#jpod: The week’s top journalism news from Journalism.co.uk, 15 October 2010

AFP: New WikiLeaks release will ‘dwarf’ previous leak

October 18th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Rachel McAthy in Editors' pick, Newspapers, Politics

The Pentagon has been searching through a database on the Iraq war in preparation for the expected release of around 400,000 secret military documents by WikiLeaks, AFP reports this morning.

This follows WikiLeaks’ release of classified military documents relating to the war in Afghanistan back in July. Reports of another release this week have concerned officials, AFP claims.

In order to prepare for the anticipated release of sensitive intelligence on the US-led Iraq war, officials set up a 120-person taskforce several weeks ago to comb through the database and “determine what the possible impacts might be,” said Colonel David Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman.

The Department of Defense is concerned the leak compiles “significant activities” from the war, which include incidents such as known attacks against coalition troops, Iraqi security forces, civilians or infrastructure in the country.

The documents are expected to be released early this week and WikiLeaks is thought to again be working with former media partners – The New York Times, the Guardian and Germany’s Der Spiegel – for a simultaneous release, the report adds.

Tags: Afghanistan war diaries, Iraq war, military, pentagon, released documents, Wikileaks

Guardian and Apax begin talks over future of Auto Trader

October 18th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Laura Oliver in Business, Editors' pick

Guardian Media Group and Apax Partners have begun discussions with banks about the future of Trader Media Group (TMG), owner of Auto Trader, the Guardian reports.

A trade sale or a flotation of TMG, which could value the owner of Auto Trader at up to £2bn, are the likeliest options. But a debt-funded dividend payment to the two shareholders is also a possibility, as is bringing in another investor to buy a minority stake of between 20 per cent and 40 per cent.

According to the report, it could be until late 2011 or early 2012 before a deal on TMG is done.

Full story on Guardian.co.uk at this link…

Tags: Apax, Apax Partners, Guardian Media Group, Trader Media Group

Conversation Agent: Is ‘braided journalism’ the future of PR?

October 18th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Laura Oliver in Editors' pick, Journalism, PR

Interesting post from PR professional Valeria Maltoni about “braided journalism” – the “practice of traditional and citizen journalists starting to intertwine through mutual need” – asking if this is the future of public relations.

Maltoni discusses an experiment by computer manufacturer Dell, which involves freelance journalists as part of a new website. Brands embedding journalists, she says, could be extremely beneficial to consumers and businesses:

The impact of journalists and reporters would be felt in a number of ways:

integrating the point of view of a third party lends additional credibility to the business;

presenting a more complete version than the one quote, sometimes taken out of context, in trade press;

bringing more customer and non-customer voices to the conversation;

including more representatives of the whole ecosystem the business operates in;

adding a needed perspective from researchers and domain experts.

Full post on Conversation Agent at this link…

Tags: braided journalism, communications, PR, public relations

#Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – getting student work in the nationals

October 18th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Rachel McAthy in Top tips for journalists, Training

Poynter Online has a useful article for student journalists who are interested in advice on how to get their work in the national press, from how to use industry contacts to the value of journalism tutors as proof-readers and editors. Tipster: Rachel McAthy.

To submit a tip to Journalism.co.uk, use this link – we will pay a fiver for the best ones published.

Tags: journalism tips, portfolio, student journalism, tip, Training

#AOPsummit: B2B media and the value of communities

October 15th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Rachel McAthy in Business, Events, Niche

Make a connection with your audience and harness the power of focused communities around your niche, media groups advised publishers during a panel discussion on how B2B publications can benefit from and offer value to their readers.

John Barnes MD of digital at Incisive Media said B2B publishers have to understand who their audiences are.

It’s about identifying a type of focused audience … and understanding what the role, function, value and importance of that individual is so we can sell that focus to advertisers. We have lost sight of that in some of the market as we have been chasing eyeballs instead.

He added that the way forward with this thinking is to create an environment where “it is the most natural thing in the world to hand over details”.

It’s about having the environment to encourage sharing … if we haven’t got that we haven’t got a media business.

Mike Butcher, editor of TechCrunch Europe which was recently bought by AOL, added that the chase for communities is historical in the publishing industry.

We didn’t chase registrations, what we chased was communities. If you look at what publishers have done historically … in the first instance it was to chase communities. They didn’t necessarily have data about them but they chased them and enlightened those communities.

In fact he said TechCrunch’s focused community was key to its value for AOL: “it was bought for this high value community”.

Tim Potter, managing director of business publishing at Centaur Media added that community focused platforms such as blogs when used within media brands will encourage high interaction.

If you give people blogging tools within our existing media brands you get a very high level of interaction, even in markets where you wouldn’t expect it … it will take a lot for a blog to come along and challenge established media brands providing they do the right things.

But as long as the publisher continues to provide informed content, he added, it will remain “central to the debate”.

Kevin Eyres, managing director for LinkedIn Europe added that the value of the individual must also be remembered by brands.

It’s about not losing sight of humans. When you’re talking about B2B it’s a business person purchasing from another business person. Companies are leveraging their best assets – their employees – to make that more personal connection back and forth with whoever that purchaser is going to be.

