PORNOGRAPHY
THEY’RE WEBSITE WIZARDS
THE OTHER WEBSITE WIZARDS
TEENAGE SENSATIONS ON THE INTERNET
FACTOID OF THE WEEK – CORD CUTTERS
CASTING CALL – PRINCESSES AND GHOST HUNTERS
COCKTAIL CHATTER – BRAD PITT DANGER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
PORNOGRAPHY. How’s that for a headline? One word. Two stories. The first comes from the Adult Internet Market Research Company. It tells you something about the size of the pornography industry that there is a research company focused on adult entertainment websites. Anyway, according to the company, many of these sites have experienced a 20% to 30% growth in membership rates since the tax stimulus checks were first sent out. The second comes via Reuters from Bill Tancer, general manager of global research at Hitwise, which tracks Internet usage. According to Tancer, social networking sites have ‘dethroned’ pornography sites as the top search interest. He says surfing for porn has been declining steadily, dropping to about 10 percent from a high of 20 percent a decade ago. Tancer speculates that it is because the 18 to 24 year old demographic, in particular, is spending so much more time on social networking sites. For another perspective on all this, Tancer also notes that celebrity websites garner more attention than sites devoted to religion, politics, well-being and diets COMBINED. Further proof of interest in the trivial (maybe), he says web surfers spent more time looking for images of Republican vice presidential candidate Sara Palin than looking for her policies.
As an interesting side note to this, Tancer says the speed of the Internet means that much of the information comes from consumers generating the stories, long before the media either sees it or “fact checks” it. He suggests that with the explosion of false information on the Internet, the next big development may come when someone develops software that filters for accurate information. Finally, if you want to really get a perspective on American society, Tancer has written a book on search interests and what they tell us, titled Click: What Millions of People are Doing Online and Why It Matters which shows, for example, that searches for anti-depressants spike around Thanksgiving in the United States.
THEY’RE WEBSITE WIZARDS: And they play a mean news ball. Okay, the Pete Townshend reference may be a little obscure, but if The Who were to do a rock opera about websites, these would be the ones they would sing about. Instead, the Online News Association is singing the praises of these sites which run the gamut from CNN.com and NyTimes.com to ArmyTimes.com and Beliefnet.com. Subjects run the gamut from Iraq and Presidential politics to religion in politics, the murder of a prostitute and a first-hand, personal account of a woman committing suicide under Oregon’s Death with Dignity act. The categories range from breaking news to investigative, multimedia and commentary. Some of the comments from the judges range from “crisp and addicting… legendary images…” to “remarkable… affective and effective.” The key point that comes out of the reviews by the judges is the fact that the online presentation as a “genre reinvented and re-architected for the digital age” made these presentations something that “couldn’t have worked in any other medium.” If you want a glimpse at the online future, visit http://journalist.org/awards/archives/001258.php.
As a FOOTNOTE (and I will leave it up to you all to decide what it means) out of the nearly 90 websites cited as either winners or finalists, only five were television or broadcasting sites – CNN, MSNBC, WRAL, NPR and Minnesota Public Radio. Another ten were web only (Smoking Gun, Salon, Slate, Politico, WebMD, Beliefnet, online news site rawstory.com and comic commentator Mark Fiore.) The rest were all newspaper sites. Finally, a personal salute to the student winners who tied for first place – those at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill who teamed up with students at the Universidad de los Andes to produce a stunning portrayal of Tierra del Fuego and student Taylor Hayden of Western Kentucky University who produced an incredibly powerful portrayal of a woman who becomes caregiver for her mother.
THE OTHER WEBSITE WIZARDS: A more pragmatic view of website wizardry comes from blog site publishing2.com which argues that the most successful news site on the Internet is The Drudge Report. And it says that’s because it actually has the smarts to send visitors away. At least that’s the argument made by publishing2.com which describes itself as an aggregation site focusing on how technology is transforming media and aimed at journalists, editors and newsrooms. The blog editor cites two statistics to make the case. One, drudgereport.com records the highest number of sessions per person (21.2) out of the top 30 news websites defined by Nielsen Online. Only the DailyKos.com comes close with ten sessions per person. Most of the news websites average between three sessions to eight sessions. Second, drudgereport.com scores the longest visit duration (59 minutes and 39 seconds) of the top news sites cited in June of this year. The closest was Fox News Digital Network which averaged slightly over 40 minutes; only nine sites averaged more than 20 minutes. Most sites ran between a low of three minutes to a high of eleven minutes. Publishing 2.0 founder and CEO Scott Karp says most websites are afraid that linking to third-party websites will send people away who won’t come back, or that the links will result in ‘low engagement.’ He says the fact that the Drudge Report is completely built on links proves those arguments to be wrong. He also notes that drudge is one of the largest referrers of traffic to newspaper websites.
TEENAGE SENSATIONS ON THE INTERNET: Regular readers of MfM will remember us telling you about lonelygirl15 nearly two years ago. It was a web sensation purportedly about a teenage girl sharing her angst on the web. It turned out to be a hoax designed to build online buzz and lonelygirl15 turned out to be 21 year old actress Jessica Lee Rose. However, that hasn’t stopped it from continuing to be a web sensation with spin-offs, just like network television. Now it has its own website, lg15.com, with major production backing and recently premiered its latest episodes. Here’s the next online teenage sensation to watch – Fred. It’s the creation of 15-year-old Lucas Cruikshank of Nebraska, who does two to three minute video clips playing a ‘mischievous’ six year old going through life – losing his meds, getting detention, going to the dentist, and oh yes, stalking Judy. The Wall Street Journal reports Fred has the third highest number of subscribers in YouTube history and Cruikshank has now been hired to promote the family film, City of Ember.
FACTOID OF THE WEEK: I actually mentioned this in a previous MfM, but it’s so interesting that it’s worth re-noting. One in six American households (17%) relies solely on mobile phones for home telecommunication. And that number is expected to reach one in five by the end of the year, according to a study from Nielsen Mobile. Ten percent of landline phone customers experimented with wireless-only, but returned to landlines, mainly for other services such as satellite TV and pay-per-view. Wireless homes, or as Nielsen prefers to call it, “cord cutters” tend to have lower income levels and be smaller households.
CASTING CALL: One of the odder/stranger/more interesting features on the programming newsletter Cynopsis is a regular ‘casting call’ by companies looking for people who want their 15 minutes of fame. For example, an unidentified “major television network” is looking for a female 18 to 25 who is rich and acts like a privileged ‘princess’ who wants to star in her own show about moving into her new apartment (and, you feel like saying, who wants to be held up to public ridicule.) Another unidentified ‘major television network’ is looking for a “high-energy, comedic guy” to host a Japanese game show pilot. And to prove these casting calls aren’t just come-ons, there are some identifiable groups, such as the producers behind Ghost Hunters on the Sci-Fi channel looking for a ghost hunter, or somebody just interested in the supernatural to be part of a new series, or the search by Fox Reality Network for ‘attractive’ men and women between the ages of 18 and 30 for season two of Battle of the Bods.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Searching for actor Brad Pitt online is dangerous, according to a study by McAfee, which found that you have a one-in-five chance (18%) of encountering malware when you search using his name. The most dangerous actress to search for is Beyonce. The study says malware creators use the actors’ names to bait fake websites. Last year Paris Hilton and Britney Spears were the most dangerous celebrities to search for. This year neither one even appeared in the top 20 list. Two thirds of Americans (68%) currently have a library card, according to research by Harris Poll, done in conjunction with September’s library sign-up month. A woman who describes herself as a wellness educator has posted a picture on her blog showing a McDonald’s hamburger she says she bought in 1996 next to one she bought this year. They look identical. Karen Hanrahan says the only difference is that the 2008 burger is “a tad darker” and the 1996 burger has begun to “crumble a bit” and it has “the oddest smell.”
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Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 22, 2008
Message From Michael -- September 22, 2008
WHILING AWAY THE HOURS
THOSE STEREOTYPES ARE TRUE
THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST
THE TECHIE SIDE OF TECHCRUNCH 50
THE TECHIE SIDE OF SARA PALIN’S E-MAIL
POLITICAL PALAVER IS POPULAR
COCKTAIL CHATTER – CANDIDATE’S CARS AND A VIRAL EMMY
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
WHILING AWAY THE HOURS. When they do, Americans spend more than half of their total leisure time each day (5.1 hours) watching television (2.6 hours). Conversely they spend 19 minutes on an average day playing games on computers – the same amount of time they spend “relaxing and thinking.” That’s according to the annual ‘time use survey’ produced by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. The second biggest leisure time activity is ‘socializing and communicating’ which takes up 46 minutes of time each day for the average person over the age of 15. Somewhat surprisingly, people in this study spent more time reading (22 minutes) than participating in sports, exercise and recreation (17 minutes) on an average day. Just for a little perspective, “employed persons” worked an average of 7.6 hours a day. As a side note, and as a factoid that says a lot, the report says one in five Americans (21%) did some or all of their work at home.
