May 2nd, 2008
8:01 am
Misc
It’s been in the works for a couple months, but now it’s for real. I’ve agreed to take a position at the Arizona Republic, and get started May 21. I’ll be doing pretty much the same thing I’m doing now, only I’ll get the added benefit of the Republic’s commitment to CAR/First Amendment collaboration. To me, that means the best of both worlds. I’ll still get to putz around on the web, but I’ll also get a hand in investigations — which is where my heart has always been. I’ll also have the extreme pleasure of working with Ryan Konig, who I’m fairly sure is one of the smarter folks I’ve ever met.
I’m pretty excited to get in and get started, but this wasn’t easy. I honestly believe that Springfield is in a position to be the next great non-metro — they have good folks in all the right places, and every day they’re adding more. If anyone wants to talk about what’s going on there, give me a shout and I’d be happy to spill the beans.
Over the past few weeks, a sort of taboo subject has continued to bubble up. More buyouts at some of the best news orgs in the country. Plunging stock prices. An intriguing article on the relationship between the newsroom and print advertising.
As if fated to be seen in contrast, the Pulitzer winners were announced, and some fantastic work got the credit it was due. Google beat out Wall Street projections and posted a profitable first quarter. And some yayhoo railed against Rob Curley, calling him a schlub because his products don’t make money (I have no clue whether that’s true or not, but, regardless, the barb was lofted).
So I ask, with both feet firmly planted in the journalism camp: At what point does all of this become our problem? At what point do we, as journalists, as the webby voices in the good ol’ MSM, start actively thinking about how we can make it better?
If there was a theoretical continuum mapping out the stance on this problem in the average newsroom, I’d wager the needle would be staunchly on the “Not my job” side of things. Any product of a worthwhile J-School has heard the horror stories: Staples Center, the CBS New Year’s Eve gaffe, various examples of ad placement for story coverage or spiked stories to preserve an advertising relationship. The overall message many students walk away with is, “If you think about how any of your work will make money, you’re dirty.”
This isn’t true. What’s more, it’s hurting us. Go over to TechCrunch and check out the list of startups. The plurality of those applications would have been ideal undertakings for a news organization. Those ideas were cooked up to make life better or more interesting, sure, but they were also meant to make money. Generally, they’re succeeding at both.
We’re doing good work, too.
But too often, we’re leaving it in the hands of advertising people to see that it makes money. Their solution, inevitably, is, “Slap an ad on it!” “Upsell X, Y and Z!” or my favorite, “You can’t do that, we sell something similar in print.”
These aren’t wrong answers. Well, except for that last one. Unfortunately for all of us, it isn’t working. It’s time for a new plan. What about allowing subscription cell phone updates for our best apps, or a choice for ad-supported and free? What about harvesting user information and allowing for targeted, premium advertising (The Facebook model)? What about sponsorship?
The journalists who are doing this kind of work are spilling over with ideas. We’re passionate. We love what we do and we want to keep doing it. And I honestly believe that if we started thinking about this, from Project Day 1, we’d come up with something that could work.
To be clear, I’m talking about turning our best ideas into sources of money, not building ideas around sources of money. That’s an important distinction, and a tougher pill for our bosses to swallow. We don’t have to compromise our passions to make this go. Doing so would subvert the entire undertaking. But the belief that our employers should let us do good work because that’s just what news organizations do is somewhere between dead and dying. We have to prove ourselves.
And we can.
ADDENDUM #1: Any and all comments appreciated. If you think this means I lost my soul, please say so.
ADDENDUM #2: Heard from an advertising/marketing person who was looking to repair a relationship with a news editor after mentioning that a new product was mostly being created because it would lead to new revenue. At the very least, that denial of the business side of this business gotsta stop.
A few weeks or months back, over on Matt Waite’s blog, Derek asked about the chances that DBTools — the system we use for rapid processing and posting of data at the News-Leader — would go open source.
Well, if you’re within Gannett, I’ve got good news.
Gannettoids, the tool is open to you. Shoot me an e-mail at my work account and we’ll get you a copy. Jennie Coughlin over the the Staunton (Va.) News Leader has already implemented it, and I think she’s had fairly positive results. It’s built with PHP, requires a MySQL connection and a webserver that can sit between the two. Get those, and it’s pretty easy to implement. That’s not to say it doesn’t have its bugs, but they mostly become apparent after installation. I’m hopeful that tapping into the collective Gannett reservoir of wisdom will help us create a tool that is free and user-friendly. Right now it only scores about 1.5 out of two.
