Selling Rain in a Rainstorm
Mathew Ingram has a nice overview for Giga of the thoughts of Prof. Tim McGuire about the future of media companies. Much of this is old news, but it is nicely framed. The key question is how do content providers add value for users in an information soaked ecology? You don’t do it by demanding a fee for information (paywalls).
One might ask why do newspapers not wake up and start experimenting more? Instead, they appear tied to their traditional modes of content distribution, and stay print based. It is simple. As Mary Meeker points out, that is where they get the most advertising revenue. It won’t last forever, but for the time being, advertisers still pay more to appear in print media. For how much longer? Until one finds a way to make digital advertising more effective.