Five media stories of note for Thursday, March 14, 2013:

Anette Novak, a media consultant blogging for the International Newsmedia Marketing Association, examines and argues for the involvement of legacy media in building community competence and awareness. She believes media can help their communities understand the three C's: critical thinking, consent and copyright. She says this would improve relationships and build credibility.

Casey Frechette, a journalism professor and digital strategist, has created a primer at Poynter.org for journalists who want to understand effective web design. She identifies techniques to achieve simple, effective expression: design grids, repetition of elements, white space, hierarchy, texture and depth, the use of colour to express meaning, and contrast. 

A new study from Pew Internet suggests one-quarter of teens mainly gain access to the Internet through their smartphones. One in four teens are "cell-mostly" users. Among many lower-income and lower-educated households, teens focused on their smartphones in the absence of computers. One in four teens owns a tablet, similar to the level among adults. Smartphone ownership has grown to 47 per cent, up from 23 per cent in 2011.

A British study suggests women Tweet more often than men, and are more likely to talk about personal matters, television and work, while men talk about sports, gaming and news. The Telegraph reports on the Brandwatch study of 1,000 Twitter accounts and concludes women (15 Tweets daily) and men (nine) not only discuss different things but use different language to do so.

John Pavlus, writing for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Review, looks at the very different tracks of two major media sites: The New York Times and the Daily Mail. The former is designed to encourage reading and the latter "doubles down" on anti-readability, he notes. But the Daily Mail just keeps on growing and striving for clicks, while the Times' strategy hasn't been proven effective just yet.


 
 
Some media stories of note for Tuesday, February 26, 2013:

Is there some science behind successful Tweeting? Seems so. Poynter's Jeff Sonderman writes about a Georgia Institute of Technology study that suggests negative Tweets are largely a turn-off in securing a larger audience. Given that Twitter is a weak-tie platform, the more negative Tweets tend to make unfamiliar people uncomfortable. Another conclusion: Feed those followers information, not your eating habits.

There are three different takes arguing the necessity of media change.

Kylie Davis, the national real estate editor for News Corp. in Australia, challenges print media to embrace content marketing or face its wrath -- the departure of advertisers who will become direct competitors. She writes for the International Newsmedia Marketing Association (INMA) blog that it can deliver a targeted audience, take time away from traditional media, and might even be better in some cases as storytellers. "Choosing to ignore it or claim it is not relevant will end only in shouts and tears."

Mark Challinor, the director of mobile for the Telegraph Group in London, says print will remain the cornerstone of his business. Challinor, writing for the INMA blog, suggests print will be integrated with mobile as a vehicle to cut through the clutter and deliver audiences to advertisers with rich content.

David Lieberman, the executive editor of Deadline New York, writes about an analyst's view that big media companies are taking the rise of mobile streaming far too lightly.  Laura Martin of Needham & Co. says a new wave of streaming tech companies are sneaking up on the traditional networks and outlets with short-term premium videos designed to attract younger viewers of tablets and smartphones.


 
 

The Daily Telegraph of London is one of Britain's most respected dailies, but when its telegraph.co.uk Web site suddenly gained 6.3 million unique visitors in two months and overtook The Guardian Unlimited in popularity, even its most ardent believers had to wonder.
Media need accurate audience measurement online to attract and capture fledgling digital advertising. The challenge is acute for conventional media looking for a healthy bridge to the digital sphere.
At the moment there are varying sources of measurement, some of them real-time and some of them poll-related that deliver delayed information. The two systems offer variances in audience totals, but each has certain attributes that help media explain their reach.
In Britain, though, the spurt has set off alarm bells and prompted the joint industry committee for Internet standards to review the matter.
Out of this should come a clearer and consistent form of measurement to make sure everyone is comparing apples to apples.

 

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