapers. One of the latest ideas to save the newspaper is community ownership or the so-called Packers model, named for the Green Bay Packers, the only non-profit, community-owned major league professional sports team in the United States.

The Packers model idea and the metaphor were proposed in January by Jonathan Golob in an article of the Stranger as a solution to save the Seattle Post-Intelligencer after Hearst Corporation announced plans to sell the publication. Golob stresses that he does not think a city government should own a paper, just as the city of Green Bay does not own the Packers, but rather have many shareholders, each only owning a few shares of the paper.

Unlike many major newspapers across Europe and the United States who are jumping on the integration bandwagon, Le Figaro has kept its print and online operations separate and intends for them to stay that way. It is, however, working hard to develop its website and keep up with online trends, as well as investing in printing plants. The Editors Weblog spoke with Bertrand Gié, Director of the department of new media at Le Figaro and Luc De Barochez, Editor in Chief at Figaro.fr, to get a better understanding of the paper's unique strategy for print, online and new media.

Strategy: Le Système Figaro

According to De Barochez, Le Figaro is unique because integration is not its objective, it has no interest in fusing print and online together.  De Barochez explained that it was a matter of specializing in two different types of media; to him print journalism is something entirely different from online journalism.  "We think that the web journalists have a specific job, that the Internet is a specific media and it's a new type of journalism that is developing - a multimedia journalism. Journalism for the daily paper is something completely different," De Barochez told the EW.  At Le Figaro, although print and online journalists work closely together, they remain independent of one another.

Investing in print    

This separation echoes the universal strategy of Le Figaro; they believe in both media and strongly support the development and integration of new media and their website, however they also believe that print is a core foundation of the brand.  Gié confirmed this belief when he described the construction of a new printing plant in the north of France due to open in September of this year.  Last year they completed a new plant in the south of France; their aim this time around is to recreate the same thing in the north, but also allowing them to "produce a brand new Figaro with a new format, and significantly reduce printing hours."

Gié went on to explain what a monumental investment this is; "In an epoch where everyone talks only of online editions and the disappearance of paper, we are, without a doubt, the only group in France to have constructed two new ultra-modern plants.  So it is very important to understand that there is a strong investment in new media, but that doesn't mean that the paper is dead."  Of course, as Gié confirmed, there is a lot of work involved in making a paper profitable while retaining its high quality, "there were a few layoffs in 2008, but that's doesn't signify the end of the paper, we are not abandoning our paper, absolutely the opposite."

Newsroom

The newsroom of Le Figaro's paper edition is made up of nearly 300 journalists, while just 30 work for the online edition. De Barochez described the layout of the web newsroom: it is a large open space is divided into four sections, economy and finance, women, sport, and news (which covers everything else, including managing the homepage).  The online newsroom is in the same building as the daily paper, allowing them to communicate easily with the print journalists.

The website

Figaro.fr was relaunched in 2005, before then, according to Gié, "it basically didn't exist," with only five people working on the site and no clear strategy of how to develop the content.  Now, Figaro.fr is the number one site in France with 5.3 million unique visitors per month, leading second place Le Monde with 4.4 unique visitors monthly.  Gié explained that the goal was for the site to be the biggest and most comprehensive portal, so they combined all of the sites and publications of the Figaro Group on Figaro.fr.  

Together but not connected

According to De Barochez, much of the online content comes from the print version and magazines owned by Le Figaro.  Although the print and online journalists work separately, they collaborate fairly often.  The print journalists are not required to write for the website and have the choice to place their articles online or not.

 De Barochez explained the different ways in which the work of print journalists goes online. Firstly, an article written for the print version could be simply reproduced online.  Secondly, when exclusive, breaking news is obtained by a print journalist, they would collaborate with the online department in order to put the news up quickly.  They write a short summary and go back and produce a more in-depth analysis.  A third possibility concerns Le Figaro's online video content, which is all created and edited in-house at its television and editing studio.  For example, a print journalist will interview a person for an online video, or a print journalist will be interviewed on a certain subject that he or she is a specialist in.

Integration

Gié acknowledged that building the website and all of its content was a lot of work, but they did it "step by step," never forcing print journalists into the realm of new media, rather allowing them to voluntarily adapt and work in collaboration when they wished.

