The plight of the aspiring [enter vocation here]
Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird has been out for awhile — at least, she describes mailing a manuscript to her agent, in the mail, all printed out, which seems cumbersome. I imagine most agents and editors use email and track changes in Word now? But I’ve just gotten around to reading the book. She covers how to be a writer and how to be a human simultaneously and with wonderful humor.
Characters, not plot
“Find out what each character cares about most in the world because then you will have discovered what’s at stake.” Plot is driven by what is at stake. When I learned to write features in a sportswriting class, my professor would continually tell us, raise the stakes. That is where the meaning of the story is, and it is what keeps the reader turning pages. But Anne tells us to start with the characters — and I love how she describes the process, sort of sitting there daydreaming about your characters, like, what will Wanda do next? Getting into their heads and turning them into complex beings makes the story authentic. It’s also a good self-test, I found. What do I care about most in the world? Because, that’s what informs what I should do next.
Jealousy
Being a writer means having writer friends. And writing is cyclical, you’re not always publishing, for months you’re just writing, and then getting edited and so on. Having to hear about others’ success while you’re down is difficult. And Anne describes in detail how it can get in your head. I think this can happen in any field, and social media makes it worse. I’ll go on Twitter to see people posting their wonderful ideas and deals, and start to think, he is smarter than me, creative and has the ability to execute on ideas, looks great in a sweater and probably teaches better yoga than me, too! See how foolish this is — I would hope someone’s passions wouldn’t mirror mine so perfectly and also outperform me on each one. But it seems that way sometimes.
It’s not about getting published
Anne teaches writing classes and students aren’t there for fun — they want to be published. But do they? Writing to get published is like a corporation focusing only on shareholder value — your writing will be worse. And for all the people who love to write — most are not very good. So we fight the good fight when we learn to write for a reason other than being published.
But what is it in us that convinces us that getting published is the achievement that makes us a “real” writer?
I think it’s just a big misunderstanding. Donald Miller once said that with his book Blue Like Jazz, a major bestseller, he felt like he put a message in a bottle and got a hundred billion messages back, like in the Police song “Message in a Bottle:
Walked out this morning
Don’t believe what I saw
A hundred billion bottles
Washed up on a shore
Seems I’m not alone at being alone
A hundred billion castaways
Lookin’ for a home
I’ve talked before about why I write. Writing is personal, and publishing says to the writer, You are a legitimate craftsman *and* a legitimate human being. Who you are and what you think is meaningful. Thing is, this is true of every person. Blogging shows us that. If you put your heart on a page it can find people who recognize the same reality. Whether this same opportunity is available for full-length books, time will tell.
An open editorial strategy for local publications
Last week I emailed this to a local publication’s editor, who put out a call for ideas a while back, but did not respond. This concepts can be applied broadly and I think many publications can benefit, so I am posting them here:
I think, if you want a strategy that keeps you going five years from now you need to be digital-first now.
First – do you think Gawker’s network of sites sort of meets some of the same need that alt weeklies traditionally did? I feel like they might and I think you can use the similarities to your advantage. Gawker’s editorial strategy has writers spend one day every two weeks putting out as many ridiculous, silly posts as possible – thing is, these usually bring in new readers while their more substantive posts bring return readers, and both are necessary. Plus, it’s sort of a fun break for writers. Would you experiment with this?
Next, verticals. Kill your homepage and split your site into verticals – like arts.you.com and politics.you.com, or you.com/politics, either works, but each vertical operates independently. This allows readers to build an emotional connection with the coverage they really really like. Niche sites are on the rise, general interest sites are dying. You have all the specialized coverage, you just need to split it up.
Be mobile first, digital second, print third. For every story anyone covers, should follow these steps: 1. announce story idea on twitter/fb 2. take a pic or video during reporting phase and post it 3. write/produce the story for the online vertical 4. repurpose the story for print. Print may be where money is made now, but I don’t think that’ll last long. Money can be made online (The Atlantic). Think of the print product as a marketing tool to bring people to the website.
Products – more and more companies are using content as marketing to sell products. You already have the content, why not sell products? Think of Birchbox or Dollar Shave Club – companies who charge say $10/month and mail out a box of product samples, and its valuable to users because the products are carefully selected. How would a “local Birchbox” work – could you mail a sampler box of locally sourced products, and would local artisans provide samples for free since it’s such great marketing for them? Other products – ebooks made up of archived stories, and possibly events (tech publications get a lot of revenue from conferences).
