Colin's Corner

Conversational Marketing Summit

For those unable to attend the Conversational Marketing Summit in New York videos of all the sessions have been posted online.

Flash content now being indexed by search engines

According to VentureBeat Adobe, Google and Yahoo are about to make it easier to have rich multimedia websites in the Flash file format (SWF)

Previously, search engines only indexed the “static” text and links on a site, falling far short of capturing all the content.

“It’s like reading the index of a book, rather than the book itself,” says Justin Everett-Church, a senior product manager for Flash.

Google made the announcement on their official blog noting they had developed a new algorithm for indexing textual content in Flash files of all kinds, from Flash menus, buttons and banners, to self-contained Flash websites.

The result is that Web designers can expect improved visibility of their published Flash content, and can expect to see better search results and snippets. There's more info on the Webmaster Central blog about the Searchable SWF integration.

Further coverage on Infoworld, Computerworld, Editechial and Search Engine Land

Nokia acquires Symbian and goes open

With a strong move that pits Nokia strongly against Google, and Apple, the world's largest mobile device manufacturer, (Nokia is currently responsible for around 60% of the of the world's smartphone market), has joined forces with other mobility heavyweights to create an open mobile software platform centered on the Symbian operating system. Nokia will acquire the remaining 52 percent stake in Symbian Ltd. that it doesn't already own for a price tag of roughly $410 million.

Although the free Symbian project will not start till 2009, it may beat the Google-backed Android phone to market, and provide a royalty-free phone that will build on a large existing installed base. With AT&T as a prominent backer, the move could also give Nokia a stronger position in the U.S. market where Symbian has so far struggled. Symbian, is hugely popular throughout Europe, and controls around two-thirds of the market for smartphone operating systems

Currently, there are more than 200 million phones across 235 models that are based on the Symbian OS, along with tens of thousands of third-party applications available for it.

Google Android and the Open Handset Alliance comprise more than 30 partners, including heavyweights like Sprint (NYSE:S), T-Mobile and China Mobile. It was reported that Android has been plagued by setbacks however, Google is adamant that its Android plans remain on schedule and devices based on Android will be available in the second half of this year.

Apple raised the bar with the launch of the iPhone. A sleek touch screen user interface, coupled with the ability to browse the mobile web has been embraced by smartphone consumers. Apple has always been the master of integrating hardware and software. They've understood the critical importance of the user interface - making their produces intuitive and easy to use as well as attractive. Now Nokia also has an integrated software and hardware platform coupled with a strong developer platform and will be a formidable worldwide competitor.

Whether the Symbian Foundation will be successful remains to be seen - as The Register suggests The most damaging problem is that Symbian's licensees may have no desire to make Nokia stronger now that it owns the operation 100 per cent. Because it dominates the "platform" already by market share, the playing field tips steeply towards Finland. Why bother joining - to make the market leader even stronger?

Om Malik at GigaOm (good to see is recovering well from a recent heart attack) has a good summary on the "new mobile reality" and thinks that LiMo, Symbian, and Apple have the best chance of "winning big," with Android and Microsoft fighting for that remaining spot at the table. Where RIM ends up remains the subject of much speculation.

Google moves into web metrics

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal Google plans to unveil a new web metrics service that measures internet usage and competing with comScore and Nielsen Online. These services gather data by using panels and conducting surveys, and many claim their results can be inconsistent and incomplete.

Google's service will be based mostly on data from their Web servers and will be offered to marketers free.

In addition, Google is expected to roll out a new tool aimed at showing how Web surfers respond to online ads. It will compare groups of people who are exposed to an ad with others who haven't seen it.

Google's new web metric tool, which will also rely on some data gleaned from panels of human users and other sources, is similar to one developed by New York-based start-up Quantcast. Given their scale Google certainly has the potential to shake up the Web-measurement business.

comScore shares dipped 6% on the news

Next Google statistics on mobile usage ?

Technology Trends - Morgan Stanley Report

An updated Morgan Stanley Report on Technology Trends was released on 12th June (but I only just noticed!) As usual Mary Meeker and the team have crammed in a huge amount of information. They cover the importance of user driven editorial and user selection of content and offer some suggestions as to why Facebook is growing faster than MySpace.

A large segment of the presentation is focused on my favorite topic - mobile and the longer-term opportunities around the mobile platform - with the suggestion that Mobile to PC is the new client -server model. Unfortunately, the US remains the laggard in many mobile categories (slide 57)

Over at Communities Dominate Brands Tomi Ahonen pull the iPhone statistics from the report

Worth a read

Google Trends for Websites

Google announced on Friday on the Web Master Central Blog that Google Trends had been updated to give information about actual popularity of websites based on their daily unique visitors.

If you have a popular enough website included in the results from Google Trends and you'd prefer it wasn't, you're out of luck. There is no way to remove your site. Google has not included their own properties - which on first sight may appear hypocritical but a reasonable explanation is offered for this omission.

Google Trends Combines information from a variety of sources, such as aggregated Google search data, aggregated opt-in anonymous Google Analytics data, opt-in consumer panel data, and other third-party market research. The new feature pits Google against a number of well-established players in the traffic data space, including comscore, Compete, Alexa, Quantcast and a host of others.

