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The New York Sun Might Set?
The New York Sun says its needs additional investors willing to part with some $10 million or it may have to cease publishing at the end of the month. The 70,000 circulation daily newspaper has nowhere near the circulation of its main rivals – The Times, The Post and the Daily News – but it has received good marks for its conservative journalistic leanings.
Editor Seth Lipsky wrote in a letter to readers, “Our losses, which are substantial, have been covered so far by a group of investors whom we would call heroic. And they are prepared to continue to back the enterprise with new capital. Bust as costs rise and the advertising market for newspapers generally tightens, keeping the Sun alive and moving it forward toward self-sufficiency will require broadening the base of investors beyond the original group.” The letter didn’t give an amount needed, but the figure of $10 million is floating around.
Surely there are enough conservatives in New York to whom $10 million is petty cash?
Irish Now Really Into Newspaper Recycling
Ireland recycles 73.7% of all its newspapers, a 250% increase from just 28% in 2002, according to RPS environmental consultants. In 2007, Ireland recycled 161,000 tonnes of newspapers, an increase of 16.5% on 2006.
National Newspapers of Ireland (NNI) environment officer Enda Buckley said: "In the past year we have implemented a new policy of 'whole copy' returns to maximize the number of unsold newspapers that get recycled."
He added that the newspaper industry had set itself a target of collecting 50% of all unsold newspapers - a target which has already been exceeded.
NNI chairwoman Maeve Donovan, managing director of the Irish Times, told her newspaper, "The Irish newspaper industry has worked very hard over the past five years to improve the supply chain so that as much paper as possible gets recycled. We have also invested heavily to promote a culture of paper recycling among consumers, and both of these initiatives are clearly working very well."
And where does that paper go? Naturally, back into newspapers. For instance in 2007 recycled paper made up 79% of the raw material for UK newspapers, according to the UK Newsprint and Newspaper Industry Environmental Action Group.
Social networking comes to radio
Twitter, twitter
Once a fad becomes mainstream the pressure is enormous to latch on. The popularity of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter has spawned both imitators and innovators. Ride that wave, or else, right?
The BBC has a new experiment in social networking called Radio Pop that tags the online radio choices of logged in listeners, displaying preferences and comments.
“Radio Pop is an experimental prototype,” wrote Tristan Ferne on the BBC Radio Lab blog (September 3).
US public broadcaster NPR (National Public Radio) is running its own social networking experiment, according to an insider, though no information is currently available. (JMH)
Publicis expands branded entertainment
Web 2.ads
Paris based advertising giant Publicis has acquired US digital ad specialist PBJS, according to accompany release (September 3). PBJS is based in Seattle, Washington. Its biggest client is Microsoft.
“The arrival of PBJS helps Publicis expand the production of videos, webcasts and interactive exhibits,” said the release. PBJS is an event marketing and branded entertainment specialist.
Parsing the ad-speak of all the releases and comments the impression is that Publicis, like most in the advertising big leagues, will spend what it needs to spend and do what it needs to do to tap the geyser of internet money spilling out of traditional media.(JMH)
Permanent British Press Corps In New York A Somewhat Rare Breed
It used to be, according to Jeffrey Blyth who has written for some 42 years for the UK Press Gazette on journalistic affairs on the US side of the pond, that the permanent British contingent was the largest foreign press corps in New York. But no more.
Blyth says that if you go by membership of the city’s Foreign Press Association then the largest press contingent is German (57 members) and Italy with 45. The UK has just 16.
It is a far cry, he says, from the times when nationals like the Telegraph, The Mirror and the Express each had as many as five or six reporters in New York. Possibly something to do with budget cuts?
After 15 Years Murdoch Ends His UK Quality Newspaper Price War
Hard to believe it was 15 years ago that Rupert Murdoch became so concerned at the dwindling circulation at his Times of London that he launched a price war – lowering the cover price from 45 pence to 30 pence. It worked in stabilizing and the growing circulation and competitive quality newspapers felt they had no choice but to protect their turf and for years thereafter there was red ink pouring down Fleet Street.
Over the intervening years competitors raised their prices because they could no longer sustain the huge losses and the Times went up, too, but always remained lower than its competitors and until Monday it was still priced 10 pence lower. But on Monday it raised its price to 80 pence to match its competitors.
And the reason why is because a lower price no longer suits the newspaper’s marketing strategy. The new name of the game with British national newspapers is subscriptions – something very common place in other countries but not a tradition that has really caught hold in the UK. So to show what a great deal one can get on The Times by subscription it behooved News International to raise its newsstand price so the percentage discount for the subscription could be even higher. Crafty, no?
