tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-87928149245656091382024-11-03T14:59:05.687-05:00Economics of MediaDiscussions of economic forces that shape mass media in the information age.Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.comBlogger56125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-88618753631069254892020-07-03T17:30:00.014-04:002020-07-04T15:03:58.924-04:00Information industry jobs changes are mixed as economy re-opens from Covid-19Three of the six information industries gained jobs in June and job losses slowed in the other three industries, according to preliminary labor department statistics.Total employment in all six Information industries is still about 11 percent less than it was in February before stay home orders began. The six industries, which employed about 2.9 million people in February, had lost about 315,000 Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-68432548255220154712020-05-24T23:35:00.354-04:002020-06-11T16:08:35.597-04:00Employment changes in Information industries after Covid -19 shutdowns Post updated June 11, 2020More than 10 percent of all Information Industry jobs were lost by May, according to preliminary labor department statistics.There are six Information industries which employed about 2.8 million people in February before stay home orders began. Jobs were lost in all of the six industries.None of the Information industries gained jobs in May as some stay home orders were Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-50875022910088933542020-04-30T19:43:00.009-04:002020-05-25T02:09:03.618-04:00A note on minimizing common problems reporting trends in Covid-19 statisticsSome of the most widely-reported statistics about Covid-19 are based on daily updates of total "new" cases in the previous 24-hours. These updates are used to track increases and decreases in everything from the number of tests to the number of deaths from the pandemic.
But these daily totals can be misleading. The day that a case is first reported may not be the day the case actually occurred. Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-11376308024000187272020-03-07T02:53:00.002-05:002020-03-08T00:41:19.893-05:00Coronavirus is a test for local journalism, will it pass?
Information
and misinformation about the new Coronavirus has for weeks been easily available to
anyone with an Internet connection -- i.e. almost everyone in the United States. So news organizations that don't cover this story until the virus is detected in their community are failing an important test.
People want information because they are justifiably concerned about the Coronavirus. Many Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-43862767112604902012016-04-25T19:48:00.002-04:002016-04-26T11:40:24.666-04:00How to evaluate Gannett's offer to buy Tribune PublishingGannett
revealed today that it wants to buy the Tribune Publishing company for about $815
million. The offer is about 63% higher than the Tribune company's closing stock
price last Friday, April 22.
Stock prices for Gannett (blue) and Tribune Publishing (orange) suggest advantage Gannett now that its offer to buy the Tribune company is public. Prices April 2015-April 2016, from MSNHugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-71768558569476896202014-05-07T13:23:00.003-04:002014-05-07T16:18:57.276-04:00Glimpse of Tumblr is reminder new media business model isn't generating many jobsThere
is still a lot we don’t know about the new media business model, so even a
glimpse of the model’s inner workings can be valuable. A New York Times article about Tumblr offers such a glimpse, which
shows the company is unlikely to generate a significant number of media jobs.
There
is a great deal of fascination about companies like Tumblr, a popular blogging
platform that Yahoo Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-23206324973809626402014-04-19T00:01:00.000-04:002014-04-19T13:58:46.832-04:00Newspaper industry revenue declines have slowed, but revenue hasn’t stabilized
Click to open full size
Some
analysts argue declines in newspaper industry revenue are finally stabilizing.
The Newspaper Association of American has released the 2013 revenue
figures.
I’ve prepared two pictures to see if it revenues have stabilized.
As
readers of this blog know, the business model
for Internet-based news organizations is unlikely to replace the thousands of
journalism Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-21014596543469826102014-04-16T18:53:00.001-04:002014-04-16T22:07:54.825-04:00Twitter's purchase of data firm an example of a new kind of media competitionI’ve
been expecting Twitter
to assert more control over the enormous volume of data generated by its users
because the data can be sold to businesses, government agencies and academics. Yesterday,
Twitter took a notable step to assert that control when it announced the
purchase of Gnip,
a company that packages and sells data generated from more than 500 million
Tweets that are posted each day.
Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-35183593904652320212014-04-14T15:24:00.000-04:002014-04-14T21:24:00.848-04:00Pulitzer Prizes an occasion to consider relationship of newspaper quality to economic success
The
Pulitzer Prizes announced today offer a
chance to consider three studies of the links between journalistic
quality and economic success. The Pulitzers,
newspaper journalism’s most prestigious awards for excellence, go to a
small number of newspapers and websites each year.
Brian
Logan and Daniel Sutter found newspapers
that had won Pulitzer Prizes also had “significantly Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-89876037600274359252014-04-11T18:47:00.000-04:002014-04-11T18:47:56.809-04:00Cortez the Killer (Neil Young interpreted by Warren Haynes/Dave Matthews Band)
The power of virtuosi in live performance. Nothing to discuss, just a nice example of what the Internet is for.
Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-9758480417284187052014-04-11T18:17:00.001-04:002014-04-13T15:47:33.376-04:00Late night TV replacement hosts were selected to avoid declines in audience ratings
Creating
a network television schedule is similar to assembling a portfolio of financial
investments, according to a
useful paper by the late Barry R. Litman and Seema Shrikhande and Hoekyun
Ann. Like investors who try to balance financial returns from different
investments, network programmers try to balance the audience size for different
programs.
The goal
is to build an audienceHugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-83133992979209236452014-04-06T15:57:00.000-04:002014-04-07T11:11:21.837-04:00Coordination costs can make it difficult to create synergies at media firmsMedia firms have for years tried to
reduce their costs by centralizing the production and marketing of a variety of
content. But the cost of coordinating centralized activities can be
considerable, large enough in some cases to offset the savings that firms hope
to realize.
For example, firms that own multiple
newspapers have for decades tried to reduce costs by centralizing the
Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-78690763752677915982014-04-03T21:59:00.001-04:002015-09-05T20:40:26.834-04:00Shifting production to the Internet creates new problems that newspapers must solve
As newspapers shift from print to
the Internet, they are hoping to significantly reduce production costs. These
companies are trying to offset declines in advertising revenue by reducing the
amount they spend on printing presses, newsprint and delivery trucks.
But the benefits of this change are not guaranteed. Reducing offline production costs is
a complex problem to solve.
Most of the Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-42202830597329777372014-04-01T20:49:00.001-04:002014-04-08T10:08:03.645-04:00Some reasons digital media probably won't offset the decline in traditional journalism jobsThe
long-term decline in journalism jobs appears quite serious because Internet-based
firms don’t have a business model that can generate enough new jobs
to replace the jobs that are being lost.
The
Pew Research Center's Journalism Project recently weighed
in on this issue, providing new information about the number of
journalists employed at Internet firms. The data in the Pew report are Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-6545623892360937702014-03-27T15:45:00.001-04:002014-03-27T15:45:19.996-04:00A controversy at Bloomberg shows why subsidizing journalism is a bad idea
One
popular idea for financing journalism is to create a non-journalistic business that generates enough profits to effectively subsidize the production
of news stories. A controversy at the financial information company Bloomberg illustrates
some reasons that this is a bad idea.
Most
journalism firms produce news and information to attract an audience that
advertisers want to reach. Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-41801326536017123992013-01-01T19:21:00.000-05:002014-04-18T22:54:51.164-04:00Will the next 10 years bring more of the same for journalists and journalism jobs?So, where do things stand for journalists who hope to
earn a decent living for the foreseeable future?
Internet-based companies
have so far failed to create large numbers of journalism jobs. Newspapers, however, are still a leading employer of journalists
and other people involved in the production and distribution of advertising, news and other information.
For example, newspapers Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-59725091176792727772012-12-27T12:55:00.000-05:002012-12-27T17:13:25.039-05:00A note on how wages might be affected as computers do more and more journalism jobs
For readers interested in the larger implications of
automating jobs that journalists and many other office workers do, I recommend this
brief post by economist Paul Krugman.
