Results matching “to launch in september”

Dow Jones & Company and SBI Holdings, Inc. of Japan formalized their joint venture, Wall Street Journal Japan K.K., which will launch a Japanese-language business and financial news Web site later this year. The joint venture agreement was first announced on May 7.

Under a licensing arrangement between Wall Street Journal Japan K.K. and Dow Jones, the new site, carrying The Wall Street Journal brand, will primarily feature Japanese translations of content, including video and other multimedia, from all print and online editions of The Wall Street Journal and those of other Dow Jones publications. Wall Street Journal Japan K.K. also plans to develop mobile products and services in conjunction with the new site.

The New York Daily News has teamed up with Toronto-based SaleSpider.com to launch a new social networking platform that will enable 500,000 small businesses to connect and interact with one another.

The New York Daily News, America's fifth largest newspaper and the most-read paper in the New York metropolitan area, will also facilitate readers with finding sales leads - namely by way of government tenders - and obtaining government grant information, as well as being able to access a number of additional business tools at no extra cost.

As US newspaper groups declare bankruptcy and some fold due to the economic recession and web competition, the printed newspaper continues to thrive in Asia. The World Press Trends 2008 by World Association of Newspapers reports that eight of the world's top ten daily newspapers with the highest circulation are printed in Asia, and the largest newspaper markets are Japan, China, and India.

According to a Time article, some media expansion in Asia corresponds with the fall of dictators as readers appreciate a freer press devoid of government propaganda. For example, Indonesia has seen a tremendous rise in the number of newspapers after the deposition of President Suharto in 1998. Though state censorship still exists in China, a press revolution is in progress as the central government reduces state subsidies for newspapers, creating a free-market that forces editors to print stories that sell.

Following Getty Images' decision to close its citizen journalism arm Scoopt, the venture's founder Kyle MacRae explained in an interview why "the dedicated cit-j agency model isn't the way forward." His reasoning was that even though many members of the public may well be on a breaking news scene with a camera, it is extremely unlikely that they will be a member of a citizen photojournalism organisation. But has Citizenside, a small, young company based in Paris, found a solution? The Editors Weblog spoke to co-founder Matthieu Stefani and editor-in-chief Aurélien Viers about Citizenside's work and the way they see the future of citizen photojournalism.

Citizenside operates in two different ways. On its own site, it functions in a similar way to other agencies: it gathers photos from its community - 35,000 members, close to 7,000 of which are active - which are published after thorough checking of the photos' validity. Staff receive 500-600 images a day, and those which pass the checking are categorised into sections such as headlines, showbiz, or unusual, or gathered into portfolios with others along the same theme or about the same event. Media outlets can purchase the photos from Citzenside, with up to 75% of the price going to the contributor. Agence France Presse owns a 34% stake of Citizenside, and is currently trialling incorporating the company's amateur images into its image forums, where any of the news agency's 7000 partners would be able to buy them. Content is clearly labelled as amateur, and Citizenside stressed the importance of differentiating the work of 'citizens' from that of professionals.

AFP is currently trialling incorporating Citizenside's amateur pictures into its image forums where any of its 7000 partners can buy them

Staff are proactive about finding images, "we don't just wait for people to send them," explained Stefani. Their kit allows them to locate users within a certain radius of any given spot, so if something happens which they want to know more about, they can send out an email requesting photos. "We send 3 or 4 of these a day," Stefani clarified. The company tries to avoid receiving photographs straight from mobile phones via MMS as the quality is poor and it is much harder to check an image's authenticity. Developers have however released an iPhone application, and are looking at launching similar products for Blackberry and  Google's Android phone. Staff also provide feedback when contributors send in images that cannot be used.

Mainstream Media success through factchecking

Citizenside photos have recently been on the cover of French daily Liberation, and in Le Point magazine and Le Figaro magazine, so the company is making a name for itself. The Liberation photo was of a snow storm, and Viers explained how a storm was a good example of an instance when citizen photo reporting really works: anybody can be a witness and as it might be harder to travel, professional photographers will not necessarily be able to cover the whole storm effectively. He added that Citizenside members were definitely not trying to play the role of reporters, rather they are "news witnesses."

One of the ways in which Citzenside differs from other sites that gather user photos and video, such as self-declared "unedited, unfiltered" CNN's iReport, is that all images are checked for authenticity. The company's developers have created a tool through which users can send photos, and which provides various details to staff about each photo or video that they receive, such as the camera brand and model, the resolution, and the date the photo was taken. Crucially, the programme can also alert staff to whether a photo has been modified online. Using the sender's IP address, the tool also shows from where in the world images have been sent. With this information, Citizenside staff can get a pretty good idea of whether what the contributor has told them about the image is indeed true. "I think at the moment, we are the only company who can offer such a specialised tool for the media," Viers remarked, and Stefani explained that developers would continue to refine the product to make it more and more effective. If staff still have doubts, particularly in the case of major, potentially controversial stories, they will contact the sender directly via telephone or email. "We will double check, triple check, quadruple check if it is a big story," stressed Stefani. "If someone appears to be trying to mislead us, we will expel them from the community," he added.

