Ways Newspapers Innovate
Currently newspapers mainly seem to be taking one of three approaches to innovation.
1. Internal R&D. The paper invests heavily in building up internal IT resources to both compete and integrate with companies, which are cannibalizing revenue streams. This is sort of the NYT approach and a recent example is their launch of The Scoop, a location based mobile app, which integrates with Foursquare.
2. Partnering. The paper develops deeper partnerships with key players. This can be said to be the CNN approach and an example is their collaboration with Facebook, for example around the Obama inauguration.
3. Opening up/platform. Currently I only know of one company that has done something radical in this area and that is The Guardian. Their Open Platform gives developers access to all content and data and should lead to both interesting new applications and insights. Interestingly hacks and apps can also be added back on to the Guardian site.
Quick Summary and Norway
Although I don’t think any one of these approaches alone will sort things out for the papers, I’m particularly fond of Guardian’s approach. Turning a paper in to a platform can be incredibly powerful and create lots of value both for the paper and third-parties.
I’ve been poking around a bit lately to see what major Norwegian papers are doing. It seems most of them to some extent are focusing on internal R&D. But, I’m suspicious many of them are waiting things out and try to be early followers, which might make sense resources and market taken into consideration.
Strenghts and Weaknesses
Some strenghts and weaknesses related to each approach.
Also posted on the Mitte blog (NO).