It’s a bit technical, but if you work through it the point
he is making should be clear.
If we are at the beginning of a widespread change that results in more
and more jobs being done by networksHugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-42641437701502982922012-12-15T18:38:00.001-05:002015-09-05T15:30:43.478-04:00Why it makes economic sense for Google to build computer programs that do the jobs that journalists doA quick note. Google appears to be expanding its computer programs that do the work that journalists do.
These programs are called digital journalism tools, and the keywords here are digital and tool.
And once again, journalists and journalism organizations are helping Google take away their jobs.
Why do I suspect this - Google is offering journalists Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-14336342464655296592012-12-13T12:32:00.001-05:002012-12-13T22:31:53.458-05:00Newspapers will put themselves out of business if they take advice from commentators who are telling them to become “more like” new mediaSubheads in this post:
1. Each newspaper should charge its readers because prices are a critical economic signal that newspapers need to survive
2. Why new media companies have not reached the point when they can began charging for access to their products
3.New media companies have a business model designed to automate journalism jobs
I started this series of posts
because Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-8944945642575195062012-12-10T19:30:00.000-05:002012-12-13T00:53:48.586-05:00Why new media can’t replace all the news and information created by old mediaMy last post mentioned that new media companies would
collapse if they had to produce original news and other information. This point
is often lost in the debate about newspapers and other pre-internet media companies
charging for access to news and information.
Older media companies should and do use many of the
cost-saving tools and techniques developed by new media companies. But this is
notHugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-83709510551463075562012-12-07T10:56:00.001-05:002012-12-13T00:54:15.086-05:00Newspaper paywalls are a rational response to competition - what took so long?Sometimes it takes a long time, but in the end rationality will
have its say. This appears to be the
case for some prominent members of the newspaper industry, which has struggled
to adapt to competition from the internet.
The steady stream of reports that more and more newspaper companies
like the New York Times, Gannett, and E.W. Scripps are beginning to charge some
customers to access Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-15822396410951532262011-09-15T21:10:00.000-04:002015-09-05T20:32:55.243-04:00The economics of transitioning to digital media marketsThe transition from traditional media markets to digital markets was one of the dominant threads of discussion during last week’s conference.
Executives from traditional media firms who are trying to manage this transition disagreed on the best approach. This was not surprising given the complexity of the problems they face.
Here are three pictures that illustrate some of the Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-86049211792881172011-09-13T13:57:00.002-04:002011-09-13T14:28:42.628-04:00Does economics overlook the logic of communication?Eric Rothenbuhler of Ohio University wonders if economic logic falls a bit short when it comes to understanding what drives success for media companies. Rothenbuhler, whose research focuses on the nature of communication, writes in response to yesterday’s post:
Steve Wildman is right, of course, about the economic logic of servers versus channels and storage versus programming. But Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-44277304074751460722011-09-12T15:53:00.003-04:002011-09-12T21:52:13.556-04:00Abundance and scarcity in new and old mediaSpeakers at last week’s conference clarified what the exponential increase in production of digital media content means for different kinds of media firms.
Steve Wildman of Michigan State University explained the negligible cost of storing content on a digital server removes an important constraint on the production of media content. This very low cost allows companies Hugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8792814924565609138.post-91518436302255981882011-08-19T15:39:00.000-04:002011-08-19T15:39:11.908-04:00Creating the Future: Managing Media in the Digital AgeReaders of this blog are invited to a Sept. 7 conference at The Scripps College of Communication to discuss the challenges and opportunities for firms operating in fast-moving media markets.
Richard A. Boehne, president and chief executive officer of The E.W. Scripps Company, will be the keynote speaker for Creating the Future: Managing Media in the Digital Age. He will beHugh J. Martin (@HughJMartinPhD)http://www.blogger.com/profile/02938199277395124137noreply@blogger.com0