What does the Yahoo deal mean to the future of the news industry? Will proxying the technological leadership of the industry to a dot-com that has no vested interest in news or the First Amendment lead to a slow fading of organizations which practice journalism at the local level? Is it possible to sell local advertising by remote control? ">Some newspaper companies [1] have already decided it is possible to prepare ads remotely [2]. And to what extent is this opening the door to Yahoo developing independent relationships with the 12 million daily subcribers of these initial participants? Could this lead to an acquisition by Yahoo of some or all of these news organizations?

Here's a roundup of some other commentary, as well as a link to a few posts of of mine (talking about newspapers' need to become their users' "home base" online) which may be relevant:
http://newshare.typepad.com/newshare/2006/01/newspapers_must.html [3]
http://www.mediagiraffe.org/wiki/index.php/Densmore_clickshare [4]
http://www.newshare.com/interactive/ [5]

-- bill densmore

Jeff Jarvis' (MGP2006 alum) blog post at BuzzMachine is insightful as he examines the issue of whether the Yahoo deal is just perpetuating an old business model. His thinking comes closest to suggesting the notion of newspaper as "information valet." (Bill Densmore's term) http://www.buzzmachine.com/index.php/2006/11/20/the-yahoos-and-yahoo/ [6]

Poynter Institute senior analyst Rick Edmonds (who came to MGP2006 in June), suggests the Yahoo deal reflects a splintering of the newspaper industry which could be a bad thing.
http://poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=114233 [7]

Blogger, consultant and MGP2006 co-convener Vin Crosbie (MGP2006 co-convenor) is far more blunt, declaring that this deal proves, "It's too late for the newspaper industry." (Vin and his family own the Willimantic Press in Connecticut, BTW). http://rebuildingmedia.corante.com/archives/2006/11/20/hundreds_of_ameri... [8]

Mitch Ratcliffe, a Kelsey Group analyst, writes on ZDNet that the deal solves a major problem for Yahoo -- how to economically get into local advertising markets. The unanswered question: What do local newspapers get in return?
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ratcliffe/index.php?p=227 [9]

Nat Worden writing at TheStreet.COM explains that the other major newspaper publishers (McClatchy, Gannett, Tribune, NYTimes, Washington Post) have already done a deal with Google.
http://www.thestreet.com/pf/newsanalysis/mediaentertainment/10323421.htm... [10]

On his blog, a former San Francisco Chronicle editor and online payments entrepreneur, Alan Mutter, says the newspapers need to be careful to avoid being on the short end of these partnerships. http://newsosaur.blogspot.com/2006/11/second-bananas-lack-appeal.html [11]

Will Shanley's story in the Denver Post (MediaNews flagship) details in bullet-point form the components of the deal and makes it pretty clear that for Yahoo, this is aimed at boosting them from an also-ran in the classified marketplace.
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_4690392 [12]

A second-day story by Shanley in the Denver Post emphasizes that the deal will help newspapers reach out to the 90% of metro-area advertisers who can't afford to be in their print product.
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_4696856 [13]

The Washington Post story notes that this is a capitulation to a major dot-com by newspaper companies tired of losing classified revenues, but is otherwise not insightful.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/20/AR200611... [14]

Louis Hau, writing on Forbes.com, summarizes the benefits for both sides nicely:
"Enter Yahoo! and its search and advertising networks. Under the partnership announced Monday, Yahoo! will provide participating newspapers with access to its technology platform to sell online classified advertising. The company will also provide papers with Web search and mapping functions to make their Web sites more appealing and will distribute the papers' content in Yahoo! News and Yahoo! search results. For Yahoo!, the deal gives the company access to local content, accelerates its move into local advertising and will help promote its job-listing site HotJobs, which draws less traffic than competitor Monster.com."
http://www.forbes.com/digitalentertainment/2006/11/20/local-newspapers-o... [15]

At the McClatchy-owned Sacramento Bee, writer Dale Kasler says the deal means Yahoo and the newspaper chains will eventually share news with each other. http://www.sacbee.com/103/story/80396.html [16]

Good Morning Silicon Valley blogger John Murrell writes the deal was "put together by MediaNews CEO Dean Singleton and Hearst CEO Victor Ganzi." It adds: "Other newspaper companies are expected to join later. The current members publish 176 newspapers in 38 states with a paid circulation of 12 million and Web sites drawing 58 million monthly visitors. Yahoo attracts 130 million monthly visitors." http://citmedia.org/blog/2006/11/20/yahoos-partnership-with-newspapers/ [17]

Murrell's post adds:

Reaction ranged from skepticism to scorn. Said journalism prof Mindy McAdams: "Giving away your local news. Oh, yeah, brilliant. The only unique thing you're got, and you're going to hand it over to people who know how to exploit it -- and also cut you out of the equation. ... Seven newspaper companies, wandering lost in the woods, walk into the gingerbread house. There will be a big pot boiling on the hearth very soon." Marshall Kirkpatrick at Techcrunch writes, "Will this partnership make a significant difference for either party? I don't think it will. Small, agile, low-overhead local sites that incorporate everything from the authenticity of blogging to the power of video to the immediacy and usefulness of mobile devices are just around the corner. Newspapers will likely retain superior access to other lumbering social institutions