1 Did the XXI Century Even Happen?
“If a newspaper sits on its hands and pretends that somehow the 21st century didn’t happen, it’s going to fail. It’s just a matter of time” – Steve Yelvingtone, principal of strategies at Morris Digital Works makes a clear point (Saba, 2008).
The issue here is the fact that a simple online presence is not enough for newspapers and magazines which want to be successful in the XXI century. They need to adapt to the needs of their audiences and to the online environment. I touch upon this topic in the entry “Blast From the Past” and this article is meant to serve as a more detailed peek into what is it that editors and their programmers can actually do to be up-to-date with the current developments in the field of online news.
The selection of features discussed is rather brief, as I wanted to not only mention them but also describe in a bit more detail. Some of the tools mentioned in “Blast From the Past”, as comment options, sending own material to the editor, contacting the journalists, etc. will not be discussed here anymore. Instead, new ideas will be presented. I will discuss the option of creating collaborations between newspapers and other platforms (in this case the New York Times and Google), the importance of including share tools and having a decent archive, the possibility of enabling downloads directly from the newspaper/magazine’s website, and the yet-to-be-hyped XML tags.
Naturally, there are vast possibilities the news platforms can use in the online environment. This selection is meant to give a general overview of such options and to convince you that there is more to news online than simply putting online the same article which was used in the print version.
You are more than welcome to use the comment option and write about other ways in which news online can adapt to the online environment. The list below is definitely not exhaustive and a lot can be added to it, so be my guest!
