It was a pleasure to stop by the ContentNext mixer last evening and to catch up with several hundred of
paidContent.org's friends and fans. By shortly after six the line to get in to the instant sellout event was already backing up down the staircase at the W Hotel at Union Square in New York City. Thanks to Rafat for a great event and congratulations to the ContentNext family of publications on their new funding and management. It's such a boost to see honest and humble efforts rewarded.
Horatio Alger is still alive and well and living in Los Angeles. Business news has a new paradigm through the efforts of journalists like Rafat, one which has brought the value of community conversations to a new level.
Rafat Ali kicked off the festivities with an interview of Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr., Chairman, The New York Times Company and Publisher of The New York Times. Rafat did a fine and relatively gentle job of probing the state of the NYT's online efforts, though much of the info coming out was already fairly well known. Probably the most interesting point that came up was Mr. Sulzberger's compare and contrast of the NYT's printing of the
Pentagon Papers in 1971 (after several days of excerpts in the newspaper the government stopped the printing by a court injunction) and today's era that would have allowed instantaneous release of the entire range of information gathered by the paper.
The New York Times' recent
coverage of bank records surveillance by U.S. government intelligence operatives may yet meet with a governmental response ("Treason...?" Sulzberger mused) but whatever the response the era of instant global publishing and republishing allows leading news organizations to have a much deeper and immediate impact with such provocative editorial efforts. But since these moments come and go so much more quickly the opportunity to monetize them at the zenith of their impact via ad services is more limited. This leaves in doubt the future financing of efforts such as placing correspondents in a Baghdad bureau (a USD 3 million for the NYT before salary expenses, according to Sulzberger). I'll have more on this quandary of finding the right revenue mix for news in this week's news analysis.
The other interesting moment of the Sulzberger interview was when he waxed warmly over the new
Times Reader browser, a Microsoft Vista-based application for reading a newspaper in a print-like format on desktop and oversized portable devices. While he has a strong commitment to making online publishing a financial and editorial success, clearly Sulzberger has a soft spot for print that's not going to go away any time soon. When an institution like The New York Times has made so much history and well-designed content in that medium it's hard not to linger with the format, but these little tricks of Microsoft to woo major publishers into feeling comfortable with the transition from print to Microsoft-captive digital revenues are mostly showboat efforts that have little to do with the ultimate future of publishing in electronic environments.
As for the event itself it was an interesting mix of media-covering-media types along with reps from consumer and business publishing services and content technology companies - very representative of Rafat's readership. While the swarm of people focusing on online video technologies seemed to have a good time, the sponsor reps from FAST Search and Transfer looked to be rather glum (hey, doesn't everyone remember how important search is...?).
Donna Bogatin at ZDNet gave the event high marks while noting that we've moved from VC-backed events in the dot-com Silicon Alley days to event sponsorships. The current content economy may have a certain bubble aspect to it, but it's a bubble in which people are making money rather than speculating about making money. Donna points out
Jeff Jarvis' rather cranky weblog entry in which he puts down "...guys in nametags making pitches for their companies to anyone who would stand still and even those who would not." Well, it WAS a networking event, Jeff...
Looking forward to the Fall event - in a larger facility hopefully. Though bring that caterer again, the canapes were great.