THOSE STEREOTYPES ARE TRUE: Married moms working full time outside the home still spend more time doing housework and child care than married dads working full time. Yep. Married dads spend more time at the office than married moms employed full-time. Yep. The “yeps” all come from the same report. Nearly three quarters (71%) of employed married moms spend time helping the kids compared to just over half (54%) of those dads; moms also spent more time (1.2 hours) with the kids than the dads (49 minutes) each day. Married working dads spend about an hour more per day (6.1 hours) at work than the married working moms (5.1 hours), in part because more women work part time and because of child demands. Just under half (43%) of married moms were employed full time compared to nearly nine out of ten (88%) married dads.
The stereotype you probably didn’t need the federal government to tell you – yes, that teenager sleeps longer. Boys 15 to 19 sleep an average of 9.7 hours, slightly more than girls in the same age group (9.3 hours). Despite the reports about sleep deprivation, the report says on average, Americans aged 15 and over sleep 8.6 hours a day. If you want to do some more digging into the data, the website is http://www.bls.gov/tus.
THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST: Are television websites when it comes to growth and newspaper websites when it comes to worth. Normally I don’t cite reports in MfM that have been widely circulated, but this one which appeared in Broadcasting and Cable is too interesting not to note. According to a joint report by BIA Financial Network and Borrell Associates, TV websites tapping into the fast-growing video and search advertising have seen their Web advertising grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 67.2%, compared to newspapers’ 33.5%. But, because newspaper websites have been around longer, they’re valued more – anywhere from $500,000 to $30 Million compared to television’s $500,000 to $9 Million. TV and radio websites only generate about 3% of the station’s gross revenues compared to just 6.5% for newspaper websites, but both are expected to grow – television to 5% or 6% by 2011 and newspapers to 10%.
THE TECHIE SIDE OF TECHCRUNCH50: There were so many interesting, entrepreneurial websites from the Techcrunch50 show that I had to re-visit it. For example, Tingz produces widgets that operate across all platforms from iPhones and Blackberrys to Macs and Windows. Not only that but the widgets interact with each other so that your recipe widget will connect to your shopping widget to make sure you get the ingredients. Website Imindi.com has set a goal of augmenting human intelligence via computer science using neuroscience and cognitive psychology through a search engine mechanism that introduces people to new ideas and thoughts instead of just new information. In place of Descartes Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am), Imindi says Cogitamus ergo erimus – We think therefore we shall be. A little more mundane but no less interesting is icharts.net which acts as a portal for people to develop interactive charts on various subjects that they can share. Japanese corporation Tonchidot has developed “Sekai camera” which translates to “world camera” and is “a real-world interface for the iPhone that connects real and virtual worlds, allowing anybody to create, experience and participate in both.” Website videosurf.com promises to help you find exactly what you want in the growing online video world by teaching computers to “see inside” video (whatever that means) so that you can use visual content instead of text to search online. Finally, my favorite, birdpost.com, which says it is leading the burgeoning field of “citizen science” (I didn’t even know it was a burgeoning field) by helping birdwatchers find new bird species using satellite mapping technology.
ANOTHER FACTOID: From a study by the Pew Research group noted in a previous MfM, the percentage of Americans with cell phones has risen from half (53%) in the year 2000, to about three quarters (74%) two years ago to now when four out of five (83%) Americans have one. Relatively few people get their news on these phones, according to the survey, but more than a third (37%) of those using iPhones and Blackberrys use them to get news.
THE TECHIE SIDE OF SARA PALIN’S E-MAIL. In the category of you heard it here first, (okay, that may not be true for all of you) regular readers of MfM will recall a discussion about website 4chan.org. It is a cutting edge site of weird and wonderful and not-so-wonderful memes that often end up presaging happenings on the Internet. Well, it turns out that the hacker who broke into Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s e-mail was a member of “anonymous” -- a group of ‘online troublemakers” who hang out on sites such as 4chan.org. Warning/ Disclaimer: If you visit the site, tread carefully.
SIDENOTE: Website Silicon Alley Insider, using data from online video measuring service TubeMogul, reports that videos of Sara Palin are being viewed more (38 Million) than her running mate, Sen. John McCain (25 Million), or Sen. Barack Obama (29 Million). No mention, oddly of Sen. Joe Biden. As you may have heard, ABC anchor Charlie Gibson’s interview with Palin on 20/20 drew 7.9 Million viewers – the highest number for the show in six months. And despite complaints to the contrary, an analysis of campaign coverage by LexisNexis found that coverage of Palin has been quite balanced with more than a quarter (26%) of the 6,000 stories analyzed being deemed ‘positive’, less than a quarter (22%) being deemed ‘negative’ and more than half (52%) being deemed ‘neutral.’ The analysis also notes that Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden was, as the analysts put it, “tossed into the discount bin” receiving only 683 stories to Palin’s 6,027.
POLITICAL PALAVER IS POPULAR: If any of you have any doubt about the unusual interest in politics this year, Nielsen Media reports that two thirds (64.5%) of all U.S. households tuned in to one or the other of the two political conventions. A third (33.9%) reported watching both conventions. An estimated 15% tuned in just to the RNC and another 15.7% tuned in just to the DNC. The 18-24 demographic had the lowest percentage of viewing – less than a quarter (24%) watched either convention. Plus the report notes that the cume percentages for the two conventions were similar across all adult age breaks even though the Republican convention was shortened a day by Hurricane Gustav.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: As long as I’m talking politics and just to prove that there is nothing too mundane for researchers to study, research firm BigResearch reports that McCain voters are more likely (68%) to drive domestic brand cars than Obama voters (54%) and that Obama voters are more likely (36.6%) to drive a Japanese brand car than McCain voters (26.7%) and nearly twice as likely to drive a European brand (9.4%) than McCain voters (5.3%). McCain voters are also more likely to drive SUV’s (19.1% vs. 14.9%) and trucks (14.2% vs. 8.3%) One in five hiring managers (22%) say they use social networking sites to research job candidates – double the figure just two years ago (of 11%). The hiring managers told Careerbuilder.com that many of the candidates talked about drinking and using drugs on their site or posted ‘provocative or inappropriate’ photographs or information, although, on the good side, nearly half of the hiring managers (48%) say the social networking background check showed the candidate was qualified for the job. Beer maker Anheuser Busch has won its first ever Emmy for a commercial that has never aired on television. The spot, titled Swear Jar, is, as its name implies, about a company that keeps a swear jar for its employees who have to put in money every time they swear. The money is used to buy a case of Bud Light. The spot has become a hot viral video online with more than 12 Million views and the award, according to AdGabber.com. I should warn anybody wanting to watch it that the language is very profane.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THOSE STEREOTYPES ARE TRUE
THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST
THE TECHIE SIDE OF TECHCRUNCH 50
THE TECHIE SIDE OF SARA PALIN’S E-MAIL
POLITICAL PALAVER IS POPULAR
COCKTAIL CHATTER – CANDIDATE’S CARS AND A VIRAL EMMY
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
WHILING AWAY THE HOURS. When they do, Americans spend more than half of their total leisure time each day (5.1 hours) watching television (2.6 hours). Conversely they spend 19 minutes on an average day playing games on computers – the same amount of time they spend “relaxing and thinking.” That’s according to the annual ‘time use survey’ produced by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. The second biggest leisure time activity is ‘socializing and communicating’ which takes up 46 minutes of time each day for the average person over the age of 15. Somewhat surprisingly, people in this study spent more time reading (22 minutes) than participating in sports, exercise and recreation (17 minutes) on an average day. Just for a little perspective, “employed persons” worked an average of 7.6 hours a day. As a side note, and as a factoid that says a lot, the report says one in five Americans (21%) did some or all of their work at home.
THOSE STEREOTYPES ARE TRUE: Married moms working full time outside the home still spend more time doing housework and child care than married dads working full time. Yep. Married dads spend more time at the office than married moms employed full-time. Yep. The “yeps” all come from the same report. Nearly three quarters (71%) of employed married moms spend time helping the kids compared to just over half (54%) of those dads; moms also spent more time (1.2 hours) with the kids than the dads (49 minutes) each day. Married working dads spend about an hour more per day (6.1 hours) at work than the married working moms (5.1 hours), in part because more women work part time and because of child demands. Just under half (43%) of married moms were employed full time compared to nearly nine out of ten (88%) married dads.
