online publishing

So have you launched a new project yet?

July 2, 2010 By Dan Thornton

A reasonable amount of people apparently saw my post yesterday on how little it costs to launch a new media brand or project online.

So if you were one of those people – have you launched something yet? Plan to? Started thinking about it?

If you weren’t one of those people – go have a look, as it might prompt you to do something. Even if you’re one of the many digitally aware people who realise how quickly and easily you can produce content online, maybe it might spur you to actually go and do something with that knowledge.

And what better time to start than now? It’s Friday in the UK, and you’ve got a whole weekend ahead of you to get something done. Don’t fancy writing? Why not record some audio? Or some video?

I’d love it if just one person reading happens to be inspired to go and produce one thing this weekend – so let me know if you do…

And in return, I’m going to be finding ways to get more productive on my own sites, so I’ll be able to share some more tips and the results shortly…

Don’t swap journalists for users quite yet…

October 5, 2007 By Dan Thornton

User generated content (UGC), citizen journalism, blogging. I’m a huge fan of all three when used correctly, but they all need to be handled with care by traditional media companies, whether it’s not serving them properly, or, in the case I’m going to hypothesise about, overestimating their effect.

Way back in June I quoted figures which put submissions to Youtube at 0.16% of users, while Flickr submissions were at 0.2%. Wikipedia was the involvement leader with 4.6%. Which should be one worry to the people I’ve spoken to who believe traditional journalists will be replaced by users in the near future.

Putting this to one side, along with discussions of trust, I think there is a further concern which anyone should consider before cutting journalists in favour of UGC.

And that’s going to be a growing rise in the need for payment for UGC. The oft cited example of OhMyNews already pays for submissions, and some bloggers are now being paid to produce work professionally. At the moment, these are exceptions rather than the rule for User Generated Content.

But there’s an established global market which already handsomely rewards creativity, and which will have an effect on any creative efforts produced. Users of MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Rolepaying Games), or users of Xbox Live will already be familiar with the concept of creating virtual items, Forza Motorsport car liveries, or a wealth of other content, and being reward in game currency, or via online auction sites in real money. And then there’s Anshe Chung, the Second Life millionaire…

As increasing numbers of people are playing online games, and are familiar with the concept of virtual capitalism, then they won’t be satisfied with the fame of having their content published on a large website, and will increasing expect fair recompense for their efforts…

And to get the best UGC, to make it worthwhile, you’ll need to be making your site more financially rewarding…

And the worst part will be that your submissions will now come from people who aren’t tied by a contract or a notice period. Instead they’ll be free to submit to any site which appears overnight with a more attractive offer…

(None of this is meant to dissuade you from using UGC on your site… But as with anything, it’s one aspect of the future of online publishing, not the only answer…)

You can never predict web users precisely

August 10, 2007 By Dan Thornton

Whenever you design a web application or service, a big part of your job is to try and define how it will serve your consumers. Even if it’s something which is totally customisable and designed to be individual to every user, you still need to work out how people will interact with it to set it up…

And there is a great example on www.flip.com. It’s a social networking/slide show type site from Teen Vogue and publishers Conde Nast.

So how will they respond to the fact some girls have grouped together to create their own magazine and publish it on flip? Check it out, here.

The right way would be to take a look, and maybe publicise the fact it’s happening. Use it as a great example of interaction to build their community, and perhaps use it to find new writing talent and ideas.

The wrong way would be to try to stop it, and see it start somewhere else.

And speaking as the Editor of an independant online magazine, it’ll be interesting to see how it turns out…