Citilista

“You don’t need to work at the L.A. Times anymore to be a significant journalist in L.A.” said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, at a Sept. 2 presentation at USC Annenberg.

Instead of celebrating the ability to interact with the people most affected by the day’s events, instead of using them as a resource of information and correction, he laments this paradigm shift as journalists have lost their status as the gatekeepers.

“We may have a gate here, but the fence is torn down on both sides,” he said.

Amen.

Rosentiel is searching for a way to save newspapers, but frequently referred to newspapers as Journalism. Journalism will continue in any scenario

“Journalism’s challenge is not fundamentally an audience problem,” Rosenstiel said. “It is a revenue problem.”

Actually it is an audience problems as their print product continues to have fewer subscribers and readers go online for news.

“Audiences are migrating online,” he said. “The way we read a newspaper or watch a broadcast is dramatically different from the way we interface with information online.”

He describes the new paradigm: “Online we are hunter-gatherers, not having a relationship with just one news organization. And while a search ad may be complementary to this type of online activity, pop-up and banner advertisements present an intrusion for audiences seeking information.”

That’s why the new advertiser will not push content on to a customer, but offer a product the customer is already looking for.

The new business person will not market to a general audience such as newspaper subscribers, but participate in and support a community that is filled with people likely to want or need their service.

All these strategies – targeting the right customer, actively joining a discussion with likely users, creating brand loyalty through dialogue and common interests – are available through online communities such as Citilista.

Lastly he claims the Internet is not the democratic dream we’d hoped for, citing Google’s power of search.

At Citilista we don’t see Google’s search algorithm as an impediment but as a challenge to make readers happy. Yo make them happy helping them find the information they are looking for. That will increase your rank and put you on the first page when someone searches key terms.

Google search works on the the citation principle – that the more useful a website is the more people will link to it. It also takes into account the time people spend on the site once they get there.

For 500 years, those who could afford a printing press had access to influence and power.

Pulitzer, Hearst, Chandler and others bought newspapers to influence local and national politics while choosing all the news that was fit to print and charging readers to see the information. Newspapers in general don’t want a conversation with readers and they definitely don’t want reader content or their input. They are the editors and the gatekeepers of “news.”

Citilista uses a different model because now every citizen has access to a printing press in the form of the internet. Newspapers and TV are no longer the gatekeepers of the news, there to feed us what they choose.

Citilista uses crowdsourced stories to build a community newspaper that serves the local community.

There are millions of people who care enough about a topic to write about it for free in the form of a blog. Some began as experts on the topic or learned more than most through their diligence.

Many of these selfless fonts of knowledge put their knowledge on the web for anybody to find. But when there are millions of blogs, how does your niche audience find you?

Citilista compiles these niche topics in one website centered around a geographic location. Then Citilista finds the audience that is already out there. Citilista nurture an online community using old-fashioned, grass roots outreach, industry-leading public relations and state-of-the-art search engine optimization.

Citilista is a reminiscent of the community newspapers that used to serve every neighborhood.

The difference is that in this digital age that disposable product turns into a permanent, searchable online collection of every trivial tidbit that makes your town special.

While the main audience are the locals who provide much of the content, the website is available for perusal for anybody, whether they are looking for a hardware store and a place to visit while they are in Los Angeles.

Newspapers are forming a national union of sorts to force readers to pay to read the news.

“Journalism Online said its technology would give publishers flexibility in how they charge for digital content, including collecting monthly subscriptions or micro-payments for individual articles. Its estimates that a website that attracts 1 million monthly visitors could reap additional annual revenue of $5 million to $10 million.

The LA Times story fails to say how that money is to be made. But simple math says that each reader would pay an average of $5 to $10 for their news online.

Will web surfers find the product being that valuable? Why won’t people just watch the news for free on TV? What if one newspaper chooses to go for readers by not charging?

While there are many implications, the bottom line emphasis means local coverage will suffer more than it already has as that audience is not big enough to warrant going after subscribers.

Journalism Online is a startup created by Steve Brill, creator of CourtTV, and Gordon Crovitz, former publisher of The Wall Street Journal. They claim agreements with 506 newspapers, magazines and online news sites that reach more than 90 million monthly visitors – but they don’t say who the clients are.

They likely are not the Tribune Co. (LA and Chicago), Gannett (USA Today), NY Times or the Wall Street Journal. Those who do not charge for the news will be the big winners if this idea actually takes shape.

Newspapers tried this model with classified advertising. But Craigslist provided a better, national service for free. And it only takes one giving it away for free to ruin a business model in the online world.