The stereotype you probably didn’t need the federal government to tell you – yes, that teenager sleeps longer. Boys 15 to 19 sleep an average of 9.7 hours, slightly more than girls in the same age group (9.3 hours). Despite the reports about sleep deprivation, the report says on average, Americans aged 15 and over sleep 8.6 hours a day. If you want to do some more digging into the data, the website is http://www.bls.gov/tus.
THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST: Are television websites when it comes to growth and newspaper websites when it comes to worth. Normally I don’t cite reports in MfM that have been widely circulated, but this one which appeared in Broadcasting and Cable is too interesting not to note. According to a joint report by BIA Financial Network and Borrell Associates, TV websites tapping into the fast-growing video and search advertising have seen their Web advertising grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 67.2%, compared to newspapers’ 33.5%. But, because newspaper websites have been around longer, they’re valued more – anywhere from $500,000 to $30 Million compared to television’s $500,000 to $9 Million. TV and radio websites only generate about 3% of the station’s gross revenues compared to just 6.5% for newspaper websites, but both are expected to grow – television to 5% or 6% by 2011 and newspapers to 10%.
THE TECHIE SIDE OF TECHCRUNCH50: There were so many interesting, entrepreneurial websites from the Techcrunch50 show that I had to re-visit it. For example, Tingz produces widgets that operate across all platforms from iPhones and Blackberrys to Macs and Windows. Not only that but the widgets interact with each other so that your recipe widget will connect to your shopping widget to make sure you get the ingredients. Website Imindi.com has set a goal of augmenting human intelligence via computer science using neuroscience and cognitive psychology through a search engine mechanism that introduces people to new ideas and thoughts instead of just new information. In place of Descartes Cogito ergo sum (I think therefore I am), Imindi says Cogitamus ergo erimus – We think therefore we shall be. A little more mundane but no less interesting is icharts.net which acts as a portal for people to develop interactive charts on various subjects that they can share. Japanese corporation Tonchidot has developed “Sekai camera” which translates to “world camera” and is “a real-world interface for the iPhone that connects real and virtual worlds, allowing anybody to create, experience and participate in both.” Website videosurf.com promises to help you find exactly what you want in the growing online video world by teaching computers to “see inside” video (whatever that means) so that you can use visual content instead of text to search online. Finally, my favorite, birdpost.com, which says it is leading the burgeoning field of “citizen science” (I didn’t even know it was a burgeoning field) by helping birdwatchers find new bird species using satellite mapping technology.
ANOTHER FACTOID: From a study by the Pew Research group noted in a previous MfM, the percentage of Americans with cell phones has risen from half (53%) in the year 2000, to about three quarters (74%) two years ago to now when four out of five (83%) Americans have one. Relatively few people get their news on these phones, according to the survey, but more than a third (37%) of those using iPhones and Blackberrys use them to get news.
THE TECHIE SIDE OF SARA PALIN’S E-MAIL. In the category of you heard it here first, (okay, that may not be true for all of you) regular readers of MfM will recall a discussion about website 4chan.org. It is a cutting edge site of weird and wonderful and not-so-wonderful memes that often end up presaging happenings on the Internet. Well, it turns out that the hacker who broke into Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s e-mail was a member of “anonymous” -- a group of ‘online troublemakers” who hang out on sites such as 4chan.org. Warning/ Disclaimer: If you visit the site, tread carefully.
SIDENOTE: Website Silicon Alley Insider, using data from online video measuring service TubeMogul, reports that videos of Sara Palin are being viewed more (38 Million) than her running mate, Sen. John McCain (25 Million), or Sen. Barack Obama (29 Million). No mention, oddly of Sen. Joe Biden. As you may have heard, ABC anchor Charlie Gibson’s interview with Palin on 20/20 drew 7.9 Million viewers – the highest number for the show in six months. And despite complaints to the contrary, an analysis of campaign coverage by LexisNexis found that coverage of Palin has been quite balanced with more than a quarter (26%) of the 6,000 stories analyzed being deemed ‘positive’, less than a quarter (22%) being deemed ‘negative’ and more than half (52%) being deemed ‘neutral.’ The analysis also notes that Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden was, as the analysts put it, “tossed into the discount bin” receiving only 683 stories to Palin’s 6,027.
POLITICAL PALAVER IS POPULAR: If any of you have any doubt about the unusual interest in politics this year, Nielsen Media reports that two thirds (64.5%) of all U.S. households tuned in to one or the other of the two political conventions. A third (33.9%) reported watching both conventions. An estimated 15% tuned in just to the RNC and another 15.7% tuned in just to the DNC. The 18-24 demographic had the lowest percentage of viewing – less than a quarter (24%) watched either convention. Plus the report notes that the cume percentages for the two conventions were similar across all adult age breaks even though the Republican convention was shortened a day by Hurricane Gustav.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: As long as I’m talking politics and just to prove that there is nothing too mundane for researchers to study, research firm BigResearch reports that McCain voters are more likely (68%) to drive domestic brand cars than Obama voters (54%) and that Obama voters are more likely (36.6%) to drive a Japanese brand car than McCain voters (26.7%) and nearly twice as likely to drive a European brand (9.4%) than McCain voters (5.3%). McCain voters are also more likely to drive SUV’s (19.1% vs. 14.9%) and trucks (14.2% vs. 8.3%) One in five hiring managers (22%) say they use social networking sites to research job candidates – double the figure just two years ago (of 11%). The hiring managers told Careerbuilder.com that many of the candidates talked about drinking and using drugs on their site or posted ‘provocative or inappropriate’ photographs or information, although, on the good side, nearly half of the hiring managers (48%) say the social networking background check showed the candidate was qualified for the job. Beer maker Anheuser Busch has won its first ever Emmy for a commercial that has never aired on television. The spot, titled Swear Jar, is, as its name implies, about a company that keeps a swear jar for its employees who have to put in money every time they swear. The money is used to buy a case of Bud Light. The spot has become a hot viral video online with more than 12 Million views and the award, according to AdGabber.com. I should warn anybody wanting to watch it that the language is very profane.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Friday, September 19, 2008
Message from MIchael -- September 15, 2008
HOW TO DISAMBIGUATE TECHNOLOGY
THE FUTURE CRUNCH IN NEWS
NEWS CONSUMPTION FACTOIDS THAT SAY SOMETHING
THE ALTERED NEWS MEDIA ENVIRONMENT
INTERNET BYPASSING THE U.S.
MACEY’S AND GIMBLE’S
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
HOW TO DISAMBIGUATE TECHNOLOGY: I think I just heard a massive “huh?” from all those wondering, like I did, what disambiguate means. According to an on-line dictionary, it means to ‘state unambiguously or remove ambiguities from.’ And that is what upstart company Angstro purports to do in culling contacts from all your social networking sites to produce an improved alternative to the Google alert system. It produces what Beet.tv called a “personalized newspaper” telling you what all your friends, associates and contacts across all your social networking sites are doing. The company is one of 52 companies that disambiguates (as well as maybe adds ambiguity) to the Internet, and which are highlighted in the TechCrunch50 conference held in San Francisco recently. (Yes, I know, 52 and 50 doesn’t add up. Apparently they’re great at technology but lousy at basic math.) A virtual walk through the TechCrunch50 list of presenting companies is a run through the efforts to monetize, incentivize and crystallize the online future.
Probably the majority of applications seem to be aimed at video gaming, but many of the efforts are targeted to the younger demographics. For example, actor Ashton Kutcher and producer Jason Goldberg are behind a company that produces blahgirls.com, “an animated clique of teenagers who enjoy providing their commentary on the latest entertainment themed news and happenings.” Then there’s Hangout.net which “turns MySpace into MyPlace, with a personalized 3D virtual room -- sort of like the bedrooms of its target audience of 16 to 24 year olds. Website Shryk.com aims at developing an online banking system (no kidding) for kids, in demographics 5 to 11, and 11 to 17 and 18 to 24. Tel-Aviv-based website Tweegee.com promises to integrate social networking, digital content and interactive tools to develop an online platform for tweens that has ‘technologically advanced safeguards.’
THE FUTURE CRUNCH IN NEWS: Just to give you some idea of what that future looks like, especially for those of you in the news business, here is a sampling of some of the start-ups on stage at the TechCrunch50 conference. Website Alfabetic provides an automated translation service in a turnkey operation that not only translates but also localizes and distributes content so that an online content provider can tap into “the multi-billion dollar opportunity of the international audience.” Website Causecast connects nonprofits, civic leaders, celebrities and brands together with media, social networking and philanthropic organizations in an “unexpected and unparalleled” convergence that will have “a positive impact on the world.” Company Quant the News has developed a website stockmood.com which tracks news stories and assesses the ‘mood’ of a stock and how its price responds to news stories. Website GoodGuide.com promises to be the world’s largest and most reliable source of information on the health, environmental and social impacts of products and companies. A variation of that is website Goodrec.com which provides a simplistic ‘thumbs up/ thumbs down’ recommendation system for friends and trusted sources to give, what it under-statedly calls ‘brief, to-the-point’ recommendations on products and services any time and anywhere on any platform.
