Businesses in the Internet

How to earn money in the landscape of new media?

As in every market, the business model need some time to get maturation. This is even a more determinant factor in the context of new media, where the constant evolution and the changes are the engine of progress. Internet embraces two main business challenges, the ones related to the enterprises that emerge after the apparation of the Net and inside this medium, and the entrance of old communications companies which try to diversify their services and adapt themselves to the new media environment.

In many aspects, not only in the economic one but also in the social and creative, and in all the sides concerning the ways of production (creation of contents), distribution and consumption, old models usually doesn't work, is the case, for instance of the newspapers that tried to make the users to subscribe to their websites as the only way of reading their news and articles. Internet brings a new paradigm, where the citizen participation is farther bigger than in previous media. Manifestos about this topic like Wikinomics (Trapscott and Williams, 2006) and We-Think (Leadbeater, 2007) talk about the importance of collectivism, creativity (added value in production in a crowded market) and participation like the keys of business in the Internet. Van Dijck explains the economical theories of these two books: "these mantras (collectivism, creativity and participation) not only inform the new business models of the digital economy, but their declared cultural roots suggest and ideological paradigm shift that is about to restructure postindustrial societies and post-service economies."

The main problem in the business of new media is the huge expectations about the possible profits on it; these expectations don't use to become true, so the investment of the producers become big monetary losses. During the first and second year of the current decade, many businesses, result of the merging of 'traditional' media companies with new media enterprises, failed. This phenomenon was called the popping of the dot-com bubble: in a few years the valuation of the stock market of these enterprises increased enormously, producing a great overvaluation; as a result the value of the shares was unbalanced.

One of the best exaples of the collapse of dot-com enterprises is represented by the telecommunications company, Time Warner, with businesses in television broadcasting, filmed entertainment and publishing, which after two years of merging with the Internet service enterprise, America online (AOL), in 2002 had to face the greatest economic losses in the history of the company.

The failure of the management in the businesses on the Net caused a radical change on the speech of many academics about the possibilities of a great social and economical shift due to the digital technologyes of communication. Henry Jenkins points out in his essay, Convergence Culture, that after the general disappointment caused by the dot-com crash and the first reaction of skepticism avout the possibilities of digital revolution is based on the cooperation and interaction of old and new media in more complex ways than was supposed to be at the beginning, that is simply the absorption and displacement of old media by new media. "The digital revolution paradigm claimed that new media was to change everything. After the dot-com crash, the tendency was to imagine that new media had chenged nothing. As with so many things about the current media environment, the truth lay somewhere in between".

Most of the current successful businesses have to do with the collectivity and the participation of users. This is for instance, the case of Youtube or social networks like Facebook, whose young creators are now multimillionaire. In many ocassions this websites don't have a particular business model, apart from the value that are used for millions of people, and even if they have advertisements (banners or any other kind of publicity) obtain the greater profits, when they are acquired by bigger groups. The aforementioned firm Youtube, was bought in 2006 by Google for 1.650 millions of dollars.

On the other hand, we are doomed to repeat past mistakes, and some sectors of the industry of new media still has to crash in order to improve the management. Some analysts have predicted the popping of the Tablet bubble for this year. Maybe Apple with the iPad will not be really who lose out, because it has a preminent position in this market. However, the fact that the supply will be propably much greater than the demand (almost the double according to the predictions) means that other companies like Motorola or RIM will have to face important losses.

As Pierre Lévy says referring to Collective Intelligence, "the more we are able to form intelligent communities, as open-minded, cognitive subjects capable of initiative, imagination and rapid response, the more we will be able to ensure our success in a highly competitive environment", and this is completely applicable to the new media. The possibilities of success are greater here than in old media, make a business is accessible to anyone who has an idea.

Henri Jenkins, Convergence Culture

Pierre Lévy, Collective Intelligence

VanDijck and Nieborg, Wikinomiks and its discontents: a critical analysis of Web 2.0 business manifestos.

