Newspaper Restructuring in Four Easy Steps
Nov 5th, 2006 by Dan Blank
Wired reports on massive changes within Gannett, as they restructure their newsrooms. Their four goals:
- Prioritize local news over national news
- Publish more user-generated content
- Cecome 24-7 news operations, in which the newspapers do less and the websites do much more
- Use crowdsourcing methods to put readers to work as watchdogs, whistle-blowers and researchers in large, investigative features
Jeff Jarvis can barely contain his excitement at the changes, but of course, remains skeptical:
“Now I’ve seen plenty of newsroom reorganizations in my day and they haven’t changed the biorhythms of news yet…”
With pressure from advertisers, many news operations have little choice. The Chicago Tribune reports on the “…tidal shift in the way advertisers think about reaching their customers.” (link via I Want Media)
Reuters reports on a memo to Gannett employees, describing the change to allow “…its 89 local papers [to] disseminate local news and information “when, where and how our customers seek it…”