Two of the more interesting websites (usual disclaimer – to me at least) offer an interesting twist on an old concept and a completely unexpected new twist. Website iamnews.com, which describes itself as a ‘global, open newsroom… for reporters, photographers, media moguls… anyone… is a crowd sourced newsroom with ambitions to one day take on A.P. and Reuters.” Founder Nir Ofir who also founded Blogtv.com says the process will ‘blur the line between the media provider and the media consumer.’ Website dotspots.com says it wants to improve online news by identifying semantically similar content across millions of news sites and blogs with the goal of improving online news for mainstream media and ‘citizen journalists’ as well. What is especially intriguing is the idea of integrating memes into mainstream media. (You may remember from previous MfM’s that a meme is a concept co-opted by the Internet world to mean any idea, thought or cultural change spread through a viral underground.) My interpretation but it’s a sort of cross pollination of ideas and information.
NEWS CONSUMPTION FACTOIDS THAT SAY SOMETHING: But exactly what I’m not sure. For example, a survey by the Pew group found that the CBS News audience has the lowest percentage by far of college graduates (15%) of any network news, whether NBC (33%), ABC (26%) or Fox (25%). Breaking preconceptions maybe, even The O’Reilly Factor (with 38%) and Rush Limbaugh (33%) have more college grads listening. As noted in last week’s MfM about the survey by the Pew Research Center for People and the Press, only 18% of those surveyed could answer three questions about news and politics correctly. As an addendum to that, the report notes that regular viewers of The Colbert Report nearly double that number (34%) and viewers of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart have a similarly high percentage of news savvy viewers (30%) even though their viewers skew younger with roughly three-quarters of them under the age of 50. But then again, listeners to Hannity and Colmes scored even higher (42%) while Limbaugh listeners (at 36%) were more than equal to Stewart and Colbert although O’Reilly’s audience was slightly lower (28%). That’s still better than Larry King Live (19% of which could answer all three questions correctly) or ABC, CNN and Fox (all 19%). The NBC news audience was only slightly better (21%) but the CBS news audience was dramatically worse (10%).
Not surprisingly the study shows nearly half (48%) of Americans follow weather news “very closely.” The closest other area of interest was crime with a quarter (28%) of those surveyed saying they following crime news very closely. The report says half of Blacks followed crime very closely compared to a quarter of Whites. Only 7% of those surveyed admit to following celebrity news closely. What was surprising (at least to me) was the low percentage of people who say they followed community news very closely (22%). In fact it was so surprising that I checked the question. In actual fact there were two – I follow ‘local community news’ very closely and I follow ‘local news’ very closely. I don’t know how the survey differentiates those two. Although the survey authors don’t say anything about it, if you look at the charts provided, there appears to be a general decline in interest across all categories since the survey was first done in 2002. For example, community news is down from 31% in 2002. Health news is down (26% to 20%); sports (25% to 20%); International affairs (21% to 16%); science and technology (17% to 13%); entertainment (14% to 10%) and religion slightly (19% to 17%). Consumer news (13%) and business news (16%) are both flat. Politics and Washington News is flat (at 21%) over the six year period but actually up from the survey two years ago (17%).
THE ALTERED NEWS MEDIA ENVIRONMENT. Buried in a New York Times article profiling Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain’s senior political advisor is a commentary of sorts on the news media. In it, Steve Schmidt reportedly tells friends that the new media environment, including political websites and blogs, is “easily manipulated because of round-the-clock thirst for news, increased competition, lowered standards created by the proliferation of outlets and hunger for the outrageous.”
INTERNET BYPASSING THE U.S. A professor at the University of Minnesota who tracks the global Internet says ten years ago 70% of the world’s Internet traffic came through the United States. That has now dropped to 25%. Part of the reason for that shift of traffic, especially Canadian and European traffic, is because of the passage of the Patriot Act which allowed for the interception of foreign Internet communication, says the executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Part of that is because other countries, most notably Japan which is working to connect China and India, are investing more in the infrastructure of the Internet, say research scientists at the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis. The article which cites these stats in The New York Times also cites a ranking analysis by a firm called Renesys which shows that the big winners in the last three years have been Italian Internet provider Tiscali, China Telecom, and Japanese telecommunications operator KDDI. The firm, Renesys, which tracks Internet connections between providers, says all of the companies that have slipped in the rankings are American. Times reporter John Markoff quotes the Minnesota professor, Andrew M. Odlyzko, as saying, “we discovered the Internet but we couldn’t keep it a secret.”
MACEY’S AND GIMBLE’S: In keeping with the spirit of the classic movie Miracle on 34th Street, I want to send a congratulatory note to my good friends at the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism which recently celebrated its Centennial of service. The school was the nation’s first, founded on September 14, 1908. Seven years later in 1915 our own Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications was founded. We, too, will be launching our own centennial plans to celebrate that founding.
A SALUTE TO STATIONS. I try to keep personal observations out of this weekly report, but I need to salute those stations dealing with Hurricane IKE as well as those stations and others who have dealt with the previous hurricanes. I am proud to say that I consult many of them. It is at times like these that news organizations in general, but television in particular, validate their value to the public.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE FUTURE CRUNCH IN NEWS
NEWS CONSUMPTION FACTOIDS THAT SAY SOMETHING
THE ALTERED NEWS MEDIA ENVIRONMENT
INTERNET BYPASSING THE U.S.
MACEY’S AND GIMBLE’S
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
HOW TO DISAMBIGUATE TECHNOLOGY: I think I just heard a massive “huh?” from all those wondering, like I did, what disambiguate means. According to an on-line dictionary, it means to ‘state unambiguously or remove ambiguities from.’ And that is what upstart company Angstro purports to do in culling contacts from all your social networking sites to produce an improved alternative to the Google alert system. It produces what Beet.tv called a “personalized newspaper” telling you what all your friends, associates and contacts across all your social networking sites are doing. The company is one of 52 companies that disambiguates (as well as maybe adds ambiguity) to the Internet, and which are highlighted in the TechCrunch50 conference held in San Francisco recently. (Yes, I know, 52 and 50 doesn’t add up. Apparently they’re great at technology but lousy at basic math.) A virtual walk through the TechCrunch50 list of presenting companies is a run through the efforts to monetize, incentivize and crystallize the online future.
Probably the majority of applications seem to be aimed at video gaming, but many of the efforts are targeted to the younger demographics. For example, actor Ashton Kutcher and producer Jason Goldberg are behind a company that produces blahgirls.com, “an animated clique of teenagers who enjoy providing their commentary on the latest entertainment themed news and happenings.” Then there’s Hangout.net which “turns MySpace into MyPlace, with a personalized 3D virtual room -- sort of like the bedrooms of its target audience of 16 to 24 year olds. Website Shryk.com aims at developing an online banking system (no kidding) for kids, in demographics 5 to 11, and 11 to 17 and 18 to 24. Tel-Aviv-based website Tweegee.com promises to integrate social networking, digital content and interactive tools to develop an online platform for tweens that has ‘technologically advanced safeguards.’
THE FUTURE CRUNCH IN NEWS: Just to give you some idea of what that future looks like, especially for those of you in the news business, here is a sampling of some of the start-ups on stage at the TechCrunch50 conference. Website Alfabetic provides an automated translation service in a turnkey operation that not only translates but also localizes and distributes content so that an online content provider can tap into “the multi-billion dollar opportunity of the international audience.” Website Causecast connects nonprofits, civic leaders, celebrities and brands together with media, social networking and philanthropic organizations in an “unexpected and unparalleled” convergence that will have “a positive impact on the world.” Company Quant the News has developed a website stockmood.com which tracks news stories and assesses the ‘mood’ of a stock and how its price responds to news stories. Website GoodGuide.com promises to be the world’s largest and most reliable source of information on the health, environmental and social impacts of products and companies. A variation of that is website Goodrec.com which provides a simplistic ‘thumbs up/ thumbs down’ recommendation system for friends and trusted sources to give, what it under-statedly calls ‘brief, to-the-point’ recommendations on products and services any time and anywhere on any platform.
