Present bad news nicely

The New York Times reported a couple of days ago on the dramatic situation of newspapers in the USA. It used a, now often applied, data visualisation technique to show the the changes taking place in circulation of the major titles. AdAge, the advertising industry magazine, mentioned that this technique is becoming the new narrative of the online business. As data is getting more and more complex and difficult to capture in PowerPoint-based charts, and as consumers want to be able to absorb data fast and in an interesting way, data visualisation has plenty of growth potential. Visa applies the technique already in a microsite.

Fourth quarter, credit crises and more bad news

The circulation figures of the USA newspapers show a decline of almost 5% in 2008 compared to the first six months in 2007. Only USA Today and The Wall Street Journal remained almost unchanged. The decline coincides with news about lay offs of newsroom staff, closing down of newspapers, increased use of e-books announced at the Frankfurter Buchmesse and the deal Google made over the digitisation of libraries worldwide.

The news gathering and news dissemination is at stake. Customers still read the news, but more do so online, and (almost all) for free. Advertising revenues for the printed newspaper decline as fast as the Dow Jones, so how to pay the news makers. A new business model is required, soon.