Gié maintains that the key to successfully integrating the site into the daily workings of the newspaper was to produce a high quality website that remained independent from the print version.  "We were able to make a good site on our own and slowly we have introduced it to the print journalists and they have grown to accept it as part of the paper."  According to Gié, as of today still not all print journalists contribute to the website, but most of them are drawn to the quality of the site and they are "eager to participate."

The other new media: E-papers and Mobile technology

As for the electronic newspaper, Gié believes (for now) it is a niche technology, and "as long as the designs remain as they are, a little heavy, in black and white, with a navigation system that is not very intuitive, it will remain a niche technology - for businessmen and for people who travel."  But, he finds the e-paper to be a technology that has the potential to develop into something very interesting for newspapers.

Gié believes that mobile phones are "very different, because traffic on mobiles is very important," and there have been significant improvements in mobile technology in the last few years.  Before, all the "operations and platforms were locked by the operators, you had to pass through the operators, it was complicated and expensive."  But now, there are mobile sites and portals that are designed for mobile users and allow them to easily access content online.  According to Gié, because of this, Le Figaro's iPhone site now has an audience of over 100,000 per month and growing since its launch.

Social Networking with Mon Figaro

Gié explained that interaction with readers is key at Le Figaro.  So in 2007, Le Figaro became the first mainstream news site in France to open all of its articles to comments.  Because it worked so well, with over one million comments on the site in the first year, they realized that it was a system that was very important to their readers - their ability to express themselves and interact with the content.  

They also realized that "people really wanted to communicate amongst themselves, and they started to communicate with each other and we really wanted to give them the tools to better manage their commentary."  So in November 2008, Le Figaro launched social networking tool Mon Figaro using a basic platform, which allows "users on Figaro.fr to place other users as favorites and to follow their activities."  Gié confirmed that 2009 will bring additional developments to Mon Figaro.

Personalized News

Gié believes that personalized news is "important but not fundamental."  For the last two years, Le Figaro has been allowing readers to personalize their page through Net Vibes.  However, Gié feels that because there is so much information on the Internet, it is hard for users to select what is worth reading.  For the most part, they select who is going to organize and sort the information for them, in most cases a trusted site like Le Figaro or The New York Times.  Otherwise, they have to select and find the information themselves, which is always  time consuming.  Gié sees Le Figaro's online role as a trusted brand that "provides news based on the notion that our readers want us to select it for them."

Le Figaro's active development of both its print product and website is admirable, and it will be interesting to see whether the paper maintains its separated operations or follows the example of other high profile papers such as the Washington Post, the Guardian, and El Pais, who, after initial reluctance, eventually caved in and integrated their newsrooms. 

To say the least, 2008 proved a difficult year for newspapers in many nations. Rising printing and distribution costs, waning circulations and fragmented audiences continued to challenge a business model that seems increasingly outdated. And despite many promising advancements made by newspaper companies in Internet and mobile, revenues remain far behind those of print.

But the news is far from all negative. Below is some food for thought for newsroom executives everywhere, ways in which newspapers began adapting to the modern media landscape in 2008 that will continue through 2009.

INTERNET TRENDS BECOMING NEW TOOLS FOR JOURNALISM
2008 saw the continued proliferation of social and professional networking sites Facebook and LinkedIn, with newspapers and journalists, with newspapers and journalists, such as the New York Times well-known columnist Nicholas Kristof, creating their own profiles, applications and connecting with new audiences. User-Generated Content (UGC) continued to gather speed as well, with CNN's iReport in the US and LePost in France among many others around the world. A December report by the Bivings Group also noted that 58% of US newspapers now use some form of UGC.

But the biggest social media revelation to journalists came in the form of 140 characters. The social site, Twitter, which allows users to post short messages for all to see, officially became a widespread tool for journalists in 2008. For example, journalists covering the US Presidential Elections took live notes from conventions and rallies that readers could follow and that also helped to shape those journalists' main story. During the Mumbai terrorist attacks, "tweets", or Twitter messages, appeared as the first news of the attacks. Twitter feeds can also be aggregated, bringing all angles of those covering a certain event into one, comprehensible, instantly-updated record.

