A tale of two very different journalism start-ups

One journalism start-up tries to restore things to the way they were. The other is looking to a different future. Bill Grueskin, academic dean at Columbia University’s Journalism School and a former managing editor of WSJ.Com, compares them in this guest post.By Bill GrueskinYou can learn a lot about where journalism is headed by looking under the hoods of two new startups.The companies –

Diving circulation? Raise newspaper prices

Instead of fretting about the all-time record dive in newspaper circulation the last six months, publishers should focus as never before on the quality, not the quantity, of their audience.That means, among other things, proving the passion and loyalty of their readers by raising the single-copy and home-delivery prices of their daily papers to at least the cost of a venti, double-shot, half-caf

Microsoft is adding a "Windows XP Mode" to Windows 7

Now Windows 7 gets built in XP mode..
Microsoft is adding a "Windows XP Mode" to Windows 7, in a move to encourage users to make the switch to the software vendor's forthcoming operating system.

The firm has built its XP mode into Windows 7 by using the Windows Virtual PC technology Microsoft acquired in 2003, to make the OS compatible to run apps designed for Vista's predecessor.
Redmond was keen to emphasise in a blog post late on Friday that it's hoping to woo small businesses to move to Windows 7 by bigging up the XP mode feature.

"Windows XP Mode is specifically designed to help small businesses move to Windows 7," said Microsoft. "Windows XP Mode provides you with the flexibility to run many older productivity applications on a Windows 7 based PC."

Users can install apps directly into the virtualised XP environment. The applications are then published to the Windows 7 desktop and they can be run from within that OS.

Microsoft said it will release a beta of Windows XP mode and Windows Virtual PC for Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate "soon" but wasn't more specific about when the test builds will land.

When Microsoft released Vista over two years ago, many businesses and individuals complained about compatibility snafus with applications that simply wouldn't work within the new OS

Content cops or Keystone Kops?

Beleaguered newspaper and magazine publishers may gain a certain amount of emotional satisfaction from mounting elaborate efforts to chase down online content poachers, but the payback may be more psychic than economic.While print publishers are well within their rights to crack down on web publishers who violate their copyrights through the unauthorized use of articles and visual media, the

Attributor test delivers so-so results

Attributor pretty much represents the state of the art these days in tracking down copyright violators. To see how well it works, I took a test drive of the free version it offers to bloggers. The results are fair to middling. Attributor works by gathering all the content on a publisher's website and then crawling the web to see if it finds sites that have picked up some or all of an article.

3 jailed journalists, 2 very different reactions

Three American female journalists are being held on charges of spying in two of the scariest countries in the world but their news organizations couldn’t be treating the matters any more differently.Everyone knows that Roxana Saberi, a contributor to National Public Radio in Iran who has been in custody since January, was convicted last week of spying after an evidently coerced confession. You

He makes $1 million crowdsourcing sources

Peter Shankman, who describes himself as a marathon-running, sky-diving, cat-loving PR guy, says he is grossing nearly $1 million a year by using the web to help reporters find sources for stories.He crowdsources sources with a nifty and thoroughly modern service called Help a Reporter Out, or HARO. It works like this:A reporter who needs to interview someone for a story sends Shankman a request,

Don’t blame Google for newspaper woes

Newspaper people are wasting time and wasting their breath in blaming Google for the failure of their products to thrive in the digital universe.They need to look to themselves – not Google, Yahoo or some other third-party savior – to begin strengthening their franchises and building up their businesses on the Internet.The airwaves have been clogged in the last couple of weeks with newspaper

Newspaper web sales lag by every measure

By every measure, online advertising sales at newspapers seriously trail the growth of the rest of the interactive market in the United States. And the industry is falling farther and farther behind.The inability of newspapers to capture and retain their fair share of digital advertising likely is one of the reasons that a growing number of publishers are thinking about charging for access to

Why Strib lets print scoop its website

Although most newspapers rush to publish their scoops on the web as rapidly as they can, the Minneapolis Star Tribune has decided to break certain major stories and projects in print and not publish them on its website until a few days have passed. Editor Nancy Barnes tells why she is doing this – and how it’s working – in this guest commentary.By Nancy BarnesI’ve gotten more response from

Publishers seek ad block on copyright abusers

Alarmed by what they believe to be widespread piracy of their copyrighted material on the web, some publishers want to force companies like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft to stop serving ads at sites carrying unauthorized newspaper content.The movement to target the pocketbooks of content poachers emerged this week at a private meeting of top industry executives that coincided with the annual

The last rant: Failing papers ‘bring me joy’

The more the problems of the media mount, the more that newspaper-bashing comments are flowing to this blog. As of today, the media bashers can save themselves the trouble, because I will reject them, one and all.Before I turn off the spigot, I want to share the mother of all anti-MSM rants to illustrate the virulent hostility that many feel toward the press. Journalists and publishers ought to

Berkeley sets media-tech leadership summit

A unique, invitation-only conference for senior leaders of technology and media companies will be convened at the Googleplex this the fall by the University of California at Berkeley.The UCBerkeley Media Technology Summit, which is being sponsored jointly by the Graduate School of Journalism and Haas School of Business, will be held from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1 at the Google campus in the heart of

Publishers zero in on charging for online news

The way to charge for digitally delivered content is a prime topic on the minds of the newspaper publishers meeting in San Diego this week to contemplate the future of their badly battered industry.Even if charging for online or mobile content is not publicly discussed at the annual meeting of the Newspaper Association of America, participants have confirmed that significant private talks on the

Boston Globe to shut down? Get a grip

The shocking banner headline today reporting the potential demise of the Boston Globe is greatly exaggerated.The story not only was vastly overplayed but also may serve to unnecessarily damage the newspaper’s already weakened business. The editors, who evidently let emotion overcome their news judgment, should have known better.While it is unfortunate that the continuing deterioration of the

Five things to do on your furlough

With furloughs becoming increasingly common in newsrooms, here are some thoughts on how to make the best of these potentially stressful situations.Get physical.Clean the closets. Paint the bathroom. Trim the rose bushes. Do something completely different from your normal routine that will clear your head and make your muscles ache. Do this first. It is the most important.Get fresh perspective.Now