How Assignmint Will Change Freelance Journalism

A new startup hopes their integrated freelancer workflow and financials system will change the media industry.

New startup Assignmint has an ambitious goal: To change freelance journalism as we know it. The company, headed by former New York Press and Forbes Traveler editor Jeff Koyen, will offer a complete pitch-to-payment cloud workflow system for freelancers and their employers. It helps digitally manage work assignments, editorial calendars, invoices, pitches, expenses, contract information, and payment. Freelance journalists, meanwhile, will be able to have access to all their outstanding invoice and payment information in one place. The startup also plans to implement a clip and algorithm service to match freelancers with potential new clients.

While Assignmint will only handle writers and editors when it launches in late 2012, the firm plans to open their doors to freelancers and employers from the rest of media--along with financial services, academia, IT, fashion marketing, and other fields in 2013. The company's profit model is based upon their payment system: Assignmint will handle freelance payments on an company's behalf in exchange for an employer-paid service fee. Other revenue streams will include premium subscriptions for editorial teams, white-label enterprise installations, and custom services such as tax form fulfillment.

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What happens to our digital property after we die?

Online lives have increasing economic and sentimental value. But testamentary laws offer muddled and incomplete ways of bequeathing and inheriting them. Digital assets may include software, websites, downloaded content, online gaming identities, social-media accounts and even e-mails.

Service providers have different rules—and few state them clearly in their terms and conditions. Many give users a personal right to use an account, but nobody else, even after death. Facebook allows relatives to close an account or turn it into a memorial page. Gmail (run by Google) will provide copies of e-mails to an executor. Music downloaded via iTunes is held under a licence which can be revoked on death. Apple declined to comment on the record on this or other policies. All e-mail and data on its iCloud service are deleted on the death of the owner.

Laws, wills and password safes may clash with the providers’ terms of service.

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Can an Algorithm Write a Better News Story Than a Human

Every 30 seconds or so, the algorithmic bull pen of Narrative Science, a 30-person company occupying a large room on the fringes of the Chicago Loop, extrudes a story whose very byline is a question of philosophical inquiry. The computer-written product could be a pennant-waving second-half update of a Big Ten basketball contest, a sober preview of a corporate earnings statement, or a blithe summary of the presidential horse race drawn from Twitter posts. The articles run on the websites of respected publishers like Forbes, as well as other Internet media powers (many of which are keeping their identities private).

The universe of newswriting will expand dramatically, as computers mine vast troves of data to produce ultracheap, totally readable accounts of events, trends, and developments that no journalist is currently covering.

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A Progress Report on a College Paper's Pioneering Metered Pay Wall

In what was believed to be a first for a college news outlet, The Daily O'Collegian at Oklahoma State University began charging for online content.

A year in, Catalino's admittedly informal goal of 100 paid subscribers was met and exceeded. On the one-year anniversary, there were 156 paid subscribers, and as of last week there were 177. Not a windfall, considering the paper has a print circulation of 25,000 and a regular online audience of 2,000, but enough that Catalino recently upped the annual fee to $15 for new subscribers.

The O'Collegian worked with a company called Press+ to launch what both call a "metered system" in March 2011. After viewing three free articles within a month, readers outside a 25-mile radius of the Stillwater campus and without an .edu email address were asked to pay $10 for a year of unlimited access.

College newspapers are not a huge business priority for Press+ and counts about 50 on the client list, but he predicts that more and more will turn to the company for help with either seeking donations (the option most current clients choose) or charging for online content.

The company's geo-location technology is crucial for college outlets because they can aim pay requirements solely at readers outside the campus community, preserving limitless access for students, faculty members, and local residents. If a mega-story breaks and a college newspaper wants full exposure for its content, it can exempt that coverage from the metered system.

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The end of the $60 video game is near

According to The NPD Group, physical content sales were down 8% in 2011. This year hasn't been a cakewalk either, with sales continuing to slide. Though some of the blame can rightfully be foisted upon the decline of the once-mighty Wii, it's apparent that people aren't buying games like they used to, and the industry is scrambling to figure out why. But most agree that it begins — and likely ends — with the high cost of new games.

The top perennial franchises like Halo, Elder Scrolls, Battlefield, and Madden aren't going anywhere, at least for a while longer. Games that critics and consumers universally laud as "must-haves" can continue to support this massive premium. But it's the mid-tier titles, the unestablished IPs, the riskier endeavors, the worthwhile games that don't quite master the magic formula, that will never get off the ground.