"We will double check, triple check, quadruple check if it is a big story." 

This emphasis on checking the authenticity of the images significantly increases the value of Citizenside's service, as amateur content with no professional input can be relatively meaningless. Citizen journalism site The Observers offers a similar commitment to fact-checking, a trend which has the potential to bring citizen journalism closer to the mainstream media in terms of respectability. Stefani asserted that he believes it is the company's focus on "quality not quantity" which makes their service so appealing to clients.  "We don't believe in the idea that everybody is a journalist, just because they have a camera and a blog," underlined Viers. Rather what he believes works is a form of professional-amateur collaboration: "an association of bloggers, witnesses, journalists and editors."

A global citizen photo network?

The most crucial difference of Citizenside, however, is its mission to share its technology. Stefani explained that he and the other Citizenside founders quite quickly understood that, as Kyle MacRae pointed out, one agency alone will never be able to get an image from every breaking story. But what if many different publications all over the world each hosted their own UGC community that was managed by Citizenside? This is what Citizenside is aiming to do by offering its 'Reporter Kit' to traditional publications, sold via AFP. The tool was released in September 2008 and the first client to purchase it was Voici, a French gossip magazine. Citizenside is about to launch the same service for Public, one of Voici's rivals and is also in talks with one of France's biggest daily newspapers, a couple of regionals and one UK paper. The Voici community allows readers of the magazine to upload their images to the site, and if Voici decides to use them in its print magazine or on its main website, then it will pay the contributor, and Citizenside takes commission. If Voici would like to sell an image to another outlet, then Citizenside retains exclusive resell rights, and the profit will be split equally between Citizenside, the magazine and the contributor. Recently, for example, a video showing Hollywood star Lindsey Lohan being showered with flour by animal activists on her way into a Parisian club was sold to US TV channel Extra TV for a considerable sum. Stefani described how he plans for Citizenside's income to be based largely on this reselling of content, rather than on sale of the technology itself. Incidentally, a years' use of the Reporter Kit tool would start at about 13,000 euros, moving to upwards of 20,000 for premium tools and tailor-made development.

What if many different publications all over the world each hosted their own UGC community that was managed by Citizenside? 

Citizenside hopes to make the checking process easier and easier for its clients, for instance by developing a system which would make automatically judge an image's authenticity based on different variables and display a red or green light. Viers stressed that he sees citizen contributions as essential in today's media environment, if news organisations "ignore UGC they are going to make mistakes, and they are going to miss opportunities." Stefani explained that "we had a hard time being understood at first because journalists would just see us as competitors." But he insisted that rather than a competitor, Citizenside aims to be "a new tool, a new source of information." They believe that particularly in a local context, such a community could be extremely valuable to their clients, who would be able to forge better relations with readers, and provide a greater level of coverage. Viers pointed out that hyperlocal news is often incredibly important to people, and it gives citizen witnesses a real chance to flourish.

Dollars for amateurs

So Citizenside believes it has found the solution to the problems raised by Scoopt founder Kyle MacRae. Stefani brought up the example of the man with the first Hudson plane crash photo previously cited by MacRae, who argued that it was the man's instinct to share the photo rather than sell it, and that he was very unlikely to have heard of a citizen photojournalism project that would help him sell it. If Citizenside achieves its goal of establishing popular image sharing community sites for major newspapers, then in the future, a similar witness to an event may well think of sending such a photo to their favourite newspaper, where it would be shared amongst the community, but could also be sold for a significant amount of cash. The project has a great of deal of potential. Obviously, the company is still very small and is yet to break international barriers, though they hope to soon. Stefani admitted that they will need a cash injection if they are to expand beyond Europe into Asian or American markets. There is likely to be some resistance from more traditional media operations to the inclusion of amateur content in their publications, and it might take time to change mindsets.

But the current economic downturn could in fact benefit the rise of citizen journalism as news organisations look for cheaper ways to obtain coverage of events. Editor and Publisher recently ran a story on World Press Photo and Pulitzer prize winning photographer Anthony Suau, who is currently struggling to find work because media outlets do not have enough money to pay him. Using photos from readers is undoubtedly cheaper than employing prize-winning professional. Citizen photojournalism does make sense, if there is a way to prove that the photos are real. A reporter can write a story from afar, but you cannot take a photo from afar. And although many photos will not be of the quality of those taken by experienced photojournalists, professionals cannot be everywhere at once, and taking advantage of the camera-armed public is definitely better than nothing.

Photo credits: Laure Bernard

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. 

