Cory Bergman
Just take a look at this post on WestSeattleBlog.com and the subsequent comments after a shooting broke out in the neighborhood. While police searched for suspects — a chopper swirling overhead — readers in the area posted comments with observations and questions, which the West Seattle Blog (WSB) worked to answer. “Thanks for the late night work WSB. My wife and I aren’t able to sleep,” says one commenter. “I live so close, info like this is invaluable,” says another. A new level of interactive journalism, folks. (We wrote about the West Seattle Blog earlier, right here.)
Filed in blogging, hyperlocal, online news
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May 14th, 2008
Cory Bergman
If you work in local TV news, what percentage of your interns in the last couple years have said they want to become anchors? In my experience, the number is 50 percent or greater. But let’s look at the trends. News consumption is shifting fast to the “anchorless” internet. Stations are negotiating anchor salaries down and even moving some shows to a single news anchor format. Layoffs are growing increasingly common, and some TV stations are dropping news altogether. While I don’t like to shatter an intern’s anchor dreams, it’s time for a dose of reality. Journalism schools, as a public service, should strongly discourage students from pursuing an anchoring career. The emphasis should be on the “do-it-all” multimedia journalist who can produce, report, write, shoot and edit both on TV and the web. Flexibility is key. As we saw from NBC Local’s announcement a few days ago, even the definition of “producer” is changing, and who knows what we’ll see five years down the road. Don’t get me wrong — anchors are important — but I can venture this prediction: we’ll see fewer anchors in the years to come.
Filed in online news, TV news
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May 14th, 2008
Cory Bergman
Diana Marszalek in TVNewsday does a great job wrapping up many of the niche sites that local TV stations across the country have recently launched. One that we haven’t mentioned here on Lost Remote is GoLo.com, a local social forum produced by WRAL.com.
The site (actually a subsection of WRAL.com) is less than a year old but has nearly 7,000 registered users. “GoLo.com grew out of WRAL.com [the station site],” says WRAL.com General Manager John Clark. “So many of the site’s viewers naturally went to GoLo to carry on community dialogue, post blogs and pictures. It was and still is a good fit.”
Also in the TVNewsday story, Fisher says it plans to launch a hyperlocal site in Bakersfield next month and Belo released a few stats on HSGametime.com (Full disclosure: I work for KING5.com, which is a Belo Corp. property.)
Filed in local TV
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May 14th, 2008
Cory Bergman
So by now, you’ve probably heard about veteran WNBC anchor Sue Simmons and her unfortunate F-bomb drop on live TV. Of course, in the market the size of New York, this sort of thing spreads like wildfire… on YouTube, especially. As of this count there are 17 clips. Wait, make that 13, as two have been removed “by the user” and two more “due to a copyright claim by a third party.” By any definition, this isn’t good publicity, but trying to stop it in today’s viral society is a near impossibility.
Meanwhile, there are 600 comments and counting on WNBC.com.
Update: Even the New York Times did the story today.
Filed in TV news, WNBC, YouTube
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May 13th, 2008
Cory Bergman
I’ve always wanted to do something like this for years (proof right here), and now MyFoxChicago.com is the first to make it happen. On AirFoxLive.com, not only do they stream their chopper live whenever it’s flying, but they also track it in real-time on an interactive Google Map.
As you can see, a bubble gives the current speed, altitude and heading. The player in the upper right displays one of the chopper’s three live cameras. “This also plugs right into Google Earth for on-air use,” says MyFoxChicago.com’s Steve Baron (who also runs LiveNewsCameras.com). How cool is that? I think this is a natural extension for a TV site, and the primary reason why nobody’s done this to date is the age-old concern that you’re tipping off your competition. But as Lost Remote readers know, that old-model, TV-driven thinking should not restrict innovation online.
