1. The emerging news landscape: Three lessons from the frontier Michele McLellan Knight Digital Media Center News Entrepreneur Boot Camp May 17, 2011

2. Photo: Andria Krewson, http://twt.tl/aocDfAi News ecosystem

3. “ Nothing will work, but everything might. Now is the time for experiments, lots and lots of experiments, each of which will seem as minor at launch as craigslist did, as Wikipedia did, as octavo volumes did.” -Clay Shirky -“Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable”

4. What hasn’t worked, what might? 1.User engagement 2.Revenue 3.How you spend your revenue

5. 1. User engagement Lesson: Volunteer journalism doesn’t scale Emerging: Participation in small bites ▫Make it easy (tech) ▫Go where people live (mobile) ▫Ask for small bits of participation (SeeClickFix) ▫Nurture community – loyalty vs. mass

8. Who produces content? Paid journalists – more 50 percent of the content published Volunteer journalists – Slightly more than 10 percent Mix of volunteers, paid non-journalists, student interns. User contributed is less than 3 percent

9. 2. Revenue Lesson: Grants are not a business model ▫Unreliable source of funding ▫National/local problem Emerging: Diversification  Multiple revenue streams  Earned revenue, even for nonprofits

10. What’s your mix? Nonprofit news site - $1 million in annual revenue

11. 3. How you spend your revenue Lesson: Good content is not nearly enough Emerging: ▫More emphasis on business development ▫Community loyalty key

12. Formula for failure?

13. 4. Bonus lesson (my opinion) Lesson: Forget about ‘success’ or ‘failure’ Emerging: Make steady progress  User engagement (content plus much more)  Business development  Revenue diversification

14. Questions? Thank you!