It took me about five minutes to make this ego search report using http://www.youtube.com/searchstories

You could cut that investment in half with a little focus.

What is BCNI?

BarCamp NewsInnovation Philadelphia is the national conference in a country-wide effort to reinvent the news industry.

Using the BarCamp open grid format (what’s that?), some of the greatest minds around will discuss new ideas on how to reenergize and innovate the news industry. This is NOT a journalists-only event! Invite any friends from various industries who are concerned about the future of news. Even your friend that complains about the biased media. Especially that guy. There will be representatives from news organizations all over the country.

The event is FREE and will be hosted at Annenberg Hall on the campus of Temple University in Philadelphia, Pa. Doors will open at  9 a.m. and the presentations will start at 10 a.m. After an hour break for lunch at 1 p.m., the last presentations will start at 5 p.m.

What to expect:

Doors will open at 9 a.m. and there will be hour to grab some coffee and meet your new best friends. There will be a blank presentation board and a stack of post-it notes. Write down your topic and post it in the time slot of your choice. Be sure to get there early to get the time you want.

At 10 a.m. presentations will begin in one of the four floors of Annenberg Hall. Each classroom has a projector and computer, some have  more than a dozen machines. There is even a TV studio if the desire so strikes you. Presentations will continue until 1 p.m. when we will break for lunch. There are dozens of lunch trucks, pizza places and restaurants on campus at your disposal.

Presentations will resume from 2 p.m. until 5 p.m. with the event closing at 6. After-party details to come.

http://bcniphilly.com/

Reasons

Two traditional media outlets have contacted me recently about my social media accomplishments, and what I might be able to share with them. In an effort to serve them best – and demonstrate the power of the SM community – I posted this hypothetical question on my Twitter feed earlier, and copied it to Facebook as well:

Help me get a job! How do I convince a traditional media institution that they need a social media expert? What can I do for them? Ideas? TY

http://twitter.com/JimMacMillan/status/1477010457

Here is a sampling of the Twitter responses:

edwebb: if media orgs are to survive they must focus on community – social media key to nurturing and maintaining.
sgengler: Explain that traditional media in the process of merging with social media, and they need a captain to steer that ship!
Janicerobertson: Maybe point out that Facebook and Twitter have more members than some countries? Also Speed that they have grown?
Mrs_Belmot: Tell them they’re getting ‘slagged’ on the internet and you can stop it. Fear motivates better than cuddles
directmaestro: I just convinced our CEO that social media management is not a part time job

I have deleted the authors from the Facebook responses in case they didn’t expect me to repost them, but you can friend me and see for yourself.

- Create a social media institution!
- You have to be able to demo how platforms such as Facebook bring in SO much traffic…..
- Google analytics does that for you. I applied these platforms at the paper that just laid me off. Traffic grew. FB an TW became top 5 in the referral sites list. You have to aggressive but also audience oriented.
- Three words: revenue, revenue, revenue.

What's news?

I have been cast in the middle of a mostly-friendly debate with some friends recently, over the viability of newspapers saving themselves by charging for online content.

My fundamental argument is that controlling content is now both impossible and counterproductive, but as an aside, I thought I might assemble a few of the alternatives readers would find online if the company that owns my local papers – The Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News – stopped offering their content for free via philly.com.

Several other local print products are present online as well, including
philadelphia weekly, City Paper, Philadelphia Business Journal, The Bulletin, Philadelphia Gay News, Tribune, Al Dia, Philadelphia Magazine, South Philly Review and the The Philadelphia Sunday Sun.

You can watch TV news, or visit each station’s web site: 3, 6, 10, & 29
Philly has an all-news radio station: KYW  and public radio news: WHYY
You can search for Philadelphia news via Yahoo, Google, MSN, AOL, newsbystate.com and get your sports directly from the teams: Eagles, Phillies, 76ers & Flyers

Beyond local, try: Yahoo News, Google News, MSN, AOL and newsbystate.com. Read the New York Times, Washington Post and USA TODAY; TIME, Newsweek, U.S. News, The Economist and THE NEW YORKER

There will be blogs, including www.phawker.com, www.philebrity.com,phillyist.com phillyskyline.com & technicallyphilly.com.

www.youngphillypolitics.com and college papers online, including: The Temple News, The Daily Pennsylvanian, The Triangle, Collegian, The Hawk & The Villanovan

Most people, however, seem to be more interested in a little thing called social media, including:
MySpace, facebook, LALA.COM, VIRB, twitter, change.org, bebo, flickr, photobucket, tribe,
del.icio.us, Flixster, digg, ryze, Linked in, PhotoReflect.com, VDIDDY, video codezone
vidiLife, Clip Shack, webshots, vod:pod, fliqz, current.tv, motionbox, dabble, bebo,
Google Video, eyespot, ourmedia, YAHOO! VIDEO, stashSpace.com, photobucket,
HOOK.TV, My Yahoo, iGoogle, Google Reader, newsgator, my.aol,
netvibes, bloglines, plusmo, newsalloy, Excite UK Info, netomat hub, fwicki, flurry,
My Webwag, Attensa, ZapTXT, del.icio.us, thefreedictionary, Odeo, Pageflakes,
Podcast Ready, reddit.com,  Digg, Newsvine, StumbleUpon, and Technorati

There will be more.

- – -

Disclosures: I worked for the Daily News for 17 years. I would prefer to see both papers thrive.

They won't charge for news.

I got in trouble with my newspaper-loving friends again today, when I started my morning by re-Tweeting a a video link showing Jeff Jarvis on the CBC last night, talking about The Decline of the Newspaper.

In response to those who still think the old newspaper company model can be saved by charging for online content (if it ever could), I argued that discussions on the future of economically sustainable journalism have been raging for years – from SXSW to blogworldexpo to Twitter to local barcamps (like this one, upcoming soon) and more. But the newspaper deciders haven’t even shown up, as if in total denial while readers shift online.

Meanwhile, I once watched a panel of successful independent bloggers pounding their fists with laughter about how much money the newspaper industry was leaving on the table.

I can’t imagine anybody paying for news again anymore than they will pay for search engines or online classifieds. Instead, we should be looking at how Google, craigslist and others make a fortune without charging us a dime. That’s the future of business, whether we deliver the news in print or online.

Jarvis’s book – What Would Google Do – articulates my argument exactly. Also, I polled my Twitter following a while back, asking “Will you pay to read The New York Times online?” They will not.

I’ll be OK if I’m wrong; I’d honestly love to go back and work in a post-desperate newspaper industry, but I can’t fathom the possibility, at least not before I see the execs embrace some new strategies.