• MO | Meg O'Brien is associate business editor at the Chicago Tribune. She's dabbled in online, keeps her hand in design, did the metro reporting thing and teaches occassionally at Medill. E-mail her.


• DS | A copy editor at The Daily News Hole, a Midwestern major metro daily. As an 18- to 34-year-old, he is highly sought after by media outlets and advertisers. When not shoveling copy, he enjoys traveling, cooking and spending quality time with his iBook or TiVo.

He was harsh. But we needed to hear it.

His biggest criticism was that newspapers continue to clutch to the role they played in the past and are not adapting to people's changing information needs.

If people want to know what's going on now, TV, radio or the Web will serve them best. We come out once a day and cannot possibly compete in breaking news. When we cover an event, readers don't see our stories and photographs for eight to 24 hours. Yet, Giner estimates that 90 percent of the content in today's newspaper focuses on what happened yesterday.

Instead, Giner said, we have to focus most of efforts on telling people what's coming next. His recipe for a successful newspaper of the future: 20 percent past, 30 percent today and 50 percent tomorrow.

My quick analysis here (green=future-oriented; tan=today; red=past) of a few papers from today shows we're looking to the future more than Giner suggests. Some of my green boxes were generous, though. But, then again, these are Sunday papers and tend to be more analytical and forward-looking -- I wonder if that has any relationship to the fact that Sunday papers are also our best-sellers.

I'll do this analysis again Tuesday. I'm curious to look at the difference on the weekdays. Though I dispute his measurement of the depth of the problem, I think he's on to something. Looking at stories through a past-present-future filter did help me see that even in cases where are telling forward-looking stories, we often spend the first 12 graphs somewhere in the past stuck in an anecdote somewhere.

We have to give readers what the haven't heard or seen before -- and not make them wade through old news to get to it -- if we are to be valuable and useful. As Giner said, newspapers "need to find news, not record it."

MMMM

Even journalists are out there blogging their tales of self-loathing.

Meanwhile, newspapers are spending some serious money exploring ways to hold on to readers. The percentage of U.S. adults who read a newspaper on any given day has dropped from nearly 80 percent in 1964 to 54 percent in 1997. Don't have more recent numbers, but we have not made notable progress, if any, in reversing the trend.

Interesting that the industry's major studies and the small sampling of weblogs above come to pretty much the same conlcusions. Readers get annoyed with us when we: are inky and smudgy, rehash old news, are too thick and too hard to wade through, behave unethically, overwrite and waste people's time, aren't engaging or interesting or don't deliver on time. They especially dislike us when we call at dinner to ask them if they want to subscribe.

Columnist Dave Barry was able to gather some additional free market research from an 8th grade class in this classic column on newspaper readership and young people. These students advised us to:

• ''I don't like reading about death, war and government. Write about things that we can relate to.''
• ''Make the newspaper more humorous, it is soooo boring. Talk about skateboarding, it is so huge now you don't even know.''
• ''Talk about not boring stuff. Like the peace thing. It's very important, I understand that. But it's boring.''
•  ''When you talk about this stuff make it interesting. Like when we kill a terrorist, don't just say he died, say he blew up in a million pieces."

The paper's Big Idea is to toss a CD containing supplemental information in with the paper -- which makes the answer to these questions a resounding "no."

What with all the boasting, The Guardian's plan to circulate an additional CD-based "section" in the paper the last Sunday of each month at first blush almost seemed like an innovation. But, of course, it's not.

The disc, which will be called "The Month," will contain extra material, including 25,000 words of text, movie and music clips, filmed interviews, DVD offers, games previews and listings -- things the newspaper can already provide online for a lot less money.

The contest solicits entries for prototypes of ideas that would make newspapers better. Some interesting ideas have emerged during the five years the contest has been around, but the well appears to have run dry.

This year's pickings were slim. In fact, there were no winners in the professional category because "the judges felt none of the entries exhibited the innovation necessary for recognition." What's worse, then contest has been cancelled for the future.

How depressing is that? Nobody working in the business had one idea this year to make newspapers better? Sell any stock you have in non-diversified, convergence-averse newspaper companies -- we're doomed.

In looking back at the winners, I do see a common, alarming theme: news put on other products, not newspapers. Students and professionals suggested news on pens, watches and ATM receipts. One contest entry may have even been the inspiration for the short-lived, widely mocked CueCat experiment.

