Q&A with Pierre Omidyar re Peer News

Those of you interested in learning more about the service I'm helping build in Hawaii might be interested in this Q&A with Pierre Omidyar published by Pacific Business News.

Key quote: "Our goal is to create the new civic square. We want to provide a platform for people to come together as a community. We hope to encourage people to become more engaged in the world around them and provide them with ways to respectfully discuss important issues with their neighbors."

My first week in Paradise

On the seventh day in a startup, you do not rest. It’s been one full week since I started work as editor of Peer News, what we’re calling a next generation news service in Honolulu. And as on all the days before - except my “days off,” when I drove around town looking for housing - yesterday was a mix of conversations with my new colleagues about topics we need to work through - for example, how to handle the contributions of non-staff writers - and the quiet of a blank office with a small group tapping away on Mac laptops.

What does an editor do to launch a new news service?

First, my new colleagues, Pierre Omidyar and Randy Ching, had already given a lot of thought, with their adviser Howard Weaver, to what the new service should look like. So the basic editorial direction has already been set, which gives me a huge head start. And they had adopted an approach to hiring, based on the book "Who: The A Method for Hiring,” which they used to hire me. So how to go about recruiting our staff had already been established, too. What I needed to do was focus on the basics. That meant unsexy tasks like writing job descriptions to make it possible to recruit people and have them understand what would be expected of them. I’ve also written a beat/coverage guide, again to sharpen what the service would offer and help explain it to prospective hires. All these, of course, go through rounds of editing and discussion. (We’ll be talking about our plans in more detail closer to launch.)

Moving has been a reminder of the stress that any new employee goes through. Good to remember. All the HR paperwork and questions. The crazy things that happen in a new town. Leaving the lights on in the rental car and getting stranded in a rainstorm. The difficulty of finding an apartment. New software tools to learn. Posterous. Dropbox. Skype Chat. (OK, I knew to how use it. But not properly, according to Mr. Omidyar...By the way, I thought I knew how to use e-mail, but it turns out I've been using it wrong all along. Blame it on my Blackberry.) And new user IDs and passwords to remember.

Job applications are rolling in. A gentle reminder: If you’re looking for a job, it’s a good idea to follow directions. A second reminder: Sending an online news service a resume that says your goal is to work at a metropolitan daily newspaper or something other than the job you’re applying for is probably not a good idea. Also, think about customizing your resume for each position. It makes people appear more serious if they seem to understand what we might be looking for. Generic doesn’t help somebody stand out.

One thing that’s impressed me in Hawaii is how open everybody is to meeting and talking about the work. Aloha actually means something. And for that I’m grateful.

I’m happy to be here. At the beginning. Digging in. Building.

I’m moving to Honolulu to become the first editor of Peer News

I’m moving to Paradise. For a dream job.

Today Pierre Omidyar, founder and chairman of eBay, announced that I’m going to become the first editor of Peer News, a Honolulu-based local news service that will produce original, in-depth reporting and analysis of local issues in Hawaii.

Pierre and Randy Ching co-founded Peer News Inc. in 2008 “with the goal of empowering citizens and encouraging greater civic participation through media.” I learned of the project in November when a friend pointed out Pierre’s blog post about his search for an editor. He wrote: “We believe that a strong democracy requires an engaged society supported by effective news reporting and analysis. And, we believe that this can be done in a profitable, sustainable way.”

I share those beliefs, and when we began talking I became excited about the opportunity to work as a member of their team. I’ve collaborated with many great people in the newspaper industry over the years, but my new colleagues come at these challenges from a fresh perspective and with a record of accomplishment in the online world. I’ve enjoyed my freedom since the Rocky Mountain News closed last February. I’ve been writing here and elsewhere, speaking, consulting, traveling and learning new skills. But as I wrote in a column for The Wall Street Journal last summer, "I genuinely miss being part of a larger entity with a purpose." That I now will have the opportunity to help build one from scratch, to create a new news culture with such talented partners, makes me very happy.

I’ll be joining the Peer News team in Honolulu later this month and will begin working right away to hire a staff. If you’re a reporter or assistant editor candidate interested in joining our team, you can learn more and submit your resume here and here, respectively. Please don’t phone or e-mail me directly. We’re looking for thoughtful writers with a proven record of breaking new ground with investigative reporting. The job will require more interaction with readers and the community than is typical at most local news operations. Hawaii experience or background is a big plus. And everybody on the team must be savvy about using today’s technology and ready to embrace any new tools. It’s a start-up, so candidates also need to be passionate about the idea and willing to do whatever is necessary to get the project off the ground.

