Comments on: Nobody here but us chickens

By: The Digital Gangster « Tomseymour’s Weblog

The Digital Gangster « Tomseymour’s Weblog — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 12:32:30 +0000

[...] The commentator Jeff Jarvis wrote, “Give the people control of media, they will use it. Don’t give people control of media, [...]

By: hugh macleod

hugh macleod — Sat, 24 Dec 2005 09:04:14 +0000

And… now that we have control, why should we pay your salary?

It is by control that these journalists (most of whom I meet are good, smart, hardworking people) make their living.

No control = No commerce.

The only thing keeping newspaspers in business is advertisers value their readers’ eyeballs higher than blog readers’ eyeballs. As soon as that changes (if and when), look out, Newspapers.

By: Andy Freeman

Andy Freeman — Sat, 24 Dec 2005 01:22:37 +0000

> Second, why hasnâ€™t some media honcho tried to negotiate a licensing or cross-content deal with Craigâ€™s List?

What do they have to offer that he wants?

By: pennywit

pennywit — Fri, 23 Dec 2005 19:46:26 +0000

A couple miscellaneous thoughts.

I’ve poked through some of the WashingtonPost.com news boards, and they seem to jump pretty well. Of course, the Post has also made an effort at such things, for several years now.

Second, why hasn’t some media honcho tried to negotiate a licensing or cross-content deal with Craig’s List?

–|PW|–

By: Carson Fire

Carson Fire — Fri, 23 Dec 2005 18:52:14 +0000

“Nobody should know its community better than a newspaper.com.”

Heh… that’s funny. Elites may serve a community, they may lecture the community, they may believe they know what’s best for a community, but they don’t *know* the community.

This attitude isn’t just something that can be corrected by short-term education or remonstration, it’s deeply ingrained in journalistic psyche.

On a lark, I picked up a book this week by a journalist/author who travelled with some of the Democratic caravans during the ‘04 primary season. Writing for a more elite audience, without the safeties on, it’s amazing to see the constant insults hurled at the “community”: hicks, idiots, etc.

Too much of journalism does not respect the community, so the community is not going to reward them by conferring unearned favoritism, allowing them to succeed by default at things which used to be their monopoly. I don’t think even “getting it” will help at this point, unlikely as that is.

By: everybuddy.org » Can Media companies “get out of the way”

everybuddy.org » Can Media companies “get out of the way” — Fri, 23 Dec 2005 18:31:58 +0000

[...] Jeff Jarvis mentions a post from a colleague of mine, Scott Anderson, about Big Media’s failure to successfully embrace online communities. Jeff likes to quote Craig Newmark of cragislist, saying Media needs to “get out of the way” and enable the end users. Of course he’s right, but that is a two-part show. 1. Recognize the need to get out of the way. 2. Get out of the way. Obviously, there are intelligent people working for these companies who understand that. Scott Anderson proves that, so let’s assume the first step is or will be successful. Part two involves actual action. These companies are huge ships to steer in a day when you need a PT Boat to be competitive. Let’s assume that issue can be overcome. There is one final mine field. Wall Street. Getting out of the way and enabling communities on the internet is the same disintermediation** that is making eBay, Craigslist and others successful. That success has a short term (at least) negative effect on the traditional “cut” for Big Media, like classified ads. Since many of the companies are publicly traded, the shareholders are going to have to accept that there will be a short term hit from within on some of their traditional strengths in order to be a long term player. No war was won without the winning side conceding some loss for the end goal of victory. Will the sahreholders accept that these companies may need to damage currently successful practices for a long term goal? I don’t know. [...]