Right after my recent Hearst Digital Media Lecture at Columbia University School of Journalism April 25, I opened the forum for a Q & A session. One of the questions went something like this:
How do you incorporate revenue when you propose a mobile platform curated edition to your clients?
It's a fair and logical question, of course. I answered it by saying that sponsored advertising is always a part of the proposal, right there on the prototype, so that the clients can invite their best advertising clients to the table for discussions of what is, in most cases, a new way of presenting information.
The question is one that has merit and that is asked in workshops around newsrooms everywhere.
It is also part of this catch 22: the need to introduce new mobile platform initiatives for delivering news at a time when in many newsrooms there is a shortage of editors, and, in some cases, a demand to trim the budget even further.
That is why I was quite intrigued by a recent piece about The Washington Post after Jeff Bezos acquired it. It seems that The Post is making all the right moves to navigate the challenging waters of the two tempos: delivering news as it happens on a 24/7 basis, while also curating and developing the more analytical and thoughtful pieces.
As I have said many times: audiences crave both.
Media companies MUST be able to provide the row meat and the cooked steak.
At The Post, which recently won two Pulitzer Prizes, editor Marty Baron (formerly of The Boston Globe) has said that he's confident the Post's 600-plus newsroom staff can pull off "the labor-intensive deep dives as well as the quick hits."
I have no doubt that the Post's staff can. I also hope that their advertisers will be paying close attention and will join the Post in this new journey.
The Post is obviously turning much necessary attention (and a bit delayed) to all things digital now, redesigning its website and launching an overnight news desk. It is also building a breaking news team to jump on stories as they emerge around the world, hopefully adding a fresh angle or take.
The two tempos seem to be in good hands at The Post. We should watch how it all develops with great interest.
