10 disturbing trends in mass media

WSJ via Digital Media Wire: 10 disturbing trends in mass media.

2007: The battle for local supremacy

A new essay by blogger-consultant Terry Heaton: 2007: The Battle for Local Supremacy in the mediasphere. A thought-provoking read, as always.

One-third of newspapers to go out of business

NetB2B: Newspapers: Collapse and Rebirth. In 10 years, probably a third of metropolitan daily print newspapers will be gone, predicts information technology writer Paul Gillin. "Instead of 1,500 print newspapers, there will be perhaps five to 10 national 'super-papers' and many thousands of special-interest community news sites." Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

NY Times 'futurist' to focus on mobile

NetB2B: Michael Rogers, the recently appointed "futurist-in-residence" at the New York Times, sees the evolution of mobile devices as a key area of focus for the company. But don't give up on print just yet, he says. "The paper product is going to be around a lot longer than anybody thinks." Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

Traditional, new media must partner for survival

Folio magazine: Old media must embrace and work with consumers to ensure its survival, according to print, broadcast and new-media panelists at an event called the "Future of News," sponsored by the Time Inc. unit of Time Warner. Time Inc. CEO Ann Moore declares: "We must liberate ourselves from fear." Thanks to IWantMedia for the pointer.

Media titans plan site to rival YouTube

Wall Street Journal: Four major media companies -- News Corp.'s Fox, Viacom Inc., CBS Corp. and NBC Universal  -- are reportedly in talks to create a video site to compete with YouTube. The companies, owners of most of the major TV networks, envision a jointly owned site that would be the primary Web source for video content from the networks, allowing them to cash in on fast-growing Web video advertising.

Good luck with that one! More from ITWire and TechCrunch: The Video Startup That May Never Launch.

2006: The Year of You

It's only Dec. 10, but the Sunday New York Times has a couple of end-of-the-year round-ups already:

• Music: 2006, Brought to You by You.

"User-generated content” [is] the paramount cultural buzz phrase of 2006. It’s a term that must appeal to the technocratic instincts of investors. I prefer something a little more old-fashioned: self-expression. Terminology aside, this will be remembered as the year that the old-line media mogul, the online media titan and millions of individual Web users agreed: It demands attention.

It’s on Web sites like YouTube, MySpace, Dailymotion, PureVolume, GarageBand and Metacafe. It’s homemade art independently distributed and inventively promoted. It’s borrowed art that has been warped, wrecked, mocked and sometimes improved. It’s blogs and open-source software and collaborative wikis and personal Web pages. It’s word of mouth that can reach the entire world. ...

• Media Frenzy: The Hat Trick That Didn’t Happen.

Mobile media: On its face, the beauty of mobile is that you should be able to do anything with it that you can on the Web — only while on the move. Simple, right? The problem is that, unlike the Web, cellular networks are privately owned and most things that media companies are trying to do require — at the very least — technical clearances from the cellphone operators to push material through their networks. ...

Woodward and Bernstein 'hated each other'

San Jose Mercury News:  Two opposites who `hated each other' changed the course of American history. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the movie ``All the President's Men,'' starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman as investigative reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

America's media bubble

An op-ed by Lawrence Pintak in The Boston Globe (via the IHT): America's media bubble: A willful blindness.

And another piece by Pintak in CJR Daily: Will Al-Jazeera English Find Its Groove?

Take control of your airwaves

FCC Commissioner Michael J. Copps writes in an op-ed in the Seattle Times: Take control of your airwaves.