Another Internet trend is the "Personalized Web", evoked by newspaper experiments such as MyTimes and start-ups such as Netvibes that provide customizable pages based on RSS feeds and widgets. Arguably the boldest example of personalized news is the BBC's revamped homepage, released in March 2008, which allows users to create their own page based on the BBC information they use most. But personalized news seems to be picking up more slowly than social media. For one thing, Internet users are used to getting the information they seek from many Web pages and may not yet be ready to create their own pages. Secondly, search engines still rule, meaning that traffic to most news sites continues to come through Google, its competitors and their various news and alerts functions. So a customizable homepage like the BBC created, which could ultimately prove a competitor to search engines, remains to become a habit of the general Internet public.  

Personalized news and social media are just two examples of all of the innovation that is occurring in digital media. As technologies continue to rapidly develop, how are journalists and publishers going to keep up? Is it worth learning to use all of these tools if six months down the line they prove to be a fad? Are these technologies hurting or helping newsrooms gather and report news?

Chances are, in 2009 journalists everywhere will continue to experiment with the latest digital fads, and smart newsrooms will set aside R&D funds to play around with new ideas. Who knows? Despite predictions that 2009 will be a difficult year for newspapers, with a lot of hard work, calculated risk and a bit of luck, the industry could find the online golden egg that it has been seeking.

PROLIFERATION OF ONLINE-ONLY NEWS SITES
Perhaps filling in for the difficulties of the print product, more high-profile Internet-based sites began popping up in 2008. Perhaps most notably, The Huffington Post, launched in the summer of 2005, has already jumped to one of the US' top-30 news sites, bolstered by the US Presidential Elections, according to Nielsen Online. Media pundit, entrepreneur and Rupert Murdoch biographer Michael Wolff trumpeted the late-'07 launch of his news aggregator Newser as a "revolution in how people get their news." One year after Wolff's launch, he gained a competitor in Tina Brown, a former Vanity Fair and New Yorker editor, who launched her own, rapidly growing online-only site, The Daily Beast, a mixture of aggregated and original articles. And these are only the high-profile, American examples. The relatively low overhead costs of launching an online-based site combined with the ease of aggregating content and news commentary means that this trend will surely continue in 2009. But there is one problem with the sites mentioned above. Aggregation and commentary can only go so far: in an online environment, what happens to the investigative journalism that newspapers have provided for the past two centuries?

NOT-FOR-PROFIT JOURNALISM
Investigative journalism is expensive to produce. Money-wise, it has always been a loss-leader for newspapers. But with modern-day information ubiquity, investigative journalism is just a loss. Whereas once newspapers could claim ownership of a groundbreaking piece and sell papers and advertising around it, now readers are often unaware of the original source of the story they are reading on the Web. So what is going to happen to the type of watchdogging we need for democracy?

Several non-profit start-ups have begun to answer that question. In late 2007, former newspaper editor, Joel Kramer, took his print expertise and moved it online with the launch of the non-profit Minnpost.com. Former WSJ editor Paul Steiger did something similar with ProPublica. The Voice of San Diego, and other similar sites around the US, are making a name for themselves as "serious, original reporting by professional journalists," with the New York Times declaring the sites "stand out" amongst Internet news sites. Crowdsourcing site OfftheBus, a partnership between the Huffington Post and the non-profit NewAssignment.net, helped capture the 2008 Elections and the Knight News Challenge winner Spot.Us is collecting donations from the public to fund investigative stories. Even former Merrill Lynch newspaper analyst Lauren Rich Fine backed the non-profit model in 2008.

With this in mind, are the days of major metropolitan and national newspapers digging up the dirt on businessmen and politicians over? For the time being, no. But newsrooms everywhere are under extreme economic pressures and have been cutting core staff, making it even more difficult for newspapers to conduct the type of investigative journalism their communities need. Don't be surprised if more non-profit (no dividends to shareholders), Internet based (low operating costs) ventures spring up to fill the gaps.

COMPETING NEWSPAPERS PARTNERING UP
As many newspaper newsrooms are cutting staff, wire services should be in greater demand than ever. But 2008 saw a backlash against the world's biggest news agency, the Associated Press, by its members. Several publishers handed in their notice to the non-profit agency partially in response to price hikes and complaining of low value for their money.

