[USA Today's iPad app, above, is free until early July]
I've always wondered how often the top brass reads any of Gannett's newspapers, or watches any of the television broadcasts. With more than 100 dailies in the U.S. and the U.K., plus 23 TV stations and hundreds of weeklies and magazines, you'd expect CEO Craig Dubow and his team would devote considerable time to seeing what the company's 35,000 employees are up to. This especially includes crucial new ventures, like USA Today's just-launched iPad application.
I'm not the only one who wants to know. When I asked readers what they'd ask Dubow if they were a Wall Street stock analyst, Anonymous@11:10 p.m. wrote last week: "Tell me how many Gannett news products you read yesterday. Today? Please tell me how many mistakes/corrections you noticed, and tell me again just how many news employees lost jobs last year and the year before. Do mistakes and corrections in news stories and/or ads bug you?"
Looks vs. contentThis came to mind as I listened to Friday's conference call with those stock analysts, after GCI reported its first-quarter earnings. Dubow was asked about revenue prospects for USAT's new iPad app, a digital version of the paper that Gannett will charge readers to access, after a free trial ends July 4. About 175,000 copies have been downloaded since it was launched two weeks ago. Here's part of what Dubow (left) said:
"I don’t know if you’ve seen the app yet on the iPad; it is absolutely gorgeous. I think the team has done an absolutely remarkable job with it in a very short period of time and I think the more people see this and just how beautiful it is -- it's a very easy application to work with -- I would expect that we’re going to see continued growth in this with similar numbers for some time to come."
Repeating for emphasis: "gorgeous." "Beautiful." "Very easy." He said nothing, however, about the content of the stories, graphics or photos on the device. Did he read any of them? And will anyone else, after the yet-to-be-announced subscription fee kicks in?
The answer is of more than passing interest. Much has been made of the e-reader's potential for saving the newspaper industry. With long battery lives, and Wi-Fi connections, the iPad and rival devices could be publishing's version of the missing link.
Counting down to July 4
I hope so, but I'm skeptical. Our elusive future customers can already read USA Today and other Gannett papers on their smartphones for free, and that includes USAT's iPhone app. The iPad experience is better, no doubt, because its bigger screen is more suited to reading: 9.7 inches (diagonal), glossy and LED-backlit. (See iPad's complete specifications.)
But that doesn't change the paper's basic content, which the company so far hasn't been able to charge readers to access online, or on mobile. Look: Visit USA Today's home page any given day, click on major story links, and see what you get. There's value in aggregating Associated Press stories in one place, but will readers pay for the convenience of reading that on an iPad?
If Corporate really wants USAT's app to sell, it should reverse the staff cuts it demanded over the past two years. Give the newsroom and advertising sales staffs a fighting chance to produce something truly unique. Otherwise, in the countdown to July 4, we may find all that cost-cutting carried an unexpectedly high price.
Related: Seeking Alpha's transcript of Friday's conference call
Would you pay to access your website? Please post your replies in the comments section, below. To e-mail confidentially, write jimhopkins[at]gmail[dot-com]; see Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the rail, upper right.
Nothing gorgeous about the iPad app. Matt Jones, the mobile wiz kid, spent $50,000 with Mercury Interactive, a small shop in TN, for an app without any graphics, video or unique content.
ReplyDeleteThis is another lazy approach by USAT to "get a product out" and satisfy Craig Dubow so he show it off at the shareholders meeting.
Even the USAT executives are laughing at the product and do not believe anyone will pay for it.
When I was working for Gannett in Westchester I often wondered how many editors read the paper. I had the feeling that it was only those editors whose jobs specifically required it.
ReplyDeleteAnd more often than not editors weren't exactly discriminating about what went into the paper. As the staff got smaller, the emphasis was on having enough copy to fill the space.
One thing I'll say about having worked in the Broadcast division (at a station, not at corporate) is that upper management definitely watches what's put on the air. They don't necessarily read what goes on the website, as evidenced by what happens when producers who don't care* are forced to post three stories a day and just rip from AP.
ReplyDelete* = There are often producers who DO care, but a good chunk of the ones at my station either didn't care or weren't adequately trained by having to spend an entire day each week or two working on the website.
Management also looks at the website. You can tell because the sites look nothing like the Go4 standard laid out by the company -- each site has done their own thing at the behest of management, who looked at Go4 and said "wow, this blows, fix it".
Then they fired the webmasters who did. So, y'know, everybody wins.
Here is one thing I don't get; Everyone in management is stupid and everyone not in management who comments on this Blog is brilliant. How come you brilliant folks never move up in this or any other organization? Does THE MAN purposely keep you down?
ReplyDeleteRegarding 7:43 p.m....I for one never thought that all of management was stupid. What I did notice over the past 15 years or so at Gannett was the hiring and promotion of a lot of people who knew how to play office politics, but not much else.
ReplyDeleteThe culture, at least at Westchester, was that everyone must be a cheerleader. Team spirit, of course, is essential, but not the kind that fosters a generation of yes-men and yes-women.
I had excellent editors/managers at Westchester and I had terrible ones. The excellent ones were capable managers of people and situations. The terrible ones devoted their time to pleasing whomever was on the next rung above them. Their value as lap dogs was what set them apart from the rank and file.
And when I opted to bail out last year, I left behind a larger-than-ever newsroom management staff overseeing a smaller-than-ever operation.
I will not ever once pay to read this i-pad version of a USAT product. I don't use any mac equipmnet (I might if I could afford it or if it did graphic, movie & audio work any better than a pc) I will never once pay to read a USAT product on a pc. I like mainframes, mid-raange, workstations, pc's, notebooks and netbooks. I like Macs of all breeds. When I am going to really "read" something I love a magazine, book or newspaper. I like to pay fo feel it, turn the pages, smell it and comapre the "gloss" vs the flatness of the ink types used on the different paper types. How is it bound, cut and put together? With glue, staples, or the several other types still used in todays market. I guess I'm turning into an old man at 48 and don't realize it fully quite yet. But...I will NOT pay for media that updates on my media reading machine when I already pay for access just to get any type of media meaning my ISP even though this is yet another topic all itelf..."How much longer will we be paying for free Provider use; Always I guess except for those few places that already draw me in for free and we all know who they are." But I'll never pay twice, once to use the machine and secondly to view the content on it...Ex Gannett worker, "FIRED" 3/9/2009, the lowest day of Gannett stock...
ReplyDeleteThe launch of iPad will fuel the further erosion of newspapers. Back to the basics, as broadband/wi-fi accelerates, print will fail. The great powers that be had a chance to create their own iPad years ago when the "DIG" was first conceived. A project similar to the iPad was submitted and rejected.
ReplyDeleteThe iPad will have no effect on newspapers.
ReplyDelete