In his blog, Steven Outing discussed the Global Conference on the Individuated Newspaper and the innovative approaches to personalized news that newspapers can adopt to attract more readers.

Key points of the conference included:

-using the available technology to give "individuated" news. This implies having a content management system that can handle personalized editions.
-younger audiences experience individuated media through many platforms including Facebook, iTunes/iPod, mobile phones, etc.
-individuated news is "inevitable" and newspapers have to evolve.

Rocky Mountain News reported that, due to the constraints of print, newspapers have provided people with a broad selection of content that might not appeal to every reader.

"It seems we can turn all the new-found power of the Internet - that so easily empowers people to personalize their news - and generate a whole new type of newspaper with greater relevance and value. Call it the reverse- published newspaper," said Dean Singleton, MediaNews CEO and chairman of the Associated Press board of directors.

Several examples of reverse-publishing have emerged in the US, with varied success, including the Rocky News' YourHub.com or the Chicago Tribune's Triblocal.

Advertisers continue to spend a fraction of their online ad expenditure on video ads, even when millions of people watch online videos every day, but the business model for online video is starting to emerge. Editors are still seeking the most effective formats for online advertising.

According to MediaShift, online video ads are "ready to bloom" thanks to:

-audience and ad inventory exploding on sites like Hulu or CNN Online
-standard advertising guidelines created by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) that would unify advertisers
-Google allowing longer independent films on YouTube to increase professional quality of content and allowing video producers to sell their ads
-small and medium businesses (SMBs) began using video ads, thanks to online Yellow Pages, Google's AdSense and video production start-ups like PixelFish and TurnHere

Short one-minute videos, similar to TV ads and infomercials, may sometimes be more effective for small businesses that don't have the resources to produce their own video ads. Video production companies like TurnHere provide documentary type video profiles created by independent producers.

PixelFish, a popular video production company, has had 20 % average revenue increase every month in 2008, according to John McIntyre, CEO.

Video ad formats: pre-roll or not?

The swan song of the subeditor is growing louder: City AM is striking its entire subeditorial team, the Guardian reports. The London business freesheet will cut eight jobs in total, 2 sales jobs and six subeditors. Journalists will now write and sub their own copies.

According to a City AM spokesman, the job losses were not a cost cutting-measure; the paper is considering expanding its night editorial team to compensate for the cuts.

"City AM is undertaking a reorganization that will see it move away from a combined editorial and subeditorial model to focus on frontline journalism," the spokesman said.

Some experts believe the position of subeditor will become obsolete in the age of digital journalism. Click here to read more about the vanishing subeditor.

Source: The Guardian

Last week, the Romanian Senate unanimously voted a law proposal forcing media to distribute 50% of positive news.

According to its instigators, the law will help to fight against "the extraordinary harms of negative news and their irreversible effects on health and people's lives."

The Senate wishes that TV and radio news programs feature as much 'negative' as 'positive' news.

The Romanian's National Council for Audiovisual broadcasting is to validate the law - under which it will have the responsibility to decide what constitutes good or bad news.

But the Council swiftly criticized the law. "News is news, it is neither positive nor negative, it simply reflects reality," said the Council's president, Rasvan Popescu.

Press freedom organizations such as Reporters Without Borders have also criticized the proposal, comparing it to similar laws in authoritarian regimes such as North Korea.

While a number of editors may agree that the news agenda tends to be vastly 'negative', no law should seek to force the reverse.

Source: Lemonde.fr (link in French)

Newspapers from South Dakota created a free, searchable Web site that acts like a database of public announcements, CyberJournalist.Net reported.

After being published in print newspapers, public notices are transferred to the site and users can search by keywords like city or newspaper.

This idea may interesting for newspapers since it helps to integrate print and online journalism.

Sourec: CyberJournalist.Net

Garcia Media recently interviewed Miguel de Lorenzi, a veteran designer, on the state of newspaper design in Argentina.