Affiliate links – if you do the vertical idea above and offer clean, attractive websites – you can capitalize off the ad space. Say your Dining homepage only has one main ad, but it’s actually an affiliate link – “purchase a dinner for two at Alexanders” and when people click and buy, you keep 30 percent. This won’t make lots of money at first, but if you carefully curate what appears in that space, and its always high quality goods and services you can build trust. People have way to many choices about what they buy, digging through Yelp sucks, why not just buy from a company that’s been vetted by your esteemed publication? I think local businesses would love it because at this point local businesses hates Groupon and are looking for other ways to bring in new customers.
I think using these ideas will prepare you for long term success and you will see other publications copy these tactics. I’m happy to talk more about why I think these will work.
The first time I met Bob Goff
When I was in college, my best friend was a girl named Taryn who was a nursing major. This means that when we’d plan to hang out, it meant we’d go to a coffeeshop or the library and we would study together. More specifically, I would stare aimlessly into business books, daydreaming and watching for cute basketball players, while Taryn would memorize anatomy.
One day, we were sitting in the university library together when a guy named Steve rolled up. He had gone to high school with Taryn. He sat down with us. “I met Superman!” he announced. He could hardly contain himself. So enthusiastic. He rambled on about this business law professor who had gotten filthy rich from suing buildings for being built two inches past their legal boundary lines. Then he would go to India and save girls from slavery and prostitution. Steve had set up a meeting with this guy for some reason, and was ecstatic to take his class in a year and a half because Bob Goff only taught business law in the spring. Well, my schedule was open, so I signed up for the following semester.
I took business law my sophomore year, even though it was an upper level class and my class was mostly juniors and seniors. This was a win because there were a few notable basketball players in that class, and taking class with the right group is second only to choosing the right professor, when it comes to college class strategy.
Every class, Bob would walk in and immediately begin updating us on what was going on in India. It was like we were getting the inside scoop. And then we would talk about law, and he’d joke about how his greatest fear was getting served, or sued, if being an international diplomat meant he could kill someone with no consequences, and whether oral contracts are binding, which I don’t remember. He also talked a lot about Rat-Dog and Sweet Maria, his poodle and his wife, respectively.
On the night before a test, he invited us over to his house on the San Diego harbor. It is so lovely. Rat-Dog was much cuter than what Bob had let on. Sweet Maria literally made fresh cookies for us, huge plates of them. It honestly felt like being in a movie, like it was too staged, but that’s Bob’s style — make a scene, because scenes are memorable. So since it was a “study session” he would talk through all the main points that would be covered on the test. You had to be an idiot to not come to this study night, because it was like he had just written the test and was going over the answers on it — we would all ace tests after study night.
He also told us to come over any time and borrow their kayaks. I honestly think he meant it. Would you stop by the house of a professor you had seven years ago and cash in on an offer to borrow some kayaks? It’s very tempting.
In class, he told us the story of the guy who walked up to his back porch on the harbor one day and asked to borrow Bob’s yard to propose to his girlfriend. It’s a great story, and you should read in in Bob’s book, Love Does. Anyway, Bob told us that the guy was a student at Point Loma, my school, and Bob decided that he needed to get involved, so he offered to teach business law, and without getting paid.
Around the time I took Bob’s class, there was a book called Blue Like Jazz that was really popular around campus. The author, Donald Miller, spoke in our chapel a few times. And a few years later, he wrote another book that included stories about his friend, Bob Goff. Of course they would be friends. I’ve always wondered how it was they first got connected, and when, because I imagine it must have been after I was out of Bob’s class. If not, surely Bob would have mentioned his friend Don.
I just finished reading Bob’s book, and it’s the first time I’ve read a book and known that the author wasn’t making up names for “his friend who had this-or-that happen” because some of the characters went to my school and we’re friends on Facebook. It was funny to re-read stories that were told in class, or hear more details about something. Even some stuff from Donald Miller’s book got light shed on it.
For example, Bob’s decision to write his memories. I think I first heard of that in a Donald Miller book, but I don’t think it was totally clear that the person who did it was Bob Goff and not a different guy. But it sounded like him. I’ve recently taken it up — in fact, much of this blog post is my memories of Bob. Sort of meta!
So now, for more about the book: Love Does had me crying. I think I knew from the back cover text that this book would “disrupt” by life as I knew it. I always have underlying passions that are limited by fear, and it usually just takes a few stories about people who overcame odds for me to face mine as well. That is what this book is.
