Trust me. The HT is not worth the $.75 they want for the print edition or whatever they charge for the on-line edition. I read it with breakfast at McDonalds ever now and then. My nephew is a reporter with the on-line edition of the Chicago Tribune, and it's a struggle all over, but ANY media outlet MUST deliver value or face extinction.
I wanted to throw another factor into the formula - the existence of paid ads on the HT website.
There are basically only two business models for online content.
Free content - the visitors see content for free and the site owner is compensated from sales of either products or advertising on the site.
Paid content - the content on the site is the product for which visitors are willing to pay the site owner to access. Paid subscribers are not interested in seeing a bunch of advertising on such a site unless it would be of direct benefit to them as it relates to what they are reading.
For example, could you imagine if Amazon.com tried to implement a business model where customers had to pay Amazon in order to see the products listed?
Unfortunately, for some reason, the leadership at the HT (and many other dying publications) fail to appreciate the degree to which their misunderstanding is cutting off their potential for revenue. As long as they continue to maintain this position it is only a matter of time before they meet their demise.
Social media is changing what we "know" to be true. Question - what is changing - the world or our perception of the world? Is social media making things different or is it just shedding light on what has always been there? Or maybe a little of both. Either way, it is imperative to know and understand the difference between what is valid (proven true by future events) and reasonable (considered to be true based on past events).
Jay - Really nice post on design thinking. "Empathy. Teamwork. Leadership. Driving change. No hierarchy (aka - networks). No boundaries. Accelerating change." If teamwork covers collaboration - I think you nailed it! Just when I thought nothing new could be added to the discussion of design thinking - I learned something new here. Thanks again and keep posting! Randy www.architects2zebras.com
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Jay Steele's Posterous
Human Computer Interaction/design Master's Candidate at Indiana University School of Informatics and Computing.
Researching design thinking, design pedagogy and social media for business organizations.
Believes that design thinking can help organizations adapt to and adopt disruptive innovations like social media.
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Randy
www.architects2zebras.com