Features of Google Trends:

- Daily traffic numbers of users sent via Google search (log in to see details)
- Related sites that were either searched for or visited in the same session.
- The ability to compare up to five sites at a given time with bar graphs and charts for each.
- Popularity by different regions.
- Estimates of the amount of unique visitors that the site has received over time with charts and graphs.

It's important to note that Google Trends for Websites doesn't give you Google's raw data -- it uses a majority of it's search data, data from Google Analytics, and some data from market research firms, and other sources. In order to get the full effect of "Google Trend For Websites" you must be logged into a Google account to see all of the data.

Micro Persuasion’s Steve Rubel has made it even easier to use Google Trends with the release of a bookmarklet that you can use to get there. Just drag the link from his blog entry to your browser toolbar, and a single click will show you the trends information for the site that you’re on.

There's commentary on Google Trends from Fred Wilson at his A VC blog.

In addition to the launch og Google Trends for Websites Venture Beat notes the release of an API for Webmaster Tools. According to Web Master Central The supported features in the first version of the Webmaster Tools API are the following:

Managing Sites
Retrieve a list of your sites in Webmaster Tools
Add your sites to Webmaster Tools
Verify your sites in Webmaster Tools
Remove your sites from Webmaster Tools
Working with Sitemaps
Retrieve a list of your submitted Sitemaps
Add Sitemaps to Webmaster Tools
Remove Sitemaps from Webmaster Tools

Will mobile advertising be a disaster ?

Over at IDG's Computerworld, Here come the cell phone ad disaster, Mike Elgan compares the upcoming revenue gold rush on mobile devices to the volcanic destruction of a Minoan civilization on the Greek Island of Santorini

Listing plenty of unpleasant ways, advertisers could seek to interrupt you on your personal mobile device:

Unwanted calls.
Recorded advertising voice mails.
SMS ads that ring your phone.
MMS ads that ring your phone.
E-mail ads.
Advertiser-supported software and services.
Web pages that force you to view an ad before you can see the page.
Location-based advertising -- you'll walk by a store, and it will ring your phone to tell you about a sale.
Viral videos.
Text, e-mail or Web-based ads that encourage you to "click to call."
Search ads tailored for phones.

Mike concludes The disaster is coming, and there's not much any of us can do about it other than reward companies that don't engage in cell phone advertising, punish those that do and hope for the best.

I agree with Mike that there's certainly the potential for disaster, and inevitably there will surely be some terrible abuses as the mobile industry matures. However, the sheer scale of the mobile market, coupled with the ability to deliver contextually relevant and targeted information that improves the user experience means that some of the inevitable initial problems will get resolved.

Handled properly, users will value additional information provided by marketers to help their purchasing decisions. But, if the customer experience is mishandled, the backlash from users will irreparably damage a brand. Appreciating the viral power of mobile and the communications power of mobile social networks will ensure that marketers who look to engagement rather interruption will win over the loyalty of mobile consumers.

Will Apple look to mobile advertising revenues ?

As expected, Apple announced the iPhone 3G at their World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco . The phone will be available on July 11th for the reduced price of $199 for the 8GB version via a subsidy, as AT&T have adjusted their relationship so that Apple no longer gets a share of the revenue stream from the carriers - rumored to be as high as 30%. The new data plan for 3G will be $30 per month - up from the $20 per month for the old 2G service.

In the US, it seems as if AT&T will continue as the exclusive carrier. As an international traveler - I remain highly frustrated by AT&T's overseas rates and the inability without jail breaking the phone to swap SIMS card from foreign carriers. If Apple is really serious about enterprise - let's see proper support for the international road warriors who want all the benefits of the iPhone and the new MobileMe service.

Apple shares initially fell on the news that Apple was giving up a revenue stream but what most analysts seemed to miss was that Apple may have its eye on a bigger revenue opportunity - off deck advertising. With control of the iPhone applications via the SDK and distribution via the iPhone apps store - Apple is in a marvelous position to look at different advertising revenue streams - from display advertising, direct response, sponsorships, in application (particularly in gaming) advertising. Different models can be developed where Apple and the application developer can share the advertising revenue streams.

Mobile advertising revenue streams are in their infancy but Apple has all the foundations in place to take advantage of what will become a huge business. One to watch.

For a great read on mobile advertising opportunities check out Mobile Advertising: Supercharge Your Brand in the Exploding Wireless Market by Chetan Sharma, Joe Herzog, and Victor Melfi

Leveraging print and mobile

Michael Zimbalist, head of R&D at The New York Times Company talks about the integration of mobile and print applications, referencing the opportunities around the use of 2D bar-codes. In addition to 2D bar-codes, I believe ViPR (visual pattern recognition) - taking photos with your camera to obtain additional information will take off over the next few years.

Michael also discusses the potential impact of the Semantic Web and device dependent media - displaying content appropriately for the device being used.

UBM / Informa Merger

According to a Reuters UK report, United Business Media and Informa are in early-stage merger talks to create a 3-billion-pound-plus ($5.9 billion) media company.

A source was confirming a story in the UK's Sunday Telegraph newspaper and declined to give any further information about the talks that could unite the owners of publications including Property Week and Lloyd's List.

Update coverage here from The Guardian and The Press Association.

UBM recently dropped the CMP brand name in the US restructuring CMP Technology into four separate businesses

The news follows speculation that Informa could be subject to a bid by Candover Investments who apparently were considering taking Informa's academic publishing and merging it with Springer Science + Business Media AG, the German academic publisher that Candover contols with its peer Cinven.

