Gannett layoffs

Twitter is a huge problem for print websites.

C.J. Spiller got banged up today in the Redskins game. I own him in a fantasy football keeper league. I was concerned.

So I went to Twitter and kept scrolling until I got an answer about his injury. Never once went to a Buffalo or Washington website. Once I had my answer, I logged of Twitter and didn't go back for postgame gamers or analysis.

We're assuming readers are always going to want stories going forward. They might not. Are Tweets and blogs good enough? For many people trying to multitask through their extremely busy lives, I think so.

 

Twitter can also be empowering for a good journalist or journalistic enterprise. For every couple of "podunk presses" who don't look beyond a tweet, there is probably someone who will click on the link who otherwise never would have gone to the site independently of Twitter. It's an effective aggragator, isn't it?

It's very similar in that regard to facebook. I have a right-wing friend who proudly told me he never goes to the NYT site, yet I looked on his history and he shared NYT stories two in the last four or five days. He found them through facebook aggregation.

 

Stacking those digital dimes one Tout at a time ...

 

Recruiting sites have it down because they're willing to trade objectivity for access to coaches who tell them which recruits to call. It's like saying Jay Glazer has it down. He lives in the pockets of certain agents and coaches.

 

Journalists are idiots about Twitter. They break news on Twitter instead of writing up, posting it on their blog, and linking to it. Breaking news on Twitter helps Twitter and no one else.

 

That would be ideal, but it's not always realistic. If it's a scoop or a piece of information you know no one else is pursuing, then by all means, take the time to work up a post you can link. But if it's a piece of information (like an injury update or definite word on a trade) that 10 or 15 other reporters are all trying to get just like you are, then you HAVE TO put it on Twitter to be first sometimes.

It's the fastest way to get it out there.

And before you say, "readers don't care who had it first," that may be true. But your boss does.

 

Never understood the fascination with Twitter.

 

How long does it take to post a blog and link it? 45 extra seconds?

If a boss thinks giving information to Twitter is a good idea, he or she needs to wise up. I'm trying to be kind here, but really: My hunch is they don't understand it very well. Or they think that, since ESPN does it, everyone else should. Yeah, McDonalds rents space inside Wal-Mart for a high cost. That's because there's 100 other McDonalds in the Metro.

The goal is to create demand for your local product fully or partially behind a paywall, not a free Twitter feed. It's like cooking a great burger with your recipe and ingredients, handing it to the McDonald's counter worker, and letting them hand it out for free with the Big Mac.

 

Honest to God, I think it's because journalists fancy themselves consumers of the newest thing, and figure just using it means leveraging it.

Twitter feeds are useful: for setting the stage for your content.

 

It takes longer than 45 seconds, and that's assuming you're near your computer. A lot of Twitter updates are done via smart phone.

 

Big staff meeting in fall of 2007 ... the entire sports dept. with the editor and managing editor. I asked when we were going to stop giving away our product for free. Managing editor says "our research has shown that if we don't put it on our website they'll get it elsewhere." What a complete bullshit answer. Yes, they might get a wire story. But they weren't going to get out paper's beat writers -- the absolute best in our state -- on the teams the people wanted to know about.

And he never mentioned what their research showed about companies that give away their products for free. I'm pretty sure they never bothered to research that question at all.

 

Then I would push for a blog system that's more user-friendly than something that takes long to use.

Next, push hard for a tablet.