New York Magazine examines the somewhat new video operation at NYTimes.com as well as the rather established, award-winning unit at WashingtonPost.com. Yes, the author seems to think that “smart people” will get their video from newspaper sites at the exclusion of TV sites — which of course, is a ridiculous statement — but there’s some good information in here. My favorite quote, from NYTimes.com’s David Carr, on how his bosses told him to give video “a whirl” fifteen months ago: “‘Let’s give it a whirl’—that’s not something that comes up a lot (at the New York Times.)” This experimentation with web video, unfettered from TV thinking, is yielding some promising newspaper video projects.
Adds Jim in comments: “Let’s let newspapers think they’ve figured it out. Sadly, they haven’t come close with any of this. It comes down to what people will ultimately find of use to them. Right now, video clips on TV station sites make up only 5-7 percent of the traffic — and that is using some of the most compelling VIDEO (‘show me’ video, not newspaper ‘video’). So, most if not all of the newspaper ‘video’ won’t begin to touch that.”