United Business Media Plc is a global business media company serving professional commercial communities, such as doctors, game developers, journalists, jewellery traders, farmers and pharmacists.

Informa provides specialist information and services for the academic and scientific, professional and commercial business communities and is a major organizer of conferences.

5 technologies to watch

BtoB Media Business covers five technologies to which media companies should pay attention.

The article leads - Technology alone may not make or break a media company, but it's certainly one of the most important pieces in the modern-day publishing puzzle. Media Business asked a handful of industry executives about technologies that are changing—or will soon change—the media landscape and how publishers can best take advantage of these advances

I had the opportunity to add a few comments about the mobile future.

Colin Crawford, exec VP-interactive at IDG Communications, said that while it may still be a few years premature, mobile will provide social network opportunities. For instance, Crawford envisions a scenario in the not-too-distant future in which an attendee at a conference such as MacWorld could look at his phone and see that there are 10 other passionate Mac users from his network within half a mile of him. More advanced visual communications such as video mail also will come, he said, though again, it might be a while.

“Some of this is early .... but in the next two to five years, mobile is going to surge forward,” he said. “As publishers, we're going to have to get our heads around exactly what is the right type of content to serve up to our users through various mobile devices. I don't believe it's a replica of ... the Web. I believe that we'll have to develop specific content and display it in the right way.”

My sentiments are echoed by Informa Telecoms and Media

"True mobile advertising does not exist today; what we are referring to is 'advertising on mobile.' When mobile advertising combines user profiling, location and communication with unique mobile inventory, the industry can justify charging a premium rate over existing immeasurable advertising channels."

Mobile revenue streams remain in their infancy but media companies should allocate resources to understand the platform, how their users consume mobile content and what service and applications they need to develop for their mobile audiences in the future. The revenues today don't justify massive investment but the same argument was used back in 1993/94 when online was nascent. Ultimately the mobile opportunities will outstrip today's online revenue opportunities - balancing short-term early investments with the potential long-term opportunities is key.

The new, news room

Based on research from the Context-Based Research Group, commissioned by The Associated Press in 2007, AP has designed a new model for news delivery to meet the needs of young adults, who are driving the shift from traditional media to digital news,

This study showed that consumers of news were overwhelmed and fatigued and were looking for assistance to get to the news content that interested them but also for guidance to help navigate to deeper content.

In addition to easier to navigate online news, AP has optimized a mobile news service for the iPhone and other smartphones

The unifying theme of AP's approach is that each piece of journalism is designed to give news consumers something worth discussing with their friends, acquaintances and co-workers.

The UK Telegraph has acted on many of the concepts and redesigned their web site with the result that the Telegraph has become the third most-visited national newspaper Web site in Britain– 17 million unique users in March 2008, compared to 7.2 million in March 2007,

The Telegraph has built a multi-layered news presentation by cross-linking current news stories with other relevant content – background, analysis,video, etc. By extending the user’s time on its Web site, The Telegraph is able to display more targeted and contextual advertising and consequently generate more revenue.

Editorially, the Telegraph has a simple-to-manage news strategy: headline first (via any available communication method – SMS, e-mail, phone call), followed by a 150-word brief, and, within an hour, a 450-word, multimedia story. Following that, assigned editors decide whether to commission analyses, opinion pieces, additional multimedia, etc.

For those interested in the Newsroom of the future check out the Next News Room discussion on Ning

Beyond Voice: Mapping the Mobile Marketplace

The Federal Trade Commission on May 6 and 7 held a Town Hall meeting, entitled "Beyond Voice: Mapping the Mobile Marketplace,” to explore issues surrounding the evolving area of mobile commerce (m-commerce) and the implications for consumer protection policy. The document is worth reading for insights into mobile trends from some of the leading players.

Online video advertising - a growth opportunity

eMarketer estimates that while online video ad spending in the US represents less than 4% of all Internet advertising, spending will more than triple to $4.3 billion by 2011 - especially as more viewers embrace full-length TV episodes and other video online.

The recently released numbers from the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) for FT 2007 are more conservative, identifying video advertising revenues at $324 MM for FY 2007 out of the total US online revenues of $21 billion but the expected growth of video advertising has prompted the IAB to release of format guidelines especially covering pre-roll ads which are limited to 30 seconds.

Echoing these sentiments, the Newspaper Association of America (NAA) has just released a report “Zooming In on Online Video: A Development & Growth Guide for Newspaper Web Sites.” that discusses the increase of online video (11.5 billion videos were viewed in the US March, according Comscore).

Additionally, to help identify the revenue opportunity around online video advertising, the NAA has issued a detailed report Making Money: Pre-Roll, Post-Roll and the Ads In Between

The main conclusion: everyone needs to jump on online video. “While still a small percentage of total and local online advertising, online video represents an enormous opportunity for newspapers to grow revenue and audience,”

For the sites that monetize their online video pre-roll and banner ads are the most frequently sold advertising formats.

To date, although there is huge pressure from advertisers to run pre-rolls, Google has decided to go for the much less intrusive in-video advertising recently releasing the AdSense for video program

The relevancy of the video advertisement and its duration obviously are major factors in user satisfaction. Some publishers are finding that while users dislike the initial pre-roll video, they are willing to watch a "post" pre-roll that links the first video with subsequent ones.