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Why social media will reveal French election winner

Can an election be won on social media? That question is being increasingly asked in France, before the first round of the presidential election.

The French are very much online now: 75% of people surf the web while 25 million have Facebook accounts, out of a total population of 66 million, of whom 43 million are voters.

With the emergence of the Social TV phenomenon, one can see TV and social media now complement each other. Ever since the Socialist Party's primaries, political TV broadcasts have caused a torrent of comments on Twitter, as TV audiences joined up on this huge virtual couch to minutely analyze politicians' statements. TV broadcasts words uttered by candidates while the social media host chats about the candidates' words. And it's on these social networks that judgement on the candidates' credibility will be passed. This is because their promises and the figures they bandy about are fact-checked in real time, by journalists and experts, ensuring a simultaneous and enlightened subtitle service that underlines the politicians' rolling spiel.

So the answer to my opening question: "Can an election be won on social media?" is: in France in 2012, most probably "no". However, the question: "Can social media predict the name of the next French president?" calls for a positive answer.

Read more at CNN

Can the dubious art of selling become more scientific?

The rise of the internet means that sales are changing. Customers bone up about prices online and are less likely to fall for a seductive pitch. There are still often huge differences in the performance of sales forces both within and between companies. Many Western corporate bosses are trying to turn sales from an art into more of a science. Entrepreneurial salesmen, doing whatever it takes to reach their numbers, can now be tracked and controlled. “Sales Growth: Five Proven Strategies from the World’s Sales Leaders”, by three McKinsey consultants, belongs in the selling-as-science school.

The book argues that data, process management and outsourcing can do as much for sales departments as for other areas of the corporation. Firms should not hesitate to re-engineer their peddlers. They should create sales “factories” where sales teams are ministered to by support people from other disciplines, and equip them with computing devices rather than briefcases. Companies still have plenty of Willy Lomans not selling much. They should seek to standardise performance by finding out what the best salespeople do and making sure everyone applies the same techniques (which sounds obvious, but not many people do it).

In emerging markets, on the other hand, selling is still personal—and old-fashioned. So companies that are trying to bring more science to sales at home will still need to master what some call the “steak-and-a-show” method when entering new markets. Industrial sales in China, especially, depend on long, close relationships between salespeople and customers.

Being a salesman in the internet age is getting harder. Sales forces are being cut and replaced with technology, and the job is losing its appeal. The popularity of the title “sales associate” on LinkedIn, an online network, has fallen dramatically in the past four years. BMW’s boss in America, Ludwig Willisch, admitted to the authors of the McKinsey book that it is hard to persuade people to go into sales these days.

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Google glasses: A view of the future

Google revealed last week that it was working on a pair of Internet-connected spectacles able to do “everything you now need a smartphone or tablet computer to do—and then some.” The glasses will display readouts on the lenses, above the normal line of sight; as you’re walking, Google Maps directions will “appear literally before your eyes.” When you meet someone new, their social-network profile will appear next to their face. Google claims to have already built a prototype, despite skepticism from the tech world that such technology yet exists. But if Google can bring this wearable computer to the masses, we’ll be nearing the point “where the line between human and machine blurs.” Read more here

WTOP, Washington DC all-newser, repeats as America's top-billing station

New BIA/Kelsey revenue estimates put Hubbard Radio's WTOP (103.5 and various simulcast stations) at $64 million in 2011 revenues. From the researcher's new Investing In Radio update, here's the top 10 list for 2011:

WTOP (News) Washington, DC  Hubbard Radio LLC  $64,000,000
KIIS (CHR) Los Angeles Clear Channel  $57,000,000
KFI  Talk  Los Angeles Clear Channel  $48,100,000
WBBM-AM  News  Chicago CBS Radio $48,000,000
WCBS-AM  News  New York CBS Radio  $47,500,000
WHTZ  CHR New York  Clear Channel  $46,000,000
KROQ Alternative Los Angeles CBS $42,000,000
WINS  News New York  CBS Radio  $42,000,000
WLTW  Lite AC New York Clear Channel  $42,000,000
WFAN    Sports/Talk  New York CBS   $40,500,000

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Can the Computers at Narrative Science Replace Paid Writers?

