Thursday, November 13, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Journalism, an Intervention
This week I broke up with you, Journalism. Yes, we had a long, great relationship, and yes, I'll always love you, but it's time for me to move on. But Journalism, you still have a lot of issues, and you haven't even come close to realizing what they are. And if I were sitting down with you, telling you the hard things you really need to hear, this is what I'd say.
It's control, stupid.
You're so closed off. You are still holding onto this "gatekeeper" thing. Oh, I know, you want to present the best information to what few readers you have left, and protect them from all the junk. Here's an update for you: You can keep that gate all you want, but the fence is gone. Let go of the control mentality and open up in an entirely different way. Stop being scared of your own readers. If your websites were neighborhoods, they would be maximum security compounds. Guard posts, 20-foot-high fences, barbed wire. Do you really want to live that way? This is your No. 1 issue. It's not resources, not technology, it's control.
You fear change
You are stuck in old methods of production. Your web production is almost completely oriented around the print schedule. It needs to be the other way around. There are only two ways for you to become viable, Journalism. Drastically cut production costs, or dramatically increase traffic. Better yet, do both. Strip down your print product to the simplest, purest form it can possibly be. Build your ideal, 24-hour web/mobile/whatever production cycle first. Take the money you save and sink it into development and innovation. Then build the print schedule around it.
Your perfectionism is killing you
You desperately wanting everything to be absolutely perfect before it goes out into the world. Remember this: Perfectionism paralyzes innovation. Try stuff out. Now. If it doesn't work, learn from it. Fail eight times to get one success. Repeat.
Get some guts
You are always saying, "well, everybody else is going to have it," which is a stupid reason to do anything. If you want to stand out, then take a stand. If everybody else is doing one thing, then do something different. People will love you only when they know you are not part of a mindless herd.
Bet on your people
Oh, you say the right things, you tease all those smart, diverse people who want to love you. But really, all your leaders think alike, and those who don't are finding other things to do. Your future needs to be led by people who are innovative, risk-taking, responsive and tuned in to diverse communities. You are far too conservative about promoting talented people fast. This is why young, bright people, especially people of color, are leaving you.
Discover your readers
You don't have a clue what readers really want, and you think they're too dumb to tell you. You, Journalism, know how to find out what really motivates people, what makes them tick. Any good reporter does. Yet you are totally unwilling to use those skills on your own readers. You rely instead on marketing staffs, bulk surveys and focus groups. And then you ignore even that. Go to where people live, work and play. Find out how information and stories really work in their lives. Adapt accordingly (See "Your Perfectionism...").
Rethink your competition
You think your big competition is the newspaper across town, or TV station, or whatever. Forget it, they're dying too. Your sites will never get the traffic you need to stay viable unless you actually work together to create scale. Don't fight your competition, syndicate it. Conversely, your print products need to leverage the advantages of print, not imitate websites. You are making your print products stupider, cramming in as much short, mindless junk as you can. In Hollywood, if people aren't coming to movies, they don't make shorter movies to take less time. They make better movies (or try).
Tell great stories
Here's one of your biggest mistakes: You call practically anything you write a story. Ninety percent of the things you write are not stories, they are collections of information. Strip that stuff down, put it on the web, in bulk. Forget about it for paper. Then concentrate on telling great stories. People always have, and always will, pay for compelling storytelling. The web hasn't changed that, and nothing ever will. The same rules for great storytelling have worked since the dawn of human history. "In the beginning..." is nothing if not a great lede.
It's control, stupid.
You're so closed off. You are still holding onto this "gatekeeper" thing. Oh, I know, you want to present the best information to what few readers you have left, and protect them from all the junk. Here's an update for you: You can keep that gate all you want, but the fence is gone. Let go of the control mentality and open up in an entirely different way. Stop being scared of your own readers. If your websites were neighborhoods, they would be maximum security compounds. Guard posts, 20-foot-high fences, barbed wire. Do you really want to live that way? This is your No. 1 issue. It's not resources, not technology, it's control.
You fear change
You are stuck in old methods of production. Your web production is almost completely oriented around the print schedule. It needs to be the other way around. There are only two ways for you to become viable, Journalism. Drastically cut production costs, or dramatically increase traffic. Better yet, do both. Strip down your print product to the simplest, purest form it can possibly be. Build your ideal, 24-hour web/mobile/whatever production cycle first. Take the money you save and sink it into development and innovation. Then build the print schedule around it.
Your perfectionism is killing you
You desperately wanting everything to be absolutely perfect before it goes out into the world. Remember this: Perfectionism paralyzes innovation. Try stuff out. Now. If it doesn't work, learn from it. Fail eight times to get one success. Repeat.
Get some guts
You are always saying, "well, everybody else is going to have it," which is a stupid reason to do anything. If you want to stand out, then take a stand. If everybody else is doing one thing, then do something different. People will love you only when they know you are not part of a mindless herd.
Bet on your people
Oh, you say the right things, you tease all those smart, diverse people who want to love you. But really, all your leaders think alike, and those who don't are finding other things to do. Your future needs to be led by people who are innovative, risk-taking, responsive and tuned in to diverse communities. You are far too conservative about promoting talented people fast. This is why young, bright people, especially people of color, are leaving you.
Discover your readers
You don't have a clue what readers really want, and you think they're too dumb to tell you. You, Journalism, know how to find out what really motivates people, what makes them tick. Any good reporter does. Yet you are totally unwilling to use those skills on your own readers. You rely instead on marketing staffs, bulk surveys and focus groups. And then you ignore even that. Go to where people live, work and play. Find out how information and stories really work in their lives. Adapt accordingly (See "Your Perfectionism...").
Rethink your competition
You think your big competition is the newspaper across town, or TV station, or whatever. Forget it, they're dying too. Your sites will never get the traffic you need to stay viable unless you actually work together to create scale. Don't fight your competition, syndicate it. Conversely, your print products need to leverage the advantages of print, not imitate websites. You are making your print products stupider, cramming in as much short, mindless junk as you can. In Hollywood, if people aren't coming to movies, they don't make shorter movies to take less time. They make better movies (or try).
Tell great stories
Here's one of your biggest mistakes: You call practically anything you write a story. Ninety percent of the things you write are not stories, they are collections of information. Strip that stuff down, put it on the web, in bulk. Forget about it for paper. Then concentrate on telling great stories. People always have, and always will, pay for compelling storytelling. The web hasn't changed that, and nothing ever will. The same rules for great storytelling have worked since the dawn of human history. "In the beginning..." is nothing if not a great lede.
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