Some other interesting video advertising technologies include those from VideoClix and Asterpix.These technologies allow objects in the video to become hyperlinks. Viewers can click on these in video hotspots and either additional information can be displayed in the viewer or they can link off to receive additional information or to buy a product.

To date, hot-spot objects require a mouse roll-over or click but with the success of Apple's iPhone, it's not hard to image that the user interface will be adapted to accommodate touch screen technology.

Online video ads are quickly becoming the medium of choice to drive both brand awareness and direct sales and rapid growth is expected over the next couple years as marketers start to see the ROI returns. Publishers need to be ready.

2D barcodes and ViPR

One of the most interesting aspects of mobile devices is their ability to link the physical and the digital world. 2D barcoding has been extremely popular in Japan and Korea for the last few years and is starting at last to penetrate the more mobile challenged regions of the world such as the US.

In the US, the uptake on 2D barcodes and other technologies linking the analogue and the digital world has been slower- largely due to lack of agreement among the five major carriers as to which technology to adopt but even more importantly, the expensive data plans that still exist around MMS in the US and other Western countries.

One major test around 2D bar-coding and mobile discovery has been conduced at Case Western Reserve University to mixed results with a fairly negative article in the NY Times covering the experiment.

ViPR (Visual Pattern Recognition) allows the camera phone to take a photograph of an object or image - the user sends this photo to an email address after which the user receives additional information such as an invite to buy, a coupon or free gift - whatever action the marketer wants to take place.

There are various companies experimenting with ViPR technologies including MobiGlyphs.com a subsidiatry of Compex Inc. and Snap Tell which recently conduced a fun contest around the movie "Where in the world is Osama Bin Laden" and received coverage in the NYTimes for their technology.

For ViPR and 2D technologies to become more prevalent over the next years the carriers will need to more aggressively push the technologies and include them with new mobile devices - with the imminent release of the iPhone 2.0 there will be several applications released over the next month or so using these technologies which will spur adoption. While adoption has been slow to date, it's likely to pick up very rapidly over the next couple of years. One to watch !

IDG's move to "the third screen"

Just over a year ago I wrote about IDG's transition from being a print centric to web centric company.

It's often too easy to theorize and be visionary but the real proof comes when you have to execute.

Today's story in the NYTimes talks about IDG's execution over the last year, with particular reference to the team at Infoworld who successfully closed the print publication and focused entirely on online, event and mobile opportunities.

There's a lot to this story but one of the most important issues is that by being unburdened by print allowed the team at Infoworld the opportunity to focus on the changing needs of their customers and to develop online , event and mobile products. It's changed the culture of that brand.

The philosophy of listening to customers and really understanding your marketplace has been installed in the organization over the last four decades by Pat McGovern and is well summarized in a recent FT interview.

Last week in Boston, I had the opportunity to attend an internal training course of our senior managers (training is also viewed as a key competitive advantage by the company). I've experienced similar events over my fifteen years at IDG, but watching Pat McGovern work the room during dinner with those nineteen, potential future IDG executives, making them feel so special by recognizing their contributions to the company underscored the very special fabric of this organization.

In 1993 I attended such a training boot camp, having arrived in the US from the UK after being Managing Director of Dennis Publishing, Ltd. my team mate on the case study project was Bob Carrigan, now the CEO of IDG Communications Inc. I guess IDG's investment in us has paid off !

So what's next ?

Of course there is more to be done on the transition to online. In particular building on the peer to peer knowledge of our communities. Today marketers want not only eyeballs, they want truly engaged and participatory audiences and through programs such as IDG's Market Fusion initiative we demonstrate the deep engagement of our IT and Tech audiences.

Next is mobile.

While, mobile marketing initiatives are still modest and the consumption of mobile content is still in its infancy, things are going to change rapidly over the next several years. I subscribe to the belief that we're seeing the dawn of a new mass media

The mobile opportunities and the move to the 7th Mass Media are well articulated by Tomi Ahonen and Alan Moore.

While the monoculture of South Korea is much different to Western cultures, they are at the epicenter of the convergence of the Internet, Telecommunications and Broadcast TV. Not everything that works within the South Korean culture will necessarily translate but publishers around the world ignore the rapid developments in this country at their peril.

To get a glimpse of the digital culture of South Korea read Digital Korea I handed out a copy to all the students at our internal training course last week. Over at the Industry Standard there is a discussion about the merger of the mobile phone and the web.

Obviously I'm not going to give away all our plans and initiatives but as the NYTimes article showed, IDG has successfully managed the transition from print to online, now I'm thinking about the transition from online to mobile.

Future postings

As has been painfully obvious - my blog output has been non existent for the last few months. It's been hard to blog and keep up with a demanding schedule both at work and home. IDG has launched a new site http://www.idgknowledgehub.com/ which is focused on marketing business opportunities and I'll be blogging there periodically. In addition I'm positing to an internal blog at IDG covering the mobile opportunities - on Facebook I'll continue to post interesting links.

The Future of Ink on Paper

Samir Husni, "Mr Magazine" discusses the future of ink and paper and the role of the news room

I guess I don't understand why "news" has to be an online medium and "information" has to be print. While there are some unique aspects to "paper technology" - emerging developments in e-paper readers and cost reductions in technology will erode this advantage over the next several years. Personally I'd like to see a tablet type portable that allows me to download my favorite paper, magazine or book via wireless and where appropriate read it in a design format that approximates to the analog original.