According to recent findings from the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Pew Research Centre's Project for Excellence in Journalism, health is a key issue for internet users. However, only 3.6% of Internet-based news content between January 2007 and June 2008 dealt with the issue, according to the study. Directnews.co.uk reports that the demand for online health news may be increasing.

The study showed that 42% of all online news stories covered specific conditions. Meanwhile, 31% focused on public health and 27% on health policy. Traffic to online health outlets in the UK rose by 10% in September since the previous month, comScore research showed.

"As the public's news consumption shifts more toward online and cable outlets, people are likely to come across fewer stories about health and particularly about health policy," said Kaiser Family Foundation's Victoria Rideout.

The Kaiser Family Foundation recently announced the launch of a news utility that will offer  "in-depth coverage of the policy and politics of health care" on the Internet and though the mainstream media.

Source: Directnews.co.uk

French regional daily Sud Ouest will be relaunched on November 14.  The new design will be simplified and the layout will be more straightforward.  

The new design is also set to link the web site more to the print version.  The paper's website was relaunched on September 24th.  Since the launch of the new site, they have seen a 25% increase in unique visitors.

Sud Ouest will also sport a new logo that better represents a paper that is organized and easier to read.  

Sources: Presse Edition, Challenges

While newspapers have been fighting off declining circulation and an aging readership, social networking sites are thriving. De Telegraaf, a leading Dutch broadsheet, has tapped into this popular medium by teaming up with popular Dutch social networking site, Hyves, for the Euro 2008 football tournament and the Olympics. In so doing, Telegraaf.nl gained access to Hyves 7 million users.

The Editors Weblog spoke to Telegraaf.nl's Publisher, Lara Ankersmit, to find out how the project came about, the impact it had on its newsroom, and the benefits of working with social media.

"Brainstorm"

When Telegraaf.nl first met with Hyves back in September 2007, it was simply to have "a conversation and a brainstorm." This initial conversation led to the two companies building a partnership that would not only drive traffic to the newspapers' web edition and enable Hyves to increase its product offering to its users, but also revolutionise and redefine the relationship between newspapers and social networking sites. This partnership has now become something of a blueprint within the industry for other newspapers looking to tap into the success of this new media platform.

"We don't care where people read our news; as long as they do read it."

Explaining the thinking behind the partnership, Ankersmit says, "We don't care where people read our news; as long as they do read it." Telegraaf has come to terms with the changes the internet has brought to the newspaper industry and adapted its product offering and thinking accordingly. Furthermore, the Telegraaf is putting its product on different platforms independent of news aggregators, and is thereby controlling how its brand is presented.

Specialised Content

To launch this innovative scheme, the two companies needed a suitably big story; therefore, the launching pad for Telegraaf's content on the Hyves site was the Euro 2008 football tournament and the Olympic games in Beijing. Telegraaf's content for Hyves was not lifted directly from its web edition: the news provider moved out of its "comfort zone" and changed its tone and content appropriately for the medium.

Telegraaf.nl and Hyves worked together to produce a fantasy football game, which was hosted on the Hyves platform. This fantasy football game proved to be a great success, achieving almost 170,000 participants. The rules are the same as other fantasy football competitions, with users selecting teams and predicting which country would win the tournament. Furthermore, Telegraaf provided editorial pieces to build on the playing experience. While playing the game, Hyves users could also choose friends from their social network to play with; the end result of this being that almost 45% of the players joined the game because of a recommendation from a friend on the social network site.

After the success of the Euro 2008 competition, the teams at Teegraaf and Hyves are working together again on a game for this year's football season (till May 2009). At going to press, the game has almost 32,000 participants.

The game comes with all kinds of statistics, eg, a player can see how good/bad they perform compared to the Hyves community, other women, other participants who are of a certain star sign, who live in the same city, and so forth. Teegraaf have not yet used this data for online content as the season has just begun. However, during Euro 2008 Telegraaf used such data for stories in the newspaper and the website.

For the Olympics, the newspaper provided tailored coverage of the games in Beijing, with the Telegraaf's sports desk working on the coverage. The blogs produced for Hyves in Beijing were also published on the newspaper's web site.

Just as content for the web edition is different from the print edition, content for the social network platform also differs from the news website. As Hyves is a more informal website than a straight web edition of a newspaper, the Telegraaf needed to provide the site with something a little different. For example, in the print edition Telegraaf will feature one photo within a story, on the web version it will have five photos, but for Hyves Telegraaf it will feature twenty photos. The style of photos will also be different from Telegraaf.nl, so there will be more behind the scenes shots or photos of the journalist travelling to, for example, the Olympic Games.

The newspaper also customised its blogs for Hyves, requesting that Telegraaf journalists at the Olympic games provide blogs from a more personal perspective.

