2009 might well be remembered as a year of cutbacks and closures, but also a year when newspapers started to fight back, make changes and began to reassess unsatisfactory aspects of their business models. The world of journalism has indeed suffered some sad losses but there has also been much innovative thinking and progress in the way that news is gathered, reported and presented. Here are a few of the top trends that the Editors Weblog has noted this year.
Cuts, cuts, cuts: what are the consequences?
And even those whose survival is assured have been cutting staff - the
New York Times just lost 100 newsroom staff - or closing bureaux - the
Washington Post now has no domestic bureaux outside the capital. Others have cut down on international reporting. Newspapers have got thinner, some losing sections or even cutting printing days.
Start-ups can help to fill the gaps in reporting, but without proper funding they too will languish. It is essential that outlets must focus on efficiencies and how to make the best of their resources, and endeavour not to sacrifice quality.
To charge or not to charge (online)?
Murdoch, undoubtedly one of paid online content's most vocal supporters, is insistent that news is a valuable product and should not just be given away. This might seem hard to argue with, but some publishers are resolute that charging online is not the answer to solving financial difficulties, and remain committed to high traffic and other schemes such as highly targeted advertising to sustain cash flow. The Guardian, for example, is one of these. A multitude of surveys carried out have suggested that, unsurprisingly,
charging online will not be too popular among consumers.
Will Murdoch fulfil his promises? Could charging online be the norm by the end of 2010? And what has happened to Journalism Online: will 'bundled' charging be an option?
The TWITTER explosion
By now, the idea of a journalist not using
Twitter is verging on inconceivable. After
CNN and
Ashton Kutcher first crossed the one million followers mark in April in a highly-publicised battle, multi-million follower accounts are now not uncommon.
HYPERLOCAL: just hype or the future for news?
The ubiquity of free online news has, quite understandably, led news outlets to contemplate what they can offer that is unique, and going very very local has appealed to many, particularly as regional papers have been suffering particularly badly and hyperlocal news has potential to offer highly-targeted local advertising.
One noteworthy initiative is the
Futuroom/Nase adresa project launched by PPF Media in the Czech Republic (
disclosure: the World Editors Forum has been involved in the project in the role of consultant) which has taken news reporting directly into the community and constructed an unusual alternative revenue stream. 'News cafes,' which place the newsroom in a cafe in the centre of town, are at the centre of PPF's strategy: these both provide income (enough to cover overheads) and offer the public direct access to journalists, allowing the newsroom
to become a real part of the community. Led from the Futuroom base in Prague,
Nasa adresa weeklies and websites are produced, and it seems as if the papers are selling.
It is too early to say whether the project, launched in June, represents a solution that could be used more widely, but looks it promising. Hyperlocal undoubtedly has potential, but an innovative business model needs to be found.
i for innovation
The paper has willingly abandoned traditional topic sections to allow more freedom of coverage, and focuses on opinion and daily in-depth analysis on key issues, taking into account the fact that its readers are likely to already be well-informed via other platforms.
New ideas and experimentation are encouraged, and enthusiasm is high. And, the paper does not put all its print content online: the website aims to be kind of a social news portal rather than a digital reproduction of the news in the paper.
As a new paper, it has been easier for i to break the mould, but are there useful lessons that established newspapers could learn from what i is doing differently?
Does a nonprofit business model have a significant place in the media landscape?
Whether or not going nonprofit is an option for newspapers is a question that has been discussed at length by media commentators and
even by the US Senate. The main advantage: protection from market forces, the main disadvantage: no freedom to endorse political candidates. And, of course, there is the challenge of finding a rich enough donor.
The idea that an entire newspaper could be funded by a foundation seems unlikely, but investigative public interest journalism has been relatively successful at attracting nonprofit support.
All these launches are good news for news in these areas, but are they sustainable? It has been argued that the nonprofit concept is merely propping up a flawed business model and limiting potential innovation. Time will tell which are successful.
Is there money in mobile?
Smart phones are becoming more and more common and could start to become the norm in 2010. Many news applications that enable a better reading experience have been built for
Apple's iPhone, and some for
Google's Android operating system - those created by the
New York Times, the
Guardian, and the
Associated Press seem to be generally considered to be among the best. The Guardian's paid for app
sold more than 9000 in its first two days.
But can they actually be a significant stream of revenue?
Many are free, and those like the Guardian's which have a one-off download fee
(something consumers are likely to be willing to pay for?) might be able to recoup the costs of development with this income, but it does not constitute regular revenue. Advertising is limited so far - there is not much space on the small screen, for a start. Briefly covering the whole screen seems to be the preferred method of some papers on the iPhone:
Le Monde's app opens with a full-page ad, for example.
It is possible to make content available via subscription. The Financial Times iPhone app only allows full access to online subscribers, and the Wall Street Journal has implemented a specific application subscription charge: $1.50 per week.
Will more do this? Can consumers be persuaded to pay on their phones for what they can get free online?
E-readers: not all they promised, but could that change in 2010?
Google: friend or foe?
Conflict over copyright reached new heights this year. Attacks on Google and other 'copyright thieves' who have built a business model off newspaper content have come from many corners: with News Corp
leading the fight in the US but
Spanish and
German publishers too. Google consistently responds that it is fact a friend to publishers, citing the 1 billion clicks that it sends to news websites each month via Google News, and pointing out that publishers can easily opt-out of Google's indexing. Publishers retort that Google's current quasi-monopoly on search would make that difficult.
Cooperation
One of the consequences of extreme financial difficulties has been unexpected cooperation between former rivals: it has become harder and less desirable to stand entirely alone. A few examples:
Between different platforms: at many papers, print and web are competing no longer, but are part of the one team. The
Washington Post is the latest major paper
to undergo integration.
For a list of top publishing strategies for 2010 please see our sister publication www.sfnblog.com
