New Media

Newspapers are dying, magazines are closing and more journalists are finding themselves without paying gigs every day. Everyone is wondering: what does the future hold for the media? We brought the questions to the front lines, asking leaders in the field to tell us: what's next?

Amanda Michel, editor of distributed reporting at nonprofit investigative journalism organization ProPublica.org, has helped shape the emerging world of citizen journalism with her work at The Huffington Post's Off The Bus project. Off The Bus became an integral part of the election season's news and helped break a number of important stories about the candidates and their campaigns. Now Michel is working on a project for ProPublica that tracks the stimulus money and where its being used and whether promises made by government officials hold water.

FishbowlNY: Why did you decide to use citizen journalists for some of ProPublica's projects?

Amanda Michel: We believe that the better the relationship we have with the public the better we can do our work. By working closely with your readers you can expand access to information. There are also ways in which you can serve the public. For example, you can show them to look at things critically or give them the tools to do that.

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Our sister blog FishbowlLA has news that "infotainment" columnist Nikki Finke has sold her breaking news Web site DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com to Mail.com Media Corp. (MMC), "the digital media company that owns and operates the Mail.com portal and email service as well as a growing portfolio of lifestyle brands, including HollywoodLife.com, MovieLine.com and OnCars.com."

But the far more interesting part of the deal's announcement -- to us in New York that is -- is that Finke plans to use this acquisition to expand her organization into a bicoastal affair.

"Within the first 90 days, DHD will become bicoastal with the hiring of a New York City-based senior journalist who will report to Finke," the company said in a press release published on DHD.

Let the speculation begin: Who will be Finke's East coast counterpart?

Our sister blog WebNewser has news about The Huffington Post. One week after announcing the appointment of a new CEO, the online pub has launched a new section: Huffington Post New York.

The new section, which launched yesterday with blog posts from with blog posts from Nora Ephron, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Frank Serpico and former Mayor Ed Koch, will be led by former New York Daily News reporter Dan Collins. It will also feature partnerships with more than one-dozen local outlets and employ HuffPo's Eyes & Ears citizen-reporting unit.

Founder Arianna Huffington explained the new page in an introductory blog post:

"New York has always held a special place in the heart of HuffPosters. It definitely has for me. It was the first place in America I lived in after moving here from London in 1980. And the majority of the HuffPost team is based in New York, working out of our offices in SoHo. But whether you live in New York or not -- New York is part of our national collective consciousness...HuffPost New York features our curated selection of the best New York news coverage, plus a collection of bloggers -- some familiar faces you know, some we're excited to introduce you to -- who are eager to share their takes on everything from local politics to the city's fashion, food, entertainment, real estate, sports teams, and business trends."

Today, IAC and the Observer Media Group officially announced their deal passing majority control of IAC's email newsletter Very Short List to Jared Kushner-owned Observer. VSL, which last week won a Webby Award for "Best Guides, Ratings and Review Website," has been renamed The Observer's Very Short List and will be written and edited by the staff of The New York Observer -- who are already overworked thanks to recent staff cuts.

News of the deal broke this weekend, with Gawker reporting that the entire VSL staff had been laid off. A press release distributed today did not touch on any staff cutbacks, but did mention that founders Kurt Andersen and Michael Jackson "will continue to remain involved" in the joint venture that is now The Observer's Very Short List.

Full release after the jump

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Newspapers are dying, magazines are closing and more journalists are finding themselves without paying gigs every day. Everyone is wondering: what does the future hold for the media? We brought the questions to the front lines, asking leaders in the field to tell us: what's next?

This week, we decided to talk blogs with author Eric Boehlert. Set against the backdrop of the 2008 presidential election, Boehlert's new book, "Bloggers On The Bus -- How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press," discusses how the liberal blogosphere affects political candidates and campaigns. He told us about how the relationship between newspapers and blogs are changing with the death of newspapers and what conservative bloggers have to do to keep up with successful liberal blogs like the Huffington Post.

FBNY: What do you think about the relationship between traditional media and blogs?

