About the Winston-Salem Journal

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I've been meaning to write about the local newspaper for the last couple of months, but I'm just now getting to it.  Anyone who's read this blog over the last few years knows that in the past I've been somewhat critical of how the newspaper has approached competing the modern information era.  Well I'd like to take a moment to give them kudos for two recent changes:

  1. Unlike some folks I like their redesign to the smaller format. I find it easier to read and I like the new fonts and layout as well. It's purely a personal preference, but the redesign definitely works for me.
  2. I think combining the hard news into one section and focusing on local news in the front is a good move. National news is easily available from other sources (cable news, national news websites, etc.) and the one competitive advantage that the Journal has is in-depth local news and they need to emphasize that.

I also think the Journal is trying hard with their online efforts.  I'm a fan of some of their blogs, Dan Collins' in particular, and they're even trying some live online chats.  Unfortunately the live chat with Mayor Joines to discuss the Dell situation seemed to have attracted about four people judging by the number of people who submitted questions (I think there were two of us) and I don't sense that many of them get a lot of active engagement. 

What I'm hoping is that the paper will keep plugging away and somehow find gold in the online hills, and do it ASAP, because their print circulation is looking pretty dismal.  Numbers from the Audit Bureau of Circulation show the number of M-F subscribers for the six months that ended 9/30/2009 to be 67,169 and the number of Sunday subscribers to be 82,959.  As those print numbers continue to plummet so will the advertising revenue derived from them, and unless it's replaced with revenue from some other function I don't think the paper will be a viable business for many more years. 

Unfortunately I think the Journal gave up its greatest competitive advantage years ago when it started laying off reporters.  I'm not saying that the folks at the Journal did it light heartedly or without a great deal of consideration, but those very same reporters would be the people that could create the locally focused product unique to the Journal whether in print, online, or written in chalk on the road for that matter.  That content could then be packaged and sold, whether to advertisers or directly to consumers, and would hold what I consider to be the best opportunity for the Journal to survive or even thrive.  Unfortunately that horse is long out of the barn and it's a little late to shut the door.

My friends, the demise of the Journal would be bad for all of us because local newspapers have traditionally been the most effective watchdog of local government and without them we'll have a vacuum to fill.  Sure, we could have "citizen journalists" step in and do some of it, and local TV will do whatever it can in two minute chunks, but local newspapers offer a level of expertise that will be very difficult to replace in the short term and as we've seen recently here in Winston-Salem, even the best intentioned and most respected politicians need some looking after.

links for 2009-10-31

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  • Univ of Chicago Mag: Sumo wrestlers are big, but are they a Big Question?
    Freakonomics' Steven Levitt is an economist at the University of Chicago and the school's magazine asks if he's responsible for ruining economics. It's an interesting article in and of itself, but I got no small measure of pride when the one non-Chicago economist cited was from my alma mater (George Mason University). FYI, GMU's first Nobel Prize was for economics in 1986 and the winner was James Buchanan, Director, Center for Study of Public Choice. I can still remember the buzz on campus the day it was announced.
    (tags: economics)
  • Bloomberg: Wilbur Ross Sees ‘Huge’ Commercial Real Estate Crash
    From the story: “All of the components of real estate value are going in the wrong direction simultaneously,” said Ross, one of nine money managers participating in a government program to remove toxic assets from bank balance sheets. “Occupancy rates are going down. Rent rates are going down and the capitalization rate — the return that investors are demanding to buy a property — are going up.”

    h/t to Ed Cone for the link.

    (tags: economics commercialrealestate apartment)

links for 2009-10-30

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Everything Old is New Again

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I read this Gartner blog post about the government making its data more easily accessible with a little smile on my face because it caused me to have a little "Back to the Future Moment" moment.  More specifically I enjoyed this part:

A conversation with a federal client on Monday about this last aspect was illuminating. He observed that certain data may allow businesses to create services that they charge for and profit from. If successful, these services, irrespective of whether they are useful to the public, would put a significant demand on the government infrastructure. The question then would be how to strike a fair balance between providing data transparency and access to the public, and ensuring that taxpayer money is not being used to subsidize businesses.

I hate to tell them, but there's been a nice little sector of the publishing industry that's made a killing off of repackaging public data since well before the internet even existed.  They did it by compiling relevant data for readers that was easier to digest than the "off the shelf" data provided by the government and/or the information was delivered in a more timely manner.  To me this worry is a lot of noise about nothing; the government has to provide the public access to its data as part of its mandate and worrying about businesses being subsidized by this activity is, to me, nonsensical.  Companies won't be in business long if they simply regurgitate data, but they can build a nice business if they add a little value for consumers (insight, context, timeliness, etc.) and I think everyone benefits from that in the long run.

links for 2009-10-29

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links for 2009-10-28

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  • Sec. of Transportation Disagrees with Freakonomics Take on Car Seat Safety
    Quote from the Freakonomics blog post: "Reading the Secretary’s blog post, it strikes me just how differently he is reacting to a challenge than Arne Duncan (now the Secretary of Education) did when I first told him about my work on teacher cheating when Duncan was in charge of the Chicago Public Schools. I expected Duncan to do what LaHood did: dismiss the findings, circle the wagons, etc. But Duncan surprised me. He said that all he cared about was making sure the children were learning as much as possible, and teacher cheating was getting in the way of that. He invited me into a dialogue, and we ultimately made a difference."
    (tags: freakonomics statistics)

links for 2009-10-27

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  • NAA: No wave of distressed properties
    This is an interesting post from the National Apartment Association blog, particularly some of the reasoning behind the lack of deals in multi-family housing:

    "'There are going to be deals out there,' he said. But companies should not expect a large-scale clearance reminiscent of the U.S. government’s Resolution Trust Corporation that liquefied many non-performing assets in the late 1980s and early 1990s, he said. 'I don’t see that happening.'