What a wonderful Twitter-world

“just setting up my twttr”. This was the first ever tweet posted on Twitter by its co-founder, Jack Dorsey, on the 21^st of March 2004. It may seem insignificant, but actually, this was the start of an incredible adventure and ever-growing innovation that has now consequences way beyond the cyberspace.

picture: http://www.matthamm.com

Since last March 21^st, it has been five years that tweets have been published across the Web. No, I don’t mean the cute little chirping birds produce, but the short text messages people around the world display on their profile page. May it be about the weather, gossips, daily moods or inspirational quotes, human imagination has no limits in terms of sharing with the whole world what comes into our minds. This incredible exchange of ideas has now grown literally into a worldwide network used by a staggering 200 million users. Just to give you an idea of how big it is, Twitter published five interesting numbers for its 5^th anniversary:

1) Approximately 460 000 accounts have been created every day in February 2011.

2) One billion: this is now the number of tweets sent every week.

3) An average number of 140 millions of tweets are published in a day.

4) 6939 tweets in a second. This record has been reached in Japan only four seconds after midnight during 2011’s New Year. The last record was reached on 25^th of June 2009, the day Michael Jackson died (456 tweets every second).

5) Last year, the number of Twitter mobile users rose of 182%.

If you still doubt of the influence of this social networking and microblogging phenomenon, let’s just think about some recent events where Twitter turned out to be an important and effective communication tool.

2009, in Iran, even after being shut down by the government, Twitter found a way to keep the world informed about the violent protests bursting in the country. Twitter became so important for Iranian opposition supporters for disseminating information that it even delayed its scheduled downtime for site maintenance. It was also said that Twitter allowed the event to be much more noticed by international media, bringing them news that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to get.

More recently, after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Twitter was used by rescue organizations to post all sorts of information that the population may need (phone lines, shelters, train schedule…).

In Egypt this time, Twitter’s role has been recognized by President Obama who admired the Egyptian’s “creativity, talent and technology to call for a government that represented their hopes and not their fears”. Indeed, although 88% of the online networks were blocked in Egypt, Twitter was used by protesters to show their determination against President Hosni Mubarak.

All these examples, and much more, show us how important Twitter has grown in only five years. It is now clear that this tremendous technology has the virtue of connecting people all over the world, sometimes bringing them together around a good cause, waking up some feeling of humanity and citizenry. I think it’s a fact we can’t deny.

On the other side, as a journalism and communication student that I am, I must admit that Twitter has also its downsides, especially as far as journalism is concerned. For four years now, I have been taught that only multi-sources papers can be called “journalistic”: you have to multiply your sources and tie them in if you want your story to be as close to the reality as possible. I personally am a fervent defender of well-documented and impartial journalism, but, however, it seems that this basic rule tend to be hard to put in practice in the world we live in now. As far as journalism has existed, the “scoop” has always been a Holy Grail for media companies: you are the only one that publishes an important piece of information, more people than usual will then buy your newspaper, which will of course make bigger profits. It’s as simple as that and news organizations know it well, although they certainly won’t clearly admit it. Yet, we live in the 21^st century, the era of the Web, where everything has been accelerated: e-mails, video-conference, live chats, live broadcasting, 24-hour information channels… The flow of information is moving faster than ever before. In Twitter terms, this acceleration manifests itself by:

- the characters-limit (140 characters is just enough for the transcription of events and news right at the moment they happen)

- the fragmentation of the information (what matters on Twitter is not the website, nor the content, but the comments and the hyperlinks)

- the easy access (you can consult and post tweets not only directly on Twitter, from your computer or your mobile phone, but also from dozens of platforms, websites, widgets, applications… Just think about the Iran case and how easily Twitter could escape from the censorship…)

- the “hashtags” or keywords (what’s important is not the content, but the topic)

- the “RT” or copy-paste (I don’t think I have to explain this one…)

- the “reply” button (it accelerates the conversation)

