Its hard to predict things,

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• Its hard to predict things,
• particularly things in the future-- Yogi Berra,
  Yankee Great

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What a Change
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from April 2005, ASNE

• One panel on the Future of Newspapers
• Another on young readers

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to October 2005, APME

• New Competitors New Demands
• The New Normal
• Our Shrinking Newsrooms
• New Products for New Readers
• News on the Web
• Convergence

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What Happened in Between?
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Was it Rupert?

• as an industry, many of us have been
  remarkably, unaccountably complacent. Certainly,
  I didnt do as much as I should have after all
  the excitement of the late 1990s. I suspect many
  of you in this room did the same, quietly hoping
  that this thing called the digital revolution
  would just limp along.
• ASNE, April 13, 2005

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Was it all Those Bloggers?

• A blogger is just a guy sitting in his living
  room in his pajamas.
• Jonathan Klein,
• President, CNN/US

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(No Transcript)
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The Blogosphere

• Technorati (www.technorati.com) reports
• 19.6 million web logs
• About 70,000 new blogs tracked each day
• 1 new blog every second
• 55 still posting after three months
• 700,000 -1.3 Million posts each day
• 33,000 posts per hour
• Blogosphere doubles in size every 5.5 months

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(No Transcript)
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Was it this Man?

• Craigslist
• Taking 50-65 million/year out of Bay Area class
  market
• (Compare that to your newsroom budget)
• Localizes ad listings in 120 cities in 21
  countries
• Overall reach 34 countries, 175 cities
• Visits up 62 since 2004
• Number tripled in past year to 2.4 billion a month

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Or Was it This?
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Whatever the Reason

• an industry that
• wouldnt change

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10 Years Ago

• Newspapers have made almost every kind of
  radical move except transforming themselves. It's
  as if they've considered every possible option
  but the most urgent change. That makes
  newspapers the biggest and saddest losers in the
  information revolution
• Jon Katz, Wired magazine, 09/1994
• http//www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.09/news.suck.
  html

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or Even Last Year

• Despite the new demands, there is more evidence
  than ever that the mainstream media are investing
  only cautiously in building new audiences
• State of the News Media, 2005, Project for
  Excellence in Journalism
• http//www.stateofthemedia.org/2005/

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Beginning to Change

• Communiction
• Convergence
• Content
• Commerce

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The Audience WAS Listening
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Now it is Talking Back
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News is a Conversation

• So Lets Join In

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Change Communication

• Readers and Web site users now feel free to
  challenge decision makers here, a development
  many of us in the newsroom welcome, although some
  editors resent the second-guessing. Get used to
  it. Interactivity is the future. People want to
  be heard.
• Bob Rivard,
• Editor, San Antonio Express-News
• 06/19/05

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Change Communication

• Our public editor, Ted Vaden, posted on a
  conference on journalism and blogging. He quotes
  media critic Jay Rosen (whose PressThink blog is
  well-traveled) saying journalists are used to
  being the filter from God, but people don't
  accept that anymore. Heavens. Perhaps Rosen has
  spent too much time peering at journalism through
  the lens of his computer screen.
• Melanie Sill,
• Editor, Raleigh News Observer
• 10/10/05

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Change Convergence

• Merging print online
• One of the biggest long-term challenges facing
  our craft is to invent a digital journalism and
  new services for our readers that both live up to
  our high standards and help carry the cost of a
  great news-gathering organization.
• Bill Keller
• Executive Editor, New York Times
• 08/02/05

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Readers Seen One Product

• "A significant percentage of newspaper readers
  have transferred their preference from print to
  online editions"
• Gerry Davidson, Nielsen//NetRatings

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Change Content

• We are going to change the character and
  content of the paper without undermining our
  journalistic principles.
• Earl Maucker, Editor
• Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
• 06/21/05

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Change Content

• We gave up on being all things to all people.
  What we hope to be is some very meaningful things
  to the distinct reader groups weve identified.
• Monica Moses,
• Deputy M.E.
• Star Tribune
• 10/10/05

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Change Commerce

• Papers being born
• The Examiner papers -- the name has been
  trademarked in more than 60 cities around the
  nation -- are attempting to carve out a niche in
  which their snappy graphics and succinct articles
  find a place among busy urban readers.
• Baltimore Sun, 10/18/05

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Change Commerce

• Papers being closed
• The publications have been losing money
  consistently for several years. Despite our best
  efforts to increase revenue, we simply have not
  been able to gain the level of support to be
  financially viable.''
• George Riggs,
• Publisher, Mercury News
• 10/22/05

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OK, Smart Guy

• Now What?