Filed in Fox, online news, TV news, WFLD
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May 13th, 2008
David Johnson
The NAA has released this big ol’ report today: Zooming In on Online Video - Newspaper Association of America: Advancing Newspaper Media for the 21st Century Video viewing numbers are on the major upswing, with comscore reporting 11.5 billion viewed in March. So everyone needs to jump on, right? With the pack mentality, does this mean everyone is going to be a broadcaster now? Does every story have to have the writer re-reading the copy in front of a camera, wearing of funny hat optional? And why DO men have nipples?
Filed in newspapers, pack mentality, video
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May 13th, 2008
Cory Bergman
An ad optimization company called PubMatic analyzed data from over 3,000 online publishers and came away with some interesting results. Display ad prices for large sites (more than 100M page views a month) dropped 52 percent. Medium sites were flat, and smaller sites actually increased. “Among the verticals, social networking led the plunge with monetization dropping 47 percent,” explains PubMatic. In many respects, this shouldn’t be that big of a surprise, as the social network sites have had the most difficult time monetizing their inventory. But it illustrates the growing commoditization effect of vast amounts of ad inventory. (Via PaidContent)
Filed in online advertising
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May 13th, 2008
Don Day
KIFI, Local News 8 in Idaho Falls, ID has found a way to break the traditional bonds of an ENG truck with a technology it calls WiNG - or Wireless Internet News Gathering. While doing a live shot via the Internet isn’t technically a new thing - KIFI is doing it on a shoestring in a very small market.
KIFI’s WiNG project uses WiMax from Digital Bridge Communications - with upload speeds of 2 MBps - paired with an encoder/decoder system from Streambox. Field crews plug their cameras into a laptop and the video is sent back to the station via WiMax where it is decoded and put on the air. KIFI General Manager Mark Danielson (disclosure: my old boss) has been working on the WiNG dream since he was news director at KTVB - but the upload speed just wasn’t there. Now in Eastern Idaho, Digital Bridge is testing the waters with WiMax, making transmitting video either LIVE or on tape a possibility.
“The technology from both partners worked well and effortlessly,” Danielson told Lost Remote. “It is critical that WiNG is simple and dependable for our staff to use.”
The video image is near broadcast quality, and while there’s currently a delay - it’s something that should improve as technology gets better. In a market that can’t justify the cost of an SNG truck, and where terrain and other limitations make ENG coverage spotty, the WiNG solution gives the station more options for news coverage.
You can see it in action here (click the video link in the story)
Filed in KIFI, technology
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May 12th, 2008
Cory Bergman
Wow. NBC left iTunes in part because Apple refused to offer flexible pricing, but now HBO will offer its shows on the download service under a flexible pricing scheme. “Episodes of some HBO shows are likely to be sold at the standard price of $1.99 per episode or higher, these sources said, marking the first time Apple has agreed to selling television shows at different prices in the United States,” reports Reuters. It’s also the first time HBO has sold downloads of its shows. The deal is expected to be announced on Tuesday.
Filed in downloads, HBO, iTunes, NBC
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May 12th, 2008
Cory Bergman
It’s upfront week, and that means a steady stream of announcements…
- NBC names Jimmy Fallon to succeed Conan O’Brien
- CBS picks up 4 new dramas, 2 comedies
- “Flat is the new up,” says Broadcasting & Cable about the upfronts
- Latest upfront stories from TV Decoder blog, B&C and Variety
Filed in upfronts
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May 12th, 2008
Cory Bergman
Calling it the “Digital Health Network,” NBCU is syndicating health video produced by NBC News, NBC Local Media and Healthology.com. Distribution partners include Healthline Networks, RightHealth and YourTotalHealth.com. “Today’s announcement is another example of how we are focused on building rich, niche digital networks,” said George Kliavkoff, Chief Digital Officer, NBC Universal. “We will continue to look at niche categories that have a passionate user base and also happen to fit the criteria of a top advertising category that we think is underserved by professional quality video on digital platforms.” (Full disclosure: NBCU is a joint venture partner of MSNBC.com, which is my new employer in two weeks.)
