Tag Archives: USD

Twitter round-up: Twitter for sale and twittering for freedom

Leave a reply

Andrew Baron, founder of videoblog site Rocketboom, put his Twitter account on Ebay (thanks to WinExtra for flagging this up). If you think that’s weird, it gets stranger – the bids apparently rose to $1,550 before Baron pulled the auction.

Not sure what’s worse: the potential that this was all a publicity stunt (I realise I’m giving it more) or that people were willing to bid so much. Baron wrote on the auction site:

I really love my Twitter account but I feel like I haven’t been using it the way I want to. Quite honestly, I feel sorry for all of my followers because they wind up with my tweets in their timelines and I haven’t been able to utilize the medium the way I want to. I also participate in another Twitter account over on Rocketboom so I’m thinking I’ll post more over there and start up a new account to do what I want to do next.

It would be silly to just delete this account I have here, especially if there is someone out there that had like interests and had something to say or wanted to get involved in some relevant conversations. In terms of monetary value, I have no expectations or needs at all so I decided not to put a minimum bid on this. Whatever will be, will be.

It seems to have worked publicity-wise: Baron’s followers have jumped from 1397 when he started the auction to 1,755 at last count.

Elsewhere, a Californian grad student used the microblogging service as a get out of jail card.

The site InsideBayArea reports on student James Karl Buck, a former multimedia intern for US newspaper the Oakland Tribune, who when arrested by Egyptian police used Twitter to send a message that he had been arrested to his network.

His contacts just happened to contain several anti-government bloggers – it’s part of a project for his graduate course – and helped him then secure a lawyer, contact the US Embassy and alert international media. Not bad for a tweet.

Associated Press launches story and picture service for mobiles

1 Reply

The Associated Press (AP) is to launch a news and picture service for mobiles, as part of plans to help struggling newspapers.

The Mobile News Network, which is expected to start in the summer, will carry local news stories and images from participating newspapers and national news supplied by the AP.

Local advertising on the service will be sold by the newspapers in addition to national advertising from networks with an equal revenue share between news providers and ad sellers, a release from the AP said.

It is currently being tested by several newspaper companies including Hearst Corp. and McLatchy Co. and a similar product for video content is also being developed.

The agency also announced a reduction in fees in 2009, as part of widespread changes within the organisation’s price structure.

The AP had previously announced expected savings of £7 million if members implemented a digital tagging programme for news stories for search purposes.

The effect of a new pricing mechanism – in which breaking news content becomes the core product with extras added at a premium rate – is also likely to have an effect next year, with potential savings of $14 million for AP newspaper members.

In addition to the advertising revenue share plan on its mobile service, AP said it will also end fees for its graphics-based news service Money & Markets and provide unlimited access to archives for photo subscribers next year.

OJR: Interview with chief news officer of hyperlocal news site OurTown

Leave a reply

George Blake, chief news officer of hyper-local news service OurTown, says editors of the sites can earn up to $60,000 (£30,306).

Content on the network of 70,000 websites is provided by the local editors and through content deals.

As such revenue from local advertising on a site is shared with its editor.

“We will continue to sell the national ads, which we will split with the local editor, but the local editor retains all revenue generated by local ads after paying a monthly fee to the company for ad serving,” Blake explains.

But will this model be enough to lure and retain local editors and help OurTown emulate the success of competitors like Topix?

Local editors, who oversee the content of their sites, keep almost all of their local ad revenue and a good local editor can make between $45,000 and $60,000 each year once they have built up a regular clientele in their area.

Innovations in Journalism – Instant Journalist

Leave a reply

We give developers the opportunity to tell us journalists why we should sit up and pay attention to the sites and devices they are working on. Today it’s flat-packed news websites ready for easy assembly and use from Instant Journalist.

image of instant journalist website

1.  Who are you and what’s it all about?
I’m Scott Durham, president of Instivate. We’re a small software company in Seattle, Washington building a flexible, scalable platform for powering online communities.

Our first product is Instant Journalist, which makes it easy for anyone to launch their own online news communities where the public can read and contribute news stories and events of local interest with rich media such as video, images, and documents.

2.  Why would this be useful to a journalist?
Since anyone can join and submit content to a site powered by Instant Journalist, it allows the site to cover a much wider range of news events than an individual or team of journalists could do alone.

We have an advanced set of content rating tools, automated algorithms, and editorial controls that makes it easy for the site owner to manage the content from thousands of individual contributors, and make sure that the best content rises to the top of the heap.

