What Right To Privacy Do You Have In An Age Of User-Generated Media?

from the not-very-much dept

Dave writes in to point to a ruling by the "Press Complaints Commission" in the UK, saying that the media needs to be careful to respect individual's privacy rights in making use of user-generated media. As we all know, many news organizations have increasingly learned to leverage the fact that so many people are carrying around mobile phones that can take photos and record video. When news stories break, the news organizations are more than willing to make use of this content to add value to the story -- as they should. However, what if the video is taken in private somewhere and reveals things it shouldn't? That was the case before the PCC, where a news organization had used a student's cameraphone video of an unruly classroom in a story. The school complained that no one had given consent to be filmed. The PCC noted that the story clearly was a matter of public interest, but that the people in the video should have been hidden, so as not to be as easily identified.

Of course, this sounds good in theory, but becomes very tricky in practice. In fact, this story is similar to one a few years ago, where a school punished the students for filming an angry outburst by a teacher, rather than blaming the teacher for the outburst. The efforts to hide these videos often comes across more as a way to coverup the very problem that resulted in the filming in the first place. It's like blaming a whistle blower. At the same time, it's ridiculous to think that such content can be blocked. Sure, they can tell "the media" that it can't use that kind of content, but that won't stop the content from showing up on YouTube anyway. In fact, this ruling makes it harder for the "official" media to report on certain stories, while guaranteeing that others will do so instead.

Filed Under: newspapers, user-generated content, video

Google Wants People In The News To Clarify News Reports

from the interesting-ideas dept

There's an old saying about the press, that whenever you're involved in a news story, you can almost guarantee that the press coverage will get the story wrong. It's amazing how true this is -- but it appears that Google News is trying to do something about it. It's launching a new service that will let those who are involved in a particular news story comment on the news coverage on Google News. That is, if there's a story about you, you'll have the opportunity to add your own perspective (or counter any points you disagree with in the news coverage) and have it shown on Google News linked to the relevant news stories. It's an interesting idea, though it has a number of hurdles to overcome. First of all, Google just set themselves up to be besieged by people who want to comment on a story who aren't actually participants (or by people pretending to be part of the story). The hassle of figuring out who's really part of the story isn't going to be easy. In fact, it seems like it would almost definitely be more costly than whatever benefit this might bring. On top of this, Danny Sullivan lays out a number of problems with this idea in the link above, starting with the fact that people already have the ability to post their own thoughts on their own sites. Wouldn't it simply make a lot more sense if Google and its magical algorithm did a better job of associating such responses to the news stories? Still, in an age where Congress still thinks the Fairness Doctrine is needed, here's yet another example of how technology is making sure that everyone has ample opportunity to get "their side" out on any particular story.

Filed Under: google news, newspapers
Companies: google

R.I.P TimesSelect?

from the good-riddance dept

The New York Times' plan to lock up its premium content known as TimesSelect was a terrible idea to begin with, and every piece of data that came out about it merely confirmed that the program was unpopular. Sure, the company drew a modest amount of revenue from it, but in exchange it severely limited the exposure of its top columnists, not to mention all of the foregone advertising revenue from the lower traffic. Now comes word that the paper is set to pull the plug on the offering (via Romenesko). At this point, it's still just a rumor, but either way, the company has to arrive at this conclusion eventually. Newspaper publishers cling to the dream that one day all of their content will be safely behind paywalls and that readers will suddenly wake up with an allergy to money and favor this model. But the trend is only moving one direction, as there's even talk about the Wall Street Journal, the one paper that's had a moderate amount of success charging for access, making its content free.

Filed Under: media, newspapers, timesselect
Companies: new york times

Are British Papers Going To Start Demanding Payments From Drudge?

from the this-is-a-local-paper,-for-local-people dept

While some British newspapers have realized that Google (and other sites that send them traffic) are helpful to them, there are still plenty that feel like Google should be paying them, for some reason. It's a strange argument: Google sends them traffic and readers, yet should be paying for that "privilege"? If the papers can't figure out how to monetize the traffic Google and other sites send them, that's their own problem. Now comes word, though, that The Drudge Report sends UK papers more than three times the amount of traffic that Google does -- so will the papers start making noise about suing Drudge for a cut of his ad revenue? The editorial director of a UK news outfit illustrates the backwards mentality some papers have by saying "You are just paying an awful lot of bandwidth and an awful lot of server costs to serve those people." Well, if that's such a concern, why have a web presence at all? That would drive bandwidth and server costs down to pretty much zero. Instead of seeing international visitors and the additional traffic they generate as a burden, they should be seen for what they are -- an opportunity to further grow revenues and profits.

Filed Under: britain, media, newspapers
Companies: drudge report, google

Washington Post Shows That The Newspaper Business Isn't Doomed

from the doing-okay dept

While many in the newspaper business are whining about the struggles some newspapers face, a few in the actual newspaper business are actually adapting and thriving. A detailed article in Fortune takes a look at how the Washington Post has thrived, while its competitors have struggled. The keys aren't too surprising: diversify away from just news, embrace new outlets for news and invest in unique investigative reporting skills. There are still plenty of questions, but it becomes clear very quickly that the Washington Post knows that it's future is quite different than it's past -- and it's not going to wait around to find out how things play out. Instead, it wants to drive news innovations forward, while others complain that nothing can be done.

