Notes from a Teacher: Mark on Media

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Thanks for some of the best words I’ve seen about the situation of print. Bad news, of course. But not necessarily crashing and burning so newsrooms and journalists can take steps to prepare and move journalism online. Thanks Mark and sorry I’m so late to discover this post. I’ve written more about what newsrooms can do here: http://tinyurl.com/8qnvox

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Our local CNHI newspaper decided to close down their public forums (they said it was their ethical responsibility…) Might be one of the bigger mistakes they’ve made as my traffic is going up, up, up! Not only that, people are becoming involved. You can check the site night or day and there are 5 to 30 users and 20 to 50 guests on at any one time.

http://www.andersonfreepress.net

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Great advice on carrying a camera everywhere you go. I’ve made some great contacts though this. Take a bunch of photos/videos and put them on flickr. then meet people in your local area doing the same, it can be really interesting, especially with more and more local businesses monitoring themselves on social media.

I’m teaching my first course in about two weeks, I’ll be putting some of these suggestions to work in there.

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Thanks for the call-out on the Gary V video. He kills it. If somehow it isn’t inspiring, I don’t know what is

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Thanks so much for the shout-out Mark. I’m working on part II right now.

The funny thing is, I’m one of the rarities in j-school who wants to do everything BUT write. I *can* write when necessary, but there’s just so much more stuff that needs done in the journalism business!

Take care, and thanks for the kind words!

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Great advice Mark.

I’ll be posting it round to my students. Feel like a ‘prophet without honour’ sometimes so it’s great to have it laid out so clearly

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Re: 10,000 words 

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Mark, thank you for adding my blog to this esteemed list. I run an online community of more than 10,000 members and I plan to highlight the community managers of many online communities in my blog in 2009. As a journalist, I feel very strongly that we all have what it takes to do something like Tracy Record and her husband have done with West Seattle Blog. It just takes a different mindset and a small paradigm shift and a willingness to get serious about serving the users, not dictating to them.

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Another note for music fans: The amateurish santouri part is not really something I’m proud of, but after taking an hour to tune the thing, I was happy to actually get a track without any major mistakes laid down. Thanks to Mark for encouraging my efforts. :)

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Yeah, that was my phrase, from this post.

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I hear you! I just made my way from North Van to Ladner for dinner and back home to North Van in it. Thank God for 4 wheel drive. Plenty of folks on the road who had no business being there.

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Hmmm. Maybe that’s why it successfully departs from the newsite-as-usual model.

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Take note that the Big Picture blog isn’t maintained by a photojournalist, or a wire editor, but by a longtime Boston.com Web developer, Alan Taylor: http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/about.html

Funny how that works out…

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Help, CanWest is killing me! Its share price is now below 40 cents! I can barely keep my head above water. I need a bailout. . . .

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Andrew:

Thanks for pointing out the typo.

As for the “supposed,” I can assure you I actually exist.

- Mark

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Interesting. A supposed journalist and teacher who cannot spell Maclean’s.

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I agree that the ad-based, free newspapers probably have a longer half-life than a lot of the dailies. In the longer term, though, I can’t see them surviving the trends. (Note: I’m talking in terms of years here. How many? No idea.)

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Mark, you are absolutely correct. Mike B ignores the law of supply and demand. Historically, information was at a premium because it was scarce–that scarcity stemmed largely from the barriers to entry (high startup cost) in the information distribution channels (newspapers, and later television).

Today, there is a huge glut of information–every consumer with an Internet connection has access to far more new information every day than anyone can possibly consume. That dictates that information must be free. Any suppliers who place even a tiny price on it immediately loses most of their attention share.

In the information supplier/consumer marketplace, the scarce factor today is attention from consumers. Eventually, it’s possible that consumers can monetize this by obtaining rewards for consuming information derived from marketers willing to pay for attention from the right consumers by means of a personal CPM (ad cost per thousand) shared between publishers and readers.

See Charlene Li on personal CPM: http://blogs.forrester.com/groundswell/2008/03/the-future-of-s.html

Chris Anderson on “Why $0.00 is the future of business:” http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/magazine/16-03/ff_free

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You may be right, but I think your prognosis is too extreme. I can see community papers (the ones supported solely by advertising) and the SkyTrain freebies surviving at the very least in print form. As the communications manager for a regional campus of a major university, I value the local papers (Surrey Now, Surrey Leader and the various South Asian papers) because it’s the most effective way of reaching our target audience - the Surrey and area community. These papers are still the best way to reach a particular geographical market - for us, for merchants, for local governments, etc. So I can see them surviving for years to come.

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It just went up 10%!!!! Now trading at 66 cents!!!

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Actually, there’s a book in your library that will help. Call number is PN 4888 O85 C73 2001

I reviewed it here: http://www.marcedge.com/taking%20stock.pdf

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You are definitely obsessed. I have followed your bemusement with amusement. I can help. I will be back there for a few weeks starting Dec. 20. I owe you lunch anyway. Let’s make sure to get together this time.

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Ooops - your website seems to erase all the <:s and makes it look very …

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Thanks Mark!

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Sorry I missed this when it was new. Thanks for the opinion.

Roch Smith

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