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The new media metamorphosis is well underway

Shel and Neville from the For Immediate Release (FIR) Podcast conducted an outstanding interview with Tom Foremski, founder and chief of the widely read blog, Silicon Valley Watcher. For me, the content, timing and even the facilitation of this podcast is very interesting because it illustrates, from several perspectives (*see perspectives below) how old media is evolving into new media. PR blogger Chuck Tanowitz calls this phenomenon Media Metamorphosis.

In the FIR interview Tom Foremski, talked about how he transitioned from being a full time journalist with The Financial Times to a full time journalist and media entrepreneur using a blog platform as his primary publishing medium and source of personal income. The point here is that Tom is still a journalist; the only difference is the primary medium he utilizes to reach his audience. Tom also talked about the future of the press release and why he thinks a traditional press release is a waste of energy. He also had some advice for PR people who want to know how they should deal with bloggers — “Public Relations should use the same principles they use on journalists, you identify the influencers in your market and you reach out to them”. Listen to the interview.

What’s ironic is this interview coincides with recent (and re-occuring) story in the Boston Globe titled “Newspaper circulation drops in Hub”. The story reports “Circulation at the nation’s daily newspapers declined an average of 2.5 percent in the latest six-month reporting period as readers continued to migrate to the Internet, with losses hitting Boston papers especially hard.” The reports also stated that local papers, “The MetroWest Daily News posted a 12.7 percent decline in Sunday circulation in the latest six-month reporting period”. Boston and San Francisco seem to be hit the hardest. I expect that is because these are two of the most wired cities in the country.

Tom made so many great points in the FIR interview and the newspaper circulation story reinforces this main point.. the media metamorphosis is well underway.

*The perspectives referenced in the first paragraph are…

• Old fashioned publishing and the expense of local distribution vs. digital global distribution and RSS.
• Old fashioned expensive broadcast media vs. the efficiency of podcasting and interview conducted on two continents.
• Access that the general public has to tools that can enable them to become a global media enterprise.
• Consumers ability to consume where and when we want.
• Please add your own in the comments area…

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Filed under: New Communications

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