In response to the AP mini-exodus, some papers, even those in competition with one another, began joining forces. Papers in Ohio and Florida whose geographical coverage overlaps are swapping stories and even combining bureaux. Not only will this help the papers save money, but it frees up time for reporters to cover issues not being covered elsewhere. In the current economic climate, this trend will continue, but not without its effects on the industry.

Some traditional news hounds would argue that two papers covering similar stories in a certain region add depth and uncover more facts that may otherwise be lost to readers. This may be true. But is it really worth having two reporters on the scene to gather one or two more different pieces of information when there may be other stories elsewhere? And what about the multitude of photojournalists that different organizations send to press conferences and like events where the story subjects don't move much? Is it really worth sending all of those photogs? Couldn't photos just be shared? Without a doubt, these are questions that cash-strapped publishers and editors are asking themselves right now. Expect to see more cross-corporation cooperation in 2009.

IS PRINT REALLY THREATENED?
We've said it before and we'll say it again: print is not going to die. But, considering the trend of the past year, print's reach will be considerably reduced, at least in Western nations.

During the last few months of 2008, publishers' struggle to maintain the high costs of printing and distribution has become apparent. In October, The Christian Science Monitor, a beacon of quality American journalism, announced that it would stop printing its daily edition. In mid-December, the Detroit Free Press, which recently won a broadcast award, decided to limit home delivery to Friday's and weekends while trimming the daily single-copy sale paper to one section. Most recently, the American Society of Newspaper Editors is considering dropping "paper" from its name.

What do these cuts mean for the news"paper" industry? As circulations drop across the Western world, it could mean substantial savings. Weekday papers often make a loss to begin with, so cutting the costs of printing those papers should cover any lost advertising revenue in those same papers.

Perhaps the question publishers should be asking themselves is "Do cutbacks on the paper product matter to readers"? Well, cutbacks will certainly change the face of the newspaper industry. But in the end, media houses are in the news "distribution" business, not the news"paper" business. As long as their news is published, media houses will have completed their service to the public.

In an effort to "capture a greater share of the market," the new owner of Racing Ahead Weekend, a better newspaper, has relaunched the product under the name Racing +.

Owner Lee Power, ex-footballer and racehorse owner, obtained a majority share of Racing Ahead Weekend in March 2008, five months after its initial launch.  He has redesigned the weekly, giving it new features, including an increased focus on "betting tips."  The first new title was published last Saturday.

The weekly will run cheaper than its predecessor at 90p, but will still print 16,000 copies, far behind the circulation of the daily Racing Post at 61,893.  

Source:  Brand Republic

Trinity Mirror has launched a website designed for viewing on mobile phones for the Birmingham Post.  The new Post site follows the launch of the Daily Mirror's mobile site last week.

In addition to the launch of the mobile site, the print version of the Post was relaunched this week.  The site offers personalized news and allows users to build their own homepage.

According to the Guardian, ten more of Trinity's regional papers are expected to get their own mobile sites within the next few months. 

Source: Guardian

A new French language newspaper L'Hebdo du Vanuatu is set to launch in Vanuatu, an island in South Pacific Asia. The title will be published by the country's Daily Post paper and will offer coverage on Vanuatu as well as New Caledonia, where it will be additionally distributed.

L'Hebdo du Vanuatu is the most recent deal for Daily Post publisher Marc Neil-Jones, who acquired backing from the European Union.

Source: European Journalism Centre

The Daily Mirror has launched a mobile phone service, Mirror Mobile, offering news without having to register or subscribe.  Users can personalize their service, or have it personalized for them based on pages they previously visited.

Trinity Mirror, the papers owner has views the technology as "a fully converged third publishing platform."

Former Vanity Fair and New Yorker editor Tina Brown announces the launch of an online project called The Daily Beast. The site will resemble an online magazine with original content, reporting, blogs authored by Brown and a "best of the Web" section compiled by the editors.

The Daily Beast, which is visually similar to The Huffington Post, may be getting "star power," according to globeandmail.com. The front page features book recommendations from former US president Bill Clinton and CNN's Christine Amanpour.

The name of the media outlet comes from Evelyn Waugh's novel Scoop. Leader of US-based media conglomerate InteraActiveCorp (IAC) is backing the project.

Source: globeandmail.com

Indonesian media, property, infrastructure and banking tycoon James Riady is to shortly launch a new daily newspaper in Indonesia, the Jakarta Globe. The new newspape for Indonesia  was reported on back in August, but it has emerged that it will hit the market soon.

