The Black Report: The Future of News

Black R ep // ort Issue:03

Special Report:

The Wireless Generation –

The Rise of the iPad, the decline of the computer and the dangers of ‘always-on’ digital burnout.

Future News

Trends // Ideas // Innovation // Inspiration

Monthly report covering consumer and social trends, trends in marketing comms, packaging, product innovation and beyond...

The Black Report is...

Laura Demasi has been a trends journalist for 15 years, working for the Sydney Morning Herald and many women’s magazines including Vogue. She now works with brands on innovation, trends and ideation. She has worked with major Australian brands including Red Bull, Fosters and Foxtel.

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Creative by: www.seekanddesign.com.au

The Future of News Editor & Founder of uncluttered white spaces On Twitter @benrennie

Around a decade ago, such an innovation might have

technology, people, travel and the environment at a

taken shape as a large plasma TV in a big office block

faster rate than ever before.

welcoming visitors to the building, or at best, connecting cities by way of conference calling. Today, this kid,

It begs the question. What is the future of the

one reader at a time, quickly shifts from being a blogger,

newspaper? Will the newspaper live forever?

to having a voice on industry and becoming a leading activist for new business models all over the world.

What happens once a newspaper or magazine goes online? It becomes neither a magazine or a newspaper.

In a busy cafe, somewhere on the outskirts of your City (let’s say Detroit for the sake of this article), sits a young student, typing away on his laptop. He is writing about the rise of the Detroit entrepreneur’s movement, a shift from the industrial age focusing on a new Detroit, with a low point of entry creating a platform for anybody to start anything. This kid is reporting on current trends, news and the future of technology and he has a world wide audience.

As he types, people walk past, their smart phones in

It becomes just news. We all know the environmental

hand reminding them to stop and drink something,

pluses with decreased burden on paper production

to call John back, to eat some nuts and to get that last

including its attendant use of strong chemicals and

project out the door as yoga is creeping up. All the while

all the carbon footprint implications of distributing

informing us that this weekend is going to be sunny,

physical newspapers around the world. That is

so book that cheap accommodation that just popped up

important. What I am interested in is the change that

on Groupon. All from the palm of their hand or pocket.

is occurring right before us, right now.

This kid in Detroit may not realize it (but I assume he

Who produces the news and at what cost once the

does) but as he types, one word at a time, he is evolving

papers are gone? While most online content is

an industry. At one end of the scale, we have Wiki-leaks,

(currently) free, the New York Times, Murdoch and other

sharing information faster and with “arguably” more

big hitters have implemented pay-walls for online news,

accuracy (without the bias of any newspaper) and at the

creating paid ipad and iPhone applications.

other end, bloggers continue to report on current affairs,

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Is your CEO ready for a shifting future?

The issue still remains, there will always be news

The online community provides plenty of options with

online and it will always be free, somewhere.

amazing journalism; honest, fast and free reporting on most things we previously paid good money for. mind” on the matter is a classic example of an

In 2010, Rupert Murdoch, speaking at George Washington University commented on his admiration

Newspapers will make a shift from the current

industry in crisis, looking to reinvent itself to a fast

for Apple’s iPad, which he stated is a “glimpse of the

model into online communities, either free or paid.

moving C-generation of connected, smart and well

future”. Interestingly, he all but called for the end of

Focusing on two-way communication, not broadcast.

educated consumers already ahead of the game.

the physical paper and ink newspaper. Stating, “If you

The future is in building and engaging a community

have less newspapers and more of these [iPads]…

of interest by encouraging active participation,

I agree with Mr Murdoch, the iPad is a revolutionary

it may be the saving of the newspaper industry.”

by allowing community members to actively discuss

innovation that will effect change and speed up

the news, a progression from existing blogs where

the demise of printed media and in particular,

This is an amazing insight into Murdoch’s thinking.

the community can also connect, in a way that social

the newspaper. That does not bother me. The tablet

He really thinks, like many other commenter’s, that

networks such as Linkedin and Facebook do but

business is cool, convenient, cost effective and

the iPad [tablets] could save the newspaper industry.

circulating around breaking news, world issues,

accessible. Wouldn’t we rather spend our time

He’s not at all afraid of technology, as long as it can

sport and current affairs. Driven by community

and money on people, bloggers and organisations

be bent to his agenda: A paid iPad application with

demand, not the advertising dollar or paid content.

that want to offer smarter, faster, more efficient (well-edited) content rather than news that feels

subscription access and all the protection of Apple’s locked-down iTunes distribution system lines up