Adapt the newsroom - stay flexible

This coverage from Telegraaf.nl did increase the workload (for example, increased blog content) for the newsroom, but Ankersmit reports that the staffers were enthusiastic about the Hyves project. Ankersmit also told the Weblog that the newspaper hired two journalism students who focused on uploading pictures and monitoring the Hyves site.
The sales and marketing team and project managers were also working in the background to ensure a buzz around the new product.

Payoff

The benefits of this relationship to the two media companies are clear: Telegraaf is able to tap into Hyves 7 million users and open up its content to a younger audience who may not have considered reading the newspaper previously and Hyves is provided with high quality content from one of the Netherlands' most respected newspapers. During the project, almost 20% of the incoming traffic to Telesport.nl (the sports pages of Telegraaf.nl) came through the Hyves site. Before the project, the traffic coming via the Hyves site was negligible.

This partnership also helped the Telegraaf re-brand itself and present itself as a modern news organisation. The newspaper had a rather "old fashioned" image before the project, but this initiative made people look at Telegraaf in a new light. The games on the Hyves site also got people talking about the site on the internet and the project became a topic of conversation around water-coolers in offices.

Despite these changes at the Telegraaf, Ankersmit says that "news is still our core product," it is simply changing the way that it connects with its audience. Anksersmit told the Editors Weblog that it is important that news organisations "extend their brand" and its relationship with Hyves got people used to reading Telegraaf news on different platforms.

The future

Building on the success of its partnership with Hyves, the newspaper site is currently moving ahead with plans for its Mobile smart phone coverage. Ankersmit reports that while smart phone content was previously just read by business users, the introduction of a flat-rate fee from mobile companies has opened up the platform to a wider audience. Telegraaf has also noted that readers are using the site in a different way, they now read content in a similar fashion to that on the website. Ankersmit expects Mobile to be increasingly popular in the years ahead as it becomes increasingly commercial, and when it does, the Telegraaf will once again be ready to break new ground.

Australian sponsorship firm The Newspaper Works, established by the country's five major newspaper publishers, announces the launch of a website in order to promote print publications, reports proprint.com.au. The site is geared towards advertisers, media outlets and creative firms.

The Wall Street Journal Online has signed a deal with Yahoo! which will enable Yahoo! users in the UK and Ireland to access its coverage of the US presidential election race.

WSJ.com's political blogs, 'Political Perceptions' and 'Washington Wire' will be available on a Yahoo! microsite specially created.

Tristan Leaver, director of business and audience development at the Wall Street Journal digital network for EMEA, said it is, "a very effective way for WSJ.com to raise brand awareness and expose our unparalleled content to a new UK audience."

In an interview with the EditorsWeblog in September, Deputy Editor of the Wall Street Journal, Alan Murray, said the brand had ambitious plans to expand internationally. This deal with Yahoo! looks like a significant step in pushing the Wall Street Journal brand and content to a European audience.

Source: Brand Republic

US: Newly redesigned WSJ site attracts 10 million users on re-launch day
US: Murdoch on the future of newspapers
US: Wall Street Journal to launch new website on Tuesday
Wall Street Journal unveils magazine supplement, WSJ
US: Wall Street Journal launches new mobile application
Murdoch: Newspapers willing to invest in new forms of delivery will prosper

The redesigned Chicago Tribune, set to launch September 29, has released a set of prototypes.

The new front page will have just two for three stories.  The front section will host all local, national, foreign and business news.  

According to Chicago Business, in an effort to save money, the paper will have a 50-50 ratio of ads to editorial copy, allowing for more advertising space and necessitating fewer journalists.

Sources: Poynter, Chicago Business

The new design of the Chicago Tribune was shown to staff members on Tuesday.

The Tribune will reduce its number of sections from five to three.  The front page will be dominated by large visuals and less stories.  The front section will contain business, local, national and international news.  There will be a sports and features section called "Live!" and Sunday's Perspective section will be cut.

The redesigned Tribune is set to debut on September 29 and a major marketing campaign is expected to start soon.

All daily newspapers owed by Tribune Co. daily are in the process of being redesigned in a cost-cutting effort.  By reducing the number of sections, the Tribune will reduce its output by around 40 pages weekly.

Source: Chicago Business

In the latest stage of reinvigorating the Wall Street Journal brand, its online edition - WSJ.com - has undergone a huge makeover, relaunching on Tuesday.

The parent company, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., appears determined to put its mark on its latest acquisition; the President of the Wall Street Journal Digital Network, Gordon McLeod, reportedly said that the investment into the website revamp is a "big financial commitment."

The Editors Weblog spoke with the Deputy Editor of the Wall Street Journal, Alan Murray, about the shake up occurring at the newspaper. Murray was bullish about the changes, saying, "The new owners have made it clear that they no longer want people to look at the Wall Street Journal as a second read. It should be their primary read, it should suit all their information needs. We want it to be the ultimate news source for our engaged, affluent and educated readers."

