Online News Squared

How Long Do Users Stay on Web Pages?

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 14:35:38 -0500

It’s a scary number, Jakob Nielsen reports.

Users often leave Web pages in 10–20 seconds, but pages with a clear value proposition can hold people’s attention for much longer because visit-durations follow a negative Weibull distribution.

How the Boston Globe built an all-in-one website, Web app and mobile site

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 08:53:06 -0500

How the Boston Globe built an all-in-one website, Web app and mobile site:

Unsaid in this piece on BostonGlobe.com’s use of “responsive design” on its new paywalled HTML5-based approach is it avoids the need for “responsive revenue sharing” with a certain Cuperinto-based company named after a fruit.

Newspaper Chain Drops Righthaven — ‘It Was a Dumb Idea’

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 08:25:14 -0500

Newspaper Chain Drops Righthaven — ‘It Was a Dumb Idea’ :

Judges have been pullling the teeth and claws out of copyright troll Righthaven for months. And now comes yet another crippling extraction — a key customer bolts.

“The new chief executive of MediaNews Group, publisher of the Denver Post and 50 other newspapers, said it was “a dumb idea” for the nation’s second-largest newspaper chain to sign up with copyright troll Righthaven.

“The Denver-based publisher’s year-long copyright infringement litigation deal with Righthaven is terminating at month’s end, said John Paton, who replaced Dean Singleton to lead the company on Wednesday.

“The issues about copyright are real,” Paton told Wired.com in a telephone interview. “But the idea that you would hire someone on an — essentially — success fee to run around and sue people at will who may or may not have infringed as a way of protecting yourself … does not reflect how news is created and disseminated in the modern world.”

Google grabs Zagat

Thu, 08 Sep 2011 10:38:11 -0500

Google grabs Zagat:

A huge move in the local online content space — Google this morning announced it has acquired Zagat and will make its ratings “a cornerstone of our local offering.” (And, as Tweeters are quickly noting, Google’s proclamations that it’s not a content company are ringing a little hollower now).

Copyright Troll Righthaven Goes on Life Support

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:18:47 -0500

The great experiment in copyright trolling that is Righthaven appears to be nearing an end.

Righthaven, which was founded more than a year ago to monetize print news content through copyright infringement lawsuits, has suffered a myriad of courtroom setbacks in recent months. Among them, it was sanctioned $5,000 for misleading a federal judge, ordered to pay $34,000 in opposing legal fees, and was told over and again by judges that it has no legal standing to even file the lawsuits.

With all those issues now on appeal, the litigation factory’s machinery is grinding to a halt. A review of court records shows Righthaven has not filed a new lawsuit in two months, after a flurry of about 275 lawsuits since its launch at the beginning of last year. A court filing indicates there have already beenlayoffs (.pdf) at Righthaven’s Las Vegas headquarters, and even some already-filed lawsuits are falling by the wayside because Righthaven isn’t serving the defendants with the paperwork

You just shared a link. How long will people pay attention?

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 08:00:47 -0500

You just shared a link. How long will people pay attention?:

bitly:

How long is a link “alive” before people stop caring? Does it matter what kind of content it is, or where you shared it? At bitly we see a lot of links, and while every link is special, we’re learning a few general principles that we can share.

Let’s take a look at one particular story - Baby otter befriended by orphaned kittens

"I am afraid I am operating under the impression that Google, Groupon, Apple, Facebook and Twitter,..."

Thu, 01 Sep 2011 09:49:00 -0500

“

I am afraid I am operating under the impression that Google, Groupon, Apple, Facebook and Twitter, new media startups and scores of garage entrepreneurs are out innovating newspapers on a daily basis. I am afraid I find little newspaper innovation breath-taking. I guess I am convinced that risk-takers without the mindset boundaries of newspapering are legitimate threats to newspaper survival.

If you believe I have a point I hope you’ll consider that if journalism is to be saved by newspaper practitioners, the hand cuffs must come off. We can’t think like newspaper people anymore.

We have to have the open minds of entrepreneurs. We have to have the innovative imaginations of liberated explorers. We have to embrace risk like bungee jumpers. We have to listen to young people as if they are our saviors, because they probably are.

If journalism is to be saved by newspaper practitioners who bring the right values of truth-telling, minimizing harm, independence and accountability, then newspaper mindsets must escape the prison of day-to-day crises spawned by business troubles.

”

- McGuire on Media » Speech to Society of Features Editors argued for a changed journalism mindset

The Growth of Social Media: An Infographic

Wed, 31 Aug 2011 09:04:00 -0500

The Growth of Social Media: An Infographic :

Full Search Engine Journal infographic.

Fully 65% of adult internet users now say they use a social...

Wed, 31 Aug 2011 08:38:18 -0500

Fully 65% of adult internet users now say they use a social networking site like MySpace, Facebook or LinkedIn, up from 61% one year ago. This marks the first time in Pew Internet surveys that 50% of all adults use social networking sites.

The frequency of social networking site usage among young adult internet users under age 30 was stable over the last year – 61% of online Americans in that age cohort now use social networking sites on a typical day, compared with 60% one year ago. However, among the Boomer-aged segment of internet users ages 50-64, social networking site usage on a typical day grew a significant 60% (from 20% to 32%).

