This is a memo/presentation that Howard Finberg presented in October, 1996. The goal twas to show senior leadership and newspaper analysts what Central Newspapers Inc had accomplished. The presentation looked at the information needs of the company and the tools the information technology leaders were building the tools for the future.
“Memos, Presentations” Items
A Blueprint for Building Online Services, 1995
Where to start? That was the question many newspaper publishers were asking in 1995. At least when it came to creating a digital / electronic version of the print newspaper. The Newspaper Association of America’s [NAA] New Media Department published what they labeled as the first in a “series of executive strategy reports” to help companies get “on-line.”
From the opening section:
Where to start in choosing an electronic newspaper publishing platform depends in large measure on the company’s broader goals. With that in mind, and in deference to the non-wired, there are several valid goals that may propel news operations into interactive media.
The report was titled “Opportunities in Anarchy: A blueprint for building online services”. It is an interesting look at recent history. There are examples from some of the newspaper digital pioneers. And there is a list of newspapers that were on the World Wide Web as of May 25, 1095. The list fit on a single page. It was authored by Melinda Gipson and overseen by NAA New Media Department Director Randy Bennett.
Presentation to Straits Times, Singapore
In July 1993, I was invited to give a series of workshops to the visual journalists at the Straits Times in Singapore. [Straits Times company also owned the Business Times, a tabloid call New Paper and two native language papers: Berita Harian and Zaohao.]
The workshop was for three days. Among the topics covered:
- Readership
- Typography and Readability
- Ethics
- Color [although we spelled it Colour]
- Graphics
- The Future [Year 2000 design, based on the work done at the American Press Institute seminar on the topic].
Leveraging Web Sites for Newspaper Ad Sales
In 2005, the Newspaper Association of America [NAA] asked the Digital Futurist Consultancy to undertake a research and communication project to help newspaper companies better leverage their digital sites [the Web] to sell more advertising in their analog editions — the print product. The project was done by Howard Finberg and Leah Gentry, industry associates and friends from way back. Leah was a digital pioneer at the LA Times while I was working in Phoenix.
Here’s a taste of what we wrote for the NAA magazine, Presstime, about the project:
“Leveraging Your Web Site for Ad Sales,” a new NAA report, highlights ways newspapers can make better use of their Web sites to attract and service advertisers.
The report, produced for the Association by The Digital Futurist Consultancy, www.digitalfuturist.com, examines whether newspapers are using their sites to promote print advertising, to share their marketing and pricing data, and to provide customer service to new and existing advertisers. The report’s findings include:
- 55 percent of the sites reviewed have an area for marketing the print edition.That still leaves lots of sites without any marketing information for potential advertisers.
- 60 percent provide visitors with advertising rates and information about deadlines, terms and ad sizes.
- Less than 10 percent provide a self-service area for advertisers. The report defines self-service as the ability to schedule and upload an advertisement.
We were proud of the report and saddened by the missed opportunities.
To read the full report just follow this link to the PDF.
Membership, Instructions and More for API Design 2000 Seminar
I’ve uploaded a collection of memos about the American Press Institute’s J. Montgomery Curtis Memorial Seminar on the future of newspaper design. The collection starts with the invite / acceptance letter in April 1988.
On July 21, API sent out the important information about the seminar — a memo outlining a task for each seminar participant: design a front page of the future.
Each member is being asked to create a front page of the future, including content mix and design elements. These front pages (which will become a part of this year’s post-seminar publication) will be analyzed in advance by Roger Black, one of the most active and acclaimed publication designers in the United States, and discussed during the program.
There is also a schedule of events and information about discussion groups and the final round-table.
Here’s a look at the seminar schedule:
- Monday, September 12:
- 8:30 – 10:00 – “Newspapers in a Visual Society11
Speaker: John Lees, Partner, Herman and Lees Associates, Inc., Cambridge, Mass.- 10:15 – 12:15 – “The Front Page”
Speaker: Roger Black, President, Roger Black Inc., New York, N.Y.- 2:00 – 3:30 – Study I: “The Future for Newspaper Graphics”
Speaker: Howard Finberg, Assistant Managing Editor, Arizona Republic, Phoenix, Ariz.- 3:45 – 5:15 – Study II: “Color”
Speaker: Nanette Bisher, Assistant Art Director, U.S. News and World Report, Washington, DC.- Tuesday, September 13:
- 8:30 – 10:00 – Study III: “The Impact of Technology”
Speaker: David Gray, Managing Editor/Graphics, Providence Journal Company, Providence, RI.- 10:15 – 11:45 – Study IV: “The Role of Tomorrow’s Newspaper Designer”
Speaker: Marty Petty, Vice President/Deputy Executive Editor, Hartford Courant, Hartford, Conn.- 12:00 – 1:30 – The membership will be broken into small groups to discuss in greater detail specific issues raised during the seminar.