Murray went on to speak about the redesign of WSJ.com, the recent changes in newsroom layout and management, and the ambitious plans for the future of the Wall Street Journal brand. He made it clear that, "(The website relaunch) is not a finishing point. This is the launching pad." 

Murray was particularly excited about the relaunch occuring at the same time as the Lehman Brothers story breaking, saying "We are delighted that the biggest financial news story since 1929 happens to coincide with the launch of our revamped site!"

"Newsreel" revolutionizes site navigation
For the new, sleek look of WSJ.com, News Corp's primary design motivation was to take advantage of users who "come in through the side door". Individual article pages mostly found through search engines, have been equipped with multiple navigation tools, to keep readers on the WSJ site.

Arguably the most interesting navigation feature is "Newsreel", essentially a news ticker placed at the top of the article. As the reader browses an article page, Newsreel scrolls through the days most important stories from the section the user is in. For example, if a user is in the business section, the Newsreel displays the top business stories of the day.    

In addition to the new layout and navigation functions, the Journal's newsroom is upping its content production to help keep readers on the site. The redesign also aims to be more colourful with more photos and includes an enhanced video player, an increasingly prevalent aspect of all news websites. Further features are set to roll out over the coming months. 

Social network for the business community
Perhaps most important for the WSJ's new owners is maintaining WSJ.com's impressive online subscription base, which has reached over 1 million paying members. Apart from increasing content, News Corp hopes to hold on to these subscribers with exclusive features such as WSJ Community, a social network for WSJ subscribers.

The key feature of this new social networking tool is that members must use their real names, which is aimed at cutting out any random, anonymous comments or useless noise found on other Internet news sites. Murray believes the quality of the site's subscriber base will create "a higher quality conversation". He acknowledges WSJ.com will not achieve the numbers of a chat on Yahoo Finance but, "we think the usefulness and quality is going to be key". The Journal is considering opening up the Community to non-subscribers in the future, who, just like subscribers, would only be able to join and interact with their real name.

WSJ.com has been the world's most successful subscription newssite for years and its membership keeps growing. According to Murray, online subscriptions have increased 26% in the past two years. And the number of unique user is skyrocketing too: "By our numbers, we now have 17 million visitors to WSJ.com" - 8 million more than two years ago - "and in September it is going to be even bigger than that. Therefore, Murray doesn't see any conflict in bringing more people in and letting them sample WSJ content.


Integrated Newsroom

Murray revealed that the Wall Street Journal is not only undergoing a radical change on its website, but is also changing in its newsroom, "The relaunch coincides with a complete integration and reorganisation of the reporting and editing staff."

Managing Editor, Robert Thomson, has spearheaded the integration programme, which has brought together the online and print staff. Last week, Thomson debuted a news hub in the newsroom where the senior editors from print, online, Dow Jones Newswires and MarketWatch all sit together and co-ordinate the coverage throughout the day.

The morning news meeting has been "totally turned upside down," according to Murray. It now begins with a report from the online team, then from Dow Jones Newswires, then MarketWatch and, only after discussing the coverage for real-time news, do they look at coverage for the day's paper.

The substantial Dow Jones Newswire team is also being moved to make the integration process physical, with the whole team being brought across the river to sit alongside their New York print colleagues. This move will happen, "sometime next Spring" Murray said.

The Wall Street Journal team has been undergoing training to prepare for the integration process. Murray reported, "A simple example is headlines. You have to write a different kind of headline in the online world and in the print world. We will continue to do that kind of training."

The future of the Wall Street Journal

The Editors Weblog asked if this process was the beginning of a long term-reinvigoration process for the Wall Street Journal brand, Murray said: "You bet! We have very ambitious plans for international, we have very ambitious plans for premium products on top of this online platform and we have a whole schedule of online innovations that we are planning over the course of the next 18 months. This is just the beginning"

"Look for us forming closer links with all the social networks because we are not trying to compete with social networks, we want to make it as easy as possible for our users to share our content over social networks and to bring their friends and connection into our community"

Murray also added that News Corp is confident about the future of print, stating, "The Wall Street Journal under its new management is investing in both print and online, so I would say we are very optimistic about the future of newspapers. We may be the only people who are optimistic! We are dedicated to delivering our news on all platforms"

Source: Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones Newswires, MarketWatch, paidcontent.org

See also:

US: Murdoch on the future of newspapers
US: Wall Street Journal to launch new website on Tuesday
Wall Street Journal unveils magazine supplement, WSJ
US: Wall Street Journal launches new mobile application
Murdoch: Newspapers willing to invest in new forms of delivery will prosper

Axel Springer announced plans to launch a free weekly, Berliner Morgenpost Wochenend-Extra on 20 September.  

Springer has been one of the most outspoken adversaries of free newspapers so this comes as a surprise shift in strategy.   

