Monday, May 23, 2016

Day 63 of MUC and day 16 of MOC, and it's innovative, agile digital day for the reptiles ... otherwise known as blame the ABC day ...



So this is what it's come to on a Monday in the lizard Oz ...

Perhaps it's the hair do, or perhaps it's just the uxorious way that Chris Mitchell has taken to the job of showing his man love for the reptiles that most disturbs the pond ...

It turns out that this second week into the new world of the head kicker as member of the commentariat, all we get is dazzling sunshine about how good the new digital world is for the reptiles basking on their hot digital rocks ...


That's it? Hucksterism and spin of the kind the pond usually expects from a pedlar, a hawker or a snake-oil salesman ...

If everything's so grand, why is Fairfax sacking people so that the head honchos might continue to haul in a lavish annuity? Why have the reptiles said farewell to quite a few as well, albeit desperately trying to keep it under the covers?

Sure, the reptile bottom line was most hit by dubious practices which saw a pay out to avoid charges of monopolizing the market for in-store promotions at retail stores in the United States (Reuters here),  but revenue is shrinking and to date digital subscriptions haven't been the solution ... unless the reptiles want to position themselves in a high end ghetto, a remote elitist gulag like the AFR ...

Here's what it looks like from other parts of the universe ...


That video story still plays at the ABC's  Newspaper death spiral gathers pace ...

Back for another try of Chris Mitchell's rose-tinted glasses ...


So forgetting about young people, and scoring with angry old people anxious to read angry old people shouting at clouds, is the way forward?

And we must put up the wall, and persuade the Mexicans to pay for it?


News Corp is still stuck with its tree-killer strategy, and therefore has all the agile flexibility of a lumbering dinosaur ... and that's the tragedy of having a "let's kill MySpace" dinosaur at the head of the tree ...

But as the pond has been quoting the ABC, and as today is media day, we should also take a look at the dog botherer's offering, a typical example of blaming the ABC for the private sector's problems...


But is it the ABC's fault that the reptiles have run with a paywall that leaks like a sieve? Not as nakedly as the Fairfax one, but enough to make the pond worry about the dyke's structural integrity.

The reptiles could make the paywall much more watertight if they wanted to, but they also want to be a part of the conversation, so that they don't slide into complete irrelevance and lose whatever perceived political clout they still have ...

The trouble is, news is everywhere, common and free. So consumers have to look at the quality of the conversation.

What happens when it's the dog botherer being part of the conversation, and inevitably the tone of the discussion turns paranoid and silly? 


Uh huh. Because the Seven Network and Fairfax have no bells and whistles ...

Well it's worthwhile pondering how PolitiFact in the United States is funded ...


And there's more  here and for an explanation of who Nelson Poynter was, go here.

The reality is that PolitiFact, wiki it here, is both an indulgence and a gimmick whose time came and then quickly went ...

The number of times that Donald Trump has done or scored pants on fire or similar and then turned around and kept on doing it, shows how ineffectual and useless fact checking with fancy graphics was ...

Its sublime irrelevance to the political process in the United States was confirmed with the Donald pulling alongside Hillary Clinton in the polls...

In much the same way both the ABC's and the short lived Fray version struggled for relevance and credibility down under.

If it's such a good idea, then the way is now clear for the reptiles - perhaps with the dog botherer at its head - to get their own fact-checker going. ..

But why would they bother? In these hard-pressed digital times, there's no point having a specialised unit doing fact-checking when that's what all the reptiles should be doing whenever they run a story ...

Of course the one thing you can guarantee is that there would be much humour in News Corp attempting to run a fact-checking unit ... how could crusaders rabid about Safe Schools show an interest in facts (yes, they were at it again today with another Marxist EXCLUSIVE).

Never mind, here for the record is the rest of the dog botherer's insights, which amount no more to the usual sight of the dog botherer cocking his hind leg in the direction of the ABC ...


Pathetic really. Here's an organisation still deeply attached to tree killing as a business model moaning about how the ABC is curbing the agility of the private sector.

As if young people head off to the ABC for the news on their mobile device ... and that's what's killing the reptile dream.

Well we all know who Chris Kenny's son favours as his outlet. He wrote for Junkee about his dog bothering dad ...

Each time the dog botherer writes this sort of retro stuff, a very old song keeps running through the pond's head which covers the dog bother's attitude to rising seas and climate science, and his work with the keyboard ...


Keep trying to blame the ABC, keep on moaning and whining, and keep on missing the point, and your business model will keep on flailing and failing ...

Here's another thought reptiles ... build a better mousetrap and people will buy it, even if offered a free socialist mousetrap.

Keep whining and moaning about how they prefer the Trabant, and talking up pie in the sky nonsense about how it's all going spiffingly for old business models in the new digital age, and it's a sure sign you've got a dud mousetrap.

Put it another way. The Chris's, Mitchell and Kenny, are dud mousetraps, no more likely to free up the red backs in the wallet and catch the consumer mouse than reconstituted cheese of the fetid, past their use-by date kind ...

Now here you go reptiles, here's how you can recycle some content and feel a little more up to date ...



Sheesh, if the pond can feature a truly dire Zack Synder movie anything's possible.

3 comments:

  1. Ahhh, 'freemium' content. Isn't that just the best?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Dorothy,

    Mitchell considers the fact that seven out of 10 Australians would never pay for his old papers output as something to boast about.

    It’s therefore no surprise that both circulation and advertising revenue plummeted at The Oz whilst Mitchell was in control.

    Under his tenure the editorial tone became ever more strident and along with the increasingly hysterical opinion pieces that he green lit, set out to denounce those deemed “class enemies”.

    The list grew over time starting with the obvious targets of “the greenies” and “the leftists” who admittedly were unlikely to read The Australian anyway. However it wasn’t long before “the doctors’ wives” were causing concern and then came the menace of “inner city elites” who were suspected of being “progressive”. “Chardonnay sippers” and “latte drinkers” were also picked out for opprobrium.

    More and more groups were considered to be politically suspect and in return the number of readers who were still ideologically pure enough to want to purchase the rag nose-dived.

    Finally the crime of being “Tertiary Educated” was enough to be denunciated. Presumably by this stage Mitchell had declared “Year Zero” at Holt Street and even the wearing of glasses could lead to the suspicion of intellectualism.

    No wonder the advertisers walked away. Why bother attempting to sell expensive luxury goods to a well paid and a well educated demographic in a newspaper that goes out of its way to vilify that very group.

    If he considers that a “premium product” and that people will part with cold hard cash for it, tell him he’s dreamin’.

    DiddyWrote

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's why DW, the pond will hang on every word the superannuated dropkick will now scribble to see if there's the slightest hint of self-awareness. Thus far, not the faintest sigh, not a flicker or a spark ... just witlessness and delusional hope and a complete failure to understand the folly of alienating swathes of potential readership ... and now they can't even give it away at airports ...

      Delete

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