Two of the more interesting websites (usual disclaimer – to me at least) offer an interesting twist on an old concept and a completely unexpected new twist. Website iamnews.com, which describes itself as a ‘global, open newsroom… for reporters, photographers, media moguls… anyone… is a crowd sourced newsroom with ambitions to one day take on A.P. and Reuters.” Founder Nir Ofir who also founded Blogtv.com says the process will ‘blur the line between the media provider and the media consumer.’ Website dotspots.com says it wants to improve online news by identifying semantically similar content across millions of news sites and blogs with the goal of improving online news for mainstream media and ‘citizen journalists’ as well. What is especially intriguing is the idea of integrating memes into mainstream media. (You may remember from previous MfM’s that a meme is a concept co-opted by the Internet world to mean any idea, thought or cultural change spread through a viral underground.) My interpretation but it’s a sort of cross pollination of ideas and information.
NEWS CONSUMPTION FACTOIDS THAT SAY SOMETHING: But exactly what I’m not sure. For example, a survey by the Pew group found that the CBS News audience has the lowest percentage by far of college graduates (15%) of any network news, whether NBC (33%), ABC (26%) or Fox (25%). Breaking preconceptions maybe, even The O’Reilly Factor (with 38%) and Rush Limbaugh (33%) have more college grads listening. As noted in last week’s MfM about the survey by the Pew Research Center for People and the Press, only 18% of those surveyed could answer three questions about news and politics correctly. As an addendum to that, the report notes that regular viewers of The Colbert Report nearly double that number (34%) and viewers of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart have a similarly high percentage of news savvy viewers (30%) even though their viewers skew younger with roughly three-quarters of them under the age of 50. But then again, listeners to Hannity and Colmes scored even higher (42%) while Limbaugh listeners (at 36%) were more than equal to Stewart and Colbert although O’Reilly’s audience was slightly lower (28%). That’s still better than Larry King Live (19% of which could answer all three questions correctly) or ABC, CNN and Fox (all 19%). The NBC news audience was only slightly better (21%) but the CBS news audience was dramatically worse (10%).
Not surprisingly the study shows nearly half (48%) of Americans follow weather news “very closely.” The closest other area of interest was crime with a quarter (28%) of those surveyed saying they following crime news very closely. The report says half of Blacks followed crime very closely compared to a quarter of Whites. Only 7% of those surveyed admit to following celebrity news closely. What was surprising (at least to me) was the low percentage of people who say they followed community news very closely (22%). In fact it was so surprising that I checked the question. In actual fact there were two – I follow ‘local community news’ very closely and I follow ‘local news’ very closely. I don’t know how the survey differentiates those two. Although the survey authors don’t say anything about it, if you look at the charts provided, there appears to be a general decline in interest across all categories since the survey was first done in 2002. For example, community news is down from 31% in 2002. Health news is down (26% to 20%); sports (25% to 20%); International affairs (21% to 16%); science and technology (17% to 13%); entertainment (14% to 10%) and religion slightly (19% to 17%). Consumer news (13%) and business news (16%) are both flat. Politics and Washington News is flat (at 21%) over the six year period but actually up from the survey two years ago (17%).
THE ALTERED NEWS MEDIA ENVIRONMENT. Buried in a New York Times article profiling Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain’s senior political advisor is a commentary of sorts on the news media. In it, Steve Schmidt reportedly tells friends that the new media environment, including political websites and blogs, is “easily manipulated because of round-the-clock thirst for news, increased competition, lowered standards created by the proliferation of outlets and hunger for the outrageous.”
INTERNET BYPASSING THE U.S. A professor at the University of Minnesota who tracks the global Internet says ten years ago 70% of the world’s Internet traffic came through the United States. That has now dropped to 25%. Part of the reason for that shift of traffic, especially Canadian and European traffic, is because of the passage of the Patriot Act which allowed for the interception of foreign Internet communication, says the executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Part of that is because other countries, most notably Japan which is working to connect China and India, are investing more in the infrastructure of the Internet, say research scientists at the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis. The article which cites these stats in The New York Times also cites a ranking analysis by a firm called Renesys which shows that the big winners in the last three years have been Italian Internet provider Tiscali, China Telecom, and Japanese telecommunications operator KDDI. The firm, Renesys, which tracks Internet connections between providers, says all of the companies that have slipped in the rankings are American. Times reporter John Markoff quotes the Minnesota professor, Andrew M. Odlyzko, as saying, “we discovered the Internet but we couldn’t keep it a secret.”
MACEY’S AND GIMBLE’S: In keeping with the spirit of the classic movie Miracle on 34th Street, I want to send a congratulatory note to my good friends at the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism which recently celebrated its Centennial of service. The school was the nation’s first, founded on September 14, 1908. Seven years later in 1915 our own Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications was founded. We, too, will be launching our own centennial plans to celebrate that founding.
A SALUTE TO STATIONS. I try to keep personal observations out of this weekly report, but I need to salute those stations dealing with Hurricane IKE as well as those stations and others who have dealt with the previous hurricanes. I am proud to say that I consult many of them. It is at times like these that news organizations in general, but television in particular, validate their value to the public.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Message from Michael -- September 8, 2008
A NATION OF NEWS GRAZERS
THE FLIP SIDE OF NEWS
WHAT DO YOU KNOW
DEFINING NEWS AUDIENCES
THE EDUCATIONAL DIVIDE
TIT FOR TAT
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
A NATION OF NEWS GRAZERS: That’s how a study by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press describes Americans. For the first time since the center began its biennial survey of American viewing habits, the majority of Americans (51%) say they get their news “from time to time” rather than at regular times. Those same news grazers spend dramatically less time with news, averaging 56 minutes a day versus ‘regular-time’ news consumers who spend 79 minutes a day “consuming” news. Despite this, the report says, getting news ‘in one form or another’ remains a daily habit for the vast majority of Americans with roughly four out of five (82%) either seeing, reading or listening to some kind of news. Despite the pace of modern life, the report says, two-thirds (68%) say they do not feel they are too busy to keep up with the news. More than half (52%) even go so far as to say they “enjoy” keeping up with the news.
ANOTHER FIRST: But an unfortunate one for my newspaper brethren. For the first time in 15 years of asking the question, the study authors say fewer than half of all Americans (46%) report reading a daily newspaper on a regular basis, a figure that is down from 52% only two years ago.
THE FLIP SIDE OF NEWS: Probably not surprising, the percentage of young people (those under 25) getting NO news on a typical day has risen significantly from roughly a quarter (25%) of the population in 1998 to a third (34%) in the latest survey. But more than that, one in seven Americans (14%) are what the study calls “Disengaged” – people who don’t follow any news, whether local, national or international, business or finance. This group was less affluent with a third (35%) making less than $30,000 a year and the least educated with two-thirds (69%) not having attended college.
WHAT DO YOU KNOW: Not much apparently. Not surprisingly, when asked three questions testing political knowledge only two percent of the ‘disengaged’ group could answer all three questions. Of course, it’s not saying much that less than one in five of all those surveyed (18%) could answer all three questions. Somewhat surprisingly, a group described by the study as “Traditionalists” who rely primarily on traditional news sources such as newspapers, television and radio didn’t do very well with only one in seven (14%) able to answer all three questions. The two other news consuming groups outlined in the study “Net-Newsers” and “Integrators” did dramatically better, with a little less than a third (29%) of each of these groups getting all three right. In case you’re wondering, the three questions were – which party holds the majority in the House of Representatives, who is the Secretary of State and what is the name of the Prime Minister of Great Britain. Pretty funny, but more Republicans (64%) know that Democrats have the majority than Democrats (54%). It doesn’t say anything for the nightly network news then that its audience is two-to-one Democratic (45% versus 22% Republican.)
DEFINING NEWS AUDIENCES: The Pew study breaks news consumers into three cutesy but convenient groups. “Traditionalists” are those who rely on traditional media sources (TV, newspapers, radio) almost exclusively and is the largest group (46%) and the oldest (median age of 52). As the study authors put it, they are “the most economically downscale” and most conservative. Somewhat disheartening to traditional media types, the ‘traditionalists’ have the lowest average income of the three groups and -- the factoid that made me wonder – nearly half (43%) of them are not employed. Note – not employed, not unemployed.