Filed Under: newspapers
Companies: washington post

Perhaps The Problem With Journalists Is They're Taught By Professors Who Think Google Is To Blame For Newspaper Decline

from the just-a-thought dept

Back in May we wrote about a journalism professor from Berkeley named Neil Henry claiming that it was it was Google's social responsibility to give money to journalists because Google News was putting newspapers out of business (which was followed by an equally bizarre claim from another journalist that this claim didn't go far enough and newspapers should actually sue Google). The problems with this statement are obvious. First, it's not Google that's killing journalism. If anything, Google has helped drive much more traffic to many websites of various newspapers. That's good for those newspapers. Second, Google doesn't host any content at all. It's not competing with newspapers, it's simply acting as a guide so people can find the news on those newspapers' websites. It would be the same thing as blaming a newspaper for harming the movie business because it has movie listings. After all, that provides "choice" to readers who can pick which movie they want (just like Google provides a choice about which news site people can pick to read news stories). Finally, Google doesn't even have any ads on its Google News pages -- showing that Google isn't even making any money on the site that these journalists claim is making so much money.

We pointed out much of this, as did many other sites. As a journalist and a journalism professor, you would think that perhaps Mr. Henry would have bothered to read up on this and understand why his claims don't make sense -- and then either apologize and change his opinion or, at least, respond to the criticism. Instead, as an anonymous reader points out, he's simply repeating the bizarre claim that Google has a social responsibility to give money to journalists, while talking about how his former students are losing jobs. It must be emotional to have your students losing jobs, but perhaps it has more to do with learning from a journalism professor who doesn't seem to understand how the thing he's criticizing actually works (and then ignores everyone who points out his incorrect statements).

Filed Under: newspapers
Companies: google

LA Times Kills Editorial On How To Revitalize Both Music And Newspaper Industries To Avoid Pissing Off Both

from the how-dare-you-make-a-suggestion-that-will-help-us! dept

Last month, when the news first came out that Prince did a deal to have a UK newspaper give away a free copy of his latest CD with every paper, we noted that this showed a great way to increase the value for both the music industry and the newspaper industry in one single move. Apparently, I wasn't the only one to think so. A columnist for the LA Times, Patrick Goldstein, felt the same way as well -- and actually had some fantastic ideas to improve on Prince's experiment in a way that would add tremendous value to a bunch of musicians and the LA Times in a single move. Of course, the LA Times sometimes is known for catering to the incumbent established entertainment industry which so dominates LA -- and perhaps that's why the LA Times' new associate editor killed the column and refused to run it (found via Romenesko). Of course, in true Streisand Effect fashion, the column has leaked and it's hard to see any reason why the LA Times would spike it, other than it was afraid of pissing off the established recording industry.

You can read the whole spiked column at the link above, and it's a worthwhile read. The smart changes Goldstein proposed were that it be a regular series of free CDs distributed with the newspaper (encouraging more subscriptions and positioning the paper as a "tastemaker"). And rather than have the newspaper pay the musicians directly (which is how the Prince deal worked), have a sponsor pony up the money to be associated with the musician (this is exactly how much music is already created). Everyone wins in this deal... except stubborn record labels who don't understand that they should be in the music promotion business and think they're only in the business of selling plastic discs. The musicians get paid, get a lot more attention and are likely to make even more in terms of a wider audience willing to go to more shows, buy more merchandise and increase the amount future sponsors will be willing to pay. The newspaper gives people a fantastic new reason to subscribe and reinvents the role of the newspaper as a tastemaker. Sponsors get a great way to associate their brand with hot musicians. And, most importantly, everyone else benefits by getting access to more good music. Yet, in a town where the entertainment industry rules all, apparently, protecting obsolete business models is more important than publishing interesting columns with fantastic suggestions for creating a great new service.

Goldstein's final paragraph is too good not to repeat (especially since the LA Times doesn't think it's worth even printing once:

"Giving music away doesn't mean it has lost its value, just that its value is no longer moored to the price of a CD. Like it or not, the CD is dying, as is the culture of newsprint. People want their music -- and their news -- in new ways. It's time we embraced change instead of always worrying if some brash new idea -- like giving away music -- would tarnish our sober minded image. When businesses are faced with radical change, they are usually forced to ask -- is it a threat or an opportunity? Guess which choice is the right answer."

Filed Under: music, newspapers
Companies: la times

Newspapers Feeling The Brunt Of Housing Slump

from the crack-up dept

Real estate professionals aren't the ones seeing the way the internet is affecting their industry. Major newspapers, which already have enough problems to deal with, are taking a major hit from lower real estate listings (via Paul Kedrosky), many of which have shifted to the internet. There are two things going on here. There's the general shift of all advertising away from newspapers and there's the housing slump, which has taken its own toll on listing volume. At this point, the newspapers are trying to make the case that the slow business is mainly the result of the housing slump, rather than anything more fundamental. Fair enough, but then you have to look at newspaper earnings during the housing boom, which were already quite poor, and adjust them down even further, in order to get an accurate picture of their past performance.

Filed Under: advertising, housing, newspapers

Google Print Revival Still Kicking

from the printing-money? dept

Late last year, Google announced that it would take another shot at selling ads for print media. The company had tried this once before with magazines, but the effort didn't pan out particularly well. This time around, the service is for newspapers, and the company believes it may be working out a little better. After the initial trial, the company is ready to let more advertisers participate in the program. Participating newspapers say they've been fairly pleased with the offering, as the platform is allowing them to find new advertisers. Still, the platform can only accomplish so much. No advertising system is going to change the fact that the slump in the newspaper business is rapidly getting worse. And of course, print ads will never have other attributes that make Google's traditional model appealing, such as the ease with which performance and ROI can be measured.

Filed Under: advertising, newspapers
Companies: google