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February 7, 2008
Birmingham and the digital age
Spent an interesting day at editors' forum in Birmingham earlier this week despite the dreadful weather in the city and a hellish drive home in wretched conditions.
There was plenty of talk with my fellow editors on the digital age, and the new multi media age that we are all concentrating our minds on at the moment as we look further at how we can develop our websites.
During the day there was plenty of debate over whether you should publish stories online as they break rather than holding them back for the print edition.
My view is that like our papers our websites have to be as competitive as possible so that means that where possible we will always try to get breaking news on to our website as quickly as possible, and then follow up and develop stories for the Gazette.
At the forum we heard about several papers in Australia and the New York Times and their approach to publishing stories online.
The Age in Melbourne publishes pretty much everything first online and then develops it for the print edition.
What is really interesting is that as well as picking up considerable traffic online the paper has also seen a rise in its print circulation figures since adopting this approach.
I certainly came back from Birmingham with some good ideas and plenty of food for thought.
However, I was quickly brought back to the harsh realities of everyday life in the newsroom when on my return I received a resignation letter from one of our sub editors.
You have to accept that people will move on but it could not come at a worse time as we prepare to re-structure our production team.
However, although it puts a hole in our plans it's all part and parcel of everyday life and just one more challenge to overcome - and more time spent recruiting a new sub editor.
Posted by aseal at February 7, 2008 8:00 AM
Comments...
Adrian - it's interesting to see how 'traditional media' is using technology to enhance the core print business. It wasn't so long ago that many editors felt that giving away their stories on the internet would mean a demise in circulation of the print product, yet now it's been proven that both delivery methods can work very well together.
There will always be space in the market for a newspaper or magazine because it's not that easy to read an online publication on the loo. ;-)
Comment posted by: Andrew at February 26, 2008 1:36 AM