Murdoch has completed the erection of paywalls

sweetly with Murdoch’s vision for the future of news.

around his news content, and has created methods to

squeezed, cheap and funded by corporations?

block or ban “companies like Google or Microsoft or

In the race to shift news from print to tablets,

Some news publications are dying fast and others

whoever from taking stories for nothing” by forbidding

with generation-c driving the change, connection

need to die out so that people with a passion for the

their web crawler technologies from accessing it.

has become the new c-word!

with a different business model, whose value

Murdoch’s dig at a competitor’s efforts at erecting

How are you connecting to your future? Welcome to our

proposition is good enough that people are willing

a paywall, snubbing it as halfhearted and that the

third issue of The Black Report...dedicated to mobile

to pay to participate.

management doesn’t “seem able to make up its

technologies. Enjoy.

news can look at creating online news communities

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1. iPads our new constant companions keep us connected to work.

Smartphones (led by the iPhone) may have revolutionised not only the way we communicate with each other but how we perceive and interact with the world at large - but the iPad is not far behind. New research shows that iPads are being used in all manner of public and private places keeping workers continuously connected to the office.

Where we’re using our iPads An Australian survey reveals: - 49% of workers used their iPads to send emails while they were on holidays - 23% of workers used their iPads to send emails from bed - 21% of workers used their iPads to send emails from restaurants - 42% of workers had used their iPads to send emails from an entertainment event

View the Link:

- 19% of workers admitted to using their iPads

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/workers-on-ipads-

from churches and other places of worship

in-bed-church-holiday/story-fn6b3v4f-1226130743852

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2. Smartphones and tablets cutting the computer cord .

A major study – ‘The Pew Internet Project’ – reveals just how great the proliferation of smartphones has been

- When asked what device they normally use to access the internet, 25% of smartphone owners say that they mostly go online using their phone, rather than with a computer.

in the USA and how Americans are using their phones. Conducted by the Pew Research Center, the study shows there has been a significant shift towards smartphones and away from desktop and laptop computers to access the internet on a daily basis.

Some of the key findings of the Pew study: - 35% - one third of American adults – own a smartphone, and two-thirds of them sleep with their smartphones right next to their beds - 87% of smartphone owners access the internet or email on their handheld, including two-thirds (68%) who do so on a typical day.

View the Link: http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Smartphones.aspx

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Smartphones in Australia A similar trend is occurring in Australia. A global study by Google Australia and Ipsos Research reveals how Australians have embraced the smartphone revolution in comparison to their international counterparts.

“ The rise of smartphones is dramatically increasing the use of the internet overall in Australia. We’re seeing mobile usage and smartphone usage starting to approach or even match PC usage.”

Ryan Hayward, Google’s mobile product marketing manager for the Asia-Pacific region.

Some of the Key findings of the Google study: - 49% of Australians have a smartphone – the highest smartphone penetration in the world.

- 44% of these use their smartphones to do local searches each day - 1 in 3 mobile searches is local.

- 80% of local information seekers have reached out to a local business after a mobile search.

- 46% wont leave their house without their smartphone.

- Internet usage could soon eclipse PC internet usage as 36% of respondents said they expected to use the web more on the smartphone in the future compared to 28% for the PC. - 79% of top advertisers do not have a mobile optimized website.

Smartphones globally A global study by IMS research predicts one billion smartphone sales by 2016.

The study predicts that sales of smartphones will exceed 420 million devices in 2011, accounting for nearly 28 percent of the entire global handset market View the Link: http://www.techjournalsouth.com/2011/07/smartphone-sales-headedfor-1b-devices-nokia-share-declines-samsung-leading/

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Smartphones in Australia CONT.

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3. Digital fatigue: Is ubiquitous connection causing burnout?

How much connection is too much? Just how information can you digest? How much of this information is genuinely important and how much of it is just distraction?

How much time does social networking take you away from real-life networking and socializing? What is all this instant access doing to our brains and our ability to focus?

These are just some of the questions being asked by a rising tide of commentators who say that mobile technology is taking over our lives.

Bestselling books such as Hamlet’s Blackberry by William Powers and The Shallows by Nicholas Carr warn against the dangers of being ‘aways-on’ and ‘always- connected’ via our mobile smartphones and tablets, which include rising stress levels, information overload, connection addiction, choice fatigue and the death of solitude.

UWS INSIGHT/ Smartphones and tablets have revolutionised the world, changing the way we communicate and consume. As global smartphone and tablet penetration continues at break-neck speed ‘mobile’ marketing will eclipse all other platforms. Is your business ready? Are you one of the 87% of brands whose website is not optimized for mobile?

