Tag Archives: Guardian Media Group

FT.com: Murdoch considers charging for online news, developing e-reader

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News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch is now convinced that ‘it is possible to charge for content’ online given the success of paid-for business news on the Wall Street Journal, he said last night.

Any pay model would be tested on one of the group’s stronger titles, he added.

Murdoch also described Newsgroup’s interest in developing its own e-reading or digital paper device.

At the FIPP World Magazine Congress this week Guardian Media Group’s Carolyn McCall suggested Guardian.co.uk could also start charging for specialist areas of the site.

Full post at this link…

FIPP 09: Charging for content or e-commerce – how will mags make money?

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“I insist that we are going to have to end up charging for our content wherever we can,” said Roberto Civita, CEO and chairman of Brazilian magazine publisher Abril, today.

“The more segmented the more we’ll be able to do this, the less segmented the less.”

Civita wasn’t the first publisher at this year’s FIPP World Magazine Congress: yesterday Guardian Media Group’s Carolyn McCall said charging for specific sections of Guardian.co.uk was a consideration.

He also echoed comments made earlier in the day by Google’s UK MD, Matt Brittin, who said publishers could learn from the e-commerce industry.

Magazine brands should be ideally placed to do this, for example, by placing direct links to buy on advertisements, he said.

Civita was adamant that magazines will continue and that the industry shouldn’t get hung up on what platform this happens on (“I really don’t think it makes any difference if we’re talking about paper or the new e-papers”) – it’s the quality of the product that matters

Fellow panellist Cathie Black, president of Hearst Magazines in the US, added to her Conde Nast’s counterpart’s remarks about the importance of brand.

“Strong brands will be brands going out into the future. Strong brand, strong advertising, strong editorial,” she said, adding that Hearst brands should be at the centre with spokes from them crossing into e-commerce, merchandising, and other media revenues, like TV spin-off ‘Running in Heels’.

So – print’s going to survive and while online will grow (and e-readers too) – where does that leave digital content?

Both Black and Civita agree: magazines’ digital offerings should be differentiated from what else is available in their sector online.

“We must continue to emphasise the things that have made our magazines what they are today: remained tuned to interests and characteristics of our readers (…) maintain our integrity and ethical principles which are the cornerstone of our greatest asset, our credibility,” said Civita.

And – one parting thought from panel chair Lord Heseltine, chairman of Haymarket – the two platforms must work together:

“The pure-play people have got to keep promoting their product. If we have a brand we have a natural promotion vehicle. I’ve seen examples where pure-play people have launched very successful sites, much more successful than ours, but it’s only been a matter of time before we caught them.”

FIPP 09: Fears ahead for magazines – what concerns those at the top?

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As reported over on the Journalism.co.uk main site, leading industry figures shared their hopes for the magazine market at the FIPP World Magazine Congress 2009 this morning.

But they were hopes in the context of an economic downturn. William Kerr, chairman of board for the Meredith Group joked that ‘being 12 per cent down is the new up’. 

Each of the panel looking at ‘riding the storm’ shared their fears for the magazine industry:

  • Carolyn McCall, chief executive, Guardian Media Group: is worried that the industry would ‘not make structural change quickly enough’.
  • William Kerr said that his main fear was that the ‘best and brightest [candidates] had migrated to other areas’ for employment. 
  • Aroon Purie, editor-in-chief and chairman of the India Today Group said he was worried about the ‘magazinification’ of newspapers in terms of content and design: it is a ‘threat to magazines, as newspapers go in that direction,’ he said. 
  • John Smith, chief executive of BBC Worldwide, said his main concern was the dominance of Google as an online sign-post. it was a ‘dangerous’ situation he said, to have all the power in one company. Google’s 63.7 per cent grasp on search traffic made it necessary for other companies to enter the territory, he said.  

Announcement of pay cut for Rusbridger and no bonus for McCall following NUJ comments

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The Guardian News & Media (GNM) editor-in-chief, Alan Rusbridger, has made his ten per cent pay cut public, following public comments by the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) about Guardian executive bonus payments at a time when cuts are being made at regional newspapers within the Guardian Media Group (GMG).

Earlier this week the NUJ published a full page advert in the Guardian which said there were “devastating staff cuts to service the ongoing expansion of the Guardian – which is losing many millions but still paying executive bonuses.”

An article published today on MediaGuardian.co.uk reports that Rusbridger is not part of the GMG bonus scheme and had last year informed the Scott Trust, owners of GNM’s parent company GMG, of his plans to take a pay cut.

The article states that Carolyn McCall, chief executive of GMG, had told the company’s remuneration committee in January that she would not take a bonus for the 2008-9 year.

“”Ordinarily such information would only be made public when GMG’s annual report is published in the summer. However, as the group’s two most senior executives, and in light of recent comments by the NUJ, they felt it was appropriate to inform the [union] chapels,” a GMG spokesman said.”

As part of the pay freeze announcement in February GMG said that it would not pay financial performance bonuses for the financial year 2008-2009, ‘which form the larger part of overall bonuses,’ it continues.

“But its remuneration committee – which consists of independent directors and the chair of the Scott Trust – decided that bonuses based on the achievement of personal objectives could be paid.”

GMG has suspended its bonus scheme for this financial year, the article reports.

NUJ Release: Guardian must consult NUJ over pay freeze

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Following Friday’s NUJ meeting at the Guardian, which confirmed a pay freeze for 2009, the National Union of Journalists has released a statement reminding managers at the Guardian Media Group that they are obliged to enter negotiations with the union.

“It has been reported that management are not open to consultation on the pay freeze, but under the union’s agreements with the company consultation must take place.

