Guardian to become digital-first publication
Guardian News & Media is the latest news organization to announce it will reorganize its strategy to focus on its digital initiatives.
“By becoming a digital-first organisation we’re taking the next natural step, one which we believe all newspapers will eventually have to take,” said Alan Rusbridger, editor-in-chief of London-based GNM, in a press release. He also informed employees that GNM would “move beyond the newspaper, shifting focus, effort and investment towards digital, because that is our future.”
Print will remain key to GNM operations, but “the strategy would involve changes to its newspapers over time and investment in digital initiatives such as a new US operation based in New York and new mobile offerings,” the release added.
Andrew Miller, chief executive of parent company Guardian Media Group, said, “The opportunities presented by the growth of digital media are immense. The Guardian’s journalism has never been more widely read. However, the same forces driving opportunity in digital are creating challenges for newspaper publishers across the developed world, including GNM.”
In May 2011, its site guardian.co.uk garnered more than 50 million monthly unique browsers and 2.8 million daily unique browsers globally. The national newspaper grew its paper readership by 3 percent against declines in the UK print press market of between 8 and 15 percent.
Other publications proclaiming their operations to be digital-first include The Journal Register Co. in the US and Postmedia in Canada.
Photo courtesy of mac steve
Duke Nukem Forever’s PR firm fired for threatening tweet
The PR firm responsible for promoting the new video game Duke Nukem Forever has been dumped by the game’s developer 2K Games, Future of Media has learned.
The fiasco began with an angry tweet yesterday. California-based The Redner Group, in charge of publicity for the long-awaited Duke Nukem game for consoles, posted on its official Twitter account a rare tweet: a threat outlining that reviewers who negatively wrote about Duke Nukem Forever may not receive review copies of games in the future.
The tweet was deleted 40 minutes after it was posted, but Wired.com posted a screenshot and it read: “Too many went too far with their reviews…we r reviewing who gets games next time and who doesn’t based on today’s venom.”
Jim Redner, who runs The Redner Group, claimed responsibility for the tweet and in an interview he stressed the errant tweet came from him and did not represent the opinion of 2K Games or anyone related to Duke Nukem Forever.
The fallout has been devastating for Redner. Despite numerous apologies on the firm’s Twitter feed, 2K Games decided to dissolve their relationship with The Redner Group, effective today. Redner remarked, “When a post or something not approved by a client places them in a bad light, it behooves them to prevent that from happening again.”
Redner quickly ended the conversation, saying, “I’m really busy today, this has ruined my business, I have to go.”
In an interview with Wired.com, Redner elaborated on his mistake: “It is not my intention to bully anyone. I over reacted. I just voiced an opinion. I have poured my heart into this project and I just want it to succeed.”
It might be an uphill battle for 2K Games and the next Duke Nukem Forever PR firm to see positive reviews of the game. On MetaCritic, the game has a low score of 49, which means it has attracted “generally unfavourable reviews.” The game is 12 years in the making, and first debuted at the recent E3 Expo and was later released on June 14.
Photo courtesy of jameskm03
Watch out for malware hidden in Android apps
As much as Google’s Android Market has been lauded for its near instantaneous approval of developers’ apps, it’s now taking flak for malware-infected apps popping up in the service. Google recently removed at least 10 applications from its Android Market because they all had malicious code disguised as add-ons to one of the most popular apps of all time.
The Angry Birds app, for instance, include “a spyware program called Plankton, which connects to a remote server and uploads phone information like the IMEI number, browser bookmarks and browsing history,” Wired reports.
Webroot analysts Andrew Brandt and Armando Orozco investigated Plankton and found how its file names could confuse users. “Some of the samples we looked at came as Android apps with names like Angry Birds Rio Unlocker v1.0, Angry Birds Multi User v1.00 or Angry Birds Cheater Trainer Helper V2.0,” they wrote in a blog post.