How The New York Times is taking Twitter reporting faster and deeper with @NYTLive

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 08:56:57 -0500

How The New York Times is taking Twitter reporting faster and deeper with @NYTLive:

After 346 tweets and 22,000 followers in three days, @NYTLive has gone dormant — for now. @NYTLive sent more than 300 tweets, like this one, with the latest updates on Hurricane Irene. The Times’ new Twitter megaphone for in-depth, real-time curation of big news stories got its first test run this weekend for Hurricane Irene. What did the Times staff learn?

The Future of The Internet is Converged Services A...

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 07:40:10 -0500

The Future of The Internet is Converged Services

A recent report about the “future Internet” by the UK’s national innovation agency, Technology Strategy Board, has some illuminating information about the emerging Internet of Things. It suggests that converged services and a brokerage model, amongst other things, will define the future Web.

"As Google gains followers, it is likely to negatively impact Facebook usage. 30% of Facebook users..."

Tue, 09 Aug 2011 07:52:39 -0500

““As Google gains followers, it is likely to negatively impact Facebook usage. 30% of Facebook users who already use Google plan on cutting down time spent on Facebook this year.””

- Google Poised To Become Number Two Network In 12 Months According To Survey

What journalists need to know about libelous tweets

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 07:26:39 -0500

What journalists need to know about libelous tweets :

An must-read for journalists who tweet but may not pay much attention to the latest legal trends.

“Statements on Twitter can form the basis of a defamation lawsuit just as much as any form of publication,” explained David Ardia, an assistant professor of law at the University of North Carolina. “It’s just sometimes with new technology, it takes a little longer for people to start to take what they read seriously enough — and more importantly for lawyers — to pay enough attention to start to bring lawsuits based on it.”

New York Times Launches Beta620, a Site for Its Experimental Projects

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 07:09:28 -0500

New York Times Launches Beta620, a Site for Its Experimental Projects

Happy 20th Birthday, World Wide Web!

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 15:02:36 -0500

Happy 20th Birthday, World Wide Web!:

The World Wide Web, which launched 20 years ago today. Full photo memory lane stroll: http://sbalink.me/qsQxkG (HT @NeimanLab)

Facebook Is The New Nielsen Family

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 07:44:23 -0500

Facebook Is The New Nielsen Family :

(Fast Company) The Online Campaign Ratings system, which rolls out later this month, promises to measure brand advertising online more like the way it measures brand advertising on television—by identifying which demographics actually see each ad.

This will allow advertisers to make apple-to-apple comparisons between the new medium, whose impact on brand advertising has remained elusive, and the old medium, in whose powers brands have complete confidence. As a result, advertisers may finally be willing to invest more online, and possibly even pay more for the privilege. (Via @Bill80)

"News should be universally accessible across phones, tablets, and computers. It should be..."

Wed, 03 Aug 2011 09:48:28 -0500

““News should be universally accessible across phones, tablets, and computers. It should be multilingual. It should be rich with audio, video, and elegant data visualization. It should enlighten, inform, and entertain people, and it should make them part of the story. All of that work will be open source, and available for others to use and build upon.””

- — Knight-Mozilla News Technology Partnership

Via Transparency, iteration, standards: Knight-Mozilla’s learning lab offers journalism lessons of open source » Nieman Journalism Lab

Meet the 'Information Radiator'

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 14:38:04 -0500

Meet the 'Information Radiator':

21st century take on the teletype in the newsroom could be called tweetatype?

Engaging News Hungry Audiences Tweet by Tweet

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 09:21:25 -0500

Engaging News Hungry Audiences Tweet by Tweet:

The company that produced the spiffy dataviz of breaking tweets about binLaden’s demise takes a new deep look at of Al-Jazeera English, BBC News, CNN,The Economist, Fox News and New York Times twitter followers.

Among the findings:

Engagement can be read in clicks: The Economist has a highly active and engaged audience in terms of both clicks/Tweet and Retweets/Tweet, suggesting a high level of alignment between content posted and attention users are willing to provide.
Audiences differ in their willingness to consume and share information on Twitter: Al-Jazeera’s audience is the most active in terms of publishing and retweeting content on Twitter, while the Fox News audience generates substantially more clicks from its audience.
A large number of Followers doesn’t necessarily translate into action: Despite being the largest account, the New York Times garners the fewest clicks per Tweet when audience size is normalized and earns many fewer retweets when compared to accounts that are much smaller.
Timing and topical interest matter when seeking attention: By arranging audience tweets into topic maps, we were able to visualize the flow of attention between topics of interest, across the different audiences.

Why editors should be active on Twitter « The Buttry Diary

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 08:30:44 -0500

Why editors should be active on Twitter « The Buttry Diary:

“Am not!”

“Are too!”

“Not.”

“MOOOOOM. He tweeted at me!”

“Billy, finish your tweets and go straight to your room — and stop DM-ing your brother behind my back.”

I guess some good points were made, but sheesh, an awful lot of energy went into this discussion yesterday about whether senior editors should tweet.