Maybe the rumored ultra-portable from Apple, supposedly making an appearance at Macworld Expo in January will give some pointers to future trends. The Amazon Kindle obviously appeals to enough people to be out of stock although it is too ugly and limited for my taste.

The Singularity Summit

I spent a good part of the week-end with 800 potential "posthumans" attending The Singularity Summit at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco. In case you don't know, The Singularity is the technological creation of smarter-than-human-intelligence . There was much discussion about how near or how far away we are from Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) or if we'll even notice when it comes around.

The audience was largely comprised of ernest young men - suggesting that the building of intelligent thinking machines based around engineering and computing prowess is less appealing to the female side of our species whose greater focus on emotional intelligence probably deserves a bigger place at this debating table before we unleash "smart" robots designed by men. Some excellent balance is provided by Renee Blodgett who acts as a consultant to the Singularity Summit

Some potential issues were brought into sharp focus during the opening keynote from Rodney Brooks the CTO of iRobot who noted the massive funding for robotics from the military who want to see future wars fought by machines rather than with humans !

A brave member of the audience challenged Rodney after his contention that The Geneva Convention was a way to control the inappropriate use of future military might. The questioner raised the issue of massive funding for robotic research from a government who has side-stepped certain key aspects of the Geneva Convention.

There is some excellent coverage of the event at Between The Lines including some refreshingly, non-techie and humorous coverage by Chris Matyszczyk

Some hightlights:
“What’s missing is a positive, compelling vision that ordinary people can buy into,” Paul Saffo

Peter Norvig, Director of Research at Google on the co-evolution of the web

“We were all surprised at how game theoretic it is,”. “We made a copy of the Web and indexed it and we thought it reflected of Web. Now we understand that we are in co-evolution. When we make a move, the Web changes and when Web changes we do. Optimizers look at what we do and we look at what they do and Web moves in different directions because of the interaction between them. We hadn’t expected that.”
Norvig also caused a bit of a stir when he said that computer error is probably killing a couple of hundred people a day in the medical profession. That was as cheery as the prediction from Wendell Wallach that "in the next few years there would be a major human disaster caused by a mistaken decision taken by a computer".

After telling us that Vampire bats were the first animals to bring altruism into the social world. Josh Hall focused on revisions to Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics * :

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

* Asimov added the Zeroth Law: "A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm"

Josh Hall wants the creation of robots to be a singular force for good. He wants them to understand the human condition, to be able to respond to the human condition, to improve themselves in order to improve the human condition.

As I tried to absorb all the information being presented I was left pondering certain issues:

While we are building machines that are capable of actions far superior that those of human beings, cultural and emotional issues are lagging far behind raw power.

Technology continues to develop along exponential lines - but the much slower linear evolutional of the human mind and body will either create a greater and greater gulf or (as many at the event believe) a merging of the human species with technology over the next few decades - at that point how human will we be ?

As we come up to the sixth anniversary of 911, the gulf between Western Capitalism and its reliance on technology and certain fundamentalist religious groups around the world with a radically different perspective seems to widen. I fear great clashes of ideology in the years ahead and we need to work on minimizing the inevitable conflict.

Check out the coverage of this incredibly thought provoking event. No matter your perspective these are real issues that require as wide a discussion as possible. Technology continues its exponential pace.

Time to bring back The Industry Standard ?

Following the final demise of Business 2.0 There has been some coverage regarding The Industry Standard.

Time To Bring Back The Industry Standard?
Posted by Eric Savitz

The Standard is coming back? Maybe, although a web-only format would be a lot more likely than a print magazine. Still it would be nice to have it back. Here’s hoping they do it.

See also Return of The Industry Standard and Good Luck Guys

Paid Content's The Industry Standard is Coming Back, Maybe, covers the IDG statement.

Also:

Will The Industry Standard Make A Comeback?

The Industry Standard 2.0?

The return of The Industry Standard

The Industry Standard’s next chapter

Publish2

I've long been a big fan of Scott Karp's Publishing 2.0 and was interested to read about the launch of his new company, Publish2, Inc. More coverage can be found here

Scott describes Publish2 as a social network and 2.0 platform for journalists (and independent “news bloggers,” “citizen” journalists, student journalists, i.e. ALL journalists, BROADLY defined), which aims to put journalists at the center of news on the web by creating a journalist-powered news aggregator.

He is joined by GigaOM contributing editor, Robert Young

I look forward to following the evolution of this site and wish Scott and Robert much success.

Zell to stop Google stealing his content ?

Sam Zell, the real estate magnate has kicked up a storm on the blogsphere (see Tech Meme http://www.techmeme.com/ for a collection of the articles covering the issue) after suggesting that newspapers should stop giving their content to the search engines.

Of course, IDG’s was not totally immune to such thinking a few years ago, but we realized we were wrong and got over it – fast !

Brilliant as he has proven to be in his field of expertise, it seems as if Sam Zell has not been paying attention. Sam Zell is going to lose billions on newspapers and the Washington Post has no idea what they're talking about.

These stories articulate why Sam Zell is wrong and why organizations such as Agence France-Presse (AFP) capitulated (although I’m not sure that’s how they position their new ménage à deux)

An interesting post by Lucas Grindly lays out a couple of arguments for Sam Zell's stance - I personally do not agree but it's one of the more interesting counter arguments I've read.

