The Death Rattle For Non-Innovators: Asking 'Who Else Is Doing It?'

from the nobody-likes-being-first dept

Taking risks can be scary, because they can fail. But if no one takes risks, then it's pretty hard to innovate -- and that's the situation many newspapers find themselves in. Jay Rosen points us to Alan Mutter's musings on how so many innovative ideas for newspapers have been killed off by the simple phrase "who else is doing it?" Very few people want to be the first. That's why so many newspaper execs have talked about putting up paywalls, but few do (not that I think paywalls are innovative, but it does show why there's so much talk, and so little action). That's not the only thing, of course, but it does highlight that newspapers have been around for centuries without having to do much innovation at all. So, perhaps it's understandable (even if unfortunate) that they've been so slow to embrace the internet in a reasonable way.

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Old Media Always Afraid of New Media... Even Back in 1929

from the history-lesson dept

Petrea Mitchell reminds us that "old media" always ends up reacting poorly to "new media" no matter what we're talking about. As an example she points to this story about theaters (the kind that put on plays) fearing new-fangled radio broadcasters back in 1929:

Once upon a time, complimentary theatre tickets would come with a covering note like this: "Dear Sir, The Management of the ------ Theatre will be much obliged if you will very kindly co-operate with them in safeguarding the enclosed invitation from being used for the purpose of broadcasting a notice of the play from any station of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The invitation is intended to meet the convenience of legitimate journalism, exclusive of broadcasting." Dated 10 October 1929 and quoted in Ego: The Autobiography of James Agate (1935)

That's right. If you were a journalist who was given free tickets, you could report about it the newspaper, but heaven forbid you talk about it on the "radio." Why, that would just be bad.

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