News Corporation executive Lachlan Murdoch - son of Rupert Murdoch - is also reportedly taking an interest and looking at other media investments in Indonesia with Riady.

The 48-page, full-colour English-language broadsheet newspaper will initially just be distributed in large Indonesian cities and Singapore, with a print run of "over 50,000", according to launch editor David Plott. Plott is a former editor-in-chief of the Hong Kong-based Far Eastern Economic Review.

Plott says, "Indonesia's a little like India, in the sense that it's a market where print publications are still quite profitable and there's still quite a lot of growth potential; in terms of advertising it's a $US3 billion a year market."

The competition for the new player in the market will be the Jakarta Post, an English-language daily with circulation of 18,000 copies. It will also have an online version; however, issues surround the name jakartaglobe.com, as a local news aggregator already operates under the name.

There have been significant challenges for the newspaper with retraining staff, as "Newspapers aren't what they used to be. You can't survive by just reporting what happened, particularly in Indonesia, where things aren't always what they appear to be, and what's actually going on behind events is not clear to anyone except insiders."

Source: The Australian via IFRA Executive News Service

Politico announced plans to expand and increase print production.  Politico was launched in 2007 and is now one of the most popular online sources for political news in the United States.  The print version is distributed free to offices on Capitol Hill with a circulation of 26,000 on Tuesday through Thursday when Congress is in Session.

The news comes as somewhat of a surprise considering that after the elections popular interest in politics is bound to drop.  Politico plans to increase to four print editions per week.  The new launch will coincide with a website redesign.  Plans to hire additional staff members, including reporters, editors, and Web engineers are also in the works

Politico's plans to increasing print production has sparked interest because of daily announcements by other news organizations of their plans to reduce print in an effort to cut costs. 

The newspaper accounts for most of Politico's revenue, however, according to The New York Times, the web site is closing in.  Politico's site draws over three million unique visitors a month.

Sources: paidContent, The New York Times

Northcliffe Media announces the launch of 45 local websites in order to expand its Thisis network, which already offers numerous regional and urban sites. The move will be focused on hyperlocal services for Nottingham areas like Beeston, Hucknall, Sherwod and Long Eaton. The company's publication count will grow from 113 to 151 daily, weekly and free papers.

"If you rewind the clock to a few years ago, people would describe businesses like Northcliffe as primarily newspaper publishing businesses with a few websites. Now they'd describe us as a multimedia business," says Sean Mahon, the firm's marketing director.

Lippo Group, a substantial Indonesian conglomerate, announces the launch of The Jakarta Globe, an English language daily newspaper that will be available both in print and online.

Bhimanto Suwastoyo, who worked with the AFP for over 20 years, is to be the paper's deputy editor. The editorial team also includes Ahmad Pathoni, who previously held senior positions at both AFP and Reuters, and A. Lin Neumann, former executive editor of the Hong Kong Standard and editor-in-chief of South Korean daily JoongAng.

The Globe will be released in the next two months and will be aimed at both Indonesians and expatriates. It will receive funding through advertisements and subscriptions.

The paper intends to be in competition with The Jakarta Post, Indonesia's prominent English-language paper.

Source: Brand Republic

Trinity Mirror announced it is developing a mobile site for two national papers, including the Daily Mirror and the Daily Record and 12 regional newspapers.

Each publication will have a print version, an online edition and a mobile site, which shows that the newspaper industry is a "growing multiplatform media business", according to Rick Gleave, head of Trinity Mirror interactive and mobile.

Nokia and Bluestar mobile (responsible for New York Post's site launch) helped develop the sites.

Regional newspapers to have their sites developed include the Newcastle Evening Chronicle, the Newcastle Journal, the Teeside Evening Gazette, the Liverpool Daily Post, Liverpool Echo, the Huddersfield Examiner, the Daily Post Wales, the Western Mail, the South Wales Echo, the Birmingham Mail, the Birmingham Post, and the Coventry Telegraph.

Source: Journalism.co.uk

In a five part series on CurryBet.net, Martin Belam reviews the Daily Mail's website redesign. Here are some highlights.