While consumers continue to embrace mobile media the anxiety over digital fatigue and over-connection hangs in the shadows. How will your brand respond to this important counter-current?

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Info-graphic: ‘The State of the Internet‘ RIGHT NOW Statistics are a moving target, right? Especially with the internet where developments occur every second. This brilliant infograph from OnlineSchools.org is live, constantly calculating various statistics – from how many new wesbites have launched to the fastest rising Google searches, gender usage for a host of the world’s biggest sites and how much time we spend online.

UWS INSIGHT/ Live tools are the future of digital insight. Tracking a constantly evolving multifaceted platform like the internet demands that we are watching every moment. Live tools like this infograph provide a powerful window into the NOW, rather than the yesterday.

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Info-graphic: ‘The State of the Internet‘ RIGHT NOW

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The latest on Twitter 1. The Twitter-Mood-Meter Using Twitter to gauge our moods Twitter’s potential as a tool for social and consumer research has reached an entirely new and exciting level now that researchers have discovered how to use the micro-blogging site’s endless data stream to gauge our moods during different times of day.

Researchers at Cornell University analyzed more than 500 million tweets from 2.4 million people in 84 countries, and found striking similarities independent of country, culture or religion.

Cornell sociologists used a text-analysis program to search 509 million tweets made over a two-year period for words associated with a positive attitude, such as agree, fantastic and super, as well as for negative words, such as afraid, mad and panic.

Key finding of the study: - Positive mood peaked about 8am on weekdays, and again at the end.

UWS INSIGHT/ Mood is at the core of the psychology of consumption. Reaching potential consumers when they’re in the right mood can be crucial to how successfully your message is received. Are you talking to your consumers at the right time of day?

View the Link: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6051/1878.abstract

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Still with Twitter

Mashable has released this history-todate infograph on Twitter... who’s on it and who we’re following.

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Is Facebook the new Google?

The social network’s new Timeline feature redefines how we use and experience the web The days of Facebook primarily being a tool to connect with friends is over. The social network has never hidden its ambition to evolve into a real-time, Google-like search engine, the core tool in your daily digital life – and its newly announced Timeline feature brings it one giant step closer to this objective.

As the New York Time puts it, Facebook “wants to be a force that shapes what you watch, hear, read and buy.”

defined by those of your friends as you are exposed to their consumption habits - be it movies, shopping, whatever – on a minute-tominute basis.

By creating TimeLine, Facebook is in effect, trying to completely redefine how we search online – by allowing friends to direct friends to content.

UWS INSIGHT/ Timeline is one of the most significant developments to hit social media. Not only does it have the potential to redefine how we search for content and experience the web - transforming it into a real-time integrated medium – it also has the potential to transform how we consume.

And by allowing Facebook to see our consumption, the company will be able to mine even more valuable data than it does now about its users’ habits and desires, which in turn can be used to sell more fine-tuned advertising.

The Timeline feature allows you to see what your friends are doing in real time – Ben is watching the movie Inception, Jane is listening to Joss Stone, Kate is shopping at Gap, Matt is eating at McDonalds.

This massive ‘internal’ or ‘social’ web of information displayed along the real-time Timeline banner becomes an internet of its own, where your online choices are increasingly

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Real-Life toys merge with interactive Apps Disney and Lego pioneer a new category of physical iPad and iPhone enabled toys to create the ultimate interactive app and gaming experiences.

Gaming is still the top category when it comes to Apps - branded and otherwise. The best are pioneering new applications of technology like these.

Disney’s AppMATes Cars 2 Toys for the iPad creates a whole new category of iPad enabled gaming toys.

The toys trigger various levels, effects, sounds, narration and experiences based what car is actually placed on the iPad. It works by special sensors that are placed on the bottom of the cars and when pressed down on the iPad surface, the individual cars are recognised by the app accordingly.

The brilliant idea hits two birds with one powerful stone – not only driving downloads of the branded app but toy sales – in a whole new category of toys – as well.

Watch the video demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VaNzbCtxtcY

This new development from Disney is something a revolution that will bring the play experience literally to life. The brand has pioneered a system in which physical toys can be used to interact with iPad apps and games, transforming the iPad into an interactive play-mat.

It’s called AppMATes and first up is a product for the movie Cars 2 from Disney/Pixar. Released this month, consumers can buy the special iPad enabled toys and then download the app for free.

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Real-Life toys merge with interactive Apps CONT LEGO Meets Augmented Reality Gaming App The clever thing about this game is it’s simplicity - LEGO have kept the game accessible to a range of ages.

