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Media trends digest
– 2008
Web 2.0, online video short on revenues 10 June
While widget makers start courting Madison Avenue, they might learn a lesson from social networks and other Web 2.0 companies that have struggled for years to find a profitable business model. The Financial Times reports that most Web 2.0 startups have produced little in the way of revenues, and VCs are wondering if a shake-out is coming similar to the dot-com bust. "If you look at some of the valuations [of startups], you wonder what fantasy of revenues they're based on," Hummer Winblad VC Mitchell Kertzman told FT. Skepticism was also rampant at the recent Under the Radar confab, according to News.com's Stefanie Olsen, who said the social media startups could learn from Web 1.0 companies: "Tech companies often fail to hire media-savvy executives at the top who can sell brand advertising...[and] many social media start-ups are marketing the idea that they have tons of data on people's demographics and preferences."
Within the social media sphere, online video has gone through its own fits and starts in trying to find a business model. GigaOm reported that YouTube's director of monetization, Shashi Seth, recently quit, as the largest video site struggles to bring in money. Om Malik says YouTube brought in $80 million in revenues last year, which could grow to $125 million this year. That's still a paltry amount, and even Hulu, with much less traffic, has made $25 million because of its brand-friendly professional content. CBSSports.com is trying out Heavy.com's "skin" treatment for video ads that surround the video that's playing. Heavy told the Wall Street Journal it gets 1.68% clickthroughs on skin ads and is spinning off its video-ad technology into a separate business.
Online Publishers Assn
Digital television switchover discussion paper
The Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, today announced the release of a discussion paper covering a legislative framework for the digital television switchover.
More
Blogging & country life
ABC: The Macquarie English Dictionary defines "blog" as "a record of items of interest found on the internet" but it is often so much more than that- a chance to interact with others and have a social network beyond geographic distance.
The ABC recently travelled into the blogosphere to explore what it is that drives people to put their thoughts and stories up in cyberspace for all the world to see.
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U2 manager slams ISPs
Variety via Benton: U2 manager Paul McGuinness launched a blistering attack on the world's Internet providers Wednesday, accusing them of strangling the music industry. Speaking at the Music Matters confab in Hong Kong, McGuinness likened ISPs to "shoplifters" and accused them of "turning their heads" away from the music industry's troubles and "rigging the market." "The recorded music industry is in a crisis and there is crucial help available but not being provided by companies who should be providing that help -- not just because it is morally right, but because it is in their commercial interest," McGuinness, said. He and numerous others speaking on the first day of the confab said the industry was caught between rampant piracy and ISPs' extortionate terms of trade.
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The future of the internet economy – OECD
Are we making the most of what the Internet has to offer our economies and societies? What are likely future developments, and can we make sure they are positive ones? This Policy Brief looks at likely future developments in the Internet economy, and how all stakeholders can help the Internet to meet the increasing demands made upon it, continue to drive innovation, provide new communications services and platforms, while being secure and respecting privacy.
Report
* Convergence and Next Generation Networks (OECD report)
Report
* Broadband and the Economy (OECD report)
Report
Upcoming conferences
The 2008 Annual Australasian Emergency Media and Public Affairs
"Excellence in Crisis Communication" Conference is to be held on the Gold Coast 25 - 27 June.
The conference will benchmark the best media liaison and public affairs responses to major emergencies and to provide a forum for interaction between media and public affairs professionals and researchers into emergency media and communications. This conference will build on the success of last year's inaugural conference and will be even more interactive and will include a hypothetical, panel discussions and open forums on both current research and its application.
Further information, and conference brochure available from this link.
And another…
The Second International Conference on Religion and Media will be
held in Tehran and Qom, Iran, from November 9th to 12th, 2008. We
cordially invite all media researchers and scholars, representatives
from diverse religious traditions, professionals and students
involved with the subjects of the conference to attend and submit a
paper. Further information could be found at the conference website.
Rampant churnalism
 Media Alliance: In his book Flat Earth News, an examination of the British newspaper industry published earlier this year, Guardian journalist Nick Davies found 80 per cent of the stories in Britain's quality dailies in a two-week period were rewritten wire copy and press releases. On the concern that Australia is facing a similar rise of churnalism, Alliance NSW state secretary Richard Harris told The Australian this week, "There has been a marked increase in journalists' daily workload as a result of newspapers launching and expanding online sites," which meant there was often less time to spend of stories.
Guardian story; Book link
Piggy-back ads rile Google customers
Wall Street Journal via Benton: As Google pushes to sell ads crucial to its revenue growth, some of its largest advertisers are growing angry with the way the company oversees its sponsored searches. The problem is a tactic known as "piggybacking," in which smaller advertisers use major players' brand names, slogans or other trademarked words in the text of search ads to lure Web surfers to their own sites. While Google and other search engines have policies against this maneuver, some marketers say the practice often goes unchecked. The brick-and-mortar world has long-established laws in this area, but the legal situation is less clear for the Internet and has only recently started to be tested in the courts. Tensions over piggybacking have been simmering for a couple of years. Companies such as Marriott International Inc, InterContinental Hotels Group PLC, AMR Corp's American Airlines and Northwest Airlines Corp. say the use of their names and slogans in the text of other companies' search ads confuses potential customers and increases their cost of doing business. They are particularly upset with Google, which is the dominant player in the search business. It controlled 71.2% of the search market last year, according to research firm eMarketer Inc.