Lorenzi pointed to Clarion and La Nacion as the country's leaders, but expressed enthusiasm over the launch of Critica de la Argentina. "(Critica de la Argentina has) a very smart content strategy as well as a great design. Jorge Lanata, its editor, takes risks with a printed newspaper... at a time when all the voices around him form a choir to chant the disappearance of daily printed newspapers."

"Graphics add emotional impact to the printed newspaper which is difficult to achieve on online editions," said Lorenzi. "This is definitely a plus that printed newspapers have over their digital counterparts so far."

Critica de la Argentina's pages are filled with larger and more colorful graphics, but also seem cognizant of the text they partner with, and don't overwhelm or distract from articles.

"From its origins, simplified journalism has been nothing more than the sum of communication plus emotion. We lost the way somehow, but, fortunately, we are now are getting it back both online and print."

Source: Garcia Media

The Washington Post has developed an online "interactive grocery store" designed to inform readers about making healthier food choices. The "store" is the main feature of a Post series on obesity.

"The idea and execution: Let people choose among similar products at a virtual store to see how careful shopping can make a significant dent in the volume of unhealthy ingredients brought home," said Stacey Palosky, lifestyles editor for the Post.

The Virtual Grocery Store will work like this. Browsers search through food items from 16 "aisles" - food categories comprising more than 80 products - and are presented with unhealthy options and better choices. Clicking on a food item or adding one to the cart provides access to the product's nutritional information.

Additionally, the site contains educational videos and the complete U.S. Department of Agriculture database.

"The store blended the best in online use of databases, video, graphics, and interactivity to create a powerful, useful and unique tool for anyone," Palosky said.

Source: Newspaper Association of America

Tabloids' new celebrities could be politicians, instead of Hollywood stars like Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. Just as mainstream media borrow content from tabloids by writing about Hollywood starlets and the like, tabloids now borrow from media covering the political sphere.

For example, US Weekly put Michelle and Barack Obama on the cover last week while People wrote about Tim Russet.

"The lines between gossip and politics have blurred," ABC News wrote, in light of coverage of politicians like "gay American" Jim McGreevy and New York's prostitute-soliciting former governor, Eliot Spitzer.

"There are a limited number of celebrities that people really care about, maybe a half dozen, including Britney and Lindsay," said New York Post's Media Ink columnist Keith Kelly. "There is a celebrity fatigue setting in. People are bored of the same people doing the same things, and there is no one new on the horizon."

According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, US Weekly's circulation grew by 10% to over 1.9 million between 2006-2007 while People continued to be the most popular celebrity magazine with 3.6 million in circulation, ABC News reported.

In the latest issue of World Press Trends, the newspaper industry's most comprehensive compilation of statistics about newspapers worldwide, readers can find a list of the top 100 newspapers in the world, advertising and circulation figures, and more.

Throughout the next week, the Weblog is offering the top-10 newspaper list in terms of circulation broken down by world region, both for paid-for dailies and free papers, starting with Europe (click on picture to view full-size):

The Chicago Tribune has appointed Tran Ha, editor of the Tribune-owned RedEye Weekend, as editor of the paper's high school newspaper project. The project, due out early next year, consists of a weekly newspaper and website, and will be aimed at and written by Chicago public high school students.

"Teens in Chicago are unique and deserve a paper and website that speaks to them...one that gets students more interested in reading and writing," she said in a statement.

Ha was previously a copy editor and assistant features editor at RedEye.

Click here for more information on the Tribune's student paper project.

Source: Editor and Publisher

In an innovative ploy, MySpace and NBC News are recruiting citizen journalists to cover the Democratic and Republican national conventions.

Anyone over 18 years old can apply by submitting a short video piece answering one of three reflective questions: "Why do you vote?" "Why are you the best person for this job?" Or "How will you stand out in the crowd and get the scoop no one else can?"

A panel of judges will select five finalists, and the Myspace Community will vote on the two winners. One winner will cover the Democratic National Convention; the other will cover the Republican National convention.

"In an election that has so engaged people," said Mark Lukasiewicz, vice president of digital media at NBC News, "It's right that we try to find ways to get original voices in the conversations around politics."

Source: THR.com through I Want Media