FT's next stage of digital transition

Andy Dickinson has drawn my attention to a leaking of details of a reorganisation of the FT newsroom.

The document states that

The priority for the organisation is to tilt the workflow towards the online content and to streamline the newspaper process.

In a question and answer document presumably for employees it says that

Despite the changes made at the company back in 2006,the world has not stood still and that catering for the online customer is now a priority.

The plan is for no more redundancies from those announced in Jan and in response to questions about whether this will mean an increased workload for journalists,the paper says that there will be some contraction on the print side with second edition pages being reduced.

As to the vexed question on subbing the document says that

we do need to move away from treating copy editing as a single demarcating in the traditional newspaper process.ie that subbing is done as far up the process as possible

Have local papers been too digitally successful

Interesting piece from John Slattery at the Wire who quotes media analyst Enders who says that

Many local publishers are accelerating their decline by ‘doing too much too well’ in terms of digital news provision at the expense of the quality of their newspapers,

They were looking at Johnston Press' results released earlier in the week.The group has prided itself at being at the forfront of convergence yet is teetering on the brink of disaster.

Time Inc hints at a paywall model

I had missed the comments of Time Inc's Ann S Moore who explained to the Telegraph why the company is ripping up its five year business plan yesterday.

Besides greater integration between the online and the print side she says

We are going to have to figure out a way to have paid content in the future," she says, adding that the business is considering making its most successful websites, such as Time.com and People.com, subscription-based.

Post's move to a brave new future

The Birmingham Post is another of the newspapers that is upending its production and moving to new integrated offices,in this case the Old Fort Dunlop buildings overlooking the M6.

Journlism.co.uk have interviewed its editor Steve Dyson, who provides some insight into the paper's move

We've gone through harsh changes here in terms of how we're restructuring things. We've taken a lot on the chin about the redundancy progamme and the new building has made a tremendous difference

he tells the site

The timing of the move is a classic management tool for the new brush style,move to a new office as redundancies take effect and Dyson agrees

We deliberately tweaked the timing of the move to coincide with the end of the consultation period for the voluntary redundancies. When we moved we chose to move without the people who had chosen to leave the company and the people who moved into these offices were the people of the future,"

The digital newsroom and how news can no longer sustain itself

Let’s kill a myth. The dream of a compact newsroom, able to output a high-intensity general news website doesn’t fly. Numbers simply don’t add up. And here is why.

A favourite topic of mine and one that the "converganists" like to gloss over sometimes.

Nothing replaces the income stream like sales revenue

That's the start of an article via the Monday Note which is sending alarm bells around the media commentators.And why?

Well it is the cost structure of the newsroom.The author argues that in a standard print newsroom

the biggest costs are industrial ones: around 25%-35% for paper and printing; another 30%-40% for distribution; around 18-25% for editorial; the remaining 10-15% are for administrative and marketing expenditures. It varies from country to country but we can safely assert most of the costs — at least 60% — are industrial in nature. Evidently, that part disappears when going online.

Leaving journalists to make up the vast majority of the costs of the digital newsroom.With it so far???

Good -well translated into costs this means that to cover its costs,a purely digital operation will require over 8.3million unique visitors based on a revenue figure per unique visitor of 0.25 euros.

And the conclusion,well even the big operations will struggle to get there.

But

Still, this is no reason to hang on to an inexorably shrinking print media.

and

news is no longer able to sustain itself. The game becomes finding “alternate subsidy” streams

Concerns for Channel 4 in a day for Andy Duncan

Audience fragmentation is playing havoc with advertising revenues. The global economy is of increasing concern. But most important of all is the looming digital switchover, with its potentially terminal implications for Channel 4's public service role, and associated subsidies.

Sue Arnott spends 24 hours with its chief executive Andy Duncan with him telling her that

"In one sense we are non-profit, but in another we are aggressively commercial. My typical day straddles the divide."

And his day reflected this multi media multi platform environment,addressing the Parliamentary media groups on the subject of convergency.Meeting over projected financial figures

The question is how much we can afford to spend next year, and how much should be spent on Channel 4 itself, how much on digital, and how much on the 4OD on-demand service."

Then finishing off the channel's submission to Ofcom's review of public service broadcasting,then hosting an event the channel is running as part of the Government's creative industries apprenticeship strategy.

A real insight into running the channel

Guardian media group announces further integration

Straws in the wind as Guardian media has just announced that it will be integrating its Guardian,Observer and Guardian.co.uk operations by the end of the year.

The statement released says that journalists will be contributing text,audio an video to all three operations.

Specialist reporters from all titles will work together in "pods" across
the three outlets, but retain their existing bylines.

However it seems that it is not the predicted death of the distinct Sunday as all operations will retain their executive team and

the Observer will retain its own news desk and a team of dedicated news reporters as well as keeping its editing operation, magazines and a separate features department.

LEP's investment in new media pays off

Uclan's relationship with the Lancashire Evening post has been a close one,it seems that the journalism department is constantly running various courses for training in the new media so it is hartening to see that it seems to be paying off.