Layout

The new Mail website has some unwieldy designs, Belam says. First, a "skyscraper advert" lining the left side of the page results in a squeezed format that is hard to read. More noticeably, the home page is a colossal 6,369 pixels long - 10 pages of scrolling.

Finally, Belam is bewildered by the 140 links jamming the Mail's homepage. He believes that the Mail may have gotten overzealous with its coverage, leaving "designers with little choice but to include everything, to the detriment of the overall user experience."

RSS Feeds

The Mail has created RSS feeds for individual celebrities - an innovation, Belam says, that demonstrates "a real understanding of the strengths of the RSS format."

Navigation

Belam is a fan of the Mail's new interactive section, Coffee Break, which offers browsers games, crossword puzzles, and cartoons.

Message Boards

Belam likes the message board's "very graphical" front-page. He has mixed feelings, however, about the Mail's decision to display individual threads with the most recent post first. He says the ordering is "a very brave design decision" but warns that it can be "a very jarring experience the first time."

Hovering Preview

This feature, which displays the preview of a story when a mouse is rolled over it, was removed after the initial launch. Belam says it "caused more usability problems than it solved."




Source: CurryBet.net through IFRA

In a blog posting Monday, Lee Abrams, Tribune Co.'s chief innovation officer, says that newspapers have to find "a zone that balances intelligent with the ability to engage the masses in 2008." Abrams offers feedback on the Baltimore Sun and Orlando Sentinel's re-launches.

Here are some of his comments and suggestions pertaining to the Sun's re-launch:

*Crime coverage: Abrams says the Sun is "honoring the importance of crime" by "owning it via a single compartmentalized daily page."

*Numbering national stories: The Sun began labeling its national news stories in order of importance from one to ten. Abrams raves that the numbering system is "a whole new and modern way of prioritizing for the reader."

*Reduce Jumps: Abrams says newspapers, when possible, should restrict stories to one place. "I've never heard of a single person that liked jumps."

The Sentinel's re-launch:

*Web Push: Abrams says the Sentinel should be more creative and proactive luring readers to the website. Current "web pushers" are "kinda throwaway," he says.

*Numbers: More local statistics, Abrams says, and more numbers in general: "Consistency is what'll create 'trademarks'"

*Maps: Abrams says the Sentinel should be "using maps in all news sections to show another way to 'see' the news."

Abram's counseling has drawn the ire of some newspaper experts who shudder at his crude writing style - lackadaisical grammar, errant capitalization - and resent some of his more philistine suggestions, like adding front-page cartoons and trimming the fine arts sections.

But regardless of whether experts find merit in Abrams' suggestions, they should admire his tenacious optimism.

"Intelligence and engaging the mainstream - doable," Abrams writes," But [it] needs the re-think and execution...every day, every page..."

Related links:

Abram's complete post
Past posts by Abrams

Source: Poynter Romenesko

The Trinity Mirror, which publishes over 150 regional newspapers, announced that it has launched 20 channels on YouTube, each branded to one of the company's newspaper holdings.

"We've got 20 live at the moment, but we are launching new sites all the time. Every new site that we launch, we set up the functionality [to automatically upload videos] and encourage them to use it," explained Jessica Healy, online marketing manager for Trinity Mirror Regionals.

"It's very much in its infancy but the aim is that every video we put up on our sites will be put into YouTube," she continued.

Since May, Trinity has launched channels first for the Liverpool Daily Post, followed by the Liverpool Echo, Huddersfield Examiner and Teesside Gazette.

Trinity's expanded online offerings may be in response to the BBC's recent £800,000 proposal to expand local video coverage, which many regional news sites have vehemently criticized, feeling the plan encroaches on their niche.

Source: Journalism.co.uk

Patrick Goldstein, author of the L.A. Times "The Big Picture" column has launched a blog, joining more than 40 other L.A. Times bloggers.

The Big Picture blog will be in the same style, but, says Goldstein, will had "be broader in scope" - a possibility for a daily blog that has become increasingly difficult in a weekly column. The Big Picture will incorporate new interactive elements, more news and analysis, as well as invite guest bloggers - most recently a 10-year-old girl - to share their views.

Goldstein, in a blog post explaining the launch, said, "...Soon our blogs will be the backbone of the paper...information is everywhere these days. But readers still crave informed analysis and lively writing, which is something we can focus on as newspapers..."