Narrative Science will certainly replace some types of human-generated writing, the stories they're most excited about are the ones journalists rarely cover. Because of readership expectations, no journalist would write a story with relevance to only one person, or a few—sports writers, for instance, don't write about Little League games in the first place. Instead of simply tallying wrong answers, your kid's standardized test results make highly specific study suggestions—in language that would do an English teacher proud. Log in to check your portfolio, you'll get an expert analysis on how your stocks are doing, with suggestions on what to trade our buy. As Slate's Evgeny Morozov notes in a recent article, "automated journalism" could result in news stories appearing differently to different readers. As Narrative Science continues refining and improving their authoring platform, two future grails stand out. First, Hammond would like to be able to train the platform to look for conclusions that haven't yet occurred to human clients. It can only report on story possibilities that human programmers have trained it to "see." Second, they hope to move beyond numbers. Though humans delve in stories and narratives, computers are simply much more adept with numbers. Further developments in computer understanding of human language could blow the current technology open. When Narrative Science can scan written documents with the same comprehension it brings to number sets, its viability increases dramatically. Read more herehere

2012 Jobs Rated Report

Professions that provide us with our news - Newspaper Reporter and Broadcaster - ranked among the worst jobs in the nation, according to the new 2012 CareerCast.com Jobs Rated Report. Lumberjacks, who work on the hottest and coldest days in a highly dangerous occupation with a low salary and a history of high unemployment, were rated as having the worst job in the nation. "Many jobs in the media are characterized by high stress, short deadlines, long hours and a poor hiring outlook," explains Tony Lee, publisher of CareerCast.com's 2012 Jobs Rated Report. To see the full rankings of all 200 jobs and the report's methodology, go here.

Radio Revs Growing

Total radio advertising revenues will grow 3.5% in 2012, according to BIA/Kelsey’s “Investing In Radio Market Report,” largely thanks to intensive political advertising. BIA/Kelsey also expects strong continued growth in radio’s online revenues. In 2012 BIA/Kelsey sees total “over-the-air” local radio station revenues reaching just under $14.6 billion. If accurate, this forecast would be a welcome return to growth after a distinctly mediocre 2011. They see radio’s online revenues reaching $767 million by 2016, suggesting a cumulative annual growth rate of 11% per year from 2013-2016. The fact remains, however, that online revenues are still a relatively small part of the radio business. Read more here

Magazine Ad Pages Down 33% From 2006

While they have not fared as poorly as their print cousins in the newspaper business, consumer magazines have taken it on the chin over the last few years. Last year, total ad pages as measured by the Publishers Information Bureau were off one-third from their peak of five years ago, having declined 33.4% from 253,494 in 2006 to 168,742 in 2011. This is partly the result of the closure of some titles, as the total number of magazines tracked by PIB fell from 252 to 221 over the same period. But even magazines that survived endured steep losses. Read more here

The Next Time Someone Says the Internet Killed Reading Books, Show Them This Chart

Remember the good old days when everyone read really good books, like, maybe in the post-war years when everyone appreciated a good use of the semi-colon? Everyone's favorite book was by Faulkner or Woolf or Roth. We were a civilized civilization. This was before the Internet and cable television, and so people had these, like, wholly different desires and attention spans. They just craved, craved, craved the erudition and cultivation of our literary kings and queens.

Well, that time never existed. Check out these stats from Gallup surveys. In 1957, not even a quarter of Americans were reading a book or novel. By 2005, that number had shot up to 47 percent. I couldn't find a more recent number, but I think it's fair to say that reading probably hasn't declined to the horrific levels of the 1950s.

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the new spirit of business

Centralised, hierarchical systems made sense in a world in which information and knowledge were relatively scarce commodities and could be tightly controlled, but the decentralisation of knowledge, brought about by the inexorable rise of the internet – combined with a collapse of trust in traditional sources of authority and expertise – legitimises the creation of flatter, decentralised operational models. Rapidly changing customer expectations powered by social media are forcing institutions to become more open, transparent and responsive and to operate in close to real time, as opposed to the painfully slow pace of institutional time.

Agility, flexibility, a willingness to exercise judgement and an ability to improvise will become the defining characteristics of successful institutions in the next decades. This means fighting the instinct to solve every problem through rules and regulations and recognising the limitations of long-term planning and the painfully slow nature of most internal decision-making processes.