Just how powerful is Google and how will it evolve is an interesting debate but rather that worry about the future "artificial intelligence Googlezon", publishers need to focus on the here and now and build their brands around their local and vertical communities. It’s all about your audiences, not all about you.

Having just taken over PC World and Macworld, I know we still have a lot to do in this regard. The attitude, (despite obvious indications to the contrary that the audience needs to be front and center) is still one of pushing out content rather than pulling it in. This approach is a by-product of our print legacy and it's out of date.

I intend to work hard to change this approach at IDG and particularly at PC World and Macworld. In one memorable interaction with Steve Jobs he very calmly told me that is was not I was wrong, it was just that I needed an "attitude adjustment".

I suggest Sam Zell and his team quickly adjust their attitude to the internet or they will be joining the dodo.

Of course, I could be completely wrong and Sam Zell is a wily fox !

InfoWorld drops print edition to focus on online and events

Earlier today IDG and InfoWorld’s management announced the closure of InfoWorld’s print publication in order to focus our colleagues energies on the distribution of IT information via online and events. The last edition of InfoWorld will be 2nd April.

InfoWorld has spent the last few years aggressively pushing in non-print directions resulting in us being in a place where the InfoWorld brand will thrive for many years to come.

Recently InfoWorld’s revenue has been predominantly driven by its online and events business. Print no longer is the major product line at InfoWorld. So while the closure of a 27-year print publication is somewhat newsworthy, it is also a natural step in a plan that was put in place 2 years ago.

This move was discussed extensively with all our key marketers who keenly support InfoWorld’s strategy. The reality is that high-tech marketers are rapidly shifting their marketing investment to online and events, while they choose fewer print publications.

There is a definite "flight to quality" as advertisers select fewer brands. IDG has a number of leading brands and these are doing relatively well in print. In the future these print publications will evolve and adjust with the times in terms of design, trim size, and circulation but through all these future changes, we will continue to keep our eyes focused on the needs of readers and advertisers.

There are observations from InfoWorld's Editor in Chief, Steve Fox and from Virginia Hines, General Manager of InfoWorld's Online initiatives.

Some external blog commentary on InfoWorld’s move can be found at Dave Winer’s Scripting News and at Forbes on Tech Plus Matt McAlister’s Blog. Matt, an ex-InfoWorld staffer, is a good friend and colleague and his piece is overall very positive on the changes, but there is one comment with which I strongly disagree.

“IDG has been a deer in the headlights of the Internet 18-wheeler for years. “

Just not true. Over the last few years IDG’s management has pursued a determined and well thought through approach to change our organization.

Pat McGovern, IDG’s Chairman has been reinforcing IDG’s web centric approach, especially around the engagement of our communities. Most recently in an interview with Forbes.

Bob Carrigan, President of IDG Communications has publicly articulated our strategy on numerous occasions

And I've written extensively about IDG's transformation to an organization that is web centric which now has 35% of its US revenues coming from digital sources .

Print advertising has been declining for years and will likely continue to decline. However, despite the downturn in print advertising, IDG is coming off of one of the best years in its history. Why? Because we are executing well on a strategy that we have been talking about publicly and openly now for some time:

We are managing print for profit as we push aggressively into non-print businesses such as online and events including our mobile test with mDog

The sheer size of our non-print businesses is testament to the strengths of our brands and our online strategy.

I’m the first to admit we are on a long journey and there is still much to be done to realize this vision. It’s not easy for organizations to fundamentally change from their legacy roots. Paul Conley documents some of the internal training and issues with which we are dealing.

While it's hard sometimes to face reality and to deal with massive change, the mark of true leadership is to provide the strategy and vision for growth; to take our organization through these turbulent market shifts with compassion and understanding for those directly impacted.

Sam Whitemore summed it up well in his article:
Like all IDG titles, InfoWorld for years has been working on a print-to-online transition. The title’s big moneymakers are events and online. InfoWorld has several online projects unfolding – InfoClipz animations, podcasts and video, careers and the IT Exec-Connect community – all of which now stand to gain higher budgets without print in the picture. IDG’s decision should not affect the river of news flowing to InfoWorld.com from the IDG News Service. For tech PR pros, this news does mean that “pitching a story” is increasingly vestigial language. PR should accept online tech content in all its variety, and develop new ways to serve the decision-makers they wish to influence.

Scott Karp observes

… if InfoWorld can make the transition from print publishing to online publishing without going out of business, without diminishing its value to readers, and without laying off a lot of people, it will prove to the rest of the publishing industry that folding the print publication does not mean folding the business.
Today is a historic one for IDG and I’m proud to be a member of a company that is taking such bold steps as part of a continuing strategy to transform our organization.

Howard Sholkin, IDG's Director of Corporate Communications who can be contacted at howard_sholkin@idg.com (617) 239-7882 will handle requests for additional information.

From Evangelism to Execution, the next chapter

For the last few years I’ve been evangelizing a transition from a print centric to a web centric culture at IDG. Events and print are very important components of our brands but there is little doubt that the current rapid growth momentum is with our online businesses. We’re evolving as a media company, responding to the information needs of our users and the desire of our marketers to reach active, engaged technology buyers.

