Is Analysis the new News?
Sidin Vadukut -
Tuesday, January 13, 2009 2:22 PM
Today my inbox was bombarded by a number of links all of which, after sifting and sorting, appeared to come as the fallout of two stories on the Internet. Both stories had to do with the precarious future of newspapers in the context of the challenges posed by the platform that is the Internet.
The first was a blog post by Guardian’s Jeff Jarvis dated January 12th on the news that the LA Times had just managed to create news history: revenues from the online operations for that newspaper had finally reached a level high enough to pay for all editorial costs. (My colleague Krish Raghav has talked about it in a blogpost here.)
Jarvis, and rightly so, highlights the monumental nature of this development:
What this tells me is that we are on the cusp of the moment when online revenue could sustain a substantial digital journalistic enterprise without the onerous cost of printing and distribution. Hallelujah.
He goes on to explain how this hope of a sea change in the journalistic business comes with various caveats. (More here.)
Also in my inbox were links to a column by David Carr on the New York Times, dated January 12th as well, on how the news business probably needs a business-disruptor in the mould of Steve Jobs to help it make money. Carr wonders: Why not have an iTunes for news? Where people can buy bite-sized news pieces?
Carr’s piece was immediately ripped to shreds by detractors: 1, 2, 3.
Both articles are worth thinking and worrying about.
Many globally known papers are in trouble. The Christian Science Monitor is now an online only operation, the NY Times may be in a serious liquidity crisis, the LA Times is broke and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has a two-month deadline to find a buyer.
As far as I know there is a challenge facing newspapers and magazines in India as well but possibly due to different reasons.
Jarvis’s perspective is interesting at a time when many people think that the Internet is killing the newspaper. Why read a paper in the morning when a quick morning browse of Google News with a cup of coffee crunches in more information in less time? And not only that, a reasonably savvy internet user can even set up RSS feeds and email newsletters that can deliver the exact content he wants, when he wants it, on a platform he wants.
(Wait for the day that Internet access and browsing gets seamlessly integrated into a TV screen. There’s no telling how TV channels will cope with that. The innovations are already in motion.)
But rather than cursing the Internet, Jarvis’s take on the LA Times achievement seems to state that the Internet may be an opportunity rather than a curse. David Carr is asking for a messiah in a black turtleneck. But before conjuring up new business models for newspapers the first question we need to answer is simple: Why do people read newspapers?
Forget people.
Why do you read a newspaper?
Not for the breaking news because you get that from your TV channel. Not for the stock prices. You get those on your mobile phone or your computer.
In fact, coming to think of it, the only real news you get from the newspaper is the local news and sordid scandals that none of the other media channels carry.
Comics strips? Internet!
That, in all probability, leaves only the analysis of news, views and feature stories which is really what makes each paper unique. That and the Sudoku puzzle for the commute.
I have no market research to prove this of course, but in my mind the real dilemma facing media outlets is the question of how to sell their analysis. The LA Times’ online success, which they somewhat attribute to a huge spurt in blog traffic, is a case in point.
What do those LA Times blogs deliver that are unique? Analysis, comment, opinion… Call it what you want, but it is anything but breaking news. It is not a matter of speed alone but also depth. The readers seem to be saying: Yes we know this happened. So what? What do you think? What do you think we should think? The blogs are the easiest way to get these answers so they go there.
Perhaps all newspapers, Mint included of course, needs to think about this basic challenge: How do we generate, position and sell analysis as profitably as possible? What size of newsroom do we need? What type of writers? What sectors can we report and analyze efficiently? Do we need to cover, say, Technology, when the reader can fire up Engadget, Gizmodo or the other specialist technology blogs? Can we be market leaders when it comes to commenting on the Indian Economy? Yes we can excel at the SME sector. But does the paying reader care?
The internet, newsprint, mobile phone all then become just platforms for analysis. Each of them may have their own importance and amenability to content but they are not, then, game changers in themselves.
Does this mean that every newspaper should aspire to become the New Yorker?
You are the reader. You tell me.