The paper will be distributed in the Berlin area by Deutsche Post and will have a circulation of one million.  It will contain articles from the previous week's Berliner Morgenpost, the paid Berlin paper.

Springer has been loosing young readers with their paid papers which is probably a main reason for the launch of a new free weekly.  Springer's director Mathias Döpfner sees the free paper as an "appetizer" to buy the paid one.

Germany has been a paid-for newspaper only market up until now; could Springer's move spark a change in the overall German market? Springer's move could certainly cause other players to move into this field, other newspaper groups, such as WAZ, reportedly have funds available to launch free newspapers in the event of a move such as Springer's launch of Berliner Morgenpost Wochenend-Extra.

Sources: Newspaper Innovation

See also:

Germany: Why the lack of free dailies?
Germany: Axel Springer plans online expansion through acquisitions and new units

Presse News announced today that Libération is set to re-launch their website on Monday, 29 September.

According to a source at the paper, the new site has been completely redesigned. Libération's objective is to create a sort of "written radio" format in which the website will be more interactive.

The new site will be comprised of three distinct sections. The first section will consist of news and events accompanied contributions by web journalists, print journalists, and bloggers. Another section will be dedicated to multimedia sources, such as audio, video and slideshows. The third section will be comprised of debates, forums, and chats.  

The biggest change with the new site is the creation of a new section dedicated to services such as weather and concerts, where users can also create their own personal account. Eventually users will be able to link into a social network where they can participate in debates.  

Source:  Presse News

Vandaag & Morgen, a free weekly newspaper, is scheduled to be launched on 25 September in Rotterdam.  

The original plan was to launch a free daily, but due to financial constraints this was shelved.




Sources: Vandaag & Morgen, Newspaper Innovation

The Chicago Tribune is undergoing a radical overhaul which is scheduled to be launched in a matter of weeks.  Prototypes of the new pages and sections for this redeign were posted in Tribune Tower for review by employees on Thursday.

Sources told the Chicago Sun-Times that the space devoted to news in the Chicago Tribune will be significantly reduced, with the paper's front section including national and international news, the local and business reports and the editorial page. The Tribune publishes freestanding sections for metro and business news currently.

The redesigned paper is set to have a three-section format, Tribune employees reported to the local rival newspaper. The newspaper's other sections would be for features, with a working title of Live, and Sports. According to the prototype, the pages for local news will be labeled Chicagoland, a term Tribune editors use to define the city and its suburbs.

The Chicago Tribune, is aiming to launch the revamp by the end of September.

The Tribune itself has refused to comment on the leaked information. The sources that spoke to the Chicago Sun-Times reported that the pages they saw were works in progress, with some section having several versions up for review. The recently leaked idea that the newspaper would be renamed The Trib has reportedly been abandoned.

Source: Chicago Sun-Tribune via IFRA Executive News

See also:

US: Chicago Tribune prototype redesign leaked

Daily Thanthi, the second largest circulated daily in Tamil Nadu, is launching a Mumbai edition on September 5.

This new edition is the third one to be published outside Tamil Nadu; the paper is also circulated in Bangalore and Pondicherry. Daily Thanthi will have an initial print run of 50,000 copies in Mumbai.

Daily Thanthi is planning a high-profile marketing campaign for the launch.

Skandraaj, Chief Operating Officer of Malar Publications, the publishers of Daily Thanthi, said; "This is our first edition outside South India, and unlike Delhi, where the Tamil speaking population is scattered, Mumbai has some pockets and reaching the Mumbai Tamil speaking audience in the commercial capital is also very easy. We see a good revenue potential here."

Skandraaj also reported that the Group has no plans to launch an edition in Delhi. Exlaining his reasoning behind this issue, he said "We are sending around 3,500 copes to Delhi everyday to reach out to our readers there. As far as Delhi is concerned, the cost of reaching out to our target audience is very high."

According to ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulation) report for the period January-June 2008, Daily Thanthi had a circulation of around 969,000 copies, an increase of around 50,000 copies against the 917,000 net paid copies during ABC January-December 2007.

Source: Exchange4Media.com via IFRA Executive News Service

Casa Ed. El Tiempo (CEET) will launch a free daily in Bogotá, Medellín, Barranquilla and Cali on 15 September.

The new paper will have an initial circulation of 300,000 - this will make it the widest circulated paper in Colombia. Paid paper El Tiempo currently has the highest circulation: 240,000 daily copies.

Columbian media group CEET will increase its grip on the Colombian market with the launch of this new paper, as it also publishes dailies El Tiempo, Hoy, Portafolio (business) and other regional newspapers.

The Colombian paper will have a similar design as Spainish free daily ADN. Spanish publisher Planeta owns a 55% stake in CEET. Planeta is the publisher of ADN.

The new paper, which has no title as yet, is the second free daily to be launched in Colombia. In 2006, Diario Occidente (Cali) was converted to a free daily.