The distribution of media continues to proliferate via all forms of appliances - connected personal devices such as the game changing iPhone and other smart communication devices, personal digital devices; various forms of ultra portable PCs such as the Ultra Mobile Personal Computer (UMPC); connected entertainment devices such as the Sansa Connect and potentially, future wireless devices supporting information display via electronic paper.

Today the buzz about the future direction of the technology information and entertainment industry is happening less at events such as CeBIT and more at the various wireless and mobile events such as CTIA and of course (shameless IDG plug) Macworld Conference and Expo and E for All Expo. The “Personal Computer” is becoming the Personal Communications device. It’s an incredibly exciting time to be in the publishing industry. The pace of change is incredible but exhilarating.

It’s also a tremendous honor to be asked to take over the leadership of two of IDG’s key brands – PCWorld and Macworld. Now I get to work with some tremendously talented individuals to execute on the transformation I have been talking about.

These two brands have had a remarkable history over the last 25 years – chronicling the history of the personal computer industry - providing millions of technology buyers with credible, trusted, authoritative advice in their business and personal lives. When these brands launched in the early eighties and for a couple of decades following, their content was all about the personal computer – the PC or Mac - – today the coverage has evolved to cover Personal Computing and Personal Communications in its broadest sense.
The coverage now continues to expand to cover the digital lifestyle and digital ecosystem. It’s now less about products in isolation and more about products as part of personal technology solutions.

Everything is becoming networked. We can now interact with and consume digital content – at our desk, at home, on the go – anywhere we choose. However, the good news for technology focused media companies such as IDG is that this connected utopia is still a lot easier in theory than in practice. We will have no shortage of content for a very longtime.

The Internet has had a profound impact on IDG’s business. We no longer just have the luxury of stable print products where our editors impart their knowledge of technology to a clearly defined audience. Life has got extremely messy and complicated. Thanks to the web, our audiences have been expanded by demographics and psychographics and by location. Our content has been extended so we can now cover topics and special interest areas in a manner that previously would not have been cost effective in print.

The print versus online debate misses the point. As a media company we are platform agnostic in how we deliver content whether it's print, online, via mobile devices, or e-paper or in person at conference and events. We deliver valuable information about the technology industry in whatever form our audiences want to consume it. All the different media formats have their advantages. However, in the online world we are now facilitators rather than just originators. We mesh and mash up content from original sources, from vendors and most importantly from our engaged community members.

Whether or not you buy into the hype of “Web 2.0” it’s hard to argue there has been a fundamental behavioral shift in how people interact share and create information. I firmly believe that all publishers must find ways to truly embrace and engage their communities. Brands are defined by their communities - that’s our differentiation and competitive advantage in today's world of search, aggregation and social networking.

This is an exciting time for me, for IDG and for the great teams of people behind PCWorld and Macworld. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to my friend and colleague, Jeff Edman, who has been an inspiring leader at PCWorld and who is universally loved and respected by people inside and outside PCWorld. His gift to me is a talented team of people who really care about their product. I am really looking forward to working with them all as together we have a blast developing our brands in this new digital world.

The official corporate PR will go out from IDG on Monday but now the leadership change at PC World and Macworld has been communicated to my colleagues there, it seemed appropriate to use this blog to announce the change. It’s going to be a very exciting journey ahead.

USAToday Redesigns

USAToday has launched a major re-design to their site.

In the "comments from the editor" section Ken Paulson identifies the change in approach as well as the obvious design changes:

With the new features we've introduced on the site, readers will have the ability to:

• Scan other news sources directly on USATODAY.com
• See how readers are reacting to stories
• Recommend stories and comments to other readers
• Comment directly on stories
• Participate in discussion forums
• Write reviews (of movies, music and more)
• Contribute photos
• Better communicate with USA TODAY staff

I am a firm believer that a key differentiator for media brands is to more fully integrate their communities and provide a platform and tools to their audiences so that they actively participate with the content on the site.

The site's new features are designed to better involved the community. There is nothing truly innovative but the tools are solid and I'm sure will be expanded. However the majority of comments to date shows that a lot of the initial feedback is unfavorable but that's inevitable with any change.

While the design may need some adjustment based on user feedback, the underlying approach to embracing the community makes a lot of sense and the editors of USA Today deserve a lot of credit for taking a much bolder approach than many of their colleagues.

I was a little surprised they dropped down the placement of the 300x200 ad to below the fold on the left hand side with a smaller rich media ad above the fold.

Comments from around the web have been including in the Community Center

The User Revolution and The Media Divide

I recently read a couple of reports that examine the rapidly changing media landscape, its business models and the importance of involving the communities we serve.

The IBM report identifies four primary business models it suggests will coexist through 2010

Traditional media – This model relies on professionally made and branded content delivered through a “walled” conditional access environment and with dedicated devices. This is where most content owners and distributors operate today.

Walled communities – This model is based on distribution of niche and user- and community-generated content within a conditional access environment through dedicated devices. Typically, these are traditional businesses that have expanded their “walls” to include nontraditional features and experiences.

Content hyper-syndication – This model makes professionally produced content available in open channels, without proprietary access “walls” or dedicated devices.

New platform aggregation – This model relies on user-generated content and open distribution platforms. It is arguably the most disruptive model, as neither incumbent content owners nor distributors have legacy advantages here. Most media companies seeking entry will likely have to “buy in” for Speed.

