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Saturday, February 21, 2009

City / Media Re: The P-I's Online Plan

Posted by Eli Sanders on Sat, Feb 21, 2009 at 10:30 AM

While I work on a longer print story about plans for a new, online-only P-I, a few more thoughts about what I've heard and what I'm now seeing.

Yesterday I pointed to an unusual, high-profile example of outside link aggregation on the P-I's homepage: a headline that, if one clicked on it, went straight to the West Seattle Blog (with "West Seattle Blog reports..." in the P-I's sub-head). This was followed by still more outside link aggregation. Go to the P-I's homepage right now and you'll find links to Lifehacker.com, King5.com, and even Slog.

What's currently happening on the P-I homepage fits with what I'm hearing: the online-only P-I, as it is currently being conceived over on Elliott Avenue, will be, in part, an aggregator.

As Josh in the comments says, this is "a big deal." Another commenter offered a one-word summation of the transformation: "PI HuffPo."

They're right. It's hard to overstate how big a change this represents. For a daily newspaper to abandon its belief that important local news should be conveyed first through its own trusted reporters, and its own trusted reporters only, is a tremendous shift. It fits with something else that's been becoming more clear lately: Hearst wants to hold on to the P-I brand, and the online traffic that comes with it, but it is ready to jettison a lot of old notions about what makes a journalistic enterprise.

More on this in next week's Stranger, but I think we are beginning to see that, despite statements to the contrary, there is indeed a pretty interesting and considered plan for the online-only P-I. Look at the top half of the P-I homepage right now. It's a mix of reported news, photo galleries, celebrity and fashion items, a curated set of links to other blogs, and some prominent links to some of the P-I's own popular blogs. This is, indeed, the HuffingtonPost model. It wasn't as clear until the P-I flipped the switch on its outside link aggregation. But it is now.

What's the aim? My guess is it can be answered in one word: traffic. The online P-I already draws a considerable number of eyeballs, but if it can become a sticky portal through which people enter the online universe of Northwest news and opinion (in the way that Huffington Post is a sticky portal into the online world of liberal news and opinion) then it has a chance to draw even more eyeballs.

In other words, by un-mooring itself from the idea that its own content is king, the new online P-I is going to try to float to the top of Northwest link heap. Sure, readers may begin at the new P-I web site and quickly end up at Lifehacker or West Seattle Blog or Slog. But if enough readers choose to always begin there, the P-I could return, in an online way, to the nice role that traditional newspapers used to enjoy: powerful gatekeeper.

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Hey, Eli, you do realize that none other than nytimes.com does the same thing? (Granted, the user does have to flip the "Extra" switch. Check it out ... it's in the nav bar.)

Times Extra "links you to coverage from other news sources and blogs, directly from our home page."

So perhaps this isn't as earth-shattering as you make it out to be.

Posted by Sherlock Homeslice on February 21, 2009 at 10:56 AM

I don't agree.

The P-I "already draws a considerable number of online eyeballs" using the reporters it has. Replacing them with, essentially, links to local bloggers and blogs that mention the Northwest is a recipe for failure. Just because you're on the cutting edge of content doesn't mean that the typical Northwest news hunter is. They're looking for something more "official".

Turning the P-I into a corporate sponsored geocities site gives it a lifetime of one year at best. My guess is that by Christmas this will be a vast wasteland, and it will be shut down within 18mo at the outside.

Posted by paul in kirkland on February 21, 2009 at 11:05 AM

Please stop the endless drivel about the PI, Village Voice Media, etc.

Nobody reads the Stranger for it's "analysis" of the local media market.

Usually that "analysis" is smug, biased as ever, and dull. Even when you get interns to count PI blog comments and call it a "parlor game"

And it's a pathetic way for the Stranger to try and elevate it's own standing, as if blogging about Hearst somehow makes the Stranger legitimate.

The Stranger is amateur. Unprofessional as ever but determined to critique everyone else.

Stranger = movie listings and blogging about things named Dick (har har har). It is not journalism. Stop pretending.

Posted by we don't want your "longer print story" on February 21, 2009 at 11:06 AM

Well,

So when news breaks, and the P-I has minimal staffing, where are folks going to go to? The Times.

And then, if the Times can get its act together online, those folks will keep going to the Times site. The Times can offer original news reporting AND aggregation.

Posted by PI:RIP on February 21, 2009 at 11:10 AM

"It's hard to overstate how big a change this represents."

oh come on. talk about exaggeration.

"What's the aim? My guess is it can answered in one word: traffic."

gee, that is some powerful insight.

Posted by you're joking right? on February 21, 2009 at 11:12 AM

@1: But even on "Extra," links to other sites are still subordinate to the NY Times' own reporting. That's different than what the P-I has been doing over the last day or so.

Posted by Eli Sanders on February 21, 2009 at 11:13 AM

Yes, Eli, it's a pretty trick to create smug, biased as ever analysis that still manages to turn out dull, pathetic and amateur!

Posted by did i use all the words on my little list? on February 21, 2009 at 11:15 AM

Eli, thanks for covering this. On a Saturday, no less. I think it's an interesting turn of events, though I agree with Paul in Kirkland that it will ultimately be unsuccessful.

Posted by Aislinn on February 21, 2009 at 11:25 AM

@2: your assertion that "The P-I already draws a considerable number of online eyeballs using the reporters it has. " doesn't take into account all of the content that the P-I and most other daily newspaper aggregated from sources like the AP and photo wire services. This is just a new kind of aggregation and filtering.