“The company has stated that the economic downturn means it can’t afford to increase salaries this year. It has also announced that most executive bonuses won’t be paid.”

Full release at this link…

SoE08: What next for local media?

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Two questions being repeatedly raised at today’s Society of Editors (SoE) conference:

  • stop talking about the nationals, how can regional media get in on the digital act?
  • what to do about the BBC – or the ‘boa constrictor’ as Mail Online’s editorial director Martin Clarke called the corporation.

Guardian Media Group chief executive Carolyn McCall told delegates that there is a model for the local press, focusing on hyperlocal.

“There will be models that emerge: investing in SEO, local press have to do that. There’s an opportunity for local press to go very local and build revenue around this. There are models, but it will have to be off a very different cost base,” said McCall.

She went on to describe Channel M – the television offshoot of the Manchester Evening News – as ‘a good model’ for local media that could be replicated in the future.

The business risks associated with online and sustainable digital business models, she added, need to be shared regionally and locally.

Regional media will have to take ‘a real hit’ on their bottom line when it comes to online to if they are to maintain standards of quality journalism, she added.

Malcolm Pheby, editor of the Nottingham Evening Post, took up the regional press’ baton in explaining how the NEP had successfully integrated its newsroom with staff now trained to treat all news stories as rolling news to be broken on the web.

But the pervading theme of the day has been the opposition from regional newspapers to the BBC’s proposed local video plans.

Pete Clifton, head of multimedia for the Beeb, did his best to defend criticisms of the plans, saying that the proposals are subject to assessments by the BBC Trust and suggesting that the BBC could forge stronger relationships with other news providers.

Still it was comments from McCall and Clarke, whose affiliate Northcliffe added its voice to the debate today, that received impromptu applause.

According to both, the BBC’s plans present unfair competition to the local press

Cue videojournalism evangelist and consultant Michael Rosenblum, who promised to teach the audience how to beat the BBC at its own game. Key to this he said is embracing technology, in particular video, wholeheartedly and not incrementally.

In response to a question from a Rotherham newspaper publisher, which currently has no video on its website, Rosenblum said there was a demand for the content and the potential for partnerships with regional broadcasters like ITV local.

AOP 2008: At yesterday’s digital sweetshop – best of the rest

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It was all a bit kids in a sweetshop at yesterday’s AOP Digital Publishing Summit, if we forget all the problems with wifi, of course.

The main aim, for most attendees, In all likelihood, was to talk to all the people they know in online life, but rarely get the chance to talk to in person – over coffee (and odd looking cake/pastries) and lunch during the day, and drinks in the evening.

The programme ranged from panels to energetic speakers with a broad range of digital publishing topics covered – though perhaps not as much new discussion was initiated as some participants hoped, despite Peter Bale from Microsoft attempt to get some answers from YouTube’s Jonathan Gillespie.

A few additional highlights to add to our coverage so far:

Emily’s Bell’s vision for Guardian’s international reach: In the panel introducing ‘the digital pioneers,’ Bell, director of digital content for Guardian News & Media, said the group sees now as a ‘uniquely’ timed opportunity for the brand to expand internationally – and to do so before their rivals do.

Speaking to Journalism.co.uk afterwards, Bell elaborated on her example of the Economist’s well-established grasp of the international market.  Although it happened for the Economist over a 20-year period, she told me that a similar endeavour in 2008 is ‘compressed’ by the web.

Bell also pointed out during the panel that the Chinese words for ‘crisis’ and ‘opportunity’ are one and the same (I tried to keep that in mind as my laptop charger physically broke and the wifi went down).

The Guardian’s move stateside was also referred to by Saul Klein, partner of Index Ventures and moderator of later panel ‘Growing in the Digital World’.

Quoting Simon Waldman, Guardian Media Group’s director of digital strategy and development (and Emily Bell’s boss), Klein said the Guardian’s acquisition of ContentNext was ‘well set up to exploit’. Waldman explained how moves like that prepared the group for a US audience.

The ‘Unlocking the mobile internet’ panel: In the spirit of the thing, TechCrunch’s Mike Butcher gave out his mobile number for questions before probing the panel on their respective views on mobile internet’s future.

Is 2009 the year of mobile? Melissa Goodwin, controller of mobile at ITV says not: “I don’t think it’s next year, I’m hoping it’s 2010.”

“We just want to give you anything you may want,” she said of ITV’s mobile strategy, though she admitted that building advertising revenue was very much an ongoing issue.

Goodwin also revealed that consumers can look forward to Friends Reunited on two iPhone applications in the first part of next year, as reported in more depth over at PaidContent.

Stefano Maruzzi, president of CondeNet International, on outlining Conde’s digital development: As reported over at MediaGuardian and PaidContent, CondeNet, the online arm of Conde Nast, has got lots of ideas about lots of things:

  • Rolling out a Wired website worldwide (and in different languages, he told PaidContent)
  • Keeping Tatler’s online presence minimal
  • Engaging with the iPod user audience

HTFP: Guardian Media Group to close six newspaper branch offices

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GMG is to make a series of cutbacks in the Manchester area with six newspaper branch offices set to close.

The papers affected will be: the Heywood Advertiser, the Middleton Guardian, the South Manchester Reporter, the Manchester Metro News, the Macclesfield Express and the Wilmslow Express.

ContentNext begins UK expansion with paidContent recruitment

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Publishing firm ContentNext, which was recently acquired by Guardian Media Group, is recruiting for its UK digital media news site paidContent.

According to a post on the site by publisher and editor Rafat Ali, paidContent UK is looking for a London-based reporter to work on the site and across its international platforms – paidContent.org, mocoNews.net and contentSutra.com.