The chapter that really got me was the one about a guy who created VIA for Starbucks, 20 years ago. Think about that, the company has been sitting on that product for that long. VIA wasn’t released until after its creator died of cancer. Why did this story catch me on such a deep level? First, he didn’t create VIA *for* Starbucks — he made it for himself and friends who went hiking and needed instant coffee but wanted it to taste good. He then showed it to Starbucks, who hired him to make all their new products. Some failed, some succeeded. You know, there’s a trend in online conversations today about “make your own luck” or Seth Godin’s “Lynchpin” concept that includes giving something away for free. I think sometimes we, I, only focus on taking logical steps, that get us from A to B. We miss out on discoveries that come from getting sidetracked.
But wasn’t VIA a total failure? It wasn’t even sold in this guy’s lifetime. But, it did get him a cool job. I don’t know, I think sometimes we have to think like artists and make our “Opus,” our proudest moment, our finest creation — and assume it will not be appreciated in our lifetime. We’ve got to make it for other reasons. What would we create differently, if we thought about it that way?
Lastly, Bob talks a bit about his work in Uganda in his book. When I took his class, he mostly talked about India, but I think he had already started working in Uganda at that time. When I finished college with a business degree, I had come to the absolute conclusion that I didn’t want a business job. In fact, I had been to Africa once (Liberia, summer 2007) and I sort of wanted to move there. To do what, it didn’t matter. After my two-week trip to Liberia, I had a lot of trouble actually adjusting to life in the US — they call this reverse culture shock. There was a lot of guilt. I didn’t really think that me going to Africa would help anyone there, but at least I wouldn’t have to look at the ridiculous running water here and wonder why we bothered making it and what it was actually useful for, because people in Africa did just fine without. When I read about the great things Bob+friends do in Uganda, I still sort of wonder if I should go.
But I think we each are given dreams and passions. Stealing Bob’s would be the easy way out, an escape. It’s wonderful, but it’s not mine. I hope that makes sense. Luckily, another piece of advice from Bob can help us moving forward: “Say yes to everything.” It’s not so much that people are throwing offers at me, because they sure aren’t, but every so often I am hit with an idea so ridiculous that I think it would be best to write it on a piece of paper and bury it in the yard so nobody will ever see. That’s when I know I’m onto something, and I must act.
#jcarn: My most dangerous idea to save journalism
Every month, I participate in Carnival of Journalism, and it is a wonderful chance to share ideas with smart people. This month the Carnival host forced a bunch of writers to appear on camera, and we’re all better because of it
Here is my video response:
This is not likely the most popular viewpoint and I don’t know that it would actually work. But when journalists are losing jobs anyway … I believe it’s a beautiful thing when your vocation is your job, but it doesn’t have to be. A vocation brings meaning to our lives and we must find a way to live our passions and not be ruled by money. What do you think? Would you keep doing journalism if you didn’t get paid?
Born to fly
Sometimes I think, if my 16-year-old self could see me know, she would be blown away. I never would have guessed how far I’d be, where I’d be, what I would look like or how much I could accomplish. I had big dreams, sure, but I’ve met those and then some.
That makes me think, what would the “me” of right now think of my 36-year-old self? What will she be doing? What are my dreams for the next ten years?
The curse of the American Dream
This morning, as I was reading through my eclectic selection of news, from Twitter, from Facebook, tabs that were open to a news article and I can’t remember where they came from. It’s a mix as complex as I am, sometimes, yoga tips right next to a guide for data visualization of the news.
Sometimes, that serendipity plants two seemingly unrelated pieces next to each other, and together they form poetry. If it was funny, we’d call it a meme, but it’s not funny.
In “Why do they hate us” by Mona Eltahawy on Foreign Policy, she talks us through how women are treated in various countries but also why. I read about female genital mutilation in the Reader’s Digest sometime in childhood, long before I would find out what an orgasm was, and whenever I think of it, I cannot understand for the life of me why I am here and not out saving people in Africa. Actually, I’ve been to Africa — Monrovia, Liberia in 2007 — and from that experience learned that a lot of my incentive to help comes from guilt at being born in a safe place. Turns out foreign policy can be complicated, too — please check out Dead Aid by Dambisa Moyo.