    Part of the issue is that special servicers, which represent multiple lenders in commercial mortgage-backed security (CMBS) loans, have little incentive to sell properties at a discount right now, said Christy Freeland, who was recently named Chairman of Riverstone Residential Group, which manages 185,000 apartments across the country. 'Servicers can wait three or four years and see if the property’s value or NOI goes up,' she said."

    (tags: apartment multifamilyhousing realestate commercialrealestate commercialloans)

  • Godin: Some people are better than others

    Seth Godin's post about some people being better customers/prospects has this interesting tidbit:

    "Walmart and other mass marketers are now offering top bestsellers for $9 or less each, about $5 less than their cost. Why? Why not offer toasters or socks as a loss leader to get people in the store? I think the answer is pretty clear: people who buy hardcover books buy other stuff too. A hardcover book is a luxury item, it's new and it's buzzable. This sort of person is exactly who you want in your store."

    I think he makes an excellent point and it's something to remember as you consider premiums and giveaways for boosting sales: make sure they attract the right kind of customer.

    (tags: marketing business strategy)

  • The DVR vs Internet Video " blog maverick

    Mark Cuban argues that TV execs should be praising DVRs instead of trying to kill them.

    (tags: media technology video strategy internet business)

  • VDM: Capmark Bankruptcy Template

    Once again Fec provides a compendium of information about a pressing financial issue. This time it's commercial real estate. Here's my favorite quote-of-a-quote:

    "The problem for the industry is that between now and 2013, more than $2 trillion in commercial mortgages, which typically have a five- to 10-year term, will need to be refinanced, according to a July report by Richard Parkus, head of commercial mortgage-backed securities at Deutsche Bank AG. It is not turmoil in the capital markets that is causing the bottleneck, but rather the fact that properties are not worth enough to retire the old debt in a refinancing, Parkus said."

    As Scooby says: "Ruh, roh."

    (tags: realestate commercialrealestate economy)

  • Triangle Biz Journal: Despite turmoil, banks up deposits to $26B

    "Even with the credit slowdown and recession, the Triangle’s banking market grew by 10 percent in the dozen months ending June 30, according to new federal data."

    (tags: banks northcarolina northcarolinabanks)

  • Breakfast Saturday

    Depending on what time Erin's team has to be in Burlington for State Cup this Saturday we might be hitting this for breakfast.

    (tags: winston-salem food)

Claudville, VA Gets First ‘White Space Network’

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Tiny Claudville, VA (pop. 916) is just across the NC-VA state line about 15 miles northeast of Mt. Airy and it has the distinction of being the first place in the country to get a "white space network."  From the BusinessWire story:

For the first time in the U.S., unused TV broadcast channels freed up by the transition to digital TV are being used to wirelessly deliver high-speed Internet connectivity to business, education and community users. These unused frequencies are commonly referred to as TV white spaces. Under an experimental license granted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Spectrum Bridge designed and deployed a wireless TV white spaces network to distribute broadband Internet connectivity in Claudville, Virginia. To ensure that Claudville residents can make the most of this new high-speed connectivity, Dell, Microsoft and the TDF Foundation contributed state-of-the-art computer systems and software applications to the local school, as well as the town’s new computer center. As a result, Claudville residents have already begun to reap the benefits of joining the online community…

TV white spaces are vacant channels in the television band and are ideal for sending broadband signals across long distances and for penetrating walls, trees and other objects. These TV white spaces hold enormous potential for expanding broadband access, particularly in rural and other underserved areas…

To discover what white spaces channels are available in your area, the Web site ShowMyWhiteSpace.com offers a free search tool that lists all open white spaces channels at any address in the U.S. This site also contains white spaces news and information, as well as links to FCC documents and other valuable white spaces resources.

In My Day it Was NoDoz and Mountain Dew

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Back when I was in college exam week meant little sleep and lots of stress, which resulted in most of us turning to artificial aids to keep us going.  Some people went hard core (i.e. speed), but everyone I knew stuck to some sort of toxic brew of NoDoz and Mountain Dew or Jolt.  By the end of the week nerves were frayed and stomachs were fragile, but for the most part we made it through the week legally.

Kids these days have other options that, quite frankly, scare the bejeezus out of me.  From the Freakonomics blog:

Students apparently consume mass quantities of the performance-enhancing drug Adderall during exam time. Normally the price is $3 for 10 mg, but it rises during exam week to at least $5.

The blog post actually focuses on the fact that drug dealers speculated on Adderall in anticipation of the rise in prices and did so in such volume that they actually drove the price down.  I, on the other hand, am focused on the fact that kids would routinely turn to an OTC drug that's essentially this generation's version of speed and I worry that they don't understand the potential side effects.  From the Wikipedia page about Adderall:

Adderall has a high abuse potential. Due to the fact that Adderall has a powerful effect of increasing blood pressure, it carries the same risk of sudden death, stroke, and heart attack in patients with pre-existing heart conditions, as does methylphenidate and other stimulants used to treat ADHD, as well as the same risk of seizures in patients with a history of seizures.