When you install the malware-infected apps, the following message appears: “Welcome! Simply click on the button below to unlock ALL levels in Angry Birds Rio. This will not delete your scores but might change the number of pineapples and bananas you have.”
The installed code then gives remote access to the malware creator, whose identity remains unknown.
The analysts said users should be smart about what they download. “Android users can protect themselves by using a little common sense when they download apps: Does the app sound like what it promises to do is too good to be true? Does it ask for all kinds of permissions that it shouldn’t need to fulfill its mission? Did you get it from the official Market or a legitimate app store such as Amazon, or from some random app collection?”
The malware found in these Android apps raise a troubling question for Google. Its Android Market wins praise for not having months-long waiting periods for apps to be available to users, unlike Apple’s App Store. “However, the Android Market’s app submission process comes at a cost. Google’s lack of vetting applications lends the Market to security vulnerabilities like these,” Wired writes. “Google mostly relies on a self-policing community…to spot offending apps, which means malware can sit in the market for months before someone spots it.”
Google has faced this problem before. In March, users reportedly downloaded as many as 200,000 of the free apps infected with malware before Google pulled them from the Market.
Wired.com’s Evan Hansen explains how publishers can find digital success
Kicking off the MagNet 2011 magazine industry conference in Toronto was a keynote speech from Wired.com editor-in-chief Evan Hansen. A graduate of Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Hansen shared advice on how media outlets can best achieve their goal on digital platforms.
As reported on a liveblog covering the speech, Hansen wanted to remain optimistic despite the gloomy news for print publishers. “Brand advertising for Wired.com has grown faster than search,” he said. The website pulls in about 40 percent of Wired’s revenues, he noted. It now attract 13 million pageviews monthly.
He made sure to point out, “The principles of great magazines are not the same as the principles of great websites.” Only five percent of the mag’s content ended up on the website. Any frequent visitor to Wired.com could attest to the variety of content available, from its 13 blogs pumping out daily content to photo essays of NASA releases, for instance.
Near the end of his speech, Hansen highlighted “eight lessons of digital success.”
1. Don’t think platforms. Think brand. “Stop thinking print first; it’s just part of the brand,” he said.
2. Your core product is community, not content. Look at how Reddit brings in a billion pageviews a month on an eight-person staff. Also, Wired started a Ning.com site for the Haiti earthquake, and it now has 2,000 community members there, including 80 engineers talking about building earthquake-resistant buildings, Hansen added.
3. Let technology lead editorial strategy. He pointed out eight of top 10 media companies in the world are digital, such as Google and Apple
4. The web is not dead.
5. Pay attention to your advertisers. People will sell ads through network, and that’s a huge disadvantage. Brand-first custom campaigns are better, Hansen said.
6. Scale up.
7. Keep an eye on costs. And don’t forget about user-generated content, it should be part of the conversation, Hansen added.
8. The web is the web, so “don’t act like a magazine, act like a website.”
Apple introduces Newsstand, a one-stop hub for newspapers, magazines
Apple will soon launch a new app called Newsstand, described as an “easy-to-organize bookshelf displaying the covers of all your newspaper and magazine subscriptions in one place.”
Users can select their favourite magazines and newspapers to be organized in Newsstand, including background downloads. As the press release states: “If subscribed to, new issues appear in the Newsstand and are updated automatically in the background so you always have the latest issue and the most recent cover art.”
It’s uncertain which publications will be made available and if Apple will only include English outlets.
Newsstand is part of the iOS 5 update due for launch in the fall.
Macgasm reports the publications will be displayed in a bookshelf view on the iPad, much like the iBooks display. “It works just like a folder on iOS, but instead of apps, you are presented with a beautiful bookshelf full of your favorite magazines and newspapers,” the author writes.
It seems like Newsstand will be in direct competition with the Zinio Newsstand app, which does what Apple’s app wants to do. Zinio offers thousands of magazines through its app, and is available not only via the App Store but also on other devices, such as Android smartphones.