Then, the next article open in my tabs was from the website of KTLA Channel 5 news in Los Angeles (and Orange County) — a broadcast I grew up with, oddly. Turns out the kids are eating hand sanitizer to get drunk. So drunk they ended up in the hospital from alcohol poisoning. Because that’s what you do when you’re born in upper middle class areas with streets so wide and pothole-free you could drive to school with your eyes closed. I’m not kidding, you would have to try very hard to hit someone, and there are not many pedestrians. There is no danger.
It seems, that with lack of danger, we make danger. Horror movies. Roller coasters. It’s like we were made with this adrenaline, and we suffer if it’s not used.
Of course, that’s when Donald Miller comes in (you may have seen the film based on his book Blue Like Jazz). More recently, he wrote a book called A Million Miles in a Thousand Years and it’s about living a good story. On his blog, he says:
“In America, the stories we are living are boring. And people are suffering the emotional consequences of the American dream.”
Frankly, the American Dream these days isn’t buying a house, it’s paying of student debt. I know there are problems here locally too, and I know we cannot all “sell our possessions and give the money to the poor.” Or move to Africa to save people.
But, from what I have seen, each person has an individual glow, something they are uniquely driven to conquer. Our passion lives inside. When we stand on the cereal aisle of the grocery store trying to make a decision, we waste that drive and instinct that “what’s not right must be made right and I will have a hand in it.”
So I’ll leave you with Don’s opening line (and please don’t answer with, eat some sanitizer):
“Ask yourself before your next major decision ‘If I were a character in a story, what decision would make the story more interesting?’ “
How journalism faces the innovator’s dilemma
Carnival of Journalism is a monthly event when a group of us share our posts on a common topic to bring discussion to the goings on in our trade. It’s also a great place to exchange ideas with smart people. Comments welcome!
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The prompt this month, simply is “What is the next big thing in journalism?” I’ve been really excited about writing this post, and I’m glad the moderator, Steve Outing, posted early — because he explained a lot of the things I wanted to say with much more clarity than I likely would have offered!
When I first looked into SoMoLo, the only information I could find was about uses for marketing. This was bothersome, because I felt SoMoLo had some obvious applications to news, but I couldn’t put my finger on how this would play out. Steve explains how the growing number of social networks or aggregators of social postings that log geolocation can provide both reliable sources and notification of an emerging news story to journalists. Ideally, a news org might have one person devoted to scouring these sources and watching for stories about to unfold.
But why are news orgs content to just aggregate from all these other networks? Even the latest Knight News Challenge seeks *not* to create a network for news, but to find ways to utilize existing networks.
“There are a lot of vibrant networks and platforms, on- and off-line, that can be used to connect us with the news and information we need to make decisions about our lives. This challenge will not fund new networks.”
But news is a BIG DEAL. A huge percentage of the activity on Twitter and Facebook are links to articles, and more and more, people are posting and reporting news on those networks. What I see here is a hunger and a market for a social network specifically designed for news.
Some concerns brought to me include the issue with apps like Meporter, where reporting news is its sold function – there is no reason to download the app otherwise, so if a person does encounter news, it is too late. Rawporter is similar, and aims to actually sell the content — but I imagine an image like the one of the Hudson River is one in a million, and this cannot be a sustainable business model.
But stubbornly, I think this can be done well must be done. Why hasn’t it happened yet? Look no further than the Innovator’s Dilemma (a wonderful concept, also a book by Clayton Christensen) to understand why.
It says that existing companies will innovate with sustaining technologies, improving the way things are done. Existing companies will ignore disruptive technologies, because they require a loss in the near-term.
I see the existing news orgs of today embracing new technology, but only looking to implement it into the way things are already done. And I get that switching up the way a newsroom functions is quite the hurdle. Even Steve — who runs the reputable Test Kitchen, a place specifically designed to identify useful emerging technologies — wants journalists to be able to “assign” or request info or media from citizens at a news event, which I think is the old way of thinking. It falsely tries to fit the disruptive technology into the old format.
If you were at the ONA conference in Boston this past fall, you likely saw the keynote of Ben Huh of LOLcats and other UGC-type sites. His point that stood out to me the most was when he said that users won’t take the time to upload free content to your site unless it’s for their own enjoyment. I see news sites (Patch is one, there are others) ask readers to upload their own pictures to add to a story. I’m sorry, but nobody gets a kick out of providing free content that your site clearly uses for ad revenue. How is LOLcats different? It’s about the people.
The innovator’s dilemma says that disruptive technologies are initially a loss (and that is why existing companies ignore them) but eventually they satisfy the market with lower costs and these existing companies are left far behind.