The second largest group is “Integrators” (23%) who identify a traditional medium as their main news source but also go online for news several days a week. Like their media choice, they fall into the middle in terms of age (media of 44) and politically are not much different than the general public. The smallest group is “Net-Newsers” (13% of the population) who are also the youngest (median age of 35) and the better educated and the most affluent, although only slightly more so than the Integrators. These two groups seem to represent the target audience for new media advocates. Nearly all of the people in these two groups have a home computer (96% to 98%), with Internet access (93% to 95%), most of which is broadband (81% for Integrators to 86% for Net-Newsers) and nearly all have a cell phone (92% each) with a quarter of them (24% to 26%) having either an Iphone or Blackberry. Interestingly the only major difference is that Net-Newsers are more likely (72%) to have an Ipod or MP3 player than Integrators (54%), which probably isn’t surprising since the Net-Newsers skew younger. As an example of how Net-Newsers are different, nearly twice as many regularly watch news clips on the Internet as regularly watch nightly network news (30% vs. 18%). But just to keep a reality check or balance in here, remember that these two groups together comprise only slightly more than a third (36%) of the total population.
THE EDUCATIONAL DIVIDE: It’s getting bigger, says the report. Nearly half of college graduates (44%) say they get news online every day, compared with just one in ten (11%) of those with a high school education or less. Using another measure, nearly two thirds (61%) of college grads go online at least three times a week compared to one in five (19%) of those with a high school or less education. Nearly three quarters (71%) of college graduates are likely to have gone online at work compared to less than a quarter (20%) of those with a high school education. (Obviously there are concurrent economic issues.) Less educated people are more likely to want news presented with their point of view than people with more education, according to the report, although the difference isn’t hugely significant (28% for high school versus 19% for college). The report says people with more education are more likely to trust some sources more than others. Nearly seven in ten college graduates (69%) say they trust a few news sources more than others, compared with half (55%) of those with some college and less than half (44%) of those with no more than a high school education. A quarter of college graduates have an Iphone compared to one in ten of those with only a high school education. Highly educated (and higher income) people are far more likely than those with lesser education to say it is important for their jobs to keep up with the news. There is little educational difference when it comes to reading newspapers, according to the report, with people with a high school education almost as likely to be regular readers as people with a college degree (31% compared to 36%).
TIT FOR TAT: Here are some examples from the report of facts and factoids that you can take as either good news or bad news, depending on your perspective, or are the Ying and Yang of news media consumption.
The percentage of the American population using any traditional news source on any given day has fallen from 90% in 1994 to 85% in 1998 to 73% today. BUT TV remains the most widely used source with 57% of Americans watching news on TV, a rate that the report notes has remained stable for the past ten years.
Although there has been little change in the credibility ratings of most major news organizations in the last two years, over the last ten years virtually every news organization has seen its credibility marks decline. BUT online news outlets are viewed with even more skepticism, according to the report, than either their print, broadcast or cable counterparts.
One-third of day-time news consumers say they get their daytime news Online, up from just 5% who said that ten years ago. BUT television still remains the dominant source for news, both overall and at each time of day, according to the report.
The percentage of Americans who say they got news online yesterday (often considered a better measure) has risen from 23% two years ago to 29% now. BUT of the 29% who got news online yesterday, more than four out of five (84%) ALSO got news from either TV, radio or a newspaper.
The percentage of Americans who say they read a newspaper yesterday has dropped from 40% two years ago to 34% today. BUT the audience for On-line newspapers has grown from 9% two years ago to 13% today. (The report does note though that doesn’t compensate for the loss in print readership.)
DAILY online news use has increased by about a third from 18% to 25% in the last two years. BUT just 5% of Americans got their news ONLY from the Web.
DISCLAIMER: As always, with the amount of material involved, I have only scanned the surface. I may, in fact, do a second report on the survey. So, stay tuned.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE FLIP SIDE OF NEWS
WHAT DO YOU KNOW
DEFINING NEWS AUDIENCES
THE EDUCATIONAL DIVIDE
TIT FOR TAT
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
A NATION OF NEWS GRAZERS: That’s how a study by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press describes Americans. For the first time since the center began its biennial survey of American viewing habits, the majority of Americans (51%) say they get their news “from time to time” rather than at regular times. Those same news grazers spend dramatically less time with news, averaging 56 minutes a day versus ‘regular-time’ news consumers who spend 79 minutes a day “consuming” news. Despite this, the report says, getting news ‘in one form or another’ remains a daily habit for the vast majority of Americans with roughly four out of five (82%) either seeing, reading or listening to some kind of news. Despite the pace of modern life, the report says, two-thirds (68%) say they do not feel they are too busy to keep up with the news. More than half (52%) even go so far as to say they “enjoy” keeping up with the news.
ANOTHER FIRST: But an unfortunate one for my newspaper brethren. For the first time in 15 years of asking the question, the study authors say fewer than half of all Americans (46%) report reading a daily newspaper on a regular basis, a figure that is down from 52% only two years ago.
THE FLIP SIDE OF NEWS: Probably not surprising, the percentage of young people (those under 25) getting NO news on a typical day has risen significantly from roughly a quarter (25%) of the population in 1998 to a third (34%) in the latest survey. But more than that, one in seven Americans (14%) are what the study calls “Disengaged” – people who don’t follow any news, whether local, national or international, business or finance. This group was less affluent with a third (35%) making less than $30,000 a year and the least educated with two-thirds (69%) not having attended college.
WHAT DO YOU KNOW: Not much apparently. Not surprisingly, when asked three questions testing political knowledge only two percent of the ‘disengaged’ group could answer all three questions. Of course, it’s not saying much that less than one in five of all those surveyed (18%) could answer all three questions. Somewhat surprisingly, a group described by the study as “Traditionalists” who rely primarily on traditional news sources such as newspapers, television and radio didn’t do very well with only one in seven (14%) able to answer all three questions. The two other news consuming groups outlined in the study “Net-Newsers” and “Integrators” did dramatically better, with a little less than a third (29%) of each of these groups getting all three right. In case you’re wondering, the three questions were – which party holds the majority in the House of Representatives, who is the Secretary of State and what is the name of the Prime Minister of Great Britain. Pretty funny, but more Republicans (64%) know that Democrats have the majority than Democrats (54%). It doesn’t say anything for the nightly network news then that its audience is two-to-one Democratic (45% versus 22% Republican.)
DEFINING NEWS AUDIENCES: The Pew study breaks news consumers into three cutesy but convenient groups. “Traditionalists” are those who rely on traditional media sources (TV, newspapers, radio) almost exclusively and is the largest group (46%) and the oldest (median age of 52). As the study authors put it, they are “the most economically downscale” and most conservative. Somewhat disheartening to traditional media types, the ‘traditionalists’ have the lowest average income of the three groups and -- the factoid that made me wonder – nearly half (43%) of them are not employed. Note – not employed, not unemployed.
The second largest group is “Integrators” (23%) who identify a traditional medium as their main news source but also go online for news several days a week. Like their media choice, they fall into the middle in terms of age (media of 44) and politically are not much different than the general public. The smallest group is “Net-Newsers” (13% of the population) who are also the youngest (median age of 35) and the better educated and the most affluent, although only slightly more so than the Integrators. These two groups seem to represent the target audience for new media advocates. Nearly all of the people in these two groups have a home computer (96% to 98%), with Internet access (93% to 95%), most of which is broadband (81% for Integrators to 86% for Net-Newsers) and nearly all have a cell phone (92% each) with a quarter of them (24% to 26%) having either an Iphone or Blackberry. Interestingly the only major difference is that Net-Newsers are more likely (72%) to have an Ipod or MP3 player than Integrators (54%), which probably isn’t surprising since the Net-Newsers skew younger. As an example of how Net-Newsers are different, nearly twice as many regularly watch news clips on the Internet as regularly watch nightly network news (30% vs. 18%). But just to keep a reality check or balance in here, remember that these two groups together comprise only slightly more than a third (36%) of the total population.
THE EDUCATIONAL DIVIDE: It’s getting bigger, says the report. Nearly half of college graduates (44%) say they get news online every day, compared with just one in ten (11%) of those with a high school education or less. Using another measure, nearly two thirds (61%) of college grads go online at least three times a week compared to one in five (19%) of those with a high school or less education. Nearly three quarters (71%) of college graduates are likely to have gone online at work compared to less than a quarter (20%) of those with a high school education. (Obviously there are concurrent economic issues.) Less educated people are more likely to want news presented with their point of view than people with more education, according to the report, although the difference isn’t hugely significant (28% for high school versus 19% for college). The report says people with more education are more likely to trust some sources more than others. Nearly seven in ten college graduates (69%) say they trust a few news sources more than others, compared with half (55%) of those with some college and less than half (44%) of those with no more than a high school education. A quarter of college graduates have an Iphone compared to one in ten of those with only a high school education. Highly educated (and higher income) people are far more likely than those with lesser education to say it is important for their jobs to keep up with the news. There is little educational difference when it comes to reading newspapers, according to the report, with people with a high school education almost as likely to be regular readers as people with a college degree (31% compared to 36%).