- …

Being conscious of that, we can’t deny that Twitter largely fosters the idea of quick, short, however unverified, raw pieces of information, which, of course, blithely circulate among people… and journalists. Indeed, this acceleration is affecting journalists’ work in a way they unfortunately can’t struggle (you know, competitiveness, efficiency, profits… Journalism, whatever we say, is still a business). If journalists are in a hurry or lacking inspiration, they still have Twitter as an endless source of information of any sort. And this not-so-professional practice is quickly spreading among the news redactions around the world. The first example that comes to my mind is the one of CNN which used, during the Iranian elections, Twitter posts and attributed them to unnamed sources (http://gawker.com/#!5304469/twitter+addled-cnn-refers-to-tweets-as-a-source). Afterwards, CNN spokesman apologized and said it was a mistake, while recognizing CNN often does use Twitter sources. Another edifying demonstration of this journalistic “laziness” is the #journorequest hashtag. This keyword has especially been invented by and for journalists in order to facilitate their search of news on Twitter. All they have to do is to type their request into Twitter with the #journorequest hashtag and wait for somebody to answer them. Usually, they don’t have to wait long until public relations companies run up and “offer their help”. Let’s just have a look at the most recent #journorequests on Twitter:

- Looking for a female survivor of a terrorist attack from anywhere in world for publication

- I am looking ton interview a male between 25 - 55 who had cosmetic surgery and is pleased with the results

- Come on ladies, don't be shy! Need couples aged 35-55 to discuss sex lives for sensitive piece 4 weekly mag. FEE.

- Are you pregnant with first baby and had fertility treatment? Would you like to be in parenting mag? Please get in touch

- Looking for a woman in 20s who has been in rehab for drink, drugs or gambling

It’s easy to see: most of them are juicy, crispy, saucy requests and unfortunately reveal present media preoccupations.

Besides this new, and I hope marginal, use of Twitter, some journalists are also simply surfing around Twitter until they find a story interesting enough to publish. As I said earlier, by lack of time, they tend not to check out sources and stories. This unfortunately sometimes results in little mistakes that will most of the time remain unnoticed, but also in bigger errors and thus bigger, sometimes serious, consequences. For example, in 2009, at the MTV Video Music Awards, the rapper Kanye West did quite a surprising exit, taking up arms against the singer Taylor Swift and her price won for one of her music videos. A bit later, in an interview with ABC, President Barack Obama would have treated the rapper of a “jackass”, which the journalist hastened to publish on Twitter. Problem: that declaration was actually “off the record”, and thus, according to the tacit journalistic rule, not aimed for publication… This tweet provoked of course a clamor of indignation in the US. ABC apologized for its mistake and Barack Obama abstained from any comment.

As a conclusion, I think we can say that Twitter can be a great tool for everyone, may it be a simple citizen or a journalist. However, as with all other technologies, it’s a matter of personal integrity and awareness to use it the right way. As far as journalists are concerned, even though it would be much easier to regurgitate everything they see on Twitter, they still should apply the basic rules they learned in journalism school (truth, accuracy, checking out stories, sources, facts and context). Twitter should encourage them to sharpen their sense of hierarchy and selection in order to give ever more sense to news. As for others, as responsible citizens that we all are, I think it’s a priority to put in place an awareness culture where everyone should be able to question the news and to keep a critical eye on them.

Oh, and I almost forgot: happy birthday Twitter! :-)

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter

http://socialmediajourno.wordpress.com/2011/03/21/happy-birthday-twitter/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rory-oconnor/twitter-journalism_b_159101.html

http://cronkite.asu.edu/mcguireblog/?p=158

http://www.wordsdept.co.uk/2010/08/18/journorequest-reveals-media-preoccupations-in-depressing-detail/

Larissa Cremens, Wednesday 30, March 2011

"You're famous because we hate you"

In the last few years cyber-bullying became an up-to-date topic for many people. Especially teenagers are involved in online abusing as well as scientists are interested in this online phenomenon. Now youtube-star Rebecca Black shows: being an online-victim can make you successful and famous.

What is cyber-bullying?