Of course, a core value of this "new" P-I (like current weblogs and hybrids like the Huffington Post) would be the independent reporter-generated coverage, but as sources of information multiply, having trustworthy guides to it will become ever more valuable to readers.

Posted by josh on February 21, 2009 at 11:34 AM

Eli,
Do you understand the difference between Portal and Gatekeeper?

No wonder the Times let you go.

Posted by Still kickin' at Fairview Fanny on February 21, 2009 at 11:46 AM

All I want to know is how much the PI employees will be paid, how many there will be, and whether any of them will be doing original reporting.

Posted by Trevor on February 21, 2009 at 11:50 AM

They could be successful going that route, but only if they maintain enough local news to keep viewers coming back. I already know how to find Slog, and any other local blog that interests me. I can already get pictures of Fashion Week and cute puppies on any number of dozens of sites. An aggregator only works if there is some supplementary reason to go there in the first place. People may read aggregated stories about Pamela Anderson on HuffPo, but that isn't what draws them there. Viewers are drawn there for the liberal political commentary that they aren't reading elsewhere.

If the P-I maintains a local newsroom of journalists, and has local reporting that I can't find elsewhere, then I'd continue to go to the P-I website, even if they become an aggregator of other stuff. And I may very well delve off into some of the aggregated stories. That model may work.

But if they drop all local reporting entirely, then I have no reason to go there in the first place. Simply being an aggregator of local blogs and news, in the absence of any original reporting, would not keep me returning there on a regular basis. I think that model would fail.

Posted by Reverse Polarity on February 21, 2009 at 12:01 PM

Didn't Crosscut kind of try this already?

And I'm sorry, but most of the P-I reporters I know could run fucking circles around all of our "neighborhood bloggers" if given the same time and space. It's sad to see them put on the street in favor of hacks, mommies and shills for local-business-banner-ad-buyers.

Posted by WTF? on February 21, 2009 at 12:33 PM

Because Seattle needs its own My Yahoo.

Posted by Troy on February 21, 2009 at 12:34 PM

GIVE IT A REST YOU HACK

Posted by SICK AND TIRED OF YOUR SHIT on February 21, 2009 at 1:04 PM

I'm sure all you newsies so love the effects of the Globalism you were all so hot about - now that it's your jobs that are being outsourced to India.

Enjoy!

Posted by Will in Seattle (had to say it) on February 21, 2009 at 1:12 PM

I'm curious who will be doing the original reporting if all of the newspapers start resorting to HuffPo-style aggregating? The internet will be nothing but a hall of mirrors.

Oh wait, it already is.

Posted by arts&letters, not a cynic, I swear on February 21, 2009 at 1:17 PM

Am I missing something? All ofthe major headlines/stories seem to be from the P-I or AP (although the vortex of poison has be a little concerned). I only see 4 links to outside, and they are hardly screaming-sized headlines, ranked just barely above the Washington college sports schedules. It really deosn't seem like that big of a deal (for the moment at least).

Posted by Good Grief on February 21, 2009 at 1:58 PM

"It's hard to overstate how big a change this represents."

Obviously not. You did it.

Except for the recognized name, how is this different from Crosscut, which has been a spectacular failure (in terms of traffic, advertising, finances, etc.)?

Posted by rjh on February 21, 2009 at 2:22 PM

Crosscut has been a failure because Brewster has been more focused on reviving the 1980s Seattle Weekly than doing what the P-I has done. For that matter, Crosscut has eschewed blogs for print when it comes to linking.

What the P-I is doing isn't about "gatekeeper." It's about "filter." It's about what Clay Shirky has been talking about the last few years -- we're losing the institutions that did the filtering for us (e.g. publishers), so we need to build new filters to handle our information sorting. The online P-I is positioning itself to be that local filter, which probably means they'll lean on local bloggers to fill some of the news holes.

Of course, there are all sorts of questions about this -- will they pay the bloggers, how much content will they create themselves, will they ever turn a profit. But it's worth a gamble. Even with Glenn Fleishmann's wild guess of $1.5M/year in ad revenue, that still suggests at an 80% reduction of staff they'll probably "only" lose, at worst, $3M/year. Given they lost $14M last year, that's a huge improvement -- and that gap should close.

The person or company that solves the "profitable online news website" riddle will be very, very, very rich. And Hearst, obviously, would love to be the company that solves the riddle.

Posted by dw on February 21, 2009 at 4:08 PM

You've just summed up the entire history of Hearst with this sentence:

it is ready to jettison a lot of old notions about what makes a journalistic enterprise.

I speak as a not-bitter--really--former Hearst employee. In fact, the company treated us well, in my opinion, but my division was spun off and then sold to another company, otherwise I'd still be working for them...I simply didn't have a choice. It was either "go with the spin-off or you're unemployed." So I'm doing exactly the same job--and even more--for another company.

Posted by Wolf on February 21, 2009 at 6:06 PM

Rule of Thumb of blogging and the Internet: The more you send people away, the more they come back to your website. It's what makes Sullivan's Daily Dish, Slog, BoingBoing, etc so popular. It's a no-brainer first step for the PI. It can't be their only strategy. Maybe if they took Dan's advice and said "Fuck" mroe often...

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