Newcastle, Australia

The Herald, Newcastle’s main newspaper, has finally acknowledged the existence of Twitter. Today’s Herald has one story dedicated to Twitter and another mentioning it.

Sarcasm aside, this is actually relatively significant. Newcastle is often used as a test-market in Australia as it is seen to be an excellent microcosm of Australian society. They say that if products can sell here, they can sell anywhere in Australia.

Newcastle is also a pretty conservative town, slow to adopt new technology and innovations. If Australia is 3 years behind the US (as is often claimed) then Newcastle is usually 6 to 12 months behind Sydney. That’s not a criticsm, just a reality.

So when the local paper in Newcastle starts talking about Twitter as the “new must-have communications method” then you know Twitter is starting to make an impact in Australia.

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In a first for Newcastle and The Hunter Valley, The Post newspaper has launched an online version of their free weeklies.

The Post Digital Edition has just launched, providing readers and advertisers with additional opportunities. Each new edition launches 9am each Tuesday.

Advertisers now have the opportunity to link directly form their advertisement to their website, and have their advertisements be seen for much longer in the archived editions.

New online advertising packages will be available from April 2009.

The only negative is that the reader system is flash based and therefore not searchable. The Post are missing a massive opportunity to create a long tail of searchable information that would help them and their customers.

But overall, congratulations to The Post for taking a leap into the 21st Century and good luck with this new initiative.

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Australian Anthill magazine announced this week that it is reducing its print frequency and increasing its online presence to counter what they have identified as publishing’s “extinction level event”.

On launching the new WordPress based Anthill site, publisher and founder James Tuckerman was quoted on Mumbrella explaining:

“The next 12 months will be an extinction level event for many Australian publishers unless they adapt to this changing environment, and quickly. The future of business marketing is all about educating customers, rather than flogging them product.”

“We have begun the process of changing our focus from a business magazine with a solid website to a digital media company with a fuller, fatter publication.”

Here is at least one publisher who sees that the writing is on the wall for his industry and that they must adapt or die.

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Media trade publications are reporting consistently bad news for traditional media properties at the moment.

The current B&T highlights the drop in weekly magazine sales.

• New Weekly (NW) is down 16.4%

• New Idea, OK & Woman’s Day are all down around 12%

• Zoo Weekly down 8.1%

B&T is also running a story on the drop in men’s monthlies:

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Following on from our joint effort promoting The Moggy Awards, Kate and the team at Marketing Magazine have been kind enough to invite me to write for them this year. My first article was featured on their website this week and is a topic very close to my heart as the owner of an advertising agency:

What will agencies do when everyone can bypass advertising?

Please take the time to have a read and leave a comment if you like.

Thanks

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I fear I will sound as though I am taking kickbacks from Tim Burrowes, but I urge all readers to check out Mumbrella if they haven’t already.

Since leaving B&T and launching his new site, Tim has really taken the lead in Australian media and marketing news online. Every day there is breaking news, insightful opinion and robust debate. Best of all, Tim is not afraid to say what he thinks.

Recent controversies such as the Qld Tourism campaign and Naked’s viral coat have received great coverage and debate.

Mumbrella’s content covers all traditional media, digital and online, ad campaigns, awards conferences and more. It doesn’t just refer to the usual suspects of Aussie media and marketing and allows everyone to participate. Its a wonderful example of journalism converging with new media.

Add Mumbrella to your RSS feeds today.

(Tim, I will send account details for those kickbacks)

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I have been maintaining for a while now that we are at a turning point in media and marketing history. The

originally uploaded by danmanley

rise on web-based media has accelerated in recent years while traditional media has begun to show serious signs of erosion. One of the most serious economic downturns in modern history seems to be contributing to the traditional media model woes whilst we simultaneously witness the rise and rise of micro-media.

A flood of recent news items now appears to be pointing to the fact that print media will be the first to fall, or at least suffer near-fatal wounds.

In the US a string of print publications have ceased to exist or ceased to print in the last few months. AdAge.com asked:

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I have never been a participant in the traditional versus new media debate, resisting the rabid us or them sentiment sometimes present in the blogosphere (and amongst some journalists at media events). As an obsessive reader of newspapers, I have maintained that there is room for traditional press in a digital world.

However the recent actions of Fairfax management many be playing into the hands of new media advocates. The wholesale cutback of editorial staff at Fairfax have been described by ex-editor Michael Gawenda as “chilling”.

Mr Gawenda was editor of the Fairfax-owned The Age broadsheet for seven years from 1997. In his last few years, he said, the internet loomed as a threat but “Fairfax lost its classified monopoly and it failed to come up with a business model that took advantage of its long-time grip on classifieds”.

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Today’s Sydney Morning Herald contains a remarkable story by respected journalist Paul Sheehan highlighting the battle traditional media faces to remain relevant in the Internet age.

Titled Floundering in a sea of change and using the Sarah Palin (US Republican Vice Presidential hopeful) story as an example, Sheehan notes how he immediately referred to YouTube for news on the nominee rather than traditional media sources. He points out that by the time he started researching Palin, 6 hours after the announcement, the Internet was in it’s fourth phase of the news cycle.

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Source: Geoff Elliott, Washington correspondent, The Australian

It was in Knoxville, Tennessee where I was put in my place as a foreign correspondent covering a US election.

Democrat Harold Ford, a young, up-and-coming leader in the mould of Barack Obama, was running for a US senate seat andhe refused to answer any questions.

"We’re not talking to you, you don’t win us any votes," his spokeswoman helpfully informed me.

Never mind that Ford had just said in a speech that Australia wanted to pursue nuclear weapons (still waiting for a clarification on that Harold) but I’m not at all convinced his spokeswoman’s premise holds, at least if it is also framed in the negative.

Ford lost the election. He lost for many reasons (the Republican attack machine that created a racially coded advertisement was disgraceful) but on substance there’s a chance Ford’s gaffe as I reported could have cost him a couple of votes.

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