In addition, we have a variety of features that aren’t available in traditional blogging or other content management systems.

One key strength is that our product comes with native support for video. That makes it easy for anyone to upload video of a news event and make it available to readers of the site. Our system handles all the complexity of video processing and conversion behind the scenes, and then allows playback on any web browser.

Another key feature includes our integrated mapping technology, where any story can be placed on a map and assigned to a specific geographical neighbourhood, town, or city.

This allows users to quickly visualise the location of a news event and browse and discover other content in that specific area. Users can also subscribe to RSS feeds for specific geographic locations and track the news around them at a very local level.

3.  Is this it, or is there more to come?
Our major focus now is the delivery of a self-service advertising solution that will make it easy for site owners to monetise their site.

It will allow any advertiser to easily sign-up and create ads for the site. Also stay tuned as we roll out more advanced content management features and more interactive ways of reporting news events on the site.

4.  Why are you doing this?
We’re passionate about building systems that make it easy for people to participate in and contribute to communities of like-minded people online.

We picked the news space as our first project because there’s a huge opportunity there to empower professional journalists and regular members of the public to collaborate online and cover a much wider range of news than has ever been possible before.

5.  What does it cost to use it?
We have a range of packages that scale up according to the amount of traffic a site serves, starting at just $18 a month.

It’s designed so that a site can start small, with pricing that grows as the site does and at a very affordable rate.

6.  How will you make it pay?
Our content management system makes it easy for site owners to plug any 3rd-party advertising solution into their site, such as Google ads, etc.  And our forthcoming self-service advertising solution will take that to the next level by allowing access to a wider range of potential advertisers, and providing the site owner a higher percentage of overall revenue than other 3rd party online advertising solutions.

Have a look at Centraldistrictnews.com – it covers a neighbourhood here in Seattle and allows people to communicate with their neighbours about the news that happens right around them.

We’re also working with a major newspaper company to adapt our platform to a wide range of less newsy applications; covering topics from travel to sports and local dining we’re allowing them to quickly deploy niche interest sites and other targeted online communities that will build a rich online ecosystem of websites around their existing newspaper brands.

Folio: US newspaper company, Tribune Co, launches magazine just for Kindle

2 Replies

US newspaper company Tribune is launching a second digital magazine exclusively for the Amazon Kindle ebook reader – a week after launching its first magazine of this kind.

A week after launching Opinionated, a political magazine aimed just at Kindle owners, Tribune has launched its second Kindle-specific title – a daily electronic magazine focused on pop culture – after partnering with PopMatters.com.

According to Folio, the magazine is targeting 18-to-34-year-olds and is available for a free 14-day free trial and $1.49 monthly subscription at Amazon.com.

Tribune resorts to ‘joke’ press release for latest appointment

Leave a reply

Those guys at Tribune know how to have a laugh don’t they? Take this ‘hilarious’ press release I received today about the US media group’s latest appointment:

Surely You Can’t Be Serious? Marc Chase – President Of Tribune Interactive!

Randy Michaels’ run of acquiring radio-management stars
came to a screeching halt today with Chase’s appointment

CHICAGO, April 7, 2008 — Another freaking Clear Channel
Communications executive on the payroll and this one’s been
named President of Tribune Interactive.

Tribune Broadcasting’s Randy Michaels’ past finally caught
up with him when Marc Chase obviously blackmailed his way
into a position he is not remotely qualified to hold.
Insiders are irate. Chase is a fraud. A source inside
Tribune HR, who wished to remain anonymous, pointed out that
Marc Chase’s resume (below) was obviously fabricated. First
of all, his name isn’t even Marc Chase–it’s Mark Thompson.
The whole thing is a sham.

MARC CHASE
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington DC 20500 202-456-1111

PROFESSINAL EXPERIENCE

Vocabulary Advisorist for George W. Bush
President of the United States of America
Washington DC, 2004-present

eBay
President of Buying Crap
San Jose, California 2003-2004

Google
Executive Vice President of Finding Crap Anywhere
Mountain View, California 2001-2002

Microsoft
Senior Executive Vice President of Technology and Stuff
Seattle, Washington, 2000-2001

CBS, ABC, NBC, FOX Television
Vice President of Watching TV A Lot
Los Angeles, California 1999-2000

Harvard University
Dean of School of Internetology
Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1998

EDUCASHION

Nearly Graduated with Honers
School of Alabama in Atlanta Georgia 1985

COMMUNITY SERVICE

400 Hours (reduced from 600)
Judge gave time off for good behavior

Chase was quoted as saying, “Timing and infrared photography
are everything. I couldn’t be happier! I know Randy is
relieved to finally have me on Sam’s payroll.”