Eric Boehlert: I think it's painful to see the newspapers in a downward spiral because I think blogs do the best when they augment the traditional press. The blogosphere sort of lives alongside traditional media and helps fill in the gaps. Blogs help keep the press accountable and raise issues that the traditional media is overlooking or forgetting. They can be a watchdog while having their own original content and analysis. It makes me nervous when people say we don't need newspapers. In a perfect world, newspapers and blogs would live alongside each other.

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At last week's Mediabistro Circus, Magnify.net CEO Steve Rosenbaum and NYMag.com GM Michael Silberman discussed the kind of multi-platform deals that media companies are seeking out in order to be competitive. In today's digital world, many of these deals involve new media concepts like video integration.

Now you can check out the fruit of a deal between Rosenbaum and Silberman: NYMag.com's video player. The videos on the Web site include original content produced by staffers at New York magazine and its Web site, as well as videos snagged from other sources that would be of interest to NYMag.com visitors, like a clip of Jimmy Fallon interviewing Mark-Paul Gosselaar in character as Zack Morris or Jason Jones' "Daily Show" piece about The New York Times.

Our favorites are Tim Murphy's man on the street videos. Check out his clip about the opening of High Line. It's definitely not substandard.

A couple of weeks ago we reported grim numbers for newspaper advertising revenues for the first quarter of the year. And guess what? Web sites aren't having it any easier.

According to the Internet Advertising Revenue Report commissioned by the Interactive Advertising Bureau, Internet advertising dropped 5 percent to $5.5 billion during the first quarter of this year, compared to the same quarter last year. This hints at the fact that -- as many have predicted -- advertising simply cannot sustain newspapers and magazines, even if they go digital only.

But although the online ad revenue drop is unfortunate, its nothing compared to total ad revenues for U.S. papers in particular, which shrunk 28.3 percent during the first quarter of the year, down to $6.6 billion from $9.2 billion during the same period last year. Newspapers' online advertising revenue was also down.

On the other hand, All Things Digital's Peter Kafka reported that big congloms Procter & Gamble and Johnson & Johnson have beefed up their online ad buys during the first three months of the year -- they are now spending 4 percent of their ad budget on banner ads. The question then becomes, are P&G and J&G seeing a return on their investment? If so, maybe other corporations will get in the Internet ad spending spirit. Let's turn this recession around!

Paste magazine needs assurances that Twitter is more than just a waste of time, so its set about compiling top 10 lists of the best microbloggers out there. Yesterday, the magazine released its list of the top 10 magazines to follow on Twitter.

Topping the list are Wired (@Wired) and Good magazine (@GOODfeed), with favorite Tweets such as "Q: How many helium balloons would it take to lift a house? A: http://is.gd/Jht5" (from Wired) and "You Stay Classy, G. Gordon Liddy http://ow.ly/aqiw" (that's a recent Good Tweet).

Smaller pubs like beer magazine Draft (@draftmag) -- home to FishbowlNY contributor Noah Davis -- indie music magazine Under The Radar (@Under_Radar_Mag), and hip hop/electronica publication Urb (@Urb@URBMAG) also got a shout outs from Paste.

Please hold while we update our Twitter feed.

Internet Week is going to have a prom for New York's new media scenesters. Gawker video editor Richard Blakeley and URLesque's Jessica Amason are teaming up with EMRG Media and Internet Week to host The Webutante Ball cocktail party on the Empire Hotel rooftop. This is Blakeley's first foray back into the world of party hosting since he cancelled his popular Media Meshing bar night last November

WebNewser has more on the Webutante Ball

Our colleagues over at BayNewser have Technorati's list of mainstream media Web sites that get the most hits from bloggers, which they have titled the "Attention Index."

YouTube is number one on the list (although we agree with BayNewser that the classification of that site as "mainstream media" is a bit of a stretch) and The New York Times's site is number two. Another New York-based paper, The Wall Street Journal ranks number four. The top five is rounded out by guardian.co.uk at #3 and The Washington Post at #5.

There are lots of other New York-based news outlets on the list, including FOX News (#12), Time (#16) and The New York Daily News (#19).

The full list, and their "attention numbers," after the jump

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