Media experiment tracking #4

I’ve now finished the one month experiment I ran where I tracked how many clicks I was sending from MMM and CT.WP to mainstream news organizations. Just to restate how I did this, I used Bit.ly tracking links to see how often people clicked through to the websites of newspapers or magazines, not other blogs. That’s because it’s not blogs that are complaining about how other blogs are stealing their traffic or ad revenue and it’s not blogs that are considering erecting paywalls for their content. So this was meant to see how much money I was helping those news organizations earn by linking to them, something that’s only possible (for me at least) if they continue to be free.

• Links Shareed: 82
• Clicks: 983
• Ad revenue at $25 CPM: $24.57

The most highly-clicked link I included was the one to the Los Angeles Times story I was quoted in. Personally I look at that and feel that it’s not just in newspapers’ best interest to continue allowing plentiful opportunities for links but engage in more outreach to blog writers for stories about the niche topics those writers cover since such outreach is likely – almost guaranteed – to result in a recommendation by the writer to go over and read that story.

I know there are some flaws in my “experiment’s” methodology. It’s not perfect by any means. But I do think the results support the broad idea that not only can blog writers help newspapers and magazines survive but that there are more opportunities for each party to help each other and build a mutually advantageous relationship. There are always going to be bad actors out there – there are as many sites that rip off the content of a highly-trafficked blog as there are ones that rip off a newspaper’s content – but for the most part we’re all in the same boat. I love to write but I’m dependent to a large extent on newspapers and their reporting resources. Newspaper writers love (I hope) to write but they can get more traffic for their stories by doing outreach to blog writers also covering that topic area.

Sharing

Here’s a thought: If you could have your television remote control or DVR box share your activity with your friends via something like Facebook Connect would you enable that functionality? We seem to have no problem sharing what we’re doing online, with some offline activity bleeding into that as well as we publish online what we’re doing in the real world. But there it’s mostly selective sharing – I’m not going to tell everyone that I just spent 10 minutes petting the cat because, well, I don’t choose to. So would people make different choices on what to watch if they knew that if they stayed on a channel for more than 5 minutes the fact they were watching that program would be broadcast everywhere? Just something that has me thinking today.

Mulling on lifestreams

I keep playing around with the idea of “life-streaming” but have never quite embraced it the way some people, especially Steve Rubel, have. The closest I come is my FriendFeed profile, which aggregates MMM, CT.WP, Twitter, Delicious, Google Reader and a bunch of my other profiles and accounts, some of which I don’t use all that regularly. That, to my mind, is what a lifestream should be – a single touch-point for all those disparate profiles and outlets where people can go to find everything I do online.

But Steve’s now thinking differently, with a post about how his lifestream is turning more from that model to one that has him posting in one place, with that then being distributed to all those outlets.

Looking at the graphic he uses, the Posterous model increasingly looks backwards to me. Yeah, that’s exactly what Posterous does – easy posting to its platform with it then auto-posting to those other profiles. This isn’t a lifestream, it’s more like lifedistribution. As an example: All of Steve’s Posterous posts are pushed to Twitter, but not all of his Twitter updates are shared on Posterous. Lifestreaming, I think, should aggregate and not distribute since a distribution model means I still have to connect with you on multiple platforms whereas an aggregation model means I get a one-stop-shop.

I get what he’s saying about signal-to-noise ratios, but there are ways to manage that. Cut your RSS feeds, create a “Priorities” column in Tweetdeck, come to the conclusion (as I have) that hanging out on Facebook all day adds nothing of value. The only reason that ratio is lower for him right now is that Posterous has yet to truly explode into the mainstream, despite a number of high-profile people who have adopted it quite fully. Give it a couple of Newsweek stories and that will change.

I’m not ragging on Steve – it’s working for him and that’s great, even if I see some problems with it. We all do what works for us and what makes sense in our own minds, just like we all like music that makes sense to and speaks to us. I just don’t quite agree with him on what the real promise of it is or on what the real value of Posterous really is.

Restrictions on social publishing

Wait, you mean the social media publishing restrictions imposed by the NCAA’s Southern Conference weren’t as restrictive as some people thought they were?

Conference officials said they were not trying to prevent fans from sending personal messages or brief descriptions of games to their Facebook pages or on Twitter, as some fans fear. Enforcing such a policy would be impractical and counterproductive because social media platforms help promote the conference’s teams, said Charles Bloom, a spokesman for the SEC. Last August, the conference signed 15-year television contracts with ESPN and CBS.

But “the line is drawn at game footage video,” Mr. Bloom said. “We want to protect our rights to have video between the conference and its members, and ban the commercial sale of photo images. Fans can post photos on their site or Facebook page, but they can’t be for sale.”

Much of the criticism from social media types last week was based on the assumption/belief/misinterpretation that the rules were meant to specifically restrict Twittering, posting photos to Flickr and other such activity. But no, not so much, at least not based on this story.

Almost posted this to Twitter

“STOP SAYING MOVIE MARKETING IS KILLING TWITTER OR I WILL STAB YOU IN THE EYE”

Thank goodness I showed some self-restraint. Oh…wait…

Media experiment tracking #3

To date since July 28th:

• Links Shareed: 70
• Clicks: 749
• Ad revenue at $25 CPM: $18.72

Note that I’ve cut the average CPM I’m using for this experiment in half since I started this experiment. My point, though, still holds, that by making their stories available to me I can help make them money despite the fact that I’m getting no subsequent monetary benefit as a result. No, $20 is not going to save the newspaper industry, but if you add my very small contribution to what is possible with some large profile blogs you could see some significant money as well as indirect revenue in the way of higher general awareness and even better ad revenue.

Lutheran

I’m not going to get into the details of it all but did want to say to all the lazy headline (and story) writers out there that while the ELCA might be the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S. it’s not the only one. So saying “Lutherans approve…” is, generously, an over-statement and, not-so-generously, an inaccuracy. It might be better to use “Lutheran group…” or even “ELCA Lutherans…” if you really wanted to go for something more accurate.

Rant over. Go about your business.

Naive

Ask the people who have illnesses – some life-threatening – that aren’t deemed cost-effective or otherwise “worth it” by the insurance company that covers them if there aren’t “death panels” in place already. If anything the government plan for health-care reform are likely to put more patient protections in place.

I’m surprised more advocates for the government plan aren’t hitting this line of thinking more.

Retreat

This has been my view for the last 24 hours or so.

FREE Review

I’ve posted my full review (based on a free, natch, review copy of the book I received) of Chris Anderson’s new book FREE over on MMM but here’s a sampler:

Anderson never, despite what some people have read into his thesis, comes out and says that giving things away for free is a one-size fits all model. There is still a place – a necessary place – in the world for charging things. And not every industry or even company can take advantage of giving things away. But it is something that some companies can experiment with and maybe find success with.

Instead FREE is an even-handed presentation of what has been done with various experimentations along these lines in the past, what is being done right now and what could be done in the future.

As with Anderson’s previous book, The Long Tail, it’s a thought-provoking and easy, intriguing read. And as with The Long Tail Anderson’s thesis makes a lot of sense to anyone who goes into it with anything approaching an open mind. If you can’t see the points he’s making and at least concede that there’s value in a discussion around those ideas it means you’re projecting your own fears and agendas onto his writing and that’s not giving them a fair shake.