Tags: aopsummit, b2b media, Niche

Shiny Media hits 30m views on YouTube

October 15th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Adam Levitt in Multimedia, Social media and blogging

Shiny Media, a company that produces websites across a number of areas including fashion, technology and lifestyle, has achieved 30 million views on two of its YouTube channels, Shiny Fashion and tech-based Shiny Media.

Shiny Media co-founder, Ashley Norris, says in a blog post: “Over the years we have had some very talented individuals producing our videos, some of whom have gone on to other great things. Our success owes to understanding that it is the content, not the quality of the video production that creates a YouTube hit.”

“Some of our early videos were very ropey, but they still attracted huge audiences because they offered footage of products before anyone else.

Norris is evidently extremely proud of the company’s achievements. He mentions the constant addition of new video content helping the website look fresh. “We almost always add three or four new videos each week and we don’t take ourselves too seriously. We have great presenters and we are serious about promoting the videos”.

Tags: Shiny Media, Video, YouTube

#AOPsummit: Media leaders encourage experimentation and openness to failure

October 15th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Rachel McAthy in Business, Events, Online Journalism

Experiment, experiment, experiment – that was the message from the heads of ‘leading media’ at the AOP Digital Publishing Summit this morning.

Google UK’s MD Matt Brittin said publishers can’t afford not to experiment.

Be distinctive … there’s an explosion of choice, it’s a very different world … We don’t know what’s going to happen in the next year, no one knows … experiment and get feedback. Audiences, readers and advertisers have got more choice than ever before … You think it’s fast now, mobile devices … are going to change the world much more than the last five years. At least we’re in a situation now where we recognise this is the new normal.

… If Fast Flip is Google’s next failure, well great. If you don’t fail then you’re just investing in low risk projects… You need to fail … now everything you do can cost you very very low amounts … if you don’t experiment, you don’t learn.

Tim Brooks, managing director for Guardian News and Media seemed to agree.

We should also be taking more risks, not fewer risks. The danger is that we try to de-risk in this environment, but digital media means you can fail more cheaply – you have to try lots of things because nobody knows which ones will work.

Stephen Miron, CEO for Global Radio, added that every organisation needs to find its own model.

There’s no template solution. We get hung up about ‘look what their doing, lets follow that’ … we need to look at what we individually do well and follow that through.

Mark Wood, UK CEO for Future Publishing added that while the near future for innovation is in mobile, it won’t be at the expense of valued content.

We’re going to see a lot more mobile apps of various descriptions, but the thing I find reassuring is throughout all these changes people still go back to the same sort of content they like to absorb and consume.

Magazines in 50 years … will still be there in some form or another. If everyone keeps hold of that, however it’s delivered, whether it’s through print or on an app is semi-irrelevent as long as you can monetise it. We’ve seen already quite dynamic changes … for example the TechRadar website’s traffic is now way ahead of Cnet in the UK … that shows what you can do with a bit of creativity and by going for a space in the digital market.

During the debate Brittin seemed to hint towards a discussion on rumoured plans for Google to introduce a micropayments system, believed to be called Newspass, by saying that “over time we’ll see the advent of a much bigger range of ways for people to pay for services”. But he quickly killed off any such ideas when questioned about it.

Don’t believe everything you read. It’s true that there has been a lot of speculation about micropayments. I have not got anything to announce. But I hope we can do something to push forward the way people can pay.

He added that it was vital for the user to always be offered choice: “be transparent and give choice, to opt in and out to different levels”, he said.

Tags: aopsummit, google, Newspass, Online Journalism

Daily Echo journalist defends Bournemouth Uni after Kelvin Mackenzie swipe

October 15th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Laura Oliver in Training

Bournemouth Daily Echo journalist Steven Smith has written in defence of the Bournemouth University’s journalism school, following criticism of the department by former Sun editor Kelvin Mackenzie.

According to the Echo, Mackenzie on Wednesday described the university’s journalism college as “hopeless” as part of his column for the paper on government plans to lift the cap on tuition fees. Unfortunately, the column doesn’t seem to be available online. It’s not the first time Mackenzie has taken a swipe at Bournemouth either.

Writes Smith:

You’ll be pleased to know that I’m a graduate of Bournemouth’s “hopeless” journalism school.

So are several of my colleagues, as well as former classmates who now work for the BBC, Sky, Bloomberg, countless national magazine titles, news websites, radio stations and, dare I say it, public relations firms.

In the fiercely competitive world of journalism – which has become even harder to get into in the five years since I started out – I guess we must have got something right.

Full post on the Bournemouth Echo at this link…

Tags: bournemouth daily echo, Bournemouth university, Kelvin MacKenzie

#followjourn: @majohns – Mark Johnson/community editor

October 15th, 2010 | No Comments | Posted by Joel Gunter in Recommended journalists

Who? Mark Johnson, community editor at the Economist, managing and developing social features on economist.com. Previously ran authonomy.com and bookarmy.com at HarperCollins.

Where? The Economist

Twitter? @majohns

Just as we like to supply you with fresh and innovative tips every day, we’re recommending journalists to follow online too. They might be from any sector of the industry: please send suggestions (you can nominate yourself) to laura at journalism.co.uk; or to @journalismnews.

Tags: #followjourn, mark johnson