BBC’s iPlayer iPad app to launch this week

AllMediaScotland: Glasgow local paper closes after 14 years

February 9th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Editors' pick, Local media, Newspapers

A free monthly newspaper in Glasgow has ceased publication after struggling to generate enough advertising revenue.

Local News Glasgow founder Grace Franklin told AllMediaScotland: “If I had been a hard-nosed business person, I would have wrapped it up a long time ago. Towards the end, it was the love of it, rather than money, that kept it going.”

Full story on AllMediaScotland at this link.

Tags: Allmediascotland, grace franklin, Local News Glasgow

LA Times: Huffington Post deal bad news for journalism

February 9th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Caroline White in Business, Editors' pick, Online Journalism, Social media and blogging

LA Times correspondent Tim Rutten predicts that editorial quality and pay for journalists will both fall as a result of the AOL Huffington Post buyout.

Rutten compares the Huffington Post’s business model to a “gallery rowed by slaves and commanded by pirates” where contributors often get paid less than US$50 for their contributions.

The bulk of the site’s content is provided by commentators, who work for nothing other than the opportunity to champion causes or ideas to which they’re devoted. Most of the rest of the content is “aggregated” — which is to say stolen — from the newspapers and television networks that pay journalists to gather and edit the news.

He also points to a memo from AOL CEO Tim Armstrong:

It’s fairly chilling reading, ordering the company’s editors to evaluate all future stories on the basis of “traffic potential, revenue potential, edit quality and turnaround time.” All stories, it stressed, are to be evaluated according to their “profitability consideration”.

Read the full post on the LA Times at this link.

Crains: Mail Online to open New York office

February 9th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Business, Editors' pick, Newspapers

Associated Newspapers is to open an office in New York to house journalists for Mail Online.

According to Crain’s New York Business, the news group has signed a four-year lease and will move in next month.

Mail Online receives 65 per cent of its traffic from outside the UK – 35 million unique users in December out of a total of 53.9 million, according to ABCe.

Full report on Crains New York at this link.

Tags: associated newspapers, Mail Online, New York

Future reports substantial progress online

February 9th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Business

A decline in print advertising at specialist leisure publisher Future has been more than compensated by strong growth in digital, the group announced today.

Print ad income fell 10 per cent year on year in the last quarter of 2010, but digital grew by 25 per cent over the same period.

Online now makes up a third of Future’s total advertising revenue and the company said income from digital magazine subscriptions was also increasing “substantially”.

Chief executive Stevie Spring said in today’s trading statement: “We expect the trading environment to remain challenging throughout 2011 but our progress online and in tablet and mobile development is pleasing.”

Tags: Advertising, Future Publishing, revenue, Stevie Spring

#Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – social searching

February 9th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Rachel McAthy in Top tips for journalists

Data Miner is running a series of useful posts focused on social searching, looking at a range of resources from those telling you what’s being said on the ground to tools to help you cultivate social sources. 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, social searching, tip

Thirty-two new new media, journalism and editorial jobs this week on Journalism.co.uk

February 8th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Ed Martin in Jobs

These are the latest editorial, PR and media job opportunities from this week on Journalism.co.uk’s jobs board

Senior reporter
C21Media is looking for a senior reporter to join its London-based editorial team as the company prepares for significant expansion
Salary: £25K-£30K DoE
C21 Media
London, England
>>more

News editor
C21Media is looking for a news editor to join its London-based editorial team as the company prepares for significant expansion.
Salary: £30K-£35K DoE
C21 Media
London, England
>>more

Online reporter
TradeWinds the leading publication covering the international merchant shipping industry is looking for a reporter for its live news internet site.
Salary: DoE
TradeWinds
London, England
>>more

Senior/Executive producer – Online media
Based in London, the senior/executive Producer will have a dual, hands-on role of managing a growing team of producers, as well as working with clients to maximise performance for their online campaigns.
Salary: DoE
Travelzoo (Europe) Ltd
London, England
>>more

Intern – Marketscope (9 Month Contract)
Interns are required to co-ordinate with S&P’s MarketScope journalists to provide coverage of news, comments and views on European stocks.
Salary: DoE
Standard and Poors
London, England
>>more

Click on the link below to see more.

Tags: communications jobs, editorial jobs, editorial recruitment, Jobs, journalism jobs, magazine jobs, media jobs, new media jobs, new media vacancies, newspaper jobs, PR jobs, PR recruitment, Vacancies, vacancy advertising

Cakes, crows, bees: celebrating the strangest newspaper names in the world

February 8th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Editors' pick, Local media, Newspapers

What do cakes, crows and mosquitoes have in common? They all have local newspapers named after them.

The BBC has asked readers to suggest some of the strangest and most distinctive newspaper titles in the world. Highlights from the UK include the Banbury Cake (“the work of a complete lunatic or a marketing genius”), the Royston Crow and the Falmouth Packet, not forgetting the Arran Banner – “the only newspaper named after a potato”.

It’s not just a UK phenomenon: the United States does well with the Sacramento Bee, the the Youngstown Vindicator, the Carlisle Mosquito and the Unterrified Democrat.

Here’s the full list.

Tags: Local newspapers, weird newspaper names

AP: Huffington Post sale boosts newspaper stocks

February 8th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Business, Editors' pick

Shares in some of the big publicly quoted American newspaper groups rose yesterday on the back of news of AOL’s £195m acquisition of the Huffington Post.

Gannett rose 2.8 per cent yesterday and the New York Times Company 2.7 per cent.

According to the Associated Press, the flurry of trading activity shows that investors are still interested in news companies. “The [Huffington Post] deal raised the value on leading branded digital properties,” one analyst told the newswire.

Tags: AOL, AP, Associated Press, Gannett, Huffington Post

Fonts in Use: A detailed look at the Daily’s typography

February 8th, 2011 | 1 Comment | Posted by Paul McNally in Design and graphics, Editors' pick

Designer and typographer Stephen Coles has taken a comprehensive look at the fonts used in Murdoch’s new iPad newspaper, The Daily.

“It does have the look of a fairly serious weekly news magazine,” he writes. “Much of this posture comes from steering clear of ultra-modern or casual typefaces.

“My guess is that the style guide is still being written, staff are still getting comfortable with the format, and everyone is still learning what’s possible in this new medium.”

Tags: fonts, fonts in use, stephen coles, the Daily