The app is based around the LEGO character ‘George’ who shows you pictures that you have to recreate from LEGO. Once the picture is complete in LEGO form, you take a picture of your object on the Playmat. From this picture, a brick recognition system from EyeCue awards you points for speed and accuracy.

Watch the video demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_ embedded&v=1DHZwSOVKBY

UWS INSIGHT/ As apps become more and more prominent in the marketing mix, innovative, ground-breaking ideas like these will become mandatory in helping brands stand out from an increasingly crowded space. By linking physical products with apps and games these brands are also directly driving product sales.

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Interactive installation Interactive is the new buzzword in experiential and installation marketing.

But engaging a cynical consumer by striking the right balance between entertainment, amusement, relevance and usefulness, isn’t always easy.

In these recent campaigns brand juggernauts Nokia, Virgin Mobile and Powerade get it right.

1. The Nokia Foursquare Gifting Machine Nokia US picks up on the increasing “Random Acts of Kindness” trend with this great interactive installation vending machine campaign. Using Foursquare, anyone can simply ‘check-in’ to one of the vending machines, that will then release a canister containing some sort of surprise, which could be anything from chocolates to the latest Nokia handset.

Watch the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSYqvIw KBS4&feature=player_embedded

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Interactive installation CONT 2. Mobile FreeFest: The interactive Echo Temple Virgin Mobile teamed up with the producers behind the Kyocera music festival to create The Echo Temple, a brilliant installation staged at the Virgin

UWS INSIGHT/

Mobile FreeFest, which allowed festival-goers to play virtual instruments and create music by moving their body in front of motion-tracking cameras.

Festival-goers could use special fans to help control the volume, pitch and unique audio effects as the cameras tracked them.

The Echo Temple included six monolithic speaker towers for the party goers to play with, all circling around a huge subwoofer station.

This unique interactive music experience proved to be a hit at the day-long, 50,000 strong-event, morphing into its own dance party.

View the Link: http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Ufro55cTp7w

3. Powerade: Football Twitter Campaign Twitter has become a default second screen during most big sporting events. Leveraging this Powerade Brazil created a live infographic for every game during the Copa America Argentina 2011, which is the

Interactive Installation is about creating a unique brand experience in a space that consumers are passionate about – be it on a dance floor or at a football game or via an unexpected act of kindness. The best interactive installations don’t ‘impose’ on consumers, they add another positive layer of experience to something they already enjoy.

It’s not about being in your face, it’s about being useful, fun and engaging.

most important football championship in South America.

Twitter aggregated every tweet about every game, and compiled them into an interactive infographic style interface where you could explore the social interaction through every minute of the match.

Source: DigitalBuzz

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DIGITAL Real Motion PROJECTION MAPPING This trend is much like the apps that use real-life toys that we saw earlier, in that it allows the real and virtual to seamlessly interact.

Large scale projection mapping isn’t new but its evolution to include interaction with real life objects represents an exciting opportunity to marketers.

These two examples demonstrate how interactivity brings projection mapping powerfully to life.

Watch the video: The World’s Biggest Space Invaders Game. http://vimeo.com/29838859

UWS INSIGHT/ Real Motion projection mapping demonstrates how crucial it is to keep evolving platforms and technologies so that they become more engaging.

For large scale events particularly, real-life projection mapping represents an opportunity to create high-impact, highly interactive and memorable brand experiences.

Watch the video: Wasps Rugby fight the Dragons http://vimeo.com/29840636

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Zegna Create the 3D iPad app immerse yourself with this in-store experience Ermenegildo Zegna, the Italian luxury menswear house, has launched an iPad application with a 3D

View the Link: http://www.zegnainstore.com/

immersive digital retail experience. The in-STORE app is a virtual boutique where customers are greeted by their own personal shopping guide, the actress Milla Jovovich.

The virtual environment is filled with clothes and models. Users can navigate the store by swiping the screen, and view products by tapping the items. The application is one of the first examples of an immersive app that tries to replicate the in-store experience.

UWS INSIGHT/ This is a unique call to action, creating a new experience will always draw in customers.

Research is yet to provide feedback on how the app is performing but it has been instantly attracting eyeballs. Can Zegna convert those views into transactions?

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Layar Create world first Welcome to the augmented reality browser.

Layar is the world‘s first augmented reality browser for mobiles phones, and works by overlaying information about your surroundings onto your camera phone viewer.

The application, mixing digital information with reality, currently works on the Android platform. Android has all the features necessary for an augmented reality application to work, including GPS, a compass, and a camera. However, Layar are also building browsers compatible with the iPhone and other platforms, including Symbian and Windows.