Filed in NBCU, online video
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May 12th, 2008
Cory Bergman
Facing an advertising downturn, soft ratings on The CW, and an inability to land new financing, 13 Pappas stations have filed for Chapter 11. The company said station employees will continue to be paid. Meanwhile, Pappas is looking for a buyer for all 30 of its stations.
Filed in local TV
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May 12th, 2008
Cory Bergman
Aggressively expanding overseas and in smaller U.S. cities, for one. But Craigslist is also fighting a lawsuit from eBay, which has a competing free classifieds service, Kijiji.com.
Filed in classifieds, Craigslist
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May 12th, 2008
Liz Foreman
When putting together a data retention policy (specifically, public archives) for your website, where do you start? Where do you stop? Does the policy vary for video and database projects? What’s the presentation like? What’s the business model? There are so many questions.
Now, comes word that UK publication The Times newspaper is putting up 200 years of content. Free. Talk about an archive.
On the opposite end of things, I know of news sites that purge content after a month (I hate this idea - it is contrary to my modern definition of journalism) or put older content behind a paywall.
Mark my words, with folks turning over stones for money, news sites will learn how to archive smarter, with business models attached.
[Despite the coincidence in terminology, this post has nothing to do with with the EU’s search engine data retention investigation.]
Filed in newspapers, online news
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May 11th, 2008
Liz Foreman
In a test run of sorts, Wilmington, N.C. will be the first market to transition to all-digital TV at noon, Monday, September 8. Well, kinda. The PBS station and a low-power station will remain the only analog sticks in town. To confuse matters, some national ads running in the market reference the rest of the nation’s February transition date, according to a quote in USA Today.
Do you think the broadcast stations will ask the PBS station for 24×7 promos, describing what the heck is going on? Or, they could always go at it Anchorman rumble style!
Filed in DTV, FCC
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May 11th, 2008
Don Day
Cincinnati.Com’s CincyNavigator launched last September - and is already increasing engagement for the site. Forbes.com notes that the data/map mashup site (along the lines of EveryBlock, etc.) spawned 570,000 pageviews in its first six months, and increased the average user session from three minutes to five minutes. It took nearly a year to put the site together - but it was well worth the work, with a simple interface and great data navigation.
Filed in Cincinnati.com
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May 11th, 2008
Don Day
The Associated Press hit the street with its latest venture: AP Mobile News Network. The site - easily accessible from a smartphone at APNews.com - features a slick iPhone interface with news, sports, entertainment, photos and even video.
But remember when the AP rolled out “The Wire” - the national news site that’s largely been eliminated now? You got a cool map of the country, and every market you clicked on gave you a newspaper choice. Ditto this product. When I customized several cities - all I could find were newspaper content providers. E&P reports that 100 news orginizations are on board - but Forbes says “100 papers” are part of the service - leading me to believe no TV or radio outlets are in the mix. Beyond the provider list is something even more basic: The default thumbnail for a story with no photo… is the image of a newspaper.
Filed in Associated Press, mobile
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May 11th, 2008
Don Day
The Associated Press is trying to get itself a prized piece of square-ish real estate on the home screen of the Apple iPhone, Forbes reports. The news collective notes that the phone has buttons for weather, stocks and maps - but not news. It says the AP Mobile News Network is a prime candidate to be that news button. But why APMNN instead of Google News, et al?
[T]he business model behind the effort is very different from those of online news aggregators, too. Instead of page views, participants will get half the revenues for any ads they sell, and half the revenues generated by any content they contribute.
A rant about the APMNN in a moment — but it’s interesting that the collective is working on a new model that would pool monetary gain for the journalistic resources contributed.
And the business model behind the effort is very different from those of online news aggregators, too. Instead of page views, participants will get half the revenues for any ads they sell, and half the revenues generated by any content they contribute.
Filed in Associated Press, iPhone, mobile
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May 11th, 2008
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