Tribune has undergone major changes in the past year, with
billionaire Sam Zell acquiring the company last April in a
complex deal that left it with $13 billion in debt. Since
then, Zell has brought in new executives to fill key roles.
This one takes the cake.

Last December, Zell hired Michaels — who helped Zell to
build Clear Channel into a radio behemoth that he could then
sell — to oversee Tribune’s broadcast and Internet
divisions. It is obvious Michaels has lost his mind with
this hire.

–By Hugh Jass – A Reputable Media Source

© 2008, Bogus Information, a division of Dewey, Cheatum, and
Howe. All Rights Reserved.

While you’re sewing you sides back together (and trying to make sense of the whole thing), you have to ask why? As Gawker points out Marc Chase has been hired – that’s about all you can determine from the message – but is it appropriate to send out a spoof release as the Tribune company faces mass redundancies?

Fortune: How Apple plans to sell 45 million iPhones in 2009

Leave a reply

Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster has released a detailed report about how he sees Apple quadrupling its 2008 sales and hitting the 45m figure he had previously predicted.

These are the key elements:

– Introducing a 3G iPhone within the next 3 to 6 months
– Offering a family of 2 to 3 iPhones – including lower-priced models selling for $200 to $300 – by Jan 2009 at the latest
– Entering new countries, effectively doubling the addressable market every year for the next two years
– Adding new features, such as games and remote purchases starting in June.

JEEcamp: online revenue models – the Waghorn way

4 Replies

Rick Waghorn, founder of myfootballwriter.com and keynote speaker at today’s JEEcamp conference, has said his Norwich FC site attracted 33,000 unique visitors in January.

However, Waghorn said the more interesting figures are 436 – the average number of seconds spent on the site by a user, and 3.5 – the average number of visits a month.

Discussing the local contextual advertising system Addiply which he has developed, Waghorn said local newspapers should now be viewing their journalists’ contact books as list of potential advertisers.

According to Waghorn it’s about creating a ‘melting pot’ of revenue from Google, local advertisers, subscribers and content syndication.

Relying on one revenue stream isn’t enough: 400,000 pages impressions over three months to MFW generated a paltry $180. Google is not the piece of advertising kit needed by local sites, Waghorn said.

News sites should aim to gear their content and advertising so it can be adapted and pushed through local, national and global channels, Waghorn advised. As an example, the site has this week signed an ad deal with the British Army, who were keen to tap into the football fan demographic.

Innovations in Journalism – EditGrid

Leave a reply

Each week we give technology developers the opportunity to tell us journalists why we should sit up and pay attention to the sites and devices they are working on. This week it’s data as journalism with online spreadsheets from EditGrid.

image of editgrid logo

1) Who are you and what’s it all about?
Hello, I’m David Lee, from EditGrid.

EditGrid is an online spreadsheet service that does for numbers what blogs and wikis do for text.

2) Why would this be useful to a journalist?
It can be useful for journalist in multiple ways: managing simple lists and mini-databases so that the data can be shared, collaborated and accessed anywhere (including iPhone and Facebook) and publishing of tables and charts.

The Daily Kos has used us to publish quick and easy charts of US primary election results.

3) Is this it, or is there more to come?
We keep enhancing the sharing and publishing capabilities to make EditGrid more powerful.

In the future it will be the platform to access live data (financial and much more). Users already created live financial spreadsheets attracting tens of thousands of users and million of views.

4) Why are you doing this?
Spreadsheet is a technology area in which the fundamentals haven’t been changed for more than 20 years.

Now we can make online spreadsheet running in a web browser which multiple people can edit at the same time with changes synchronising in real-time.

We see much potential in it and believe it will revolutionise the ways people use spreadsheets.

5) What does it cost to use it?
Free of charge for personal users, US$5 per user for organisations.

6) How will you make it pay?
We offer most of the features for free but we charge organisations $5/user/month and provide more administration and security features.

Currently, we’re more interested in growing our base to hundreds-of-thousands of users, we may charge for future value-added features and/or premium data access but what our users can enjoy for free now will remain free forever. 🙂