One application of the browser includes finding houses for sale, which are displayed using dots on the screen.

The information bar displays the address of houses and the price. Settings can be changed to allow the user to find exactly the type of houses they are looking for, and they can also choose to get additional information from the estate agent.

UWS INSIGHT/ View the Link: http://layar.eu/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b64_16K2e08

Augmented reality is an exciting new frontier in mobile marketing, as the ability to fuse digital information with real-life surroundings provides endless opportunities for marketers. Although the technology is still very much in its infancy, more exciting new applications are beginning to come to the forefront.

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Nike Chalkbot Takes Over the Tour De France The Chalkbot was automatically programmed to paint personalizes the text and online messages in yellow chalk around the 2,200 mile route of the Tour de France by Nike‘s innovative mobile campaign. Focusing on printing messages on roads around the Tour de France route.

As an extension of the Livestrong campaign, the aim was to provide messages of hope, support, and perseverance to the cyclists and inspire them to push themselves that little bit further.

After the Chalkbot prints the message, it takes a picture of the road, logs the time and GPS location then sends it back to the user.

The campaign also aimed to generate money for a charitable cause, as 100% of the profits from Nike‘s Livestrong collection go to the Lance Armstrong Foundation.

View the Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Jb-KT4r6NY

UWS INSIGHT/ The campaign was not only innovative, but also effective in terms of increasing the bottom line. The campaign coincided with a 46% jump in sales, generating $4 million for Lance Armstrong’s fight against cancer.

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Ikea Create a Showroom on Facebook Initially using the Facebook profile of store manager, Gordon Gustavsson, they uploaded pictures of the store‘s showrooms to Facebook.

Any friends who tagged the products with their names then won these items.

This was an effective promotional tool, as the campaign went viral. This is a good example of an innovative social media campaign on a low budget.

This makes it easy for users since they are already familiar with Facebook tagging.

In addition, using the Facebook platform is effective because of its inherent viral potential as user actions are automatically reported in news feeds.

View the Link: http://creativity-online.com/news/forsmanand-bodenfors-turns-facebook-tagging-into-apromotional-tool-for-the-opening-of-ikeas-newstore-in-malmo-sweden/140646

UWS INSIGHT/ Whilst this might now comply with Facebook terms of services, which limits the potential for campaigns like this in the future. The novelty of this campaign as the added incentive of prizes made this a viral success for Ikea. Make online content remarkable... ie.e, as Seth Godin states, worth remarking about.

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Chartbeat Creates Real-time analytics dashboard Chartbeat provides real-time analytics for websites and blogs, allowing site owners to see what their users are doing right now.

It shows visitors, load times, and referring sites on a minute-by-minute basis. The service also provides alerts the second your Website crashes or slows to a crawl.

Traditional analytics services have focused on understanding usual behaviour across persistent content. Real-time analytics can supplement the insights from traditional web analytics solutions, as the software focuses on unusual patterns of user behaviour.

Chartbeat makes data available in real-time, and also receives constant updates from a site’s users about what they are doing. For example, Chartbeat can tell the analyst how many people kept the page open and are on the page right now, and whether they are actively interacting with it.

View the Link: http://chartbeat.com/demo/#

UWS INSIGHT/ Chartbeat also includes alerts via SMS, email or iPhone and this means site owners get information in real-time such as when traffic spikes, page load slows, or the site goes down.

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The Editor’s Critical Links

5 Online Retailers Worth Visiting or perhaps, dare we say it... mimicking.

1. http://made.com Made.com is an online furniture retailer that ―cuts out the middle-man‖, and connects consumers with furniture makers directly.

The online site cuts out the retailer and the wholesaler, to offer consumers designer furniture at highly discounted prices.

2. http://preorder.it/ Preorder.It is a website that allows customers to pre-order new gadgets and electronic devices before the sale officially starts.

3. http://GoTryItOn.com GoTryItOn is an online fashion site, where users can upload their own photos in various outfits. The community can then vote to wear the outfit, or change it, choose between two different outfits.

4. http://martinandosa.com Martin + Osa‘s US website makes organizing products by type and by outfit. Users then click on each product range and have the option of buying each item with the outfit.

5. http://pronto.lastminute.com Lastminute.com has recently launched an innovative new search feature on its website, called Pronto. The search makes it easier for customers to find what they are looking for as drop-down lists appear for each search item, helping the user to make their search as precise as possible, by enabling them to specify different attributes of what they are looking for.

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Trends // Ideas // Innovation // Inspiration