Stop the presses! Please!
four more years...then what?
New York Times columnist Frank Rich offers a bit a daring insight into the news media and its coverage of the US Presidential election campaign. “Stop the presses,” he leads. “The disconnect between the reality of this campaign and how it is perceived and presented by the mainstream media is now a major part of the year’s story.” (link)
His main point is that mainstream media gets everything wrong because it, itself, is yesterdays’ news.
“We, too, are made anxious and fearful by hard economic times and the prospect of wrenching change. YouTube, the medium that has transformed our culture and politics, didn’t exist four years ago. Four years from now, it’s entirely possible that some, even many, of the newspapers and magazines covering this campaign won’t exist in their current form, if they exist at all. The Big Three network evening newscasts, and network news divisions as we now know them, may also be extinct by then.”
To hammer the point one more time, Rich quotes Andrew Rasiej of the Personal Democracy Forum, who said judging journalistic “success” by market share is like “counting horses while the world has moved on to counting locomotives.”
In other words, using the eloquent American expression (mixed metaphor notwithstanding), “the horse has left the barn.” (JMH)
Hurricane Gustav Stops Print Newspapers But Not Web Coverage
Hurricane Gustav may not have hit as hard as feared, but it still had enough power to knock off print newspapers. The Times-Picayone of New Orleans printed its Sunday edition early Saturday so those evacuating the city that afternoon would at least have a Sunday read when they got to their destination. There has been no print edition since (their building was safe and employees were still working and not evacuated as they were for Katrina three years ago, but just producing a newspaper doesn’t mean it can be delivered given weather conditions, and besides, who is left in town to read it?
Throughout the Gulf Coast newspapers have had to figure what they should do. With the evacuation so widespread is it worth issuing print editions? One example is The Courier and Daily Comet in Thibodaux, Louisiana, about 66 miles (100 kms) northeast of New Orleans that made the decision on Sunday not to print its Monday and Tuesday editions but it would provide 24-hour coverage on its web site.
Hedge Funds Increase Their NYT Stake
Remember Harbinger Capital and Firebrand Investments, the two hedge funds that in January bought 4.9% of New York Times Company A shares, kept building their stake and finally in April persuaded the company to expand its board of directors and give them two seats? Well, now they own about 20% of the company A shares and have influence over additional A shares, too. (But remember it is the B shares, mostly owned by the Sulzberger/Ochs families that control the company)
In August they bought 200,000 shares at $13 each (the market last closed at $12.99) and they have taken equity swaps on 1.7 million shares which can be closed out at any time by either party. When called, the hedge funds would have to pay the counterparty the difference on a valuation of less than $13.41 each and the counterparty would have to pay the hedge funds the difference above that price.
The bulk of the hedge funds total NYT holdings are thought to have been bought from $15 - $20. Which all makes one wonder, of course, what it is the hedge funds know that we don’t, since investors seem busy these days dumping their media shares? There was nothing in the Times Company’s July revenue report, down 10% from the year earlier, and advertising revenue alone was down 16%. Moreover digital growth retracted dramatically. The hedge funds have been urging company management to get even more involved in online activities.
Customs raid at consumer electronics show
…PR guy phone home…
Reuters reported German customs authorities raiding the Hyundai stand at the Berlin IFA consumer electronics show Saturday (August 30) as visitors looked on.
A German court ruled Thursday (August 28) that Hyundai and ‘others’ were importing unlicensed technology – meaning appropriate duties had not been paid – and authorized the raids.
The IFA is the world’s biggest consumer electronics show and usually heralds expected trends for the Christmas buying season. So far, the word is ‘home’ – big screen TVs and high-tech refrigerators. (JMH)
Police threaten, throttle and arrest TV news producer
“…not Myanmar…”
American television news network ABC has posted on its website startling images of the arrest of one of its news producers. The video shows police officers – identified as Denver, Colorado and Boulder County officers – pushing, shoving, cuffing and arresting producer Asa Eslocker Wednesday (August 27) as he and a crew prepared a report on the Democratic Party convention. The ABC crew was on a public sidewalk outside a hotel.
"We expect to see that kind of thing in Myanmar, not on the streets of Denver," said ABC spokesperson Jeffrey Schneider in a statement.
ABC reports that one of the five police officers told Eslocker “You're lucky I didn't knock the (expletive deleted) out of you.”
Note to the Denver City Attorney’s Office: Eslocker works for ABC’s Emmy Award winning investigative team headed by Brian Ross. If the old adage “never pick a fight with a guy who buys ink by the barrel” was once true, today it’s wise not to (expletive deleted) with a guy who gets bandwidth by the terabyte. (JMH)
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