Growing Audience Is Turning to Established News Media Online (login required, use mine! user:dean_paxton password:paxton) “National sites will get more and more of a share of the news audience and the smaller sites will get less and less,” predicted Vin Crosbie, president of the consulting firm Digital Deliverance.” (Digital Deliverance? WTF? Does that mean? When I think of Deliverance I think of terrifyingly inbred rednecks prone to sodomizing tourists.)
Well, I’m sorry to disagree with the uber marketing techohillbillys at the New York Times and “Digital Deliverance.” If internet news is only going to consist of MSNBC, Slate, Reuters, AOL and whatever else. I better shut down paxtonland now. All these guys are trying to apply old advertising demographics to market share on the internet. For gods sake, get over it.
“The smaller the media outlet online, the more likely it will be pared down to its core competence, which is local news,” Mr. Crosbie said.” Thank you Mr. Obvious… that pearl of wisdom I can carry to my grave. National conglomo syndicates cannot get local news right. More, they cannot figure out how to squeeze the local markets for more cash without the FCC getting pissed.
“New-media dynamics do have something to do with the success of old media online. The ability to turn on a fire hose full of online subscribers and point it in the direction of a particular site helps.” Okay that tears it, I’m not fodder for your crap and neither are most of the readers on the internet. Please get off of your old/new media mantra once and for all. The old rules only apply as long as there are technophobic baby boomers like these still alive.
“None of the other big national news sites have adopted The Journal’s paid-subscription model. But the daily Cedar Rapids, Iowa, newspaper, The Gazette (daily circulation 66,000), owned by Gazette Communications, plans this fall to begin charging some users of Gazetteonline.com, whose most popular offerings outside the political season are coverage of University of Iowa sports, local news and obituaries.” Ummmm, no they won’t you’ll tank miserably. Why on earth will people subscribe to what they can get for free at 100,000 other sites. Dumb. More boomer financial ethics, the same mentality that sunk the internet earlier this year.
“Terry Bergen, The Gazette’s director of marketing and Internet services, said that Web users who wanted more than a headline service would pay $8 a month or $60 a year…” Terry, get ready for the unemployment line… Buddy get comfortable with the online jobs listings (if they don’t go to a pay model too). I wouldn’t pay $8.00 a month for porn much less pork belly reports from Devil’s Asshole Iowa. HAVE YOU NOT LEARNED ANYTHING FROM THE LAST SIX MONTHS!!! Guess not. They’d better learn how to subsist on advert revenues as they always have, or else. Go.com, Excite.com, and half of the mega news portals are tanking in case you didn’t notice. No amount of user subscriptions is going to help you please your shareholders. Get out of the business… spare us all the misery of a second round of dotcom failures, please.