The pitch to advertisers is a little cheesy -- defining the section as one "created for young, energetic and self-actualizing D.C., Maryland and Virginia adults who ... place a huge importance on actively spending their downtime doing exactly what they want with the people they want." Then the Post advises, "Don’t get in their way."

But, the content is good. Each week the section contains these short features:

• Gatherings: A feature on entertaining at home with a recipe.
• Real Deals: A look at new gadgets you can buy.
• Tell Me About It: A short advice column.
• 15 Minutes: A quick how-to project. One showed how the make a room screen.
• The Look: Shows what people are wearing out on the streets, paired with "Style Q" fashion Q&A and another column by and expert "Fashionista."
• Media Mix: A look at new movie and video releases for the week.
• The Week: An extensive guide to events and entertainment throughout the Washington area.

It's possible that I'm smitten with it because it's so similar to our Medill Your Saturday project implemented by the Times of Northwest Indiana in October 1999. The section became the best-read feature section of the week, drove Saturday retail ad sales up 200 percent and boosted Saturday single-copy sales 8 percent -- all sustained during three year-plus run.

We pitched a section that focuses on what people do on Saturdays -- chores, shopping, family and fun. The cover features "Best Bets" for things to do that day, a people feature, a project to do with kids and the dominant element is a guide to what else is inside. Inside we had a One-Tank Trip, a Shop! page, a coupon page featuring discounts on Saturday chores like oil changes, a Go Guide calendar, Dinner & A Movie double truck of movie and restaurant reviews, Dinner & A Video recipes and movie reviews for those that stay in, a pet page among other features.

MMMM

While I still don't think the paper is being all it can be, I think this is a great strategic move. It's not unlike Play BAC Presse's strategy, outlined in the post below -- an age-targeted specialty paper delivered at home.

A Tribune spokeswoman told MediaPost that home delivery will cost $1 per week -- a slight discount from the $1.25 it would cost you to pick it up each day on the newsstand. And, subscribers can get the regular, adult Sunday Chicago Tribune for another $1. Not a bad deal.

And what young hipster can turn down this kind of aren't-you-cool marketing: "Now, get RedEye delivered early enough in the morning so you can pick it up as you walk in from the night before."

MMMMMMMMM

By running a weekly kids section -- usually a colorful, comic-y, tid-bitty, non-newsy page or two that also contains puzzles and games -- most newspapers think they're covering the bases for all readers younger than 18. For 14-year-olds these sections are insulting and they wouldn't be caught dead reading one. For 5-year-olds it's probably too advanced. It might be just right for a few 7-year-olds.

So, one one day a week, most of us take a shot at serving a few kids in one grade. Not the best strategy for future growth.

The Washington Post is taking it more seriously with a daily KidsPost page. They take stories in the news and rewrite them in terms of their relevance to a younger audience. I remember one from a recent trip about the West Coast port strike. The adult version talked about negotiations and union deadlines; the kid version warned that Christmas toys may come late. It's really well done, but I still think it's too hard to create one page that serves both 8-year-olds and 13-year-olds.

Play BAC Presse in France is trying the age-group approach and having some success. The company produces home-delivered daily newspapers -- Tuesday through Saturday -- aimed at specific age groups. It claims a circulation of 170,000 for its first three -- Le Petit Quotidien (ages 7 to 9), Mon Quotidien (ages 10 to 13) and L’actu (ages 14+) -- and expects the fourth added in January targeting ages 5 to 7 will add another 30,000.

Hmmm, I can think of some American newspapers who'd like to pick up another 200,000 subscribers. Since ABC allows these separate editions to be counted as part of total circulation, this may be an option.

There is no advertising in the French model, it's all subscription. My French isn't good enough for me to discern the price, but it seems to be growing and healthy. Having it as a separate edition, I think, is brilliant. It makes it seem special and gives kids something to look forward to. “Among other things, children as young as 5 already love to receive mail everyday,” said François Dufour, editor of all four newspapers.

The Economist article claims newspaper readership has dropped off 20 percent since 1990, citing the National Readership Survey, the British equivalent of the Readership Institute in the United States.