According to the site HOW DO

Eighteen months after the LEP became the UK’s first fully convergent regional newsroom, editor Simon Reynolds has hailed the development as a great success – but now believes the tougher challenge is how to best manage the huge amount of response.

Reynolds goes onto say

“It’s now become just a part of our business. To be honest, I’m surprised at just how quickly we’ve all adopted and adapted to the new digital age.”

and

Reynolds is cautiously optimistic for the future of newsprint but he also strongly believes that “print media companies will make it (the digital transformation) and succeed before and better than most other sectors.”

Are journalism schools adapting?

Thanks to Dave Lee for pointing me towards this article on the Editors Weblog.Apart from Dave lapping up his well deserved publicity having been called

"probably Britain’s leading student journalist blogger"

Come on Roy-why don't you read mine sometimes?

The article includes a discussion between Jeff Jarvis,Roy Greenslade and Keith Woods looking at the state of student journalism.

I thought that this from Roy in the face of learning the terchnologies of the New Media was excellent

If we are to have professional journalism in the future, we must uphold standards. We must teach our students and show that journalism is still useful at a time when everybody can publish their ‘news.’

From Woods

They'll continue to need the basics of reporting and storytelling, but students will also need to have a fundamental familiarity with software and some knowledge of how and why to use audio, video and still pictures to tell stories.

There can be a rush towards the new technology,it is going to play an important role for all of us but as with any profession,the basics must be mastered first.

Here on the journalism course at UCLAN I feel that they have got the balance just right in spending a good proportion of the time setting down the basics and recognising that the new media is simply an alternative way to communicate.

A blue print for the future

The Atlanta Journal Constitution has thrown away the rule book when it comes to designing news rooms in the age of convergence.

The American Journalism review reports that

For years, journalists have wrangled with rampaging change, especially the online revolution that brought vast new duties and the accompanying downsizing that left fewer people to accomplish them. Now these changes are rushing toward a threshold that seems likely to remake the homely print newsroom into a multimedia center fighting for survival and success.

The paper this summer

abolished traditional desks and reconstituted itself into four departments instead of more than a dozen. Two produce the content: News and Information, the largest department, supplies breaking news and other material directed first toward the Web. The Enterprise department develops surprising, watchdog-type stories largely for the morning newspaper. The two other departments, Digital and Print, independently select from this content and handle presentation for the Journal-Constitution and its Web site, ajc.com.

The paper has tried to become Web based something that many papers will have tried to adhere to.Its

structure serves up constantly updated online news, lifestyle guides and interactive multimedia features, with about 5 million unique visitors a month. The print paper, circulation 360,000 daily, 525,000 Sundays, stresses depth and enterprise.

The news diamond

Just catching up with some of the comments and ideas in the blogsphere over the past week and one item in particular seems to have done the rounds so to speak.

Paul Bradshaw has produced a model of the 21st century newsroom which he describes as the "news diamond"

It is well worth a read and an excellent concept Paul which draws on what Paul; decribes as both the strengths and contradictions of the online concept,speed and depth

UK Broadsheets and the use of video

Andy Dickinson has posted an overview of what the UK broadsheet newspapers are doing in terms of video and multimedia.(Well worth a read ,as always).

This on the Telegraph

"

Unfortunately, like the Guardian, the broadcast production roots of a lot of the
content shows through and it looks pretty bland. Produced in conjunction with
ITN a lot of the news content is bland and lacks a distinct personality."

And Andy concludes that

A general criticism that you could level at all of the
broadsheets is the lack the basics of online presentation. No consistent date
stamps for the video, a lack of clear contextual information and poor linking to
existing content are repeated mistakes. Some of it, I can imagine, are the
limitations of the content management systems. But it’s obvious that in terms of
joined up thinking the ‘convergence’ of content still has a way to go.

Why youngsters aren't reading papers

Follow the Media has an interesting article ,if one sided article,on the reasons why young people are not reading newspapers anymore.

The comments are directed at his local paper in Orlando Florida and he describes himself as

"a 28 year-old who has a genuine interest in national news and current events, as well as a profound interest in the local and national sports scene. I am what could be considered a typical male in his upper 20’s"

So why has he shunned his local paper:

It is out of date and with the plethora of constantly updated news on the eb,why wait 24 hours to get that news.Perhaps obvious comments but he then complains that

"Now the logical response to that is that the newspaper has its own web site, so one should read there the updated news that outdates the print edition. That would be fine if newspapers did that right, but for the most part they don’t’. Some newspapers are now saying that filing online comes first before print, but for many that is still not so, and it shows in their web product. That is why most newspaper web sites don’t satisfy my national and international news needs. They rely on AP updates and that’s it."


And continues

"I believe the Internet has decimated print’s ability to provide the information I want quickly and relevantly, but it should be able to do it on the Internet. My generation does not know what it means not to have the internet. High speed internet can be bought in some cases for less than a subscription to your paper. "

But is it better to have all content on one site.He continues

“Now while I realize that you run your own web site, I challenge you to compare it to the most popular Internet news outlets across the country. Our world has become a global one, and it is my feeling that you have remained content to localize your audience. Sure we want the local news, even hyper-local news, but you have to be compettitve on the state, national and international coverage, too. Web stories are not updated as often as they should be, and thus newspaper sites fall far behind in my list of websites to check as I go on my quest of information.