In news, it’s not so much lower cost as it is faster and easier content that the market will choose. This is why news orgs lost to technology companies with digital ad revenue — they kept thinking, digital dimes to print dollars, and were slow to adapt the content itself. Mobile tools may not look productive or lucrative now, but for the reasons Steve laid out, it is much to important to ignore. As explained by the Innovator’s Dilemma:
“Large companies have certain barriers to innovation which make it difficult to invest in disruptive technologies early on. Being industry veterans means that they have set ways in approaching new technologies. Baggage from precedents … “
These norms include assuming journalists need to be involved to request certain images. Also – news judgement – something for which we’ve relied on journalists. Mark Zuckerberg once said something to the point of “People care more about the squirrel dying in their front yard than people dying in Africa.” News is about to be very customized, very fast — and it has a lot to do with SoMoLo.
News will be reported, person to person — with photos and videos from a smartphone that will never make it to any news site. The incentive is simply to help your neighbor — look no further than to the news reported on Facebook and Twitter to see that this is an existing incentive. News will be distributed by relevance, either through social ties or location.
Think of a fender bender that doesn’t harm anyone but plugs up a busy street for half an hour. It doesn’t matter to people half a mile away, and it won’t matter to me later tonight, but if I’m stuck in traffic because of it, maybe I want to know. Why can’t I pull out my phone and see the picture uploaded by the guy five cars ahead of me?
Imagine with me, because I think that something like this is coming. And for existing news orgs, is there a way around the Innovator’s Dilemma?
“With a few exceptions, the only instances in which mainstream firms have successfully established a timely position in a disruptive technology were those in which the firms’ managers set up an autonomous organization charged with building a new and independent business around the disruptive technology.”
How to make Egyptian sugar for hair removal
The good news is, it is just a mix of sugar, lemon juice and water, and easy to make if you have a candy thermometer.
Here’s a list of reasons sugaring is different/better than waxing but from personal experience I will say, it hurts much, much less, the hair grows back thinner and slower and your skin is not red afterward (this is because wax pulls off a layer of skin cells, sugaring only attaches to the hair). Also, as my esthetician noted, if you use sugar on your face, it will remove blackheads and clogged pores much like a pore strip. Best of all, it is completely water soluble, so you won’t make a mess.
How to make sugar:
- 2 cups plain white granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup water
- 1/4 cup lemon juice (just use the stuff from a bottle, you don’t want pulp, etc. in here)
Warnings: If you don’t cook the sugar long enough, it will just be a soft honey mixture and will not work because it will not pull off in one piece. If you cook it too long, when it cools it will just be really hard — you can warm it in the microwave, but as you are working it may get too hard to work with. Getting the right temperature is tricky but it’s worth a few batches because the ingredients are so cheap.
How to use sugar:
- First, make sure the sugar is pliable. This really depends on the weather, and also, how long you cooked it. You should be able to shape it in your hand.
- If you want, you can wear gloves — personally, gloves make it more difficult.
- You will spread the sugar onto your skin *opposite* the direction of hair growth, so, spread it up your leg. You can cover about the same area you would cover with a wax strip. Use your fingers to spread the sugar three times, and use a bit of pressure, so you’re really dragging the hair in the opposite direction.
- Then, flick up the top of the piece of sugar, and tug that down in the *same* direction of hair growth. It will probably take a few tugs to get the whole piece off, but each time, re-flatten the sugar down onto your skin.
- Then, re-form the sugar into a ball and use it to pick up any stray bits of sugar left on your skin.
- Now, use the same piece of sugar on the next area.
You will want to grab a new piece of sugar a few times if you are doing large areas. Also, if your body heats up or it is a hot day, the sugar might get too warm and refuse to come off in one clean piece. There are two ways to deal with this — you can mix the stubborn sugar with some fresh, cooler sugar, or, you can just wipe off the sugar with a warm washcloth. If it’s a hot day you might just want to sit in front of a fan, because it can be really frustrating if the sugar won’t pull off.
The more you do this, the better you’ll get at it. There’s definitely technique to how you spread on and pull off the sugar. You will also get a better idea of what temperature the sugar needs to be — sometimes it’s nice to have it warm so it spreads on easy, but too warm and it won’t work.
If you want to try out sugaring before doing it yourself, I can recommend these places:
- The Upper Level Spa, San Diego
- Pure Clover, Dana Point
Lectio Divina Yoga
When it was a bit warmer outside, I did morning yoga with my friend Amber in the park. Here is the live audio from one of our sessions.