Like their American counterparts, the British papers are particularly concerned that young readers don't seem to be picking up the habit. According to the article, the number of newspaper readers under the age of 24 has shrunk by more than a third since 1990 as young Britons increasingly grab news online, or from television or radio.

When they do read newspapers, they tend to like the ones without much news -- and newspapers have been quick to accommodate their tastes.

The Economist reports the only three daily tabloids that bucked the circulation decline in the second half of 2002 focused on entertainment "news." The Daily Star writes almost exclusively about celebs -- with headlines like “Kylie's bum is so yum” -- and its circulation shot up 17 percent. When not writing about bum-yum, the paper is engaging in more meaningful public service through its "Babes" section and by selecting the official five worst blonde jokes.

The Chicago Tribune has gone through considerable time and effort looking for a way to reach the underserved and disinterested 18-34 demographic. Yet, for the most part, all they're doing is repackaging the same news most papers give to the masses. They're taking burritos and making soft tacos -- same ingredients, same taste, different form.

If you're truly trying to reach a different market -- a market that you've identified has different interests and priorities -- doesn't it make sense that you would have different content?

RedEye has attempted the occasional original story. They did one on how it's difficult to park in Chicago (that's news?) and they did another Friday about the upcoming Chicago city elections. The election article focused how voting may have slipped the minds of young people because they're thinking about things like "Gotta get to the gym ... am I hot? ... Tyson's tattoo ... and will Evan and Zora get married?"

The RedEye could have done a great youth-centric election issue, questioning incumbent Mayor Richard Daley and other mayoral candidates on what they would do for young people in the city and/or ask for their positions on city services most used by the young. Or, they could have have looked at the youngest aldermanic candidates and why they are getting involved in government. Or, they could have examined why there isn't anyone under 40 involved in Chicago politics.

But no, they gave us a few man-on-the street shots of three white young guys saying that voting is a good thing, directions on how to register to vote (even though it's too late to do so for this election) and a story that starts with this lead: "You may not know it, but there is an election Tuesday."

Well, if the RedEye thinks its readers are that ignorant about the election why write about it at all? Or at least given them a ward map to help them figure which aldermanic race they're blowing off.

If the RedEye really wants to attract young readers, it needs to serve them. That means being their voice and writing stories about their issues -- stories that supposedly aren't already out there for them in traditional newspapers. Taking stories from the big people's paper and cutting them in half doesn't serve anybody.

Sure, they want it all. But one thing they crave in particular is communication. In fact, readers are willing to forgive many of our failings if we just explain the situation or give them a chance to know us better.

At the Hoosier State Press Association conference in December, researcher Steve Duke encouraged newspapers to actively promote upcoming features and stories, casting aside fear that we might not be able to deliver the story on the promised day. "In that case, you just have to tell them when it will run. Readers are forgiving, all they ask for is communication about what happened and what's next. ... Newspapers just don't do that now. They leave readers guessing."

The editors at the Journal-Times in Racine, Wis. recently have taken steps to stop the guessing and reveal a bit of themselves to readers in a new a Web log, called Inside the J-T.

So far, editors have used the forum to: explain policies about slowing political coverage in the days before an election; give insight into how the paper interacts with other subsidiaries of the parent company; talk about decisions to cover stories outside of Racine; and even answer reader questions about why stories sometimes appear differently on the Web than they do in print; among other topics.

The university's Valley of the Shadow Project has transcribed or summarized hundreds of stories from five newspapers of the era -- two from Virginia, three from Pennsylvania. The papers have some interesting historical information and provide a fascinating glimpse into life at the time. Interestingly, the curators of the project suggested that these papers had their own problems with relevance -- even when there was no competition from TV, radio, magazines and the Internet.

Curators: "The papers of the nineteenth century, however, may be an even more important source of information for those of us investigating the past than they were for those who lived in it. In the nineteenth century, as today, individuals shared information in many nonliterate and informal ways -- by word of mouth in the church, the household, the workplace."

Even more interesting than the articles are the actual digitized pages. They're hard to read, but still quite interesting. You can look at a few here, here, here or here.