The IBM report came up with 10 recommendations to help traditional companies face up to the immediate threat from the new media world and the eventual collision with their traditional partners. AlwaysOn provides a summary

1 Put consumers at the center of your business
Create a consumer-obsessed culture and place a premium on continuous consumer feedback.

2 Give control to consumers

3 Deliver experiences, not just content

4 Leverage virtual worlds

5 Innovate business models

6 Redefine partnerships, while reducing fallout

7 Shift investments from traditional business to new models

8 Create a flexible business design

9 Determine entry strategy for going “open”

10 Make user behavior a competitive advantage

The report quesitons whether or not traditional media is adapting quickly enough.

The other report is from Piper Jaffray The User Revolution: The New Advertising Ecosystem and The Rise of the Internet as a Mass Medium

1. Global online advertising revenue is exprected to reach $81.1 billion by 2011, representing a 21% CAGR (2006-2011).

2. The User Revolution. The advertising world is going through a revolution, -the "User Revolution" as it is happening primarily with the consumers, who are taking control of content consumption and branding. This trend will cause a significant rise in prominence of the Internet as a major content consumption and marketing medium.

3. "Communitainment." (Ugh!) The Internet has increasingly become a principal medium for community, communication, and entertainment--three areas that have collided together and are impacting each other's growth--generating a new type of activity that Pipper Jaffray calls communitainment.

4. The Internet Is Mainstream. The Internet has become a mainstream media outlet that now rivals traditional media for reach and advertising dollars.

5. Media Fragmentation. The proliferation of online and offline media outlets has resulted in shrinking television audiences and an increasingly fragmented media landscape.

6. The Golden Search. Search continues to gain ground, driven by the rise of search as the New Portal, the increasing use of search in branding campaigns, and the local search opportunity.

7. Google's wide variety of non-search-related products creates a virtuous cycle of brand affinity that drives incremental search volume.

8.Video Ads Could Drive The Next Wave. Internet video ads could become a game changer for large brand advertisers, who are used to the 15- or 30-second TV commercial

9. Internet Usage Patterns Are Changing. Portals maintain the highest reach, but the fastest growing category of destinations is communitainment sites such as MySpace and Facebook.

10. Ad networks are experiencing increased demand due to increasing Internet fragmentation, desire for more targeted inventory, increasing usage of networks for branding, and increased site visibility.
Agencies are rapidly evolving into more sophisticated, technology-savvy entities that combine best of breed offerings.

Companies to watch: Google (and YouTube), Yahoo!, Disney, News Corp, Time Warner, Microsoft, InterActive, Facebook, Craigslist, Brightcove, Yelp, SINA Corp., Baidu, aQuantive, ValueClick, 24/7 Media, Netflix, Wikipedia, MobiTV, Digg, and Hakia to be the most important players to watch.

The finding of the reports should not come as a massive surprise for those who have been watching the developments in our industry.

For me it is, always was and always will be about managing the relationship with those who consume and absorb our content. It’s about developing the audiences’ emotional connection with our brands. The communities around our brands – really define our brands and they need to be nurtured. Our communities are a competitive advantage in a world of search, aggregation, syndication, mash-ups and social networking.

The transformation of IDG

For over four decades we’ve had print blood running through the veins of the corporate body. But over the last few years we’ve seen dramatic change. Today the absolute dollar growth of our online revenues now exceeds the decline in our print revenues. This occurred in the US in 2006 and in Europe during the last quarter.

With this change in the revenue mix and the higher margins from our online businesses - the company is more profitably today than it has been previously.

IDG, where I’ve spent the last 14 years of my career, is a media company, delivering information on the information technology industry – from the Enterprise with B2B brands such as Computerworld, CIO, Infoworld and Networkworld to the Consumer Technology segment with brands such as PCWorld, Macworld and GamePro.

In the US, our online revenue now accounts for over 35% of our total US publishing revenues. Next year, for many brands online revenues will be greater than print revenues, if fact they already are at some of our key brands and by 2009 – approximately 50% of IDG’s US revenues will come from online.

To drive this change and to focus on online revenue we’ve changed the business mission of our organization away from print. Going forward IDG Communications will define itself as a web centric information company complemented by expos, events and print publications.

The brutal reality that we’re facing today is the costly process of dismantling and replacing legacy operations and cultures and business models with ones with new and yet to be fully proven business models. However, we face greater risks if we don’t transform our organization and take some chances.

In the past media organizations controlled content and pushed it out to subscribers, today’s media has to deal with a world of social connections, networking and collective actions enabled by the Internet.

The more enlightened in our media world will figure how to allow their audiences freedom to create and share their knowledge and content and to mash it up in a way that engages users.

We have to become facilitators as much as content creators – our brands are trusted, they have quality content and loyal audiences – these are our competitive advantages but we’ll only hold onto those assets if we truly listen to our communities and provide appropriate environments for user initiated conversations and user created content

Figuring out the transformation from print to online is only the start. The information we produce, facilitate and aggregate increasingly will be viewed on a number of screens - the Computer, the TV, the smart mobile phone, the iPod and other portable entertainment devices. Many of these screens are more suited to video and audio than text. Even more new skills for our organization to master!

We’re in an exciting growth industry. Let’s shake off the image of being in a beleaguered print industry and seize the opportunities afforded to us by the digital revolution.

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