I’d be interested i talking with folks about creating something with the express purpose of going open source. If anyone wants to explore that, get in touch.
December 16th, 2007
10:45 am
Misc
Derek has been, as a man smarter than I so eloquently put it, “like a dog with a chew toy on this issue.” And it’s hard to do more than he has to bring the problem with Caspio to the very audience who needs to see it. But as one of about three Gannettoids who has bucked the Caspio trend in our company-wide frenzy to shovel data onto the web, I think I should offer up an explanation.
As I see it, there are only two reasons Caspio could seem like a good idea:
1) In the time-honored tradition of telegraphists, railroad conductors and blacksmiths, you believe that where we are is where we are going. That point placement on google maps and rote data publication are as good as it gets, and more importantly, as good as it’s going to get.
2) You acknowledge that things will change, but you have actively decided that it’s not worth thinking about. In fact, you have outsourced the job of thinking about change, and trust Caspio to do it for you.
Now, obviously, things aren’t quite this black and white. The decision to go with Caspio is probably not a careful consideration, but a flip-of-the-wrist, “Whatever. These guys can handle it, at least in the short term” deferral.
The problem is that it’s not a short-term solution. The farther into Caspio’s bed you crawl, the harder it is to back out. When you do make a decision to change direction, what happens? Do you continue to pay for the existing content? Do you pull it down and try to recreate it on your own? The more you use their system, the less elegant your reponse to these questions can be. The result will be expensive or ugly. Or both.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I considered going with Caspio for a short time. First job, I needed fast results, and Caspio definitely seemed like the path of least resistance. (Case in point: The newsroom might get full server access in January. Might.) And David Milliron, Director of Media Services for Caspio, is a person I respect both as a good guy and a talented journalist.
But in the end, we decided that, a) Going with Caspio could not be a short-term solution, for reasons already described, and b) We were in no position to make a long-term decision. It was that simple.
If you want pretty arguments weighing the value of Caspio vs. other solutions, ask around and check out what Derek has to offer. I’m no expert on that stuff, nor do I want to be. But the bottom line is that going with Caspio is passing the innovation buck. And, what with new ways to share information being developed every day, now seems like an awful time to mortgage our potential role.
That sound (think bozo the clown when a kid just misses the bucket) was my Knight application getting KOd. Dang.
I have to think the fact that it’s already been done, (and quite successfully) had something to do with it.
However, from the “ya win some, ya lose some” Department: The News-Leader is embracing Django. This is good for many reasons, but mostly because I can now stop worrying about the frantic e-mails my kindly web host sends me every few weeks telling me I’m just about out of space.
It also comes as some relief. Shoveling data to the web makes sense in some situations. But it’s there’s not a one-size fits all solution (Sorry Caspio).
November 3rd, 2007
6:37 pm
Misc
I think I know how you feel. I mean, I was here, and you were there, and everything was great for so long. We had our ups and downs, sure, but who doesn’t? Everything was going great.
And then, Poof!, I was gone. Just like that. Oh, sure, there were a few little blip of life now and then; an animated “under construction” .gif, some awful Wordpress incarnation. But it just wasn’t the same, and now you want answers.
Well, here it goes. Cliffs Notes version: Sometime in about April 2006, Chase Davis , who, while a goofball, has always had a pretty good head for these things, started talking about a little thing called Django. And it sounded cool. Really, it did. But I was still wrapping my head around things like how best to devour a Chipotle burrito, and just didn’t have time to look into it. Then, a few months back, Matt Waite rolled out this fantastic creation called PolitiFact. I was floored. And a few weeks later (For those keeping track, that’s at least 1.5 years behind the rest of the pack), I downloaded it for myself and started putzing around on my computer at work.
I realized this tool had some pretty enormous potential. And after asking, realized it’s something I’d have to play with on my own time. So I bought some space on a shared server from A Small Orange, and here we are.
I know what you’re thinking. “Right, Matt. That’s all well and good. So where’s all the cool Django stuff? Huh? Where is it?”
All I can day is, you’re right. There’s some work to be done. Installing it on Windows, which I’ve been using since puberty, was a heck of a lot easier than doing it on a shared UNIX host via Putty — two things I’m not even sure I can spell, much less use. But there’s been a lot going on, and I want to get it out there. So, probably for a long while, this is how it’s going to be. Yes, it’s another WordPress incarnation, hopefully not as awful.
I hope we can patch things up.
Sincerely,
Matt