I feel very lucky to have had the opportunities I’ve had as a journalist. Every step of the way I’ve been able to become part of fascinating communities - Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Toronto, Denver - and now I look forward to immersing myself in Honolulu. I’m grateful to so many in Colorado and will miss my adopted state and the many friends I’ve made there. But I’m excited about the future and about the possibility of making a difference in a new community.

You’ll be able to follow what we’re doing at Peer News on Pierre’s blog and on a blog I’ll start as editor. I also plan to start a new twitter account at Peer News. For the time being, I’ll keep you up-to-date on my doings at Peer News and my thinking about journalism and media issues on this blog. I’ll post a link to the conference call where we discussed the new initiative today as soon as I have one.

Onward.

Back in the blogosphere

This is my first post in more than a month. I've been working as an on-site consultant to the Greenspun Media Group in Las Vegas and found that it was very difficult to keep up a blog and work inside a media company as an adviser. The blogosphere is a place for open and robust discussion. But that conflicts with the work of a consultant, which is to offer insight and assistance on a confidential basis. Not only is the work demanding and time-consuming. But it seemed to me that anything I wrote could be read as some type of commentary on the place where I was working or the issues I was working on. I don't think it would have been right to have done that. It could have confused the staff or given the wrong impression to the community or competitors. It made more sense to me to keep everything internal.

It was difficult to find where to draw the line when writing about journalism or media issues when I was working as a media consultant. So I drew it very broadly. I would have felt differently if I had been a member of the company's very talented staff. In that case, as when I was editor of the Rocky Mountain News, I would have used my blog and twitter to interact with the community and try to provide insight into our decisions and actions as a news organization. As I would advise any editor to do today.

I've now wrapped up my on-site work in Las Vegas and look forward to rejoining the online debate.

Today Show interview of woman who claims to have had sex with Tiger Woods: How depressing can things get in journalism?

When the Today show interviews a woman who "claims" she had sex with Tiger Woods, there can't be any confusion over why the public thinks so poorly of journalism.

How can a show that interviews presidents spend its time asking a woman about her alleged relationship with Tiger Woods?

Depressing. To put it mildly.

Why would people call for a boycott of a guy like Don Imus and then think it's worth going on the Today show? Ratings can be the only explanation.

Rest in peace, E&P: Killed by an aggregator

As someone who has experienced the death of his own publication, my heart goes out to the folks at Editor & Publisher, especially Joe Strupp, who always approached coverage of the newspaper industry with passion.

But perhaps there's a lesson in what happened to the industry trade magazine that other journalists should take seriously.

In 2006, I wrote a blog post with the headline, "Why Editor & Publisher has become irrelevant."

Three years later, it's dead.

It's easy to underestimate the power of aggregation. But the truth, in my view, is that Romenesko replaced Editor & Publisher long ago as the place where journalists turned to find out what was going on in their world. It's not limited by one medium or industry. It's timely. And it's deep. The magazine couldn't compete. And it's not just Romenesko. There are many sites and blogs to turn to today to learn what's going on in journalism. Which is why E&P couldn't survive as a viable business. I know many would like to think that the same thing couldn't happen to other publications. I wouldn't if I were them.

Two good articles give vision for successful news Web sites

Data about customers.

Seems like such an obvious answer to the needs of news organizations looking for ways to be successful online.

Two recent articles, I think, provide direction for news organizations trying to find their way in this era.

The first comes from The New York Times.

The headline on the article is: The Data That Turns Browsing to Buying

The article, by STEVE LOHR, begins:

"NEXT JUMP may well be the most intriguing Internet business that you’ve never heard of — though that’s likely to change as the company seeks a wider audience.

"The handful of industry analysts who were invited into the company’s New York offices recently have come away impressed. Next Jump, they say, represents the future of online commerce and could emerge as a counterweight to Amazon, the giant Web merchant. And this patiently gestated start-up, they add, shows one path to the still-elusive promise of Internet advertising: using data to greatly improve the efficiency of marketing."

How many newspaper companies can say they're using microtargeting data to greatly improve the efficiency of the marketing services they're offering advertisers?

The other article is from PaidContent.org. It contains the text of the speech given by Matt Kelly, associate editor of Britain's Daily Mirror, to the World Newspaper Congress.

His talk makes clear why the first article is so important.

"The associate editor of the Mirror says we have to put journalism first and search engines second," the headline says.

His speech is a worthwhile read that makes one critical point. Not all traffic is created equal. It matters who's reading your content, not just how many people are reading it.