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Integrating Legacy Technologies With Web Systems at Newspapers

Rajiv Pant — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 20:59:00 +0000

The topic of integrating print technology systems with web technology systems often comes up in the newspaper, magazine and book publishing industries.

There is a key difference between Content Companies (e.g. newspapers, magazines) and Other Companies (e.g. pharmaceuticals). With the World Wide Web and information technology (IT) becoming part of everyday life, every company is becoming a content company in certain ways.

In the case of other companies like pharmaceuticals, aeronautics, construction, etc. their pre-digital products are not going away nor changing as drastically as a result of the world wide web and IT as is happening in the case of content companies like newspapers and magazines.

For those other companies, it makes sense to integrate the web systems like content management with their core products because their other core products are not fading away as a result of the web and IT.

However, in print media companies like newspapers whose legacy has been printing systems, their product in its printed form is fading away as a direct result of the Web and IT. So for them it may make sense to not spend too much effort on integrating legacy print systems with Web systems. Instead, it may be a better strategy to spend more resources on enhancing and upgrading the Web systems and digital media products. So for newspapers today, the 1990s holy grail of having one seamless print+web content management system may be less relevant in 2007. It may actually make better business sense to to keep the print publishing system and Web CMS separate, focus more on Web and digital media and allow the printed on paper versions of their products to gradually retire over the next two decades.

Consistency in Labeling Ads as “advertisements” on Content Sites

Rajiv Pant — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 01:43:00 +0000

Some newspaper and magazine web sites visibly label some ads on their web pages as “advertisements” but don’t mark other ads including their own in-house ads on the same pages. Their intentions are journalistic: They want to visibly differentiate their editorial content from ads. (Though that doesn’t explain why they don’t label their own in-house ads.)

Sites should be consistent in visually differentiating journalistic content from advertising and other types of content. Either they should label all ads consistently or not label any.

In specific cases where the Editors believe advertising content may be confused as editorial content, they should label it as an “advertising section” like they do in print.

However, some sites choose not to label ads as “advertisements“. Their reasons:

Readers can differentiate an ad from editorial content in over 99%¹ cases of web pages.
Ads are not visibly labeled as ads in print publications, except in special cases when the Editors feel that ad may be confused as content.
Why stop at ads? Why not label everything on the web page that is not editorial content?

Presenting an entire advertising section as that does make sense. The same way the sports section is branded sports in both print and online, it is useful to brand an advertising section as such. It also does make sense to label ads that look like editorial content (in the Editor’s opinion), such as text ad links and ads in between content.

A related article on this subject at MediaPost.

This 99% is not based on a survey, but I believe the actual percentage would be even higher.

On content sites requiring user registration

Rajiv Pant — Fri, 17 Sep 2004 11:15:00 +0000

I wish I didn’t have to register at and maintain my profile for each web site that I use that requires me to log in. A shared (not necessarily centralized) registration/login system would be a big convenience and time-saver. The Liberty Alliance has been talking about one for a while, but don’t know when, if ever, it will materialize. Microsoft seems to be lowering the external marketing for Passport. I like Six Apart’s TypeKey, but wonder if they have enough backing and industry and public interest for it to last and remain free.

Some people worry about the privacy concerns of a shared registration system. I think it is safer to give your info to one shared system than to give it to dozens. What happens when I need to update my passwords (or anything else in my profile)? I’d rather do it in one place.

It does make sense for certain sites to ask for registeration: e-commerce sites, sites that provide utilities and services, and sites that charge for content. However, even for these sites, it would be nice if I could use a digital wallet — a common online digital identity, rather than manage my account on each site.

Also read the article by John C. Dvorak of PC Magazine on the topic of content sites requiring user registration before allowing readers access to content:

Thankfully, you don’t need to register to read his article :-)

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1646213,00.asp