Reuter's CEO gets it.

Some selected quotes from Tom Glocer's Online Publishers Association Keynote address delivered March 2, 2006.

About this time last year I stood up in front of a room like this at a Financial Times media conference. I talked then about the personalization of news – how technology was allowing consumers to filter exactly the news they wanted to receive. And how it was allowing content organizations like Reuters to multicast individual streams of desired content, not just broadcast a single feed.

In a nutshell, it was about the consumer as editor - you get the news you want when you want it, either pulled by something like an RSS feed or a Tivo box or pushed by the media company – in this instance filtered by your profile.

Well, 12 months on, media companies are catching up with this demand, but you guessed it, our audiences have already moved on – now they are consuming, creating, sharing and publishing.

The consumer wants, not only to run the printing press but to set the linotype as well.

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My message today in this opening session of the OPA’s “Forum for the Future” is simple – our industry faces a profound challenge from home-created content – everything from blogging and citizen journalism to video mash-ups

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How if we create the right ”Crossroads”, provide consumers with the appropriate tools and use “old” media skills like writing and editing, we can harness the upside in what at the outset looks and feels very much like a punk revolution.

It is becoming clear that our media world is fundamentally changing again only a decade after the internet attracted the first wave of online publishers.

As media historians look back on this period, they’ll probably identify News Corp’s recent acquisition of Intermix Media, parent company of MySpace.com, as a turning point.

Looking at the numbers cold, $580 million was a lot of money to pay for a company with barely $20 million in revenues.
But sites like MySpace are redefining our world and providing an online forum for kids, music groups, their promoters and basically anyone with anything he wants to share.

Look behind the weirdness of some of MySpace’s inhabitants and Murdoch has now gained access to 54 million users (including one called Tom Glocer) - all potential customers for News Corp’s content.

More importantly he has the kind of market data that would make consumer industry bosses giddy - an early warning system of future trends and brand choices for the world’s youth market.

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What we are seeing on-line now is almost a continuous talent show, with media-savvy consumers using digital technology to express themselves and stand out as individuals in their virtual communities, as well as appeal to the Harvey Weinsteins and Simon Cowells of the world.

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If users want to be both author and editor, and technology is enabling this, what will be the role of the media company in the second decade of this century?

I would argue that there are three distinct attributes:

1. First, the ‘seeder of clouds’.

What do I mean by that?

Well, if you want to attract a community around you, you must offer them something original and of a quality that they can react to and incorporate in their creative work – just like Warner’s music to enable video mash-ups. Being authentic in what you create and deliver to your audience is essential for success.

But it’s no good hoping that new content creators will magically be drawn to us – we need to attract them. That means making the most of the content we already produce and setting out our electronic stall.

If you attract an audience to your content and build a brand, people will want to join your community and interact. They’ll be inside your tent.

This is as true for traditional “letters to the editor” on the op-ed page as it is for MySpace.com.

2. The second role media companies need to adopt to maximise the opportunity from new content is that of ‘the provider of tools’.

Maybe the French will create a better Google or a CNN a la Francaise, but I don’t see a lot of private money lined up behind this lot.

We need to promote open standards and interoperability to allow a diverse set of consumer-creators to combine disparate content types. We must enable our content to be at the Crossroads of our audiences’ consumption – and realize that no one fully “owns” audience anymore.

Let’s not make the same mistake that newspapers did with the protectionist online strategies that characterised Internet One: The Web was not created to merely display a replica of yesterday’s newspaper with a few banner ads.

As an aside, I think that the growing mood amongst European publishers to rebel against search is exactly this type of ill-considered, rear-guard action that will fail.

3. Third, the final role that media firms will play in the emergence of the two-way content pipe is that of ‘Filter and Editor’.

In my mind, media has always had these two functions – to allow and to filter – one without the other is death.

I believe that the world will always need editing just as consumers place value in others making decisions about what is good and what is not.

Just because everyone now has the potential to publish their own blog doesn’t mean they’re all worth reading.

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So… we are now at our Crossroads. Old media (and ironically enough) that now means on-line publishing as well, has a choice – adopt these three roles to prosper or risk becoming less relevant.

1) To be the seeder of clouds;
2) To provide the tools for creation and;
3) To filter and edit.