Source: Newspaper Innovation

Telkom Kenya will launch the iPhone in Kenya in September, following the release of a mobile phone service under the Orange name, reports Telecom Paper.

News outlets like IHT.com already offer mobile versions of their online editions as an iPhone application and the expanding iPhone global market may help in boosting audience figures.

Telkom Kenya has not determined yet whether it will launch the 3G version, an older one or both.

Source: Telecom Paper

See also:
France: Le Figaro launches iPhone site
US: NYT launches iPhone application
AP launches native iPhone application
IHT.com launches iPhone-optimized site
US: Mobile technology may be important to media outlets in the future
Belgium: Flemish newspapers offering mobile services

An interesting and growing market has opened up for newspapers with online editions in Africa: the expat reader looking for news about home from a familiar news source. The print version of newspapers remains paramount in Africa in terms of readership and revenue, but newspaper organizations are waking up to this new medium's potential.

When Kenya's Daily Nation launched its website a decade ago, it had a clear vision. The country's leading newspaper recognised that the 1.8 million Kenyans living abroad had little access to news from home, and that an online edition would have mass appeal to the increasing number of ex-pats who hungered for news. This is something that editors and publishers across Africa should bare in mind: the International Labour Organisation estimates there are some 7.1 million Africans living outside their home country. The number is rising rapidly and by 2025 could climb to one in ten, the IOM predicts.

The Editors Weblog spoke with the Daily Nation's managing editor of special projects, Macharia Gaitho, about his newspapers online edition and he said: "We wanted to extend the paper's audience beyond Kenya's geographic borders to deepen the paper's voice and authority, while also offering a service to the growing Kenyan diaspora." The website was launched formally in October 1998 with a dedicated team, following trials the previous year just before the Kenyan general election.

This service goes back to the very foundation of what newspapers are all about, they are not only providing a news service, they are also serving their communities, even the members of it who have moved away.

The fact that the online edition is very reflective of the print edition is a pull to the expat community who will immediately have the emotional response of recognition and thus feel "familiar" with the web version from their first visit, this familiarity will likely encourage return visitors. As one of the most trusted news organization on the African continent, it would already be a first port of call for expats looking for news from home, but with its easily navigable site, clear graphics, photographs, video footage and with a style that echoes the print version, they have cleverly tapped into the expat market.

Gaitho, who describes the Daily Nation website as the "recognized go-to place online for news on Kenya" said it was important that the web edition reflected the "Nation's look and feel."

The Daily Nation site has recently undergone a revamp and the new-look site achieved 50,000 unique visitors daily in its first week after the launch. The previous version averaged 80,000 unique visitors daily. Explaining this disparity in visitors, Gaitho said: "Because of faster download speeds and improved features, we project the new one will surpass 80k".
 
However, some news organisations in Kenya have been slow to see the potential of this new market and only have a web version as a nod to this evolving technology without fully engaging with the medium. Dr George Ogola at the University of Lancashire says that in Kenya, "The element of interactivity, the very essence of 'experiencing' news online remains unexploited." He believes that news organisations need to recognise that with the advent of online news, the relationship between the reader and the newspaper has been altered.

The appeal of ex-pat readers is therefore another attraction for African newspapers to consider when they lead the charge to online editions, not only for editors looking to boost their news organizations readership and to keep their media house relevant, but also to appeal to advertisers such as Western Union who wish to reach the expat audience. It is as a result now mandatory for any newspaper in Africa to have an online edition.

The Editors Weblog spoke to the Directeur de Publications at Le Jour in Cameroon, Haman Mana, about his thoughts on this issue. Recently launched newspaper Le Jour is a particularly interesting case, as they chose to launch the print and online version at the same time on the 17 September 2007. This decision underscores how online media is growing in importance in Africa, even though print still creates more revenue and attracts a larger readership. When I asked Mana about his thinking behind this decision, he said bluntly, "It is inconceivable for any Cameroonian newspaper that wants to be taken seriously not to have an online edition."



Mana agreed with Gaitho on how it is important that the online edition mirror the newspaper, saying, "The design was an important step for us, because we wanted to keep the spirit of the print edition." Mana reports that a significant portion of Le Jour's online readership is also made up of the Cameroon disapora. He also highlighted how having an online edition is simply good publicity for a newspapers brand, he said the web version has opened up a world of markets to Le Jour and, "it permits us to have a global presence and visibility."

It is therefore clear that the expat reader opens up a whole new market of readers and revenue to Africa's newspapers. For those organisations that are reticent about connecting with the web, they need to be aware they are ignoring a growing market waiting to be exploited. The African web news market is already jostling with competitors, so if they do not leap now, they could miss out completely.