My absolute favorite find was a small item at the bottom of the Republican Vindicator of Nov. 25, 1859 -- it struck me as somewhat innovative in terms of subscription payment models. Currently, this is a hot issue at newspaper companies as papers try to get subscribers to convert to automatic-billing methods like credit cards or direct debit to reduce costs, cut churn and, I think, obscure how much a subscription actually costs. The Vindicator's alternate payment method of choice, however, was wood. And in that cold November, it put in a notice that someone needed someone to step up and pay their bill.

You can check in on the project's status here. It hasn't been updated since November, but there are a couple of interesting reports that merit a look: a report on editorial staffing as it correlates to quality and a report on the credibility-circulation death spiral.

[ 11:48 PM | Posted by Ms. M ]

GOOD IDEA: A READERSHIP EDITOR | The Union in Grass Valley, Calif. is putting some money behind its efforts to readership by hiring a dedicated readership editor. Here's a job description.

Dixie Redfearn got the job. She will spend her days as a central contact point for all readers with story ideas and submissions, while also leading newsroom planning on proven readership-driving topics like health, local news, government, business, health and fitness, public safety, home, food and fashion.

I think this is a great idea and I commend a 17,000-circulation paper for dedicating resources to it. I think bigger papers could take this idea and make two jobs out of it-- a full-time readership-driving story planner and a full-time funnel for community news.

In our case, we've got three community news folks representing different territories -- releases come in from all over and get sent to dozens of people in the newsroom. No one knows who's doing what and readers who submit items can never get a straight answer. That angers readers and, I think, stops them from sending us things in the future.

I was reared at a paper where the publisher's mantra was, "What comes in, gets in." I think we routinely underestimate the importance of submissions -- people love this stuff and buy mulitple copies for friends and family. One of the most valuable lessons I took from my online days was that "reader-generated content" was often more popular than what our team of "professionals" was laboring to create.

Newspapers are notoriously one-way. It will be interesting to see if the Union's approach translate to any quantifiable gain in readership.
[ 12:14 PM | Posted by Ms. M ]

TOO FUNNY | Normally, I might find this little game a bit cynical, but I had *one of those days* in the newsroom today.

Right now, I'm thinking it's hilarious.

I discovered this at Infomaniac: Behind the News, which is a great web log of links gathered by a news researcher in Florida.

[ 8:33 PM | Posted by Ms. M ]

I think learning to connect, involve and communicate with the people in your own company -- people who are supposedly working toward the same goals -- is our first step. The staff is a microcosm of our readership. If we can't connect inside, how can we hope to reach hundreds of thousands of others on any meaningful level?
[ 1:37 AM | Posted by Ms. M ]

IDENTITY CRISIS | Our newspaper, like virtually every other in the country, doesn't know how to explain or sell itself to its readership. For a business that makes its money selling advertising and convincing clients they need to advertise each day so they may create brand awareness, it's shameful how poorly we do it for ourselves.

Our paper, which has decided to redefine and reinvent this year, has taken the drastic step of reaching for outside help. We hired Lynn Upshaw & Associates and this week its namesake dropped by to meet us and start the process.

I hope this helps. Something like this, done internally, could help us sort out who we are and who we want to be -- not knowing this I think is our most significant problem at the paper. But I don't know that going outside, and having our identity decided in some conference room in California is going to be as effective.

So far, we've been the subject of the consultant's research. He spent all day in different meetings with staff, asking us a series of questions about how we think people perceive us and what we would do as individuals to change the paper if resources weren't an issue. He's supposed to come back in a few weeks.

I hope he returns with more information than we gave him.
[ 2:41 AM | Posted by Ms. M ]

Likely not. I think the answer is learning to be both. We need to give people the big picture and a shared experience. But, we also have to find ways to fill their special, deeper interests, too.

[ 11:27 PM | Posted by Ms. M ]

BOMBS AWAY | The ominous, methodical clicking has stopped for the RedEye which this week handed its fate to gravity.

Crain's Chicago Business reported Monday that the Chicago Tribune has decided that it's time to try to get people to actually buy the RedEye.

Free at newsstands, gas stations and special newspaper boxes since launch, the paper will now cost a quarter. Not to be outdone, or accused of having an original idea, the Chicago Sun-Times announced, it too, will start charging.

It's been interesting to watch the papers dabble in this experiment, but this is the part of the ride where we hold on, kids. It's gonna be a steep one.

[ 7:17 PM | Posted by Ms. M ]