Plowing through emails, tweets and RSS feeds last night, I found another great story of entrepreneurial journalism: Planet Princeton founder Krystal Knapp profiled by The News Frontier, an impressive and important project from the Columbia Journalism Review (and a good companion to Nieman Lab’s Encyclo). Knapp, who I had the pleasure of working with at [...]
I was invited to appear on the weekly podcast at Techflash.com last week and the timing couldn’t have been better. John Cook and Todd Bishop wanted me to discuss the hyperlocal news business and, it just so happened, I had a little news to break on the subject. My new employer, King 5 TV, was [...]
By Rick Martin As a part of the planning process for a local site I’m soon launching, I’ve been knocking around some ideas on Google Wave with some friends on how to set up some revenue streams for a website. Yes I know what you’re thinking– it’s going to be one of those ‘monetization’ posts. [...]
Yes, Virgina, there is a business model for journalism. For now, however, it’s called “local online.” Last week’s Interactive Local Media conference in Los Angeles featured two-and-a-half days of presentations and hallway conversations focused on connecting local businesses with local audiences while making money. “Monetizing the local opportunity” was the title of the conference, which [...]
The good news for local publishers? There is growing demand for local advertising. The bad news? An entire industry of companies you’ve never heard of (including some giants you have) are laser-focused on connecting local businesses with local consumers and most of them don’t care if a publisher is in the middle of that transaction. [...]
Several hundred people at a Hyatt in LA this week think so. And by “local online,” I’m referring specifically to the opportunity for marketing local businesses, not publishing local journalism. Although, as we’ve learned during the almost-completed decade, the latter will have trouble surviving without the former. I’m at the Interactive Local Media conference in [...]
(NOTE: I originally published this post on the Serra Blog.) Expect to see more of this in the coming months: indepdent local news and information sites banding together to form a local/regional advertising network. The Sacramento Press today announced the most recent version, called SLOAN for Sacramento Local Online Ad Network. It’s an ambitious effort, [...]
Local news, advertising and commerce took center stage at the MIT Enterprise Forum dinner last night in Bellevue. While it was one of many subjects discussed, local (and “hyperlocal” and “microlocal”) strategies and opportunities were given the most attention by the speakers at a dinner called “Breaking News: How will the pieces be put back [...]
Do a couple of self-proclaimed tech guys/news junkies stand a chance competing in a crowded online news media field? While it doesn’t seem plausible, the digital age has made it possible. And sometimes, that’s enough. In Portland, Ore., the landscape is already crowded with stalwarts Willamette Week and the Portland Tribune and upstarts Portland Sentinel [...]
Last Friday, John Cook published a Q&A on TechFlash.com where I discussed the state of hyperlocal (and my own transition from journalist to entrepreneur). The post elicited an email from a weekly newspaper publisher who asked many probing questions. In an attempt to open up the discussion on the current and future business opportunities of [...]
Mark Briggs 
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