Jim Shumaker.

Chuck Stone.

Raleigh Mann.

Now, to this list of lions I will add the name of a truly legendary University of Georgia journalism professor.  This man not only reaffirmed my commitment to the calling to teach, but served as a model for what I should strive to become both in and out of the classroom.

Conrad Fink.

Fink, the former foreign correspondent and newspaper executive turned J-school icon, died Saturday after a courageous 20-year battle with prostate cancer.

As I and the rest of the Grady College family mourn the loss of Professor Fink, I am proud to count myself among the legions of Finkites or Finksters whose career was touched by a man whose stature and reputation (like his signature bushy eyebrows) seemed larger than life.

Fink was a mentor, a colleague and a friend.  Fink was and in many ways still is the heart and soul of Grady College.

One of the last occassions I saw Professor Fink,  in his office about a month ago, he was reflective of his life’s work.  He said that he felt fortunate to have had not one, but two, long, successful meaningful careers.  

Fink was the consummate journalist.  I’ve never met a man or woman who loved or cared for the newspaper industry and journalism profession as much or as deeply as Fink did.

 But teaching was Fink’s true calling and where he left his greatest mark.

Look at what Fink wrote in his teaching statement, included in the application material for one of the University system’s highest teaching honors:

For although as a journalist I touched thousands–millions, perhaps, on big stories I covered–my touch was fleeting, the impressions I left soon were washed over by bigger stories that always came rolling along.

In teaching, I found, my touch could be formative, truly meaningful, truly lasting. And isn’t that–learning and leaving footprints–what a creative, rewarding life should be all about?

Fink definitely lived a creative, rewarding life and left behind meaningful footprints. Fink’s impact has been seen by the “rascals” and “pals” he left behind.  There have been many blog posts, newspaper articles, columns, tweets and Facebook rememberances written and shared by Fink’s students, colleagues and friends.

Fink’s reach was far.  Fink affectionately called his students “rascals.”  In this oral history project interview (around the 31:17-33 minute mark on the audio file available by clicking “listen to the full interview” link above the embedded video– I’d recommend the listen, Fink’s warmth and humor comes across in this clip), Fink tells the students, “I’m on a mission to convert rascals to journalists.”

Mission accomplished, pal.

One of the biggest backlashes/criticisms/questions my colleague Jameson Hayes and I get about our “Modified News Micropayment Model” (MNMM) and our “Modified Media Micropayment Model” (4M) is about cheating.  In other words, what is to stop people from stealing the content that others must pay for?  Our answer is that microearning is designed to prevent that, but we’re pleased to know that even without microearning, Louis C.K. reports that few people have stolen the video.  Louis C.K. was on Leno (in the video embedded below) talking about his successful micropayment experiment and the lack of people stealing the video (starts around the 2 minute mark).

And if you like Louis C.K. and need a last minute gift idea, I’d recommend the $5 video direct from the comedian.

Enjoy, and Happy Holidays! 

http://www.hulu.com/embed/nbd_NTqv5f9NgwRX-SzwVg

As companies tied to “old ways” of doing business seek to transform their business for the digital age, the brand remains an integral component to making a successful switch.  Classic marketing and management concepts such as brand positioning and brand messaging are important strategies to employ as change agents.

Now, back to the van and how it fits in.  The yellow van I spotted was for “YP.com” and touted the features of search on its powerful local directory.  The back of the van featured a generic smartphone image and a generic computer image and touted the benefits of these new digital products.

Of course, YP.com is the latest branding for YellowPages, long known for its big, bulky telephone book directories.  The very name YellowPages conjures images of its print origins.  The old logo I recall from my childhood consisted of fingertips flipping through those signature yellow pages.  This is a company and a business model clearly disrupted by the Internet.

And thus, to survive, to remain a sustainable operation, YellowPages has adapted.  The new brand identity, YP.com, conjures an entirely different image.  For starters, the digital identity- the .com, is now in the name.  Secondly, the references to the print identity (pages) is removed from the new branding effort.

And the brand messaging?  All about digital products.  You, the consumer, can access the YP.com local search directory online (cue generic computer) or on your phone (cue generic phone logo) through an app.  Those print pages from the big old phone books?  Nowhere in sight.  The name Yellow Pages?  Not on this van.

This is  a simple example of a case study on brand messaging and digital transformation.  A real world application of a “textbook” approach.  Spotted on a van while stuck in holiday traffic.

As this video shows, digital natives are born with a “digital first” mindset.  They simply do not have the same affinity for print that previous generations may have had.  One of the early mistakes newspaper executives made with the Internet was to try to recreate the print product online, failing to ignore and capitalize on the advantages afforded by an interactive medium.  Almost a decade ago, when he was a Harvard Business professor, Clark Gilbert (he now runs Deseret Media), conducted a multi-case study of 8 different newspapers.  The vast majority of the newspaper’s online content (75-95%) was a recreation of the print product at all but one of the newspapers.

Newspapers have certainly come a long way since Gilbert’s 2002 study.  Now, wireless mobile distribution affords newspapers another opportunity to tackle digital disruption head on. Tablet devices like the iPad and smartphones like the iPhone and Droid devices afford newspapers the opportunity to create new digital products for digital consumers like this baby below.

-Ken Doctor, newsonomics blog post

Newspaper executives and industry observers are starting to pay attention to two significant developments that are altering their business: disruption and the continued emergence of wireless mobile devices (specifically smartphones and tablet devices).

In a blog post on “the newsonomics of disruption,”  digital news analyst Ken Doctor writes about tablet disruption of tablet, tablet disruption of laptops, tablet disruption of smartphones and most importantly, local news disruption and tablet news disruption.

“Digital disruption is now increasing,” according to Doctor. “Audiences are even more up for grabs than they were a couple of years ago. Advertising and sponsorship dollars, pounds and euros, are also being more greatly swayed by these disruptive winds than they were in 2009.”

In an article first published in Editor & Publisher and republished on his Reflections of a Newsosaur blog, Alan Mutter writes that “publishers have not failed to embrace disruptive experimentation because they are not smart enough to do so. The video embedded below (note: also embedded on this blog) is proof that the folks at Knight Ridder in 1994 had a pretty good idea of what the future might hold. But the newspaper business historically was so successful that publishers didn’t need, or want, to change much about it. Consequently, risk-taking and experimentation took a back seat to business as usual. “

“With print circulation and advertising revenues falling to ever-lower lows for each of the last five years, newspapers now must find new ways to cost-effectively create content; build new web, mobile and social audiences, and monetize their traffic as profitably as Facebook and Google do,” Mutter continues. “To do that, they will have to bring the creative chaos of Silicon Valley into every corner of their businesses. This means launching multiple, carefully planned initiatives across the full array of print and digital media.”

These newspaper disruptions brought on by wireless mobile devices is precisely what I’m looking at for my dissertation.  I’m interested not only in the disruption to newspaper business models, but what publishers are doing about it.  A good headline for an article about my work would be “Wireless devices disrupt newspaper business models, publishers respond.”

Here’s a brief summary of my ongoing dissertation research:

Firms are now operating in hypercompetitive, emergent, dynamic, unstable, highly volatile environments in which a sustained competitive advantage may no longer be possible.  Disruptive innovation (disruption) may alter not only business models, but the strategic processes used to address the disruption.

Disruptive innovation can either disrupt or sustain a firm or industry either through business model innovations or radical product innovations.  There is not one clear definition for business models, but revenue streams and consumer values are vital to most business-model concepts.  Circulation revenue and advertising in print have long made up the traditional newspaper business model now being disrupted by the Internet and mobile devices. Whereas the Internet served as the first wave of disruption to newspaper business models, wireless mobile devices represent a second wave of disruption.

Newspapers are now experimenting with emerging models for online and mobile content, but have a history of failing to act on risk-taking experimentation that brings about change even though companies like Knight Ridder designed a futuristic tablet nearly two decades ago that closely resembles today’s iPad, and other newspaper companies commissioned a group to address disruption.  Wireless mobile devices have emerged as a critical news delivery platform and offer potential to newspapers at the same time as they continue to disrupt existing newspaper business models.

The highly uncertain “emergent” disrupted environment, characterized by evolving business models, unclear industry boundaries, new competitors and consumer preferences that are not well known, can have a dramatic impact on the managerial process of newspaper managers.  Newspaper managers’ decision speed, participation, comprehensiveness, and perceptions of the environment can affect the business model implemented to address business model innovation in order to gain a competitive advantage.  My dissertation explores these internal strategy processes newspaper executives are using to develop strategies and tactics to address mobile disruption.

