» Innovation

Dove Evolution

staci baird — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 15:21:38 +0000

Seriously. Now this is thinking outside some boxes, isn’t it?

Let’s face it, a lot of women are critical about the way beauty is portrayed by the media. Dove is capitalizing on that emotion and creating an “experience” around a “campaign.”
If you look at Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty it’s really ingenious. I LOVE the interactivity – the ability to vote – to have a say – and way to take action.

But is it something women will respond to? Well, the forum for discussing the pro-age TV commercial video, at the time of my post, has 3,789 posts. I don’t know how long the forum has been up but the campaign was announced in a press release Feb 8, 2007. Jury is still out, I think. But I gotta believe it’s a step in the right direction. Their biggest problem is going to be marketing. Getting people to come to the site and interact with it. Word-of-mouth will be a big part and so will the workshops/training on the ground.

This is definitely one to watch.

Desparately seeking Django developers

staci baird — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 14:25:13 +0000

Do you love Django?

Do you want to work on innovative new business projects?

Contact me! s t a c i [at] g i r l j o u r n a l i s t [dot] c o m

More details about the job on GypsyJobs.com

Why does innovation have to be so hard?

staci baird — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 02:19:40 +0000

I left my job in New York for two reasons: 1). Love and 2). Because I believe there is a future for “traditional media.” Because I wanted to be part of the solution, to help nurture innovation in our industry. But I find myself getting frustrated by the speed at which we move (or more accurately, don’t move). Everyday I read about daring new ideas, websites that have launched, brave men and women who are testing capricious waters… I know it’s hard to think outside the box, but it could be so rewarding.

Perhaps we should start with the most important question, “how do we make money?”

This of course, is not a rhetorical question. We need to answer it. Our future depends on it.

I completely agree that databases, data aggregation, mash-ups and all the like are valuable to the user, and would probably draw a decent amount of traffic… but you wouldn’t suggest supporting that with banner ads, would you? Or *gulp* up sells for business directory listings. This is where we, in the newspaper industry are stuck. We don’t need more ways to serve content, we need better ways to make money.

Newspapers are not going to survive on pay-per-click advertising alone. It’s just not enough. What we really need is to re-think the whole business model and advertising strategy.

But at the same time, keep in mind that we have to continue running the core business and churning out the daily newspaper. So it’s like managing a start-up while at the same time continuing to run an established business. You have different cultures, different schedules, different strategies and different business models and in many ways, they’re actually competing against each other.

It’s scary for many of us to think about the future.

Especially for those of us who are desperately clinging to the model of media as it existed before the Internet and the World Wide Web. I remember the good ‘ole days of print newspapers – the smell of the ink, the warm, “hot off the press” feel of the broadsheet in my hands. I remember cutting and pasting (with scissors and rubber cement). I remember selling classified ads and inserts.

But I also know that clinging to a dying medium is not going to do me, or anyone else any good.

It’s time to let go… to loosen our grip and let a cool breeze gently carry us away…

Perhaps it isn’t so awful to let go of our definition of news, of newspapers, of radio, of broadcast television, of advertising, branding and marketing. Perhaps it isn’t so hard to see news and information as just bits and bytes. Data that can be shaped and re-shaped, packaged and delivered, responded to and re-delivered over and over again, seamlessly, painlessly…

I believe it’s possible to save the function but change the form.

There must be others who believe too.

Innovative media company seeks smart, snappy php developer

staci baird — Fri, 18 May 2007 21:26:35 +0000

We’re hiring!

Innovative media company seeks smart and snappy php developer (with extensive Drupal experience).

Our environment is fun, friendly and seriously dedicated to making cool things happen online.

E.W. Scripps, a media company with a record of success in developing new initiatives is developing several new websites. We are looking for an experienced developer to work on a full-time contract basis with the innovations group of the Newspaper Interactive division.

To be chosen for this project, developer(s) must have proven experience using Drupal 5.x and related modules and themes for:

– Building highly customized, production-volume websites, with performance enhancements applied, such as Drupal caching and throttling.

– Creating new content types, customizing and interrelating them using Content Construction Kit (CCK).

– Creating user interfaces for linking media objects (images, video and audio) from external sites such as YouTube and Flickr.

– Establishing and configuring user roles for site managers, editors, producers, authenticated and anonymous users.

– Customizing user profiles to collect geographic, demographic and interest data points.

– Customizing site appearance to client specifications in Drupal admin, themes and via the ConTemplate module. (Developer[s] are not required to be proficient graphic designers or XHTML/CSS specialists, but should know enough about Drupal themes to edit them to client specifications.)

– Configuring rules for user forums and commenting environments using built-in modules for each.

– Creating and configuring custom blocks, and scheduling their appearance by content section.

– Creating and managing category taxonomies.

In addition, demonstrated abilities in rapid web development in LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) environments will be very important. The client project must be ready for public-scale beta launch within two months of contract signing. Developer(s) on this project may be retained for a longer period, however, as we expect some adjustments in features, functionality and user interface along the way.

If you’re a developer with an entrepreneurial spirit and a need to innovate, this is the perfect job for you!

Developer(s) on this project will be customizing an already installed instance of Drupal and the component modules, so only minimal server/software package administration — mostly keeping Drupal core and module versions up to date — will be required.

Interested developers must be willing to sign a confidentiality agreement prior to reviewing client specifications, and must provide at least two samples of live, production sites they have built using Drupal and some or all of the components required for this engagement.

Send your resume and links to at least two live Drupal sites to swolfe [at] scrippsweb [dot] com.

Show me the money

staci baird — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 21:34:52 +0000

Perhaps the most important question we (in the newspaper business) need to answer is “how do we make money?”

Databases, data aggregation, mashups and all the like are valuable to the consumer/user, and probably draw a decent amount of traffic to news web sites… but supporting that kind of content with banner ads? Or *gulp* worse yet, up sells for business directory listings?

This is where we, in the newspaper industry, are stuck. We don’t need more ways to serve content, we need better ways to make money.

Newspapers are not going to survive on pay-per-click advertising alone. It’s just not enough. What we really need to do is to re-think our business models and advertising strategies.

But we can’t ignore the core business, we have to continue churning out the daily newspaper. It’s like managing a start-up while at the same time continuing to run an established business. You have different cultures, different schedules, different strategies and different business models and in many ways, they’re actually competing against each other.

For a time, we focused on building newsrooms where print, broadcast and online could converge to create new and exciting content. But maybe it’s better to actually separate the online business from the core print business? A little healthy competition might spur some interesting innovations. Maybe then we could introduce strategic thinking and advertising together in the online newsroom.

I realize that many professionals in our industry fear what would happen if we were to cross “the line,” but that’s why we teach ethics, right? If we continue to put up a wall between editorial and advertising I’m afraid we will fail to optimize opportunities. Now is the time to be thinking of new ways to provide value to both the consumer/user and the advertiser. The definition of news is changing.

There isn’t going to one “thing” that will save us, but perhaps, overtime, there will be series of changes that will provide opportunities for newspapers in the digital age.