Jeff Jarvis of BuzzMachine interviews Mark Whitaker of Washington Post/Newsweek Interactive
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[Start of Audio]
Jeff Jarvis: We call it user-generated content. We all hate that title because we’re not users; we don’t generate it and it’s not content, but anyway, we call it that for short. So in that realm, there’s that idea of – there are kind of stages of interactivity. The first is we allow you to talk about our stories. The second is please give us stuff. The third, I believe, is no, I own my own space; I have my own blog; what’s your relationship to me?
Now, you have started what I think is God’s work here in what the Washington Post is doing, a local blog ad network, where you’re selling ads for the bloggers. They still own their space; it’s theirs, and you can a commercial relationship to support them.
Mark Whitaker: Right.
Jeff Jarvis: God bless you. Good work. So the question I have is how’s it working? What are the lessons so far? I know it’s brand new, but talk about it.
Mark Whitaker: Yeah, well, I mean, it’s early days, but we think – obviously, we’re very good, as most big media companies are, at selling advertising on a large scale, but, obviously, with search ads and so forth, there’s now an opportunity to also serve ads against local content and single bloggers and so forth, and we wanna be part of that, and we think that that is the way actually, financially to support the continuing good reporting on a local level that, as you know, is increasingly going away as quality newspapers fold around the country.
So it’s obviously, I think we’re looking at is a commercial opportunity, but we’re also looking at it as a way to create a new business model that will actually continue to support good, solid reporting around the country.
Jeff Jarvis: And it puts you in the middle of the conversation
too. You’ve done amazing work at especially
Washington Post, both online and giving the print people cameras. When I showed the video that you’d done
versus the New York Times to my students at the
What do you see as the future for video and news? Is it a distraction to all the reporters? Are they getting into it? Is it an ego thing? Is it a better way to report? Is there better revenue? Talk about the prospects for video from print organizations.
Mark Whitaker: Well, I think it’s the great next frontier, and we have, as you say, I think thewashingtonpost.com has been a pioneer, Travis Fox, a fulltime video blogger, has been doing it for a while for us; just won the first online Emmy. We’re very excited about that.
But I think you have to realize that video on the web is different from television video, and I think it’s the reason why, even though, in some ways, television has a head start as we go forward in this new area; I think, in some ways, they’re held back by their assumptions about the production values that are needed and about what really works on TV, which is not necessarily the thing that works online.
I think editing is key. It doesn’t have to be slickly produced, but I think something that’s well edited, I think is very important, and I think content is key. I think that when people – I think what YouTube shows and what proliferation of video on the web shows is if it’s interesting – if the content is interesting, people will watch it.
So what we’ve gotta do is figure out, I think, a way, a low-cost model to producing good, well-edited video about as much really interesting content as we can across all of our sites, and we’re looking both at doing more of that on our existing sites, but also looking at possibly some new ventures and some new spaces, which will really be really much more focused around web video.
Jeff Jarvis: Sticking around
Mark Whitaker: We are always looking at both; I mean, obviously, we wanna own the Washington market, online, as the Post has the newspapers, but with Slate now and actually two-thirds of thepost.com’s audience is now national, so we think there are some real opportunities for doing some things nationally as well.
Jeff Jarvis: If you were gonna put a panel together with all kinds of newspaper mockers and magazine mockers, what would you want the main message to them to be from that event?
Mark Whitaker: Well, first of all, I think, in print, it was always the case that you had to have people, not only editors, but owners, who had a passion for the mission of journalism, and I think you’re gonna need that online too.
I think people who are looking at just a commercial prospect and just to make the maximum amount of money aren’t necessarily gonna succeed in the long run, but I think there is an opportunity, as there has been in print, for people who are willing to invest in quality, I think, to succeed.
But, look, I think that, obviously, we’re in a period now where from investor point of view; if you’re a public company that there’s a real skepticism about the future of the newspaper business. We’re lucky at The Post because we have other sources of revenue. Our Kaplan Division is making a lot of money, and that allows us to be a little bit more patient than some of the companies that you now see that are being broken up.
But I think one big issue, I think, for the industry as a whole is there is a lot of duplication of effort. If you were coming from another planet and looking at the world of journalism, you’d say that there – you know, 60 percent, 70 percent of all the content that everybody’s producing is also being produced several other places at the same time without a lot of difference.
So I think the future for journalism, I think, is for, whether it’s imprint or online; everybody figuring out where they add value, and I think the people who do that and do it well; I think will have a bright future.
Jeff Jarvis: Well said. Thank you much. Great to meet you.
Mark Whitaker: Thanks, Jeff.
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Mark Whitaker, Newsweek Interactive, Jeff Jarvis, Brave New Web, Henry Jenkins
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