TIT FOR TAT: Here are some examples from the report of facts and factoids that you can take as either good news or bad news, depending on your perspective, or are the Ying and Yang of news media consumption.
The percentage of the American population using any traditional news source on any given day has fallen from 90% in 1994 to 85% in 1998 to 73% today. BUT TV remains the most widely used source with 57% of Americans watching news on TV, a rate that the report notes has remained stable for the past ten years.
Although there has been little change in the credibility ratings of most major news organizations in the last two years, over the last ten years virtually every news organization has seen its credibility marks decline. BUT online news outlets are viewed with even more skepticism, according to the report, than either their print, broadcast or cable counterparts.
One-third of day-time news consumers say they get their daytime news Online, up from just 5% who said that ten years ago. BUT television still remains the dominant source for news, both overall and at each time of day, according to the report.
The percentage of Americans who say they got news online yesterday (often considered a better measure) has risen from 23% two years ago to 29% now. BUT of the 29% who got news online yesterday, more than four out of five (84%) ALSO got news from either TV, radio or a newspaper.
The percentage of Americans who say they read a newspaper yesterday has dropped from 40% two years ago to 34% today. BUT the audience for On-line newspapers has grown from 9% two years ago to 13% today. (The report does note though that doesn’t compensate for the loss in print readership.)
DAILY online news use has increased by about a third from 18% to 25% in the last two years. BUT just 5% of Americans got their news ONLY from the Web.
DISCLAIMER: As always, with the amount of material involved, I have only scanned the surface. I may, in fact, do a second report on the survey. So, stay tuned.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- August 25, 2008
TAMI… TAMI… NBC’S IN LOVE
UN-CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
FACTOIDS OF THE WEEK
WEB VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
COCKTAIL CHATTER
TAMI… TAMI… NBC’S IN LOVE: And the Olympics are proof of that, but it may be an unrequited love. By the time you read this, the Beijing Olympics will have gone down in the record books as the most watched television event in U.S. history, surpassing the Atlanta Olympics, according to numbers supplied by NBC and Nielsen. That’s especially interesting because as late as July, many media observers were predicting that the Beijing Olympics could go down in history as the least watched games because of the time difference. According to The Programming Insider, the Olympic coverage has beaten the four other networks COMBINED by an average of 40% to 75% most nights. Oh, yes, TAMI. That’s NBC’s acronym for Total Audience Measurement Index, which compiles total numbers for multi-platform viewing – TV, including the network and its cable operations, the Internet, mobile audiences and video on demand. The NBC Olympics website had 50 live feeds a day on everything from badminton to wrestling. But the big events were reserved for television where the ad dollars are. That fact, plus speculation that some online users were reluctant to download Microsoft’s video player Silverlight, is why some observers say the video streaming scored a silver instead of a gold. Even so, the numbers are pretty amazing, with Nielsen reporting that U.S. daily traffic to NBC’s video site averaged 1.5 Million unique visitors from home and work each day. In the first four days alone, Marketing Vox reports, there were 291 Million page views and 13.5 Million video streams. As of a week ago, that had gone up to 65 Million video streams and 1 Billion page views. (Just for the record, NBC’s previous online record came during the Tiger Woods – Rocco Mediate golf match in which there were 9.1 Million page views and 1.5 Million streams.) Website compete.com, though, says the real winner of the gold in online Olympics was Yahoo’s Olympics page which averaged slightly higher than NBC in terms of page views but slightly lower in terms of time engagement. Research firm eMarketer estimates the NBC online revenue at $5.75 Million, compared to the $1 Billion in TV sales. Interestingly, several reports note that despite the multiplatform approach, TV still accounted for anywhere from 92% to 94% of all Olympic viewing. Website tvbythenumbers.com put it even higher – at 99.7%, based on total viewing minutes on each, even though NBC says it put 3600 hours on television and 2200 hours on the Internet. Regardless, NBC officials still say the multiplatform approach and TAMI measurement system is the way of the future, with online and other platforms helping to drive prime time viewing.
Side Note: Working with chinarank.org.cn, and based on 200 Olympic-related sites in China, Nielsen Online calculated the DAILY unique browsers in China alone at 64.5 Million – or about a quarter of all the 250 Million Internet users in what is now the largest Internet population country in the world. Nielsen cited the video streaming not only of NBC but also of Terra in Brazil as ‘impressive.’ It also noted that upwards of a million people around the world daily went to the official website – Beijing2008.cn, with the U.S., Australia and France ranking in the top three as their athletes scored medals.
Foot Note: Does anybody besides me remember the Debbie Reynolds song that the headline for this section was based on?
UN-CONVENTIONAL WISDOM: That is what will be needed to win the Presidential election, if several marketing and Internet research sites are to be believed. As the two party conventions get underway, much is being made about the un-conventional versus conventional approaches of the two candidates. (Yes, there is a play on words in there somewhere.) First, let me give you some statistics in case you haven’t seen them. According to monitoring site techpresident.com, Barack Obama has 458,954 MySpace friends, compared to John McCain’s 64,598. According to monitoring site tubemogul.com, Barack Obama had a cumulative viewing of just under 57 Million views on YouTube compared to John McCain’s 14 Million. According to monitoring site twitterholic.com, Barack Obama had just under 65,000 followers while John McCain had just over 1,600 followers. (Yes, they both twitter… sort of.) In fact, Obama is the top twitterer, even though his messages (like McCain’s) are simplistic campaign announcements. According to their YouTube websites, Barack Obama had just over 15,000 subscribers but with more than 15 Million channel views while John McCain had more than 13,000 subscribers but with just over one Million channel views.
But more critical than the technology is what you do with the technology. According to a front page article in M.I.T.’s Technology Review, Obama made the greatest use of the social networking capabilities of the Internet to build his political network. It all lies at a technology center called Blue State Digital where graduates of the Howard Dean presidential campaign have taken those efforts to the next level. All of the campaigns used the Internet but the Hillary Clinton campaign was marked by a top down approach that limited the social networking aspects, while the Ron Paul campaign had a bottom up approach that resulted in “Internet anarchy” and the John McCain campaign had such a limited view that it created a “walled garden” that didn’t allow for a free flow of visitors. In addition to online videos, profiles on all the sites, and SMS text messaging, the Obama campaign identified volunteers and wannabes who helped in the get-out-the-vote campaign, donating and holding local events. The article notes that all of the campaigns also get the public records to find out who voted and when, but the Obama campaign correlated that with its own list of people, and who organized house parties, who donated, and what other online connections they had. It should be noted that the McCain campaign has made some dramatic changes, including ‘blogettes’ from his daughter and the viral video comparing Obama to Paris Hilton and the one likening him to Charlton Heston’s Moses; while there has been some criticism of Obama’s latest efforts, including the text messaging announcement of his VP choice which came after many in the mainstream media had already identified Joe Biden. Anyway, you can read the complete article at http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21222/?a=f .
More Campaign Factoids. According to Nielsen Media, the Democratic Convention has had more viewers than the Republican Convention in nine of the last 12 Presidential campaigns starting in 1960. The Republican exceptions were Richard Nixon’s in 1972, Gerald Ford’s in 1976 and George W. Bush’s in 2004. The Obama campaign’s image-based online advertising was five times bigger in July than June, with 417 Million impressions; while the McCain campaign doubled its sponsored search link to reach more than 15 Million impressions. By comparison, McCain had 16 Million image-based ad impressions in July and Obama had One Million search link impressions in July. The two ran a combined total of 127,513 local TV spots between June and August 1st, and 668 national cable TV ads. McCain had 57,000 local TV spots compared to Obama’s 70,000. McCain had 526 national cable ads, compared to Obama’s 142; and McCain had 256 spot radio ads compared to Obama’s 184. Neither candidate placed ads on any of the national broadcast networks or syndication during June and July. Obama’s top five targeted states for ads were Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. McCain’s top ad markets were Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Iowa.
FACTOIDS OF THE WEEK: The number of cell phones sold in the U.S. dropped 13% to 28 Million in the second quarter of this year compared to last year, according to research firm NPD Group, but the total value of the phones sold was only down 2%, at $2.4 Billion because they have more features and are more expensive. The same group says the sale of video games reached $9.5 Billion in July of this year compared to $7 Billion last year. The group estimates the gaming community in the U.S. at 174 Million. Of those, three percent are “extreme gamers” who spend an average of 45 hours a week playing video games. According to Kansas State University professor Michael Wesch, the equivalent of 385 24/7 TV channels of video (9,232hours) is uploaded to YouTube every day.