- 1:45 – 3:30 – The membership will return to the API Round-Table to hear reports from each group detailing observations and any conclusion.
One other important document: the discussion leaders biographies.
The end product of this seminar can be seen in this slideshow.
10th Annual Interactive Newspaper Conference
I was a speaker at the Editor & Publisher magazine’s 10th Annual Interactive Newspapers Conference in Atlanta, Ga. My speech was recorded live on February 18, 1999 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Here’s a bit of what I said at the start of my speech:
I made a presentation to our managers at Phoenix Newspapers a couple of weeks ago, and I sort of titled it “Armageddon” and whether, when we lose all, some share of classifieds in the next three years, what impact will that have on the bottom line. And if you look at the latest research from Forrester, they predict, on industry average, a 7% reduction in bottom line figures. If classified continues going the way it’s going then seven percent of us won’t be here next year, unless other things happen.
Another couple of interesting statistics is that in less than a dozen years, in 10 years, everybody under 50 will be computer literate. We’re all basically computer literate here; and obviously, the generations coming behind us are all computer literate. And even scarier is that by 2010, everybody under the age of 21 will not have known a world without the Internet. To us, some grey hairs [old folks] in the room, along with myself, is that we can remember, hot type and cold type and all that. And we remember when the Internet first took off.
This transcript is sometimes hard to read since the transcriber didn’t catch all of the jargon. However, it gives you a taste of what we were talking about in 1999.
Poynter’s News University: Site Structure
I’ve have learned that when trying to create something new, it is helpful to draw a picture. Some folks learn by reading; others by looking at a picture.
The site diagram of the 1st technology phase of Poynter’s e-learning project was helpful in working with our technology vendor, DataGlyphics [which became YourMembership], as we figured out to link various elements. We decided early in the process that to build a learning management system [LMS] would be too difficult given all of the other tasks, especially building courses. We really didn’t know much about e-learning or a LMS, so we decided to integrate three different sites:
- The News University landing pages and other static pages
- The eCollege LMS site [with Poynter NewsU content]
- Poynter Online for promotion and traffic generation
This is one of the first News University documents. Even earlier is the memo I wrote to Robin Sloan, one of the first NewsU staff members. That memo outlines the technology goals we hope to accomplish, thanks to a grant from the Knight Foundation.
Sidebar: Robin is now an accomplished best selling author and olive oil entrepreneur. Wonderful olive oil.
PAFET Review of Media Landscape, 1994
The PAFET Operating Committee had several tasks. The most important was to keep the Strategic Committee, i.e. the Big Bosses, abreast of technology and changes in the media landscape. One of the tools we used was a report [monthly at times] that could be distributed across various “C Suites” and lower in an organization. Here’s what I wrote about the first edition:
The purpose of the Pafet Review is to keep you abreast of the changing alliances and their potential impact on the media industry. The report is prepared by the Yankee Group under the direction of the Operating Committee.
In the future, the committee plans to add more analysis. This analysis will not only include broad implications, but also the impact of the changing landscape upon Pafet’s mission.
Media Companies Launch Consortium
This is the official launch of PAFET, Partners Affiliated for Exploring Technology. It was a consortium that hoped that by exploring technology together, these companies would benefit from shared knowledge in the creation of new businesses and/or services.
“Our purpose is to maintain and strengthen our competence in collecting, packaging and marketing information, making use of the best of evolving technologies available. As a group we can invest in research on new information technology that larger companies are pursuing,” states James N. Rosse, president and chief executive officer of Freedom Communications, Inc., who will be the first chairman of the PAFET management committee
SND European Workshop
One of the most unusual and fun workshops that I have participated in was a tour of four European cities on behalf of the Society of Newspaper Design in 1993. Between May 7 and 15, six designers and editors gave workshops on design, photography, infographics and more to 300 participants from almost 20 different countries. Among the cities visited by Andrew Chapin, Juan Antonio Giner, Bill Ostendorf, Norvall Skreien, Deborah Withey and myself were Stockholm, Hamburg, Zurich and La Coruna [Spain]. Here’s what Bill wrote for an SND publication:
The EFS, patterned after SND’s successful Quick Course programs in North America, drew warm and enthusiastic responses from audiences dominated by top editors. Most attendees had never heard of SND before attending one of the workshops, but afterwards many wanted to join, help establish chapters and sponsor more SND events in their countries.
…
“Everyone was very interested in what SND has to offer. And they were very pleased with our decision to bring our biggest workshop to Europe in 1995,” said Howard Finberg.
He added that now is the ideal time to foster better design in Europe. ”While there are pockets of very good design in Europe, there are also a lot of areas that are just on the verge of the kind of design revolution that swept the U.S. in the ’70s and ’80s. While we were in Germany, you could feel that same sense of excitement when you talked to editors who saw the need for attracting new readers.”
The full article is here.