Value of New Media vs. Old Media

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Jeff Jarvis on the the Rockeboom ad auction:

And here we have in a microcosm the explanation of why media is so horribly out of sync today: The public is valuing new media much more than the old, but the advertisers still value the old. Most every newspaper and in many cases TV networks and magazines have much larger audiences online, but the revenue for their old media properties remains much higher because the advertisers and agencies still value the old and the safe. They want metrics. They want control. They want guarantees. This, in turn, makes big publishers and producers play it safe because they don’t want to mess with the cash cow. And that means that advertisers miss the opportunity to reach a larger, younger, smarter audience in the new medium, which is — supposedly — what they’re dying to do. And that means that big media companies now face competition from a thousand Rocketbooms and a million Gawkers.

And if you are in the media/advertising business and you’ve never heard of Rocketboom or Gawker… you’re probably already screwed. Tick, tock…tick, tock.

Guy Kawasaki’s tips for effective email

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  • Attach files infrequently. How often do you get an email that says, “Please read the attached letter.”? Then you open the attachment, and it’s a dumb-shitcake Word document with a three paragraph message that could have easily been copied and pasted into the email.
  • Never forward something that you think is funny. The odds are that by the time you’ve received it, your recipient already has too, so what is intended as funny is now tedious.

May I add one of my own? When you send an all-company email, please put the recipients in the BCC field so we don’t have to scroll through 300 names. And please, try to resist the impulse to reply-to-all with something witty like, “I couldn’t agree more.” The reply-to-all button should automatically include something along the lines of “This is a Reply-to-All from a Clueless Ass-Clown” …right at the top of the message.

Where’s my camera?!

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This is why you should always have a camera with you. Jackie Johnson, a co-worker in our Madison, WI newsroom, captured the amazing image below:

Bald Eagle

“I’ve seen many bald eagles in my life, but never one in the wild just a couple feet away from me! The other day I came across a mature bald eagle on the side of the road eating roadkill! It was cool! I hit the breaks so as not to kill this endangered species, and simultaneously grabbed my camera and manage to get a somewhat decent shot as the fully-grown bird flew away. It’s a little blurry as I frantically tried to contain my excitement.”