WHAT'S NEXT: INNOVATIONS IN NEWSPAPERS

These will be The New Media Kings of 2011.

1. Mobile Media will rule.

2. New Multimedia Digital Narratives will be a must.

3. Tablets will be the best multimedia integrators.

4. iPad still will lead the tablet revolution.

5. Web is to surf, print to read and tablets to dive.

6. Reading is back in a big way.

7. Amazing Visual Journalism will be better than ever.

8. Newsrooms integration will accelerate.

9. iPad will become iPay.

10. Paid content will make print and digital media profitable.

And all these 10 trends can be summarized in just another one:

It’s the wine, not the bottle!

Who is Jesse Angelo?: The leader of this project is a former managing editor of the New York Post, a tabloid that has been losing a lot of money since Murdoch bought this competitor of the New York Daily News. Angelo is a Harvard graduate and lifelong New Yorker. He began as a freelance reporter for The Post’s Page Six in 1999. He was hired full time as a news reporter, then moved to the business desk, where he quickly rose to deputy business editor. Angelo was named metropolitan editor in April 2001.“

Murdoch on The Daily one week ago: “I’m starting a paper in six weeks. A brand new paper. It will be a bit like the New York Post. But it will be national. It will only be seen on tablets. It will only employ journalists – and maybe eight to 10 technicians.”

Promotion: Amazing. Learning from Apple, News Corporation is almost silent, but the viral marketing is going crazy. Serious newspapers like The Guardian have been trap in this noisy silent-strategy publishing rumors with no facts.

Is this paper another example of “Dead On Arrival”?: That’s the main view of all the blind experts, people that have not seen anything and are killing the baby before birth.

My own take: Give them a chance. They have will, money, resources and talent to try this only-tablet national publication. If Murdoch wins, expect a lot of replicas around the world. If he fails, all of us will learn how to do it better. So, let’s wait and see. My only concern is that the time has been too short: a huge project like this cannot be done in six months.

Tentative name: “The Daily”

Publisher: News Corporation.

Headquarters: New York, USA.

Digital platforms: Apple  iPad and Google Android based tablets.

Target: general readership, offering short, snappy stories that could be digested quickly.

Main print competitors: USA Today and The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal  national editions.

Launching date: before Christmas.

Budget: $30 million.

Tentative subscription cost: $1 per week (The Wall Street Journal on iPad is available for a $4 weekly subscription fee).

Staff: 150 editors, journalists, IT experts and managers.

First big guns: The New Yorker music critic Sasha Frere-Jones hired as culture editor; Richard Johnson (gossip) and Jesse Angelo (crime) come from The New York Post; Mike Nizza from AOL, The Atlantic and The New York Times.

Business manager: Greg Clayman, former head of Viacom’s digital division,

Key-factors for success: original content.

Why a tablet? Because is the iPad is “a game-changer,”

Why Rupert Murdoch is so much involved in the project?: Because he believes that The Daily, properly executed, will demonstrate that consumers are willing to pay for high quality, original content specifically designed for a burgeoning category of high-end digital readers.

Mobile first: As Murdoch said, “Mobile technology will transform the print business. We’re going to see, around the world, hundreds and hundreds of millions of these devices – we’ve got to develop our methods of presentation of news.”

In summary:Murdoch’s number 1 and most exciting project right now.

More at our Harvard Tablets Summit.

Be there!

Steve Jobs announced the launch of many new “Dead On Arrival” (DOA) Tablets.

So, let’s check the best candidates for this funeral ranking.

First one: Toshiba Folio 100

An Android 16GB tablet to be launched in November (UK) with these Pros & Cons.

PROS:

Bigger touchscreen than the iPad (10.1 inches)

I doesn’t quite have the resolution of the iPad (1024 x 768)

A 1.3 Mp web-cam for video calls.

Displays Flash animations.

Cheaper (329 GBP): 100 GBP less than the iPad.

USB 2.0 port (not in the iPad or Galaxy).

CONS:

Less intuitive operating system (FroYo).

Less sophisticated design.

Plasticky-feeling chassis

Access to less apps, many of them designed for Android iPhones, so not optimised to run on big-screen devices.

