I Want My Rocky! (dot com)

Internet killed the newspaper star

I agree that the Rocky has better political reporting, but do we really need two major papers? Maybe this was going to happen no matter what ever since the JOA.

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by: redstateblues @ Mon Dec 15, 2008 at 17:46:55 PM UTC

It's not going to surprise me

if we don't have one major paper here in a couple of years..

I had a dream that Rupert Murdoch rode into town and bought the Rocky just to help turn CO back to the red spectrum of purple.

Well, it's better than the 'naked commencement address' dream, anyway...

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by: Laughing Boy @ Mon Dec 15, 2008 at 18:07:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I agree

it's sad but newspapers are going away. If they can figure out a HuffPo type approach that pays one might survive - but that's their only chance.

Where all the cool kids will be on Saturday - Code War!

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by: DavidThi808 @ Mon Dec 15, 2008 at 20:15:31 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Note the antagonism toward journalists on Rocky

Earlier today the Rocky posted a story on its home page announcing the save the Rocky site.

Some pretty interesting comments are here:

http://www.rockymountainnews.c...

For some reason, the Rocky's buried the story and the comments.

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by: Another skeptic @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 04:18:53 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Newspapers can survive, if they leave the 19th century behind..

As someone who used to work for a media monster that owned both newspapers and TV stations, I know there is money to be made in newspapers - but they have to change the way the do business.

1) Subscriptions - Newspapers only get 20% of their income from paper subscriptions. They still haven't figured out a model by which they can get people to subscribe online, or how to build "extended" subscriptions into the paper version. (Kiplinger's and ConsumerReports being two successful magazines doing this.

It's either a micropayment model or a online subscription with extended access to archives and exclusive content that will increase subscriptions.

2) Content - Folks want more than articles...they need to include multimedia, or exclusive content that they don't share anywhere else. Some Gannett and Tribune papers are embedding video with the articles, but Print guys don't do video as well as TV guys. They have to come up with a way to provide more stuff than what they get from the TV Stations. That can be longer, better articles, or, better links to related articles (on their own site) and maybe animations that highlight the points of the article (esp for business and sports.)

3) Convenience - If the newspapers could come up with a way to "push" stories to my iPod or Crackberry every morning, and make them stories I care about, then they can make a lot of money selling me that service. (Podcasts don't work since they tend to opinion or long-format stories.) if I can get an immediate, up-to-date news stories pushed to me when I have the time to listen to them, they can easily sell it for .25 or .50 cents a pop - almost what a newspaper costs.

4) Ads have to be free. Because that's what the market bears right now. They can make money on additions like super-fotos, or extra listings, or fancy graphics, but they have to have the traffic at the classifieds to sell classified ad space, and right now they don't have it.  

"The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten." Calvin Coolidge

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by: SSG_Dan @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 00:22:14 AM UTC

Add to that

interactive ads - I say what I want and it lists them up for me. I can click and get a full picture of the item, specs, etc.

Where all the cool kids will be on Saturday - Code War!

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by: DavidThi808 @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 01:24:57 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Which web sites get paid subscriptions?

Consumer Reports? Maybe around the holidays or other big shopping seasons, but unless you're in the market for an expensive car or a giant TV, it's hard to find them useful.

Daily Kos? Maybe if you find the ads really annoying, or you have more disposable income than you know what to do with, you might toss a few bucks to a blogger, but generally it's hard to be very successful this way.

Hmmm...

Wait a minute...

PORN! Porn sites charge lots of money and get very loyal subscribers. How about if newspapers do pretty much the same things they're doing now, but every time you finish reading an article, a girl on a webcam shows you her boobies?

Now that's a business model we can believe in.

"Have a Bobby bar! My dad made them." --Jon Huntsman Jr.

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by: sxp151 @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 03:48:27 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Wall Street Journal

Always been a pay site for anything but "front page" type content. Murdoch considered making it all free a while back but backed off, I'm guessing when he saw how much money it was making.

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by: bmenezes @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 17:38:25 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

What's interesting

is that no newspaper has tried totally embracing the changes that have hammered them. It's like they want to change as little as possible, rather than taking full advantage of the changes.

Where all the cool kids will be on Saturday - Code War!

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by: DavidThi808 @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 04:49:32 AM UTC

Just like the music and film industries

Media companies resist change more than any other business.

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by: redstateblues @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 07:31:16 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Some have tried and failed

With free news floating around just about everywhere, it's been hard for the newspapers to make money online.  The NYT went to a subscription-only service for a while and abandoned it because it was lowering the ad revenue from hits to their website more than it was increasing their subscription revenue.

The Internet is a tough market for an organization that spends a lot of money on its reporters and editors.

"We're below sharks and contract killers." -- Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), speaking on Congress's 9% approval rating

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by: Phoenix Rising @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 20:42:42 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Liked it

I have always like the Rocky, would be sad to see them go.  

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by: poliwatchdawg @ Tue Dec 16, 2008 at 06:51:59 AM UTC

--

make content free and (and of high quality) and set your sales force loose on getting online specific advertisers

sell the same adspace around online articles to numerous clients on a 2 or 5 second ad rotation (thus making the ads even cheaper for potential advertisers

offer the ability for clients advertisements to be displayed longer durations during peak online visitation hours of the day, make the advertisements specific to zip codes so advertisers can more closely reach their target audience effectively, thus creating additional potential profit channels for the website and offering clients more choices

never get greedy, make the ad space affordable for everyone from the local kid who mows yards and shovels snow, to the car dealership who wants to target the entire metro area

and while your at it, hire me as your online marketing consulting, and I'll help make these ideas a reality!

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by: sloanslake @ Wed Dec 17, 2008 at 07:55:54 AM UTC