Cyber-bullying is the use of social-networks, cell-phones, e-mails or chat-rooms to abuse, tease and threaten another person or another group of people. There are a lot of cases where classmates wrote abuses in online forums or putting an intimate or exposing video online. Usually the reason why teenagers are doing that are: fun, cultural conflicts, demonstrating power, acceptance in one group or because they fear to be the victim. Especially in new media there is no way to escape for bullied victims. If someone abuses a person online in a blog or social network it will be a public information and the victim cannot just go home and hide.

Rebecca Black: victim, but famous

The past showed us that we had a victim who got hurt and an offender who was the one who abused someone. Everything was clear before some internet-stars appeared. One of them emerged a few weeks ago. Rebecca Black is not the classical victim of online-bullying because she benefits of the people who hate her. More than 53 million clicks in six weeks for the song “Friday” and more than 700000 comments for her youtube-video. Most of the comments make fun of the people who appear in the video, the lyrics as well as of the pop-song which seems to be too primitive and crappy for most of the youtube users. One user just posted on youtube: “WTF was that shit I almost threw my iPod away to stop the madness she needs to stop singing and jump off a cliff.“

The 13 year old online-star is confused and got hurt of all the bad comments and reactions of her song as well as for her music-video. Anyway she has the attention of all the American TV-Stations and her song entered in the iTunes charts on position 46. She is successful and does not stop to put more stuff of her online. So another version of the song appeared on youtube where she is performing her song live with her friends in a living room. It is us who give people like Rebecca attention and make her successful even when we do not like her. One iYoozy-user posted a comment which makes the situation very clear: ”We don´t hate you because you're famous. You're famous because we hate you.”

Use of New Media

It is not new that new media can be used as a platform to put your own stuff online and become famous, but in the past users expected positive reactions for their stuff they were putting on youtube, myspace, etc.. It seems that we now reached a point were we just can use new media to get attention in a positive or a negative way. It will not make any difference if you want to become famous. All artists who spend a lot of time and work hard to write and record songs feel treated unfair. Why do people want to listen and watch crappy songs and videos and do not prefer listening to a song with good lyrics? The song “Friday” is just a representative example where some users and media will go in future and so far the top of all the crappy output of online users.

It might be not seen as cyber-bullying in the eyes of the offenders because they never met Rebecca personally and do not go to school with her also. Youtube users rate the song like they rate any other funny stuff in which are no people involved, but this time there is one human being who is abused and most of the people do not realize that fact. There is a difference between the classical online-bullying and the case of Rebecca. Most of the comments are not personal and the people who rate and abuse her are far away from her. Anyway telling Rebecca anonymous and far away that she should jump of a cliff because it is not bearable to listen to her voice is cyber-bullying.

New role of the victim

Even if it was not Rebecca`s aim to obtain all the hate of the youtube-users, in future there might be much more people who want to be famous at any price. Cyber-bullying now gives you the ability to get the attention of lots of people and can make you famous. The role of the victim has changed in some cases. Now we can put crappy stuff online on purpose and wait for how shitty the users rate or how many bad reactions we get for a video or a song. The classical role of the victim does not disappear, but the victim has the ability to use the abuses in a positive way. The online-victim is able to become a star. Anyway the victim is still a victim who has to fear psychological problems and might need the help of other people. The offender remains constant and does not realize that his power to abuse is used in a positive way.

There are a lot of people who think that Rebecca was not cyber-bullied. These people should ask themselves how they would feel after putting a video online and reading thousands of bad comments. You might be famous and you might feel good giving interviews to well known TV-stations, but when you leave the house of your family it will always remain that there are 53 million people who saw your video and the majority of them hates you. Success does not make cyber-bullying go away.

Sources:

http://www.spiegel.de/kultur/musik/0,1518,752176,00.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD2LRROpph0

http://www.thecampussocialite.com/wp-content/uploads/rebecca-black-plague.jpg

http://images2.memegenerator.net/ImageMacro/6647717/Is-friday-I-hate-you-bicht.jpg?imageSize=Medium&generatorName=Rebecca-Black-Meme