It means accepting the need to operate in real time and making the organisational and cultural changes necessary to achieve it. And most importantly, it means building a strong, self-sustaining, trusting organisational culture rather than in investing in yet more process and bureaucracy.

The future is loose, messy and chaotic: now is the time to embrace it. Read more here

Young people just aren’t that into cars these days

Young people just aren’t that into cars these days. For many Millennials, getting a license and buying a car—once considered rites of passage—have taken a backseat to “buying the latest smartphone or gaming console. Read more here

Which tongues work best for microblogs?

Though Twitter, with 140m active users the world’s best-known microblogging service, is blocked in China, Sina Weibo, a local variant, has over 250m users. Chinese is so succinct that most messages never reach that limit, says Shuo Tang, who studies social media at the University of Indiana.

Japanese is concise too: fans of haiku, poems in 17 syllables, can tweet them readily. Though Korean and Arabic require a little more space, tweeters routinely omit syllables in Korean words; written Arabic routinely omits vowels anyway. Arabic tweets mushroomed last year, though thanks to the uprisings across the Middle East rather than any linguistic features. It is now the eighth most-used language on Twitter with over 2m public tweets every day, according to Semiocast, a Paris-based company that analyses social-media trends.

Romance tongues, among others, generally tend to be more verbose. So Spanish and Portuguese, the two most frequent European languages in the Twitterverse after English, have tricks to reduce the number of characters.

Though ubiquity and flexibility may give English hegemony, Twitter is also helping smaller and struggling languages. Basque- and Gaelic-speakers tweet to connect with other far-flung speakers. Kevin Scannell, a professor at St Louis University, Missouri, has found 500 languages in use on Twitter and has set up a website to track them. Gamilaraay, an indigenous Australian language, is thought to have only three living speakers. One of them is tweeting—handy for revivalists.

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Is Pinterest the next Facebook?

Pinterest (is) the fastest-growing website of all time. In March the site registered 17.8 million users, according to Comscore, a 52% jump in just one month -- and it isn't even open to everyone (would-be "pinners" must still request an invitation to join).

Pinterest, for the uninitiated, is a deceptively simple-sounding, insanely addictive social media site that lets users collect and share images on digital pinboards. Most social-networking sites have first become popular among tech's early adopters along the country's coasts. But Pinterest found its most passionate users among the Midwestern scrapbooking set -- a mostly female group -- who have turned to it to plan weddings, save recipes, and post ideas for kitchen renovations.

Essentially, Pinterest excels at something that's very hard to do on the web -- help people discover new things. If you can name what you want, after all, Amazon (AMZN) and Google are pretty good tools for helping you find it. But what if you don't know what you want? Social-networking sites have helped businesses influence people, but they are imperfect. People use Facebook and Twitter to talk to each other, not necessarily to discuss things they might want to buy. In contrast, Pinterest users are more often in a shopping mindset when they are using the service. If you're keeping a pinboard called "Spring handbags I'm considering," there's a good chance you'll click through and make a purchase.

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Many Magazines Racing to Capitalize on Pinterest

Pinterest, the social site that lets users post images from the web to their personal "pinboards," has been around since 2010. But brands and publishers' notice of it has been increasing, partly because every image "pinned" links back to its source, offering new traffic to anyone who can capitalize.

Pinterest is now being hailed as one of the fastest-growing platforms, reaching 10 million monthly visitors more quickly than Facebook or Twitter did. It ranks among the top 30 U.S. sites by total page views.

 Read more at AdAge

Seeing a Future in Tablets, Magazines Unveil the Digital Newsstand

After more than two years of preparation, a consortium of magazine publishers will release the full version of its digital newsstand, which gives readers the chance to purchase magazines for a monthly flat rate.

Next Issue Media, a group of publishers including Condé Nast, Hearst, Meredith, Time Inc. and News Corporation, will announce the latest version of its tablet application, which will include 32 magazines like The New Yorker, Time, Vanity Fair, Better Homes and Gardens, Elle, Esquire, Wired, Fortune, People, Real Simple and Sports Illustrated.

The group has good reason to want to put its digital editions on tablets and make them available to readers. According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, digital circulation of magazines — on tablets, paid Web sites and mobile phones — has doubled in the past year. A total of 223 magazines reported more than 3.1 million digital copies of their publications in the second half of 2011, compared with 195 magazines that reported 1.5 million copies in 2010.

Read more at the NY Times