Wednesday, January 03, 2007 7:32 AM
When I opened The Wall Street Journal yesterday morning, I was greeted by the following paragraph:
For over a century, The Wall Street Journal has been an icon in business, markets and journalism. In a time of change, those of us entrusted with icons face a dilemma: Do we preserve the icon as it has been, rejecting change as too risky? Or do we try to add to the qualities that created the icon in the first place, taking care not to change simply for the sake of change?
Fair questions. Thoughtful questions. Critical questions.
That paragraph, written by the Journal's Publisher, L. Gordon Crovitz, was followed shortly by this:
The impetus is the great change in recent years in how you get news and information. You now get updated throughout the day from many different sources, print and online. Readers told us that the Journal could better tailor its efforts to how, when and where you access news. We've rethought the role of a newspaper as well as what you seek online. Your expectations of media have shifted, making this an era when you expect us to embrace change.
The Journal has embraced that change in a variety of ways, small and large, across its media properties, both online and in print. Podcasts, blogs, video, a completely overhauled print edition, everything seems on the table.
Today's always-on, 24/7 information overload of data makes the Journal indispensable for the real knowledge and understanding that we try to help you achieve. That's why, in today's Journal, you'll see new content features, new ways to navigate the newspaper and innovations in aligning the print Journal and the Wall Street Journal Online to make the Journal your essential source throughout the day.
The idea behind the changes seems to be developing synergies between print and online, in an attempt to find a mix that makes business and economic sense. Particularly interesting to me is that while the Journal has clearly recognized the sea change that the web has brought to the delivery, dissemination and consumption of information, it is not abandoning print media altogether. Instead, it is refocusing it, as noted in this paragraph from Mr. Crovitz's commentary:
The biggest change is the one Managing Editor Paul Steiger describes: The Journal's news department is increasing the proportion of articles that are exclusive, telling you about facts, trends, ideas and analysis you won't see anywhere else. A little over half of the Journal in recent times has been this kind of unique coverage -- more than any other newspaper, which is one reason the number of people subscribing to the Journal is up by 10% this year, when most newspapers have many fewer such subscribers.
If you think about it, this idea makes a lot of sense. The Journal can still differentiate itself from other media by the depth and quality of its articles. Many people may even still prefer to read detailed, lengthy and in depth articles in print. Conversely, the "headlines of the hour," which are often wire service reports widely disseminated can be conveyed in small bits and chunks on the various Dow Jones web properties. Again, which is more likely how the average person prefers to receive such headlines.
In looking over the online version of the Journal as well as other Dow Jones web properties, it is evident that the company is not just presenting its content in online, static form. It is exploring interactive and emerging web technologies as it attempts to create destination pages for both existing and potential subscribers. In the end, whether it is successful or not remains to be seen, but it seems evident to me that the Journal has recognized that the web changes (almost) everything...and that the old guard media will have to change with it.