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The Journalism We Need

By
Maha Rafi Atal
– October 8, 2010Posted in: Featured, Future of Media, Our Work

In the fall of 2008, when the markets went into free fall, I was working at Forbes and getting a master’s at Columbia.  While everyone suffered that year, the ‘legacy’ media had it particularly bad. Newspapers went out of business, and cubicles around mine emptied. My friends asked: why are you entering journalism now?

I answered: “Journalists, I believe, are most important at times like these, when the nature of public debate itself comes under question or into flux. Society—and journalism—will be transformed, and the only way to influence the outcome is to participate in the transformation.”

I went on to express a great deal of optimism about the business model that would emerge after the transition, one in which old institutions would embrace the ability to dig deep into data and the opportunity to connect more personally with audiences.

But one problem remained: this new model would have to produce more journalism for a shorter news cycle at a much lower cost:

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a.o.l. Buys Techcrunch

By
Maha Rafi Atal
– September 29, 2010Posted in: Featured, Future of Media, Media News

a.o.l. has moved to acquire technology and business blog TechCrunch, as part of new CEO Tim Armstrong’s strategy to turn the company from an internet service provider into a stable of content sites, a digital version of a magazine holding company. TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington on his reasons for selling:

They run the largest blogging network in the world and if we sold to them we’d never have to worry about tech issues again. We could focus our engineering resources on higher end things and I, for one, could spend more of my day writing and a lot less time dealing with other stuff.

They already own many of the top technology blogs. They already have a huge sales team in place (although our own sales team kicks ass and is staying on). And they have an internal events group that we will be able to leverage.

From a product and business standpoint, it’s a perfect fit.

…AOL was very aggressive about one last important issue that really sealed the deal – editorial.

Tim told me that he doesn’t want whatever makes TechCrunch special to go away. He also said it was important that we feel free to criticize AOL when we think they deserve it. And the agreement we signed with AOL fully reflects this. In particular, we used the Twitter document scandal as a test. If the same thing happens with AOL in the future, we should feel comfortable posting those documents. And in that unlikely event, we will.

More information on the deal here.

I’ve been saying for some time that the future model is a kind of aggregation of niche sites under big name banners, including a.o.l.’s. And TechCrunch is one of the best niche sites out there. I disagree with much of what they write, because they get over-excited about each and every startup they cover. But the fact is, they also break more big tech stories than anyone, and I find that the site is pretty indispensible as a result. All in all, Armstrong has made a smart acquisition.

This article is cross-posted from Instant Cappuccino.

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The Future Model: aggregated niches

By
Maha Rafi Atal
– September 29, 2010Posted in: Future of Media

For over two years, I have been writing a series of posts on the media industry called the Apocalypse. I am often asked whether that’s overly pessimistic. My answer: ‘apocalypse’ is a term we use for the end of the world, sure, but it’s also, to those who take the term seriously, supposed to herald the revelation of something new and extraordinary. That is what I believe is coming to media, whenever the chaotic collapse of the model we know is over.

Occasionally, the Apocalypse Series has attempted to read the tea leaves and make predictions about the new model. I don’t believe–as other media prophets seem to–that there will be no more Big Media. Human history suggests that power tends to consolidate, break down and then consolidate again. I believe that the new consolidators of power will be organizations who can mix and match. It will be the people who can take the nichification that the web brings and use it to deepen rather than to flatten what we know.

Firstly, there will be places like Google, who reproduce news written elsewhere and use it to aggregate and distill data. Secondly, there will be places like Yahoo! and a.o.l. who are able to create or buy networks of niche websites that combine to present a reasonably full picture of the news. And thirdly, there will be places like the BBC, Reuters, and Bloomberg who can use an array of broadcast and text platforms to cover the same story from multiple sides.

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