I’ve thought about uploading these regularly, so if you like it, please let me know!
Welcome to 2012, the year citizen journalism mobile apps will fail
More than a few spins on citizen journalism were released as mobile apps as of late, and with good reason: it is an excellent idea. So before I discuss the limitations I see in the current iterations, here’s why the market is ripe.
People are posting breaking news, photos and videos to their networks on Twitter and Facebook already. There’s an intrinsic incentive already there, for regular people to report the news, and one lucky app just needs to capitalize on it.
Next, there’s a clear need — as citizens begin reporting, whether in Egypt or at Occupy Wall Street, we’re realizing that there’s more news that needs reporting, and fewer pro journalists. Plus, the cameras on mobile phones just keep getting better.
And last — we don’t yet have a network based on location. All of our social networks are based on social connections, either through friends or work or family, and apps these days take advantage of using Facbeook or Twitter to authenticate and further push the norm that these existing networks are the only networks a person will identify with. An app that uses relationships based on location would strike an unseen chord with users. At a moment in time, you have more in common with the person sitting in traffic with you than anyone else, and this relationship thus far has been ignored.
Here’s a use case: Wanda is driving home from work and sees a car get T-boned in an intersection. The cars behind her are backed up in traffic for 20 minutes, until emergency workers come to clear the road. Within an hour, the scene is totally clear, as if nothing happened, save a bit of debris. This story is relevant to people living in the community, who might sign a petition to reduce speed limits, or people stuck in traffic behind Wanda, who can’t see what happened or know how long they’ll be held up. This relevance, based on time and location, is not currently dealt with in existing digital networks.
With this clear opportunity for a mobile citizen reporting platform, it’s not surprising that many such tools are emerging. Here are a few:
The core value propositions of all these services is similar: geotagged media posts that can be used in C2C news reporting, but also used by media organizations. One major difference is the business model of each, and that will prove a defining factor not just in success, but in user acquisiton.
As I mentioned, there is an intrinsic incentive for regular (non-journalist) people to report news, manifested in two ways: The “I saw it first” and the “Helpful neighbor.” Offering micropayment for user-submitted content devalues the service. That’s why people aren’t submitting to content farms for fun, but they are posting LOLcats. Posting content must serve the user experience.
Also, making money off the news is the greatest challenge for media companies right now, so there’s going to be a fine line between working with them and competing with them, when it comes to revenue streams. Plus, offering a viable revenue stream might diminish interest from investors — who are better able to control valuation when there’s little science involved. Building a fantastic product for an acquisition might frankly be better worth everyone’s time than building a long-term business.
Design is said to be the biggest differentiator in Silicon Valley right now — but the aforementioned services still emphasize tech. In all fairness, their offering is heavy on tech and getting that right might seem to be the biggest challenge up until the point of launch. But that’s when the battle for users begins, and a product that wasn’t designed for users from the beginning will struggle.
When it comes to user acquisition, all these services deal with the same issue: Why download an app for reporting news when you don’t know that you’ll walk by something that is newsworthy? News is, by definition, time-sensitive. Stringfly incentivizes non-time sensitive use with brand interaction while Bambuser’s livestream offering allows for non-news use cases.
To look at some historical examples, Facebook acquired users who wanted to interact with college classmates, and Twitter acquired users who wanted to follow thought leaders and icons. Both these services mimicked an existing network and just gave it more architecture by making it digital.
The silver lining is that with a specialized network, users can start from scratch in deciding which contacts they’d like to share news with. But does news need its own network? Mobile-first Just.Me is getting ready to launch, and will be a competitor to both Path and Facebook, with privacy controls that allow for personal journal-type entries as well as more public posts.
If a non-specialized app is able to get this right — serving as an effective location-based C2C network, and also surfacing UGC news to news media organizations — all these citizen journalism apps may fall flat. Since their design and launch strategies have not acquired the mass users necessary for network dynamics to be put in play, they all still hold a weak grip on the pain point they aim to solve. Trying to monetize right away will only slow down the development of the product.
Perhaps the market is simply not ready for an idea that, in theory, seems so crucial and in demand. Time will tell if any of these services hit gold, and I can guarantee more similar platforms are underway in development. But if these companies do not arm themselves with the flexibility to fail a few times, they will not be able to discover the model that will work.
04. May 2012 by admin
Categories: Commentary, Journalism | Comments Off