Sources: AllAfrica.com, Business Daily, International Labour Organisation, Daily Nation, Le Jour

The China Times, one of Taiwan's leading Chinese-language newspapers, announced in June that it would re-launch itself as a tabloid paper in early September. This announcement and the further statement that the paper planned to layoff 400 employees and reduces its page count has resulted in the union calling for its members to strike.

Union members intended to go on strike last week, but only 117 of 243 votes were in favour of the strike, the minimum necessary being 122. Following a meeting with Times staff, the publisher Chou Sheng-yuan announced a reduction in the number of staff cutbacks from 575 to 430, all of who will receive one month's salary as compensation.

The China Times says it has little choice due to the declining demand for newspapers, according to Asia Media. The rising cost of operations and plunging revenues have made the Times decide to re-invent itself as a "newspaper for the elite".

"Newspapers are more than a business. They are also an indispensable public sphere in a democracy," said Chiu Chia-yi, a Campaign for Media Reform representative. Chia-yi further mentioned that the Times should try to model itself on UK's Guardian by handing itself over to be managed by a trust.

The Association of Taiwan Journalists (ATJ), civic groups and academics have been convincing the public to sign an online petition in support of the Times workers.

Kuo Li-hsin, assistant professor at National Chengchi University's Radio and TV department, is concerned that the quality of reporting may spawn "trivialities" and "garbage reporting and that the Times may follow in the footsteps of the Apple Daily, which is undergoing structural changes.

The ATJ also predicted that the Times would remain a tabloid for a short while, eventually vanishing.

Source: Asia Media

Generating - and maintaining - an online audience is the perpetual challenge of news websites. Whereas print readers report spending 16 minutes a day with their dailies, the average nytimes.com reader spends just 68 seconds a day on the site. 

Interactive features may be sites saving grace. USA Today's Candidate Match Game has drawn more than 2.5 million unique visitors since its launch last September, and Senior Designer Juan Thomassie reports the feature can keep readers engaged for five to six minutes.

The Poynter Institute recently interviewed Thomassie on the development and success of the project. What follows is an edited version of the transcript that appears on the Poynter Institute's website.

How did interactivity help to tell the story?

Thomassie: Some candidates had a very high profile and some were not so well-known. The candidate match game was a way to use some issues-related questions and multiple choice answers to help readers get an idea of which was closest to their views.

The presumption was that readers might not be so well-informed about candidates. We just posed them as a Q&A, a blind quiz. Each time you chose your answer, we'd reveal question by question which things matched.

We were surprised that most people who took (that version of) the quiz said, "I had no idea I agreed with this candidate."

How many ideas were on the table?

Thomassie: We actually drew up a few storyboards and kind of played around with the idea of a horse race theme. As you answered the questions, the candidates who you are most like would go farther on the track. We decided that idea was a little too light. It wasn't just a game.

The challenge for us was to find that sweet spot between newsy and informative and fun and interactive. We pulled back from the horse race and used the vertical bars format that we ultimately used.

What were the important talents involved in producing this interactive graphic?

Thomassie: A collaborative effort between the political editor, the producer and myself.

This represented many months of meetings, conceptualization, brainstorming, storyboarding, development of prototypes. As we'd get feedback from prototypes we'd rebuild things -- make significant changes to the model in key points in the process. But each time it got better and was a really useful process.

This is such an investment of resources. How did you let people know that the feature was there?

Thomassie: We promoted it heavily on the USA Today homepage, on the politics homepage and in the newspaper.

Then, thru blogs and word of mouth, it really started to get some play in the media. It steamrolled from there. We saw the match game discussed on a local TV station where they talked about how helpful it was. We saw a discussion on C-SPAN about it. It just caught on in political blogs, news blogs and interactive graphics blogs, and we were a bit surprised by the steady stream of traffic it was generating.

Again, something like this takes so much time. How do you decide what is worth the time it takes to create something like this?

If someone comes to the page, interacts with the graphic, spends time digging for more content -- spending at least 5 or 6 minutes on a page -- it's worth it. We can track that.

What about interactivity for daily publication?

Thomassie: On a daily basis, if it's a breaking news story, then there's a compelling push to do a news graphic. But to determine if it should be interactive, you have to ask if it will be of interest in two weeks or down the road.

With 14 months before the election date; We knew that there would be a long-term interest.

Though it took weeks of development, the results we got from this are a resounding "yes" when we get hundreds of thousands of visitors per month, for months and months and months.

Source: Poynter Institute

As the Figaro readies the launch of its own in-house video studio (still fully under construction when visited), Bertrand Gié, head of new media for the paper, agreed to give us a few words about the role of video within the quality daily.

There’s no question that video is one of this year’s biggest priorities for newspapers, whether national or local. In this Q&A, the Editors Weblog interviewed Alexander Houben, editor of volksfreund.tv, an online local TV channel launched by the German local paper Volksfreund. Houben describes video’s costs, its effects on journalists and how the editorial content fits the paper's strategy.