Fair point,but is it reasonable for a local site to cater for all information needs.Certainly in the UK,the local press are doing the opposite.Thet are trying to concentrate on a niche market on their web sites and can do this by being more specific to local needs than they can in their print additions.

Don't write off print yet

Peter Cole writes in the Ios today that he fnds it odd

" that so many in the communication industry, particularly its print dimension, should think it sensible to spend quite so much time predicting their own demise. Say it often enough and people will believe it. We do not have to sell the death of newspapers in order to promote the growth of online."

He sees some good news in the circulation of the papers that have turned compact over the past few years,ie the Indy and Guardian/Observer.They are selling more in their new format today than in their last days as a broadsheet.

That ,for Peter ,is good news.

"we'll want to read words on paper for a long time to come. Let's start talking about the media mix, not the death of one of the ingredients."

Perhaps he has a point in that we should see print as being part of the convergence rather than one component that will be no more

Kelner on Integration

Following the series of redundancies announced by the paper,the Independent's editor Simon Kelner gives an interview to Guardian Media this morning.

Whilst using the oppurtunity to set the record straight on some issues,the 49 year old leaves his most controversial comments for its future direction.Talking about technology he says

"We're happy not being pioneers, because it means we won't get shot in the back. Our approach has been - and will be for the near future - that we'll go about things more steadily, we're not going to rush headlong into massive investment."

He is particually scathing about some aspects of digital integration,especially the use of pod casts and video on newspaper sites.

I've never met anyone who ever listens to podcasts," When I saw in the Telegraph 'Get your podcast of Simon Heffer discussing David Cameron's latest policy announcement', I thought you've got to be joking! I'm not convinced that they're the future."

Whilst admitting that the paper's website needs to catch up with its rivals.And perhaps most importantly he tells that

I completely reject the idea that newspapers are on some sort of slippery slope. I feel a little bit like a lone voice, but talk about turkeys voting for Christmas! The way that people in newspapers are writing this industry off is scandalous. Part of every newspaper's marketing budgets should go on marketing newspapers [generically]. It's madness that we don't actually promote our own value and too many people within our own industry talk us down."

The face of the Convergent Newsroom

Is this the face of the convergent newsroom?

A report by Cardiff University says the Trinity are putting their Welsh titles at risk by investing in the web to the detriment of its news titles.

Interviews with journalists across the region have uncovered practices including staff being forced to do more work such as video and podcasts without extra pay and more importantly without adequate training.

The report says that journalists in Trinity's newsrooms are "very concerned about the changes in their working conditions but they do believe the digital newsroom represents the future of journalism".

They have five key areas of concern:

1. Little investment in new resources
2. increased workloads
3. quality of multimedia news will be poor
4. insufficient training
5. No reward recognition in the form of pay

Th report goes on to say that Trinity faces a "stark choice as it moves online.It can continue to make cuts with an eye to maintaining short term profit margins and watch the quality of its news decline or it can invest in journalism with the aim of producing quality print and digital news products with a view to creating sustainable long term profits"

That Guardian memo in full

Thank you to Martin Stabe who links to Innovation International Media and prints Alan Rushbridger's memo to Guardian staff about integration and convergence at the paper.


Dear All
DRAFT PRINCIPLES OF 24/7 WORKING
The Guardian is increasingly becoming a global news provider with an international audience and reputation.
Web users expect to read about news as it happens.
If we don’t update our site continuously readers will go elsewhere.
Our website is crucial to our digital strategy and to the future of the Guardian & Observer.
The international purpose and reach of the Guardian & Observer cannot be achieved by current publication schedules.
The Guardian and Observers’ journalism must be accurate, reliable and trusted.
In any circumstances where speed might compromise trust we should place a greater emphasis on trust.
We still place an extremely high value on depth, complexity and journalism which cannot be rushed.
We recognise that much of our best journalism takes time, patience and diligent research.
24/7 means we will publish material around the clock across seven days, rather than (as at present) for 16 hours a day across five days
It means publishing more of our news according to the demands of the web rather than the rhythms and expectations of a newspaper
Generally, news material which has been written, subbed and legalled may be posted on the web as it becomes available
Exceptions can be made for any stories which the relevant editor wishes to hold back for the print edition
We will continue to use news wires for breaking news but will seek to use our full editorial resources to add “Guardian/Observer” value as soon as possible.
This means adding context, analysis and opinion - and, sometimes, colour.
The above mainly applies in the areas of news (home, foreign, city, sport).
It also applies to commentary and, for instance, arts criticism.
There will be areas of non-news coverage that we wish to extend and explore over seven days.
Our production processes must reflect the needs of the web (e.g. the use of web-friendly headlines as well as newspaper headlines, links, tagging, key wording and so on.)
All journalists across Guardian, GU and Observer will be expected to work according to the above principles.
Alan RusbridgerEditor, The Guardian