Only seven-hour battery (40% less than the iPad)

Only wi-fi version (3G option later).

Heavy: 750g.

IN A FEW WORDS:

Big but not sexy.

More movie-centric than media-centric.

Not an iPad killer.

AND REMEMBER:

“It’s the wine, not the bottle”.

So, hurry up, and register in the INMA/INNOVATION Harvard Tablet Summit.

The deadline is coming.

You know…

It will not fly.

It’s a flop.

It’s just crap!

I am returning my iPad.

Well, the last handbook from the Magazine Publishers Association (MPA) has good news for us the tablet fans.

We are not a minority.

We are not crazy.

We are not alone.

We are not the exception.

We were right!

Almost 60% of the US consumers plan to buy a tablet within the next 3 years.

Not only iPads but just tablets.

The mobile media revolution is over us.

Another reason not to miss the INMA/NIEMAN/INNOVATION Harvard Tablet Summit.

Cambridge, December 2-3, 2010.

A Worldwide Summit to learn, master and share new ideas.

Be there!

Yesterday ViewSonic unveiled the ViewPad 7, not a very good one.

And tomorrow SAMSUNG will present its first Android 7-inch Galaxy Tablet (the iPad is 9.7 inches)

So iPad competitors are here and the winners will be… you and me, the consumers.

Expect immediate reaction from Apple.

And a new, better and cheaper iPad model very soon.

More competition is always good.

Another reason not to miss the INMA/NIEMAN/INNOVATION Harvard Tablet Summit.

Cambridge, December 2-3, 2010.

A Worldwide Summit to learn, master and share new ideas.

Be there!

Chang Ma, vice president of marketing for LG in the WSJ announcing is Google Android OPTIMUS, the first tablet of his company:

The first LG tablet will set itself apart from Apple’s iPad by focusing on the ability to create content, rather than simply display it.

Mr. Ma said that the iPad is a great device, but he doesn’t do much work on it.

“Our tablet will be better than the iPad.”

The tablet, Mr. Ma said, will include content focused on creation such as writing documents, editing video and creating programs.

It will also have “high-end features and new benefits,” many of which will focus on productivity.

Interesting challenge.

Yes, the iPad is mainly a consumption device.

90% consumption.

10% creation.

More competition is always good.

Another reason not to miss the INMA/NIEMAN/INNOVATION Harvard Tablet Summit.

Cambridge, December 2-3, 2010.

A Worldwide Summit to learn, master and share new ideas.

Be there!

(Picture: a Google tablet mockup)

Tags: Chang Ma, Harvard Tablet Summit, INMA, LG, NIEMAN, Optimus, Tablets, iPad, productions versus creation

Hearst magazines launchs an “Apps Think Tank”.

While the free iPhone app of Esquire got more than 100,000 free downloads and produced more than 1.000 subscriptions to the magazine, the$1.99  iPad app of Popular Mechanics got only 40,000 downloads.

So Hearst is trying to develop an in-house”App Lab” to improve all these numbers.

Hearst Magazines has created nine iPhone applications; all of its titles are available on the iPad via the Zinio application; and by the end of the year, the company expects to have at least 35 iPhone, iPad and Android applications for its brands.

As Kenneth A. Bronfin, president of Hearst Interactive Media says:

“There is no such thing as the ‘status quo’ in interactive play–or business. Our business reflects our ever-evolving communities of users–both on the Internet and throughout Hearst Corporation. We are innovators who change the landscape and challenge the status quo.”

All this shows that readers, advertisers, software companies, designers and media publishers are desperate looking for new and moire exciting ideas.

As one readers comments in the iTunes iPad store about Esquire magazine:

“Been a subscriber to the mag for years. Not going to pay for the same content I already pay to have delivered to my door.”

That’s the challenge.

And this will be the main objective of our next Harvard Tablet Summit (Cambridge, December 2-3, 2010)

Via Buzzhunt.

Next: the INNOVATION’s Rubber iPad.

Bill Gates on the iPad:

“It’s a nice reader, but there’s nothing on the iPad I look at and say, ‘Oh, I wish Microsoft had done it.’”