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No More Accidental Journalism

• Page 1 is often a happy accident
• Says editor at a top 20 U.S. newspaper (not this
  one)
• That means it is
• Haphazard vs. thoughtful
• Opportunistic vs. planned
• Luck of the daily draw vs. drawn from a long-term
  strategy

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Intentional Journalism

• Ask yourself this
• Youre given your current newsroom budget and
  told Make any kind of news operation you want.
• Would you make the same newspaper?
• Would you create the same beats, departments,
  production and decision-making processes?
• Would you hire the same people?
• Would you design the paper and its web site in
  the same formats?

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OF COURSE NOT!

• So how do we overcome the inertia, culture and
  tradition that keep us from changing?

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Newspaper Culture

• Aggressive-Defensive
• People forcefully protect status and security
• Perfectionistic Avoid all mistakes
• Oppositional Poor group problem-solving and
  "watered-down" solutions
• Pervasive in fast-paced environments
• Passive-Defensive
• Dependent and conventional behaviors
• Do what it takes to please others
• Jobs narrowly defined
• Success not celebrated, but mistakes punished
• Protected" organizations government agencies,
  regulated and monopoly industries
• Readership Institute

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Explode the Newsroom

• Re-think, Refocus, Re-invent
• Seven Ideas to Build On

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Explode the Newsroom

• Dont Tinker, Explode
• Big rewards come from big bets, bold moves into
  new territory tabs, niches, citizen journalism,
  blogs
• Adding a columnist or rearranging type-faces
  isnt enough
• Papers that survive will have learned how to
  adapt and exploit current emerging markets.
• Risk-taking is a learnable skill. Teach it.
  Reward it.

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Explode the Newsroom

• The 10 Solution
• Devote 10 percent of the newsroom budget each
  year to product and staff development
• Goal Restructuring traditional, content silos
• Goal People who have the cross-disciplinary
  skills.
• You cant change your newspaper over night, but
  you can do it in a decade 10 percent at a time

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Explode the Newsroom

• Go Horizontal, Not Vertical
• Tear down the Sports, News, Features and Business
  silos
• Reconstitute around virtual communities Moms,
  singles, baseball fans, age, etc.
• Want younger readers, for example? Devote a
  departments worth of editors, reporters,
  photographers, designers and online producers

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Explode the Newsroom

• Go Weekly -- Every Day
• Mass is dead class matters
• Old A little for everyone
• New More for fewer
• Old Mass media
• New A mass of niches

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Explode the Newsroom

• Be the Tip of the Information Iceberg
• Reverse the print-online priority equation
• Publish more online than in print
• Print cant match the
• Virtual newshole
• Endless conversation
• Power of relational advertising

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Explode the Newsroom

• Lead from the Middle, Not the Top
• You cannot lead from behind the desk
• Reporters and line editors want direction, want
  to learn
• Edit more, manage less
• Get the editors out of the offices and onto the
  newsroom floor

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Explode the Newsroom

• Dont Cover the Community, Be the Community
• Empower readers, enable citizen journalism
• Aggregate and celebrate their voices
• Get engaged. Lead civic discourse. Be on the side
  of the people
• Dig, dig, dig into the public officials, civic
  and corporate institutions and the flow of money.
  This is a differentiating capability of
  newspapers.
• (Thanks to Hodding Carter)

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Explode the Newsroom

• Seven Ideas to Build On
• Dont Tinker, Explode
• The 10 Solution
• Structure Horizontally, Not Vertically
• Go Weekly -- Every Day
• Be the Tip of the Information Iceberg
• Lead from the Middle, Not the Top
• Dont Cover the Community, Be the Community

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Questions?

• Tim Porter
• tim_at_timporter.com
• www.timporter.com/firstdraft
• 415-381-9945