WEB VIDEOS OF THE WEEK: Just to make sure, you’re with it and in the know, we are starting a new feature about online videos. On YouTube, Numa Numa is one of the hot videos, garnering more than 18 Million views (and, no, I don’t understand why.) Former Doogie Howser star Neil Patrick Harris is the star of a new webcast Dr. Horrible. And, finally, Midnight Rida which is billed as an “urban comedic spoof” of the 1980s TV series Knight Rider, is proving a popular hit on Maniatv.com. (Warning – language is rough.)
MFM FOOTNOTE: Because of the dominance of the Olympics and the Convention, I did not do an anticipated review of the latest research on audience segmentation amongst news viewers from the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. A special edition of MfM will come out later for that.
MFM DISCLAIMER: We confess that we have not been updating the media-consultant.blogspot.com website often enough. Partially that is because we have been re-building the MediaConsultant.TV website. More on that later. In any case, for those asking, the blog of past MfM’s is up to date.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
UN-CONVENTIONAL WISDOM
FACTOIDS OF THE WEEK
WEB VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
COCKTAIL CHATTER
TAMI… TAMI… NBC’S IN LOVE: And the Olympics are proof of that, but it may be an unrequited love. By the time you read this, the Beijing Olympics will have gone down in the record books as the most watched television event in U.S. history, surpassing the Atlanta Olympics, according to numbers supplied by NBC and Nielsen. That’s especially interesting because as late as July, many media observers were predicting that the Beijing Olympics could go down in history as the least watched games because of the time difference. According to The Programming Insider, the Olympic coverage has beaten the four other networks COMBINED by an average of 40% to 75% most nights. Oh, yes, TAMI. That’s NBC’s acronym for Total Audience Measurement Index, which compiles total numbers for multi-platform viewing – TV, including the network and its cable operations, the Internet, mobile audiences and video on demand. The NBC Olympics website had 50 live feeds a day on everything from badminton to wrestling. But the big events were reserved for television where the ad dollars are. That fact, plus speculation that some online users were reluctant to download Microsoft’s video player Silverlight, is why some observers say the video streaming scored a silver instead of a gold. Even so, the numbers are pretty amazing, with Nielsen reporting that U.S. daily traffic to NBC’s video site averaged 1.5 Million unique visitors from home and work each day. In the first four days alone, Marketing Vox reports, there were 291 Million page views and 13.5 Million video streams. As of a week ago, that had gone up to 65 Million video streams and 1 Billion page views. (Just for the record, NBC’s previous online record came during the Tiger Woods – Rocco Mediate golf match in which there were 9.1 Million page views and 1.5 Million streams.) Website compete.com, though, says the real winner of the gold in online Olympics was Yahoo’s Olympics page which averaged slightly higher than NBC in terms of page views but slightly lower in terms of time engagement. Research firm eMarketer estimates the NBC online revenue at $5.75 Million, compared to the $1 Billion in TV sales. Interestingly, several reports note that despite the multiplatform approach, TV still accounted for anywhere from 92% to 94% of all Olympic viewing. Website tvbythenumbers.com put it even higher – at 99.7%, based on total viewing minutes on each, even though NBC says it put 3600 hours on television and 2200 hours on the Internet. Regardless, NBC officials still say the multiplatform approach and TAMI measurement system is the way of the future, with online and other platforms helping to drive prime time viewing.
Side Note: Working with chinarank.org.cn, and based on 200 Olympic-related sites in China, Nielsen Online calculated the DAILY unique browsers in China alone at 64.5 Million – or about a quarter of all the 250 Million Internet users in what is now the largest Internet population country in the world. Nielsen cited the video streaming not only of NBC but also of Terra in Brazil as ‘impressive.’ It also noted that upwards of a million people around the world daily went to the official website – Beijing2008.cn, with the U.S., Australia and France ranking in the top three as their athletes scored medals.
Foot Note: Does anybody besides me remember the Debbie Reynolds song that the headline for this section was based on?
UN-CONVENTIONAL WISDOM: That is what will be needed to win the Presidential election, if several marketing and Internet research sites are to be believed. As the two party conventions get underway, much is being made about the un-conventional versus conventional approaches of the two candidates. (Yes, there is a play on words in there somewhere.) First, let me give you some statistics in case you haven’t seen them. According to monitoring site techpresident.com, Barack Obama has 458,954 MySpace friends, compared to John McCain’s 64,598. According to monitoring site tubemogul.com, Barack Obama had a cumulative viewing of just under 57 Million views on YouTube compared to John McCain’s 14 Million. According to monitoring site twitterholic.com, Barack Obama had just under 65,000 followers while John McCain had just over 1,600 followers. (Yes, they both twitter… sort of.) In fact, Obama is the top twitterer, even though his messages (like McCain’s) are simplistic campaign announcements. According to their YouTube websites, Barack Obama had just over 15,000 subscribers but with more than 15 Million channel views while John McCain had more than 13,000 subscribers but with just over one Million channel views.
But more critical than the technology is what you do with the technology. According to a front page article in M.I.T.’s Technology Review, Obama made the greatest use of the social networking capabilities of the Internet to build his political network. It all lies at a technology center called Blue State Digital where graduates of the Howard Dean presidential campaign have taken those efforts to the next level. All of the campaigns used the Internet but the Hillary Clinton campaign was marked by a top down approach that limited the social networking aspects, while the Ron Paul campaign had a bottom up approach that resulted in “Internet anarchy” and the John McCain campaign had such a limited view that it created a “walled garden” that didn’t allow for a free flow of visitors. In addition to online videos, profiles on all the sites, and SMS text messaging, the Obama campaign identified volunteers and wannabes who helped in the get-out-the-vote campaign, donating and holding local events. The article notes that all of the campaigns also get the public records to find out who voted and when, but the Obama campaign correlated that with its own list of people, and who organized house parties, who donated, and what other online connections they had. It should be noted that the McCain campaign has made some dramatic changes, including ‘blogettes’ from his daughter and the viral video comparing Obama to Paris Hilton and the one likening him to Charlton Heston’s Moses; while there has been some criticism of Obama’s latest efforts, including the text messaging announcement of his VP choice which came after many in the mainstream media had already identified Joe Biden. Anyway, you can read the complete article at http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21222/?a=f .
More Campaign Factoids. According to Nielsen Media, the Democratic Convention has had more viewers than the Republican Convention in nine of the last 12 Presidential campaigns starting in 1960. The Republican exceptions were Richard Nixon’s in 1972, Gerald Ford’s in 1976 and George W. Bush’s in 2004. The Obama campaign’s image-based online advertising was five times bigger in July than June, with 417 Million impressions; while the McCain campaign doubled its sponsored search link to reach more than 15 Million impressions. By comparison, McCain had 16 Million image-based ad impressions in July and Obama had One Million search link impressions in July. The two ran a combined total of 127,513 local TV spots between June and August 1st, and 668 national cable TV ads. McCain had 57,000 local TV spots compared to Obama’s 70,000. McCain had 526 national cable ads, compared to Obama’s 142; and McCain had 256 spot radio ads compared to Obama’s 184. Neither candidate placed ads on any of the national broadcast networks or syndication during June and July. Obama’s top five targeted states for ads were Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. McCain’s top ad markets were Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Iowa.
FACTOIDS OF THE WEEK: The number of cell phones sold in the U.S. dropped 13% to 28 Million in the second quarter of this year compared to last year, according to research firm NPD Group, but the total value of the phones sold was only down 2%, at $2.4 Billion because they have more features and are more expensive. The same group says the sale of video games reached $9.5 Billion in July of this year compared to $7 Billion last year. The group estimates the gaming community in the U.S. at 174 Million. Of those, three percent are “extreme gamers” who spend an average of 45 hours a week playing video games. According to Kansas State University professor Michael Wesch, the equivalent of 385 24/7 TV channels of video (9,232hours) is uploaded to YouTube every day.
WEB VIDEOS OF THE WEEK: Just to make sure, you’re with it and in the know, we are starting a new feature about online videos. On YouTube, Numa Numa is one of the hot videos, garnering more than 18 Million views (and, no, I don’t understand why.) Former Doogie Howser star Neil Patrick Harris is the star of a new webcast Dr. Horrible. And, finally, Midnight Rida which is billed as an “urban comedic spoof” of the 1980s TV series Knight Rider, is proving a popular hit on Maniatv.com. (Warning – language is rough.)
MFM FOOTNOTE: Because of the dominance of the Olympics and the Convention, I did not do an anticipated review of the latest research on audience segmentation amongst news viewers from the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. A special edition of MfM will come out later for that.
MFM DISCLAIMER: We confess that we have not been updating the media-consultant.blogspot.com website often enough. Partially that is because we have been re-building the MediaConsultant.TV website. More on that later. In any case, for those asking, the blog of past MfM’s is up to date.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
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