the decline of news

04/11/2023 The Decline of News 1


The Decline of News,The Rise of Connection and

The Battle For Your Mind

By Thomas Paper

For the CIC Conference, October 1-2, 2009

Webster Pacific


The Decline of News

• What’s going on?– TRANSFORMATION– DESTRUCTION OF DEFINITIONS

04/11/2023 The Decline of News 4Source: http://www.naa.org/TrendsandNumbers/Advertising-Expenditures.aspx , Morgan Stanley, IAB

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Newspaper Print

Newspaper Online

Total US Online

http://www.naa.org/TrendsandNumbers/Advertising-Expenditures.aspx

Data360 BACN


TV and Online News


Who’s Killing The Media?


• W – W – W – W – W• The lead• The pyramid

Definitions Are Changing

Traditional Journalism New “Journalism”• Political• Sensational• Single-issue

“What gave newspapers their value was the mission and promise of journalism – the hope that someone was getting paid to wade into the daily tide of manure, sort through the deliberate lies and cunning half-truths, and tell a story straight.”

Mark BowdenThe Atlantic, October 2009


What is news?What is journalism?

No one knows….

What do we know?


Information (news) is like food.


Information (media) is like food.

We’re being fed junk.

http://data360.wordpress.com/2009/04/15/people-are-fickle/cheetos/


“We don’t have information overload; we have filter failure.”

“Cognitive Surplus”Clay Shirky

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d3/ClayShirkyJI1.jpg


Need to Filter!

Basic Choice• Newspaper (also web)• TV news (also web)• Magazines (also web)• Blogs• Phone / PDA• Text Message• Email • Social networks

Filtered Choice• Email alerts• Hyper-local news• Tweetdeck/retweets• NYT most-emailed• Blog discussion threads• Groups on social

networks


The Rise of Connection


How Big is The Web?

1998 1999 2000 2006 20070

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Number of Websites on World Wide Web

Mill

ions

of W

ebsi

tes

Source: http://www.pandia.com/sew/383-web-size.html


Source: Dave McClure

What’s the limit? >>> “Dunbar’s Number”


http://blogs.oracle.com/retail/TouchGraph.html


Social Networks Overtake Porn


Connections are like food.




The Science of Networks Can Help

• Networks is any system of:– nodes– links– hubs


Two Kinds Of NetworksRandom Networks

• Links Made Randomly

Scale-Free Networks

• Links Made Based Upon “Preferential Attachment”

• Believed to explain social networks and the world wide web


FOLD # LAYERS OF PAPER Miles 1 2 0.00 2 4 0.00 3 8 0.00 4 16 0.00 5 32 0.00 6 64 0.00 7 128 0.00 8 256 0.00 9 512 0.00

10 1,024 0.00 11 2,048 0.00 12 4,096 0.00 13 8,192 0.00 14 16,384 0.00 15 32,768 0.00 16 65,536 0.01 17 131,072 0.01 18 262,144 0.02 19 524,288 0.04 20 1,048,576 0.09 21 2,097,152 0.17 22 4,194,304 0.35 23 8,388,608 0.69 24 16,777,216 1.39 25 33,554,432 2.77 26 67,108,864 5.55 27 134,217,728 11.09 28 268,435,456 22.19 29 536,870,912 44.37 30 1,073,741,824 88.75 31 2,147,483,648 177.50 32 4,294,967,296 355.00 33 8,589,934,592 709.99 34 17,179,869,184 1,419.99 35 34,359,738,368 2,839.97 36 68,719,476,736 5,679.94 37 137,438,953,472 11,359.89 38 274,877,906,944 22,719.77 39 549,755,813,888 45,439.54 40 1,099,511,627,776 90,879.08 41 2,199,023,255,552 181,758.16 42 4,398,046,511,104 363,516.33 43 8,796,093,022,208 727,032.66 44 17,592,186,044,416 1,454,065.31 45 35,184,372,088,832 2,908,130.62 46 70,368,744,177,664 5,816,261.25 47 140,737,488,355,328 11,632,522.49 48 281,474,976,710,656 23,265,044.98 49 562,949,953,421,312 46,530,089.96 50 1,125,899,906,842,620 93,060,179.92

Layers of paper 1,125,899,906,842,620 Paper Thickness (inches) 0.0052 # Inches after 50 folds 5,896,293,000,000 Inches Per Mile 63,360 Miles Thick 93,060,180

km Earth to Sun 150,000,000km per mile 1.61Miles Earth to Sun 93,000,000

Thickness After 50 Folds

Earth to Sun Distance

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Band Together!

• Connect sites & relationships• Common & Connected indicators• Common brand

• Greater attention and mindshare


The Battle For Your Mind

Work, Church & School

Family, friends & community

Sports & hobbies

Television & Radio Newspapers & Magazines

Competing for Mindshare

Competing for MindshareData Democratization

Brands & advertising

Internet, blogs & email

Community Indicators


We’re competing with junk.



Be Creative!

1)Stories 2)References3)Bottom up


Stories > Data

Carnegie Mellon University

Save the Children

$1.14 vs. $2.38


Movie Popcorn

The Washington post media critic Howard Kurtz has described how the Center for Science in the Public Interest created a public furor over saturated fat in movie theater popcorn. The CSPI “carefully stage-managed the news,” Kurtz wrote (1994), by…holding a news conference that featured “colorful visuals” and “tantalizing sound bites.”

http://www.cspinet.org/index.html


Emotion & Data

Emotion

Data


References > Promotions

What customer surveying question leads to “long-term profitable growth?”


The Ultimate Question“How likely is it that you would recommend Company X to a friend or colleague?”

910 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0

Not at all likely

Extremely likely

Promoter DetractorPassive

#Promoters - #Detractors

(#Promoters + #Detractors) x 100Net Promoter Score (NPS) =


Example: NPS for Schools


NPS For Communities?

• How likely are you to recommend YOUR CITY to a friend or colleague?


Bottom up > Top down


Types of “New Media”Blogs, user-generated content, podcasts

Social networks and virtual worlds

Wikis and open source

Forums, ratings and reviews

Tags RSS & Widgets

How they work / examples

Facebook, Myspace, LinkedIn --- Second Life

Wikipedia (wiki)Linux (open source) – key is collaboration.

Amazon book reviews, and eBags are examples.

Also called “folksonomy”, Del.icio.us is most used tagging application

RSS = tool that brings you updates. Widgets= mini-applications, bolt on to blogs, etc.

Participation Blog reading one of most popular activities. 25% of Americans read blogs.

25% of Americans visit a social networking site monthly.

22% of Americans use Wikipedia; only 6% contribute to a wiki.

20% of Americans participate.

7% of Americans use tags.

23% of Americans have personalized homepages that rely on RSS.


Volunteers & Ratings


What Data360 is Doing

• A Wiki for data – – open source – non-profit - free

• Common/shared database – collaborative• Conversational

– Editors & visitors• Dynamic


Graphs connected to shared database.

Comparable to data from other sources.

Name of editor(s)

Editor comments.

Text box for free-form comments.

Sources

Comments from visitors.


Dynamic Graphing on Data360


News is declining.


Need to Filter!

Connection is rising.


Band Together!

There’s a battle for our minds.

We’re fighting junk.

Be Creative!

1. 2. 3.

the decline of news

News & Politics