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Voice of America warns on censorship
Broadcasting & Cable via Benton: Dean Austin, the head of Voice of America, the US government's international broadcasting arm, advised other countries Monday that they must be on guard for Web censorship and "influence operations" disguised as journalism, and that they must protect journalists' rights to gather information without fear of overzealous courts.
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A shield law for the world?
Washington Post via Benton: The United States owes a federal shield law not only to American journalists but to journalists around the world. Passage of such a law is urgently needed. By finally allowing the media to protect the anonymity of confidential sources, Congress would do more than close a fissure in US press freedoms: It would also help curtail the destructive behavior that current US prosecutorial habits are inspiring globally. The proposed US federal shield law is officially called the Free Flow of Information Act, in reference to the renowned commitments of the Helsinki Accords more than 30 years ago -- human rights promises that still invigorate today's Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Passing the Free Flow of Information Act would send a clear message that prosecuting journalists is not in vogue anymore and would signal solidarity with nations that crave more press freedom.
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Media enabled the Iraq war
NY Times via Benton: In his new memoir, “What Happened,” Scott McClellan, the former White House press secretary, said the national news media neglected their watchdog role in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, calling reporters “complicit enablers” of the Bush administration’s push for war. Surprisingly, some prominent journalists have agreed. Katie Couric, the anchor of CBS Evening News, said on Wednesday that she had felt pressure from government officials and corporate executives to cast the war in a positive light. Jessica Yellin, who worked for MSNBC in 2003 and now reports for CNN, said on Wednesday that journalists had been “under enormous pressure from corporate executives, frankly, to make sure that this was a war presented in a way that was consistent with the patriotic fever in the nation.” On Thursday, she clarified her comments in a blog post, writing that her producers at MSNBC had wanted their coverage to reflect the patriotic mood of the country. A spokeswoman for General Electric, which owns NBC and MSNBC through its division NBC Universal, declined to speak about the specifics of the comments but said, “General Electric has never, and will never, interfere in the editorial process at NBC News.”
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Commercialism & pluralism don’t mix
EU Parliament: There is a "considerable risk" that the private media's pursuit of profit could compromise its ability to act as a watchdog for democracy, warns a report adopted by the Culture and Education Committee on Tuesday. MEPs advocate "editorial charters" to prevent owners, shareholders or governments from interfering with editorial content, and ombudsmen to protect media freedom. They also want status of weblogs clarified, and suggest introducing fees for commercial use of user-generated content.
Market mechanisms are not enough to guarantee media pluralism, warns the own-initiative report by Marianne Mikko (PES, ET), which voices concern about the concentration of ownership in the media business, "as experience shows that the unrestricted concentration of ownership jeopardises pluralism and cultural diversity".
More
Back to mags for Wash Post
Change is in the air at the Washington Post Co. The venerable media company has seen the departure of longtime interactive honcho Caroline Little, as well as online wunderkind Rob Curley, as it tries to integrate its online and print newsrooms more tightly. The Wall Street Journal reports that Curley is leaving for the Las Vegas Sun after a botched effort at hyper-local with LoudonExtra.com, a site that never caught on in the community, largely because the developers never got out into the community. "I dropped the ball," he told the Journal. "I won't drop it in Vegas, dude." Meanwhile, Washington Post Co is hoping that Slate's Jacob Weisberg can extend the success of his online magazine into other niches, as Weisberg is being tapped to run the new Slate Group, a kind of start-up venture within the Post. "I think it's sort of the logic by which Time magazine gave birth to Sports Illustrated and People, and it's the idea that you can incubate a magazine within another magazine," Weisberg told Reuters.
Online Publishers Assn
IDC: Online ads will surpass TV by 2012
Google and others have long touted Internet advertising as the perfect safe haven for marketers during a recession. IDC is now backing that concept, predicting that U.S. online advertising revenues will explode, doubling from $25.5 billion in 2007 to $51.1 billion in 2012 -- with a compound annual growth rate of 14.9%. Plus, online advertising will go from an 8.6% share of all ads to hit 15.6%, overtaking broadcast TV and newspapers and trailing only direct marketing. That's not bad, considering that IDC thinks that overall ad spending will contract in the years ahead. The firm also believes video advertising will boom. "What will also drive this trend is that consumers are starting to realize that, as opposed to TV, Internet video lets them watch what they want, when they want, and increasingly where they want," said IDC's Karsten Weide.
Online Publishers Assn; IDC release
IAB: European online ad growth is huge
If you think online advertising growth will be eye-popping in the US, watch out for Europe, where growth is almost stratospheric. According to the IAB Europe, online advertising was up 40% last year to hit $17.4 billion -- compared to 26% growth in the U.S. If those rates of growth continue, European online ad revenues will surpass the U.S. by 2010. The IAB noted that the UK, Germany and France vacuumed up two-thirds of all online ad money in Europe last year, but that growth rates were higher in less developed markets: Greece saw 90% growth, Spain hit 55% and Slovenia notched 49%. The IAB predicted that 10 European countries will have 10% of all ads going online -- up from 7 countries that already have that percentage. "Not only is the growth coming from some of the smaller markets...but also from the more mature countries as companies move their advertising budgets online for the first time," said IAB Europe honcho Alain Heureux.
Online Publishers Assn
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