More than two-thirds of surveyed respondents told pollsters that if their hometown newspaper disappeared, it would not seriously hurt their ability to keep up with the news.  This finding is telling because it demonstrates that first and foremost newspapers have done a poor job of  illustrating the value of their reporting.  As a paid content advocate, I would argue that a decade+ of giving content away for free online has brought newspapers to this point.  To say that putting news content online for free has tremendously devalued that content would be an understatement.  Readers have been conditioned to believe that newspapers’ best content is not worth paying for.   Is worth nothing. Nada. Zip. Zlich. Zero.

“The assumption seems to be that this information is a commodity, that it’s free and it’s omnipresent,” Tom Rosenstiel, principal author of the Project for Excellence in Journalism report told The Los Angeles Times. “That may not be true, particularly with this civic information that newspapers are primary in producing. It’s quite possible, if the newspaper disappeared, that the information would disappear along with it.”

Rosenstiel links what should be contradictory concepts in one sentence.  Even in the most simplest of terms, a commodity is a thing of value.  In economic terms, consumers pay a price for what they value.  A free commodity is an oxymoron.  And yet by failing to charge for online content, newspapers have been peddling a free commodity for years.

The Pew study should serve as the latest warning siren to beleaguered newspaper executives.  As the Los Angeles Times’ James Rainey writes “newspapers could do a lot more to tell their unique stories to the public.”  True.  But they also need to send a message that their content is highly valuable.  That it truly is a commodity.  That the content is worth paying for.  Charging for online content restores the value proposition that has been obliterated by FREE content.

Watch the last 30 seconds of this humorous but biting commentary on student journalists today (you can start around the 2:35 mark).  The fact is that not even journalism students are instinctively willing to pay for news content because of the free online alternatives.

If newspapers value their content so little that they don’t even ask the reader to pay for it, that they aren’t even willing to put any price tag on the toils of their labor, why should we expect the audience to find value in that work?  Thus, newspapers are faced with an audience who cares so little for their product that they feel they would not be phased without them. Newspapers need to show the public otherwise.  But first newspapers need to value their own product before they expect others to do the same.

This is precisely what Jameson Hayes and I had in mind 2 years ago when we began drafting our “Modified Media Micropayment Model” (we wrote “the social aspect of payment for web content is also vital. In many ways, web users are already dependent upon this socialization aspect as a referent of content we’re willing to click through. As media products are experience goods, opinions of others are often tapped to alleviate  uncertainty prior to consumption. … the modified micropayment system harnesses trusted sources from social networking sites to help consumers determine whether a media good is worth purchasing. This converts online social networks into value creating distribution networks beneficial to all parties.” p. 34 – “Synergizing Traditional Media and The Social Web for Monetization: A Modified Media Micropayment Model, Journal of Media Business Studies, 8(2),)

Gary says this more emphatically than I ever could.  Check out this excellent video below:

Given my sports journalism background, I was delighted to hear Bob Rathbun speak on the University of Georgia campus last week.  Rathbun, the “Voice of the Atlanta Hawks,”  got his start in journalism in a North Carolina town as a young child. Just as I did.  Rathbun, who also covers college basketball (including calling games of my beloved Tar Heels) for a regional sports network, offered an inspiring, enthusiastic and encouraging message to members of the UGA chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists (which is currently run by one of my former students).  Rathbun encouraged students to seek out opportunities to gain experience and to work their way up the ranks, as he did.

Another encouraging sign is the rise in scholarship dedicated to sports journalism.  Universities are starting to launch new programs aimed at studying sports.  The University of Maryland just launched the Shirley Povich Center for Sports Journalism.  My college has also launched a new sports journalism initiative, which Conrad Fink tells you about in the video embedded below.  As part of the new sports journalism program, we are also hiring a tenure-track sports journalism professor (in addition to the endowed chair position).  I am serving on the search committee for that position (I will post a link once the position is formally advertised).

In many ways, my interests in sports journalism and my interests in media management and economics are blending as television contracts and “big money sports” are driving conference expansion plans.  Anyone who loves sports and high quality journalism should read this exceptional piece in The Atlantic.  With economics and management decisions impacting college athletics, with scandals galore filling the front pages of  daily newspapers and banner headlines in cyberspace, academic programs dedicated to sports journalism are more valuable than ever.