Monday, March 28, 2005

Publishers' policies on blogs

I've been impressed with how some mainstream newspapers are embracing the participatory journalism movement. The Greensboro News & Record, for example, is generating considerable attention from other mainstream media outlets for its use of blogs and its embrace of transparency. But I have yet to come across a B2B publisher with a similar level of interest in how online journalism is evolving.
Much of the foot-dragging is based in fear, it seems. When I mention blogs to many B2B journalists, I tend to run into a lot of paranoid pontificating about amateurs pontificating in pajamas. I've said it before ... and I suspect I'll say it again ... trade publishers have to look again at the community journalism movement. Those people in pajamas are not your competition, they are your audience. They are not your enemy. They are the key to all your opportunities.
The pajama people are also often your coworkers.
And one specialty publisher has created a set of rules on employee blogging that may prove a workable template for any B2B publisher. The rules are evolving, according to Rexblog, because the company is listening to feedback from bloggers! Check out the most recent version of the rules here.

2 comments:

  1. I know you hate Variety. But u gotta give them credit. Their editorial department does reporters' blogs too.

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  2. You're right. I do hate Variety. And I do have to give them credit. Variety does publish a series of reporter-written blogs, and they are used in a way that other B2B publishers would be wise to emulate. Variety's blogs cover micro sections of the entertainment industry (comic books, gaming, etc.) that don't warrant full coverage in the main Variety site. Most importantly, the Variety blogs are "actual" blogs, i.e., they link to outside content. However, I haven't come across any links to content from Variety's main competitor -- Hollywood Reporter. Maybe they have linked to HR, but I haven't seen it yet. And as long as I'm talking about B2B publisher-approved blogs, I should again mention my friend Rafat Ali's work for Billboard:
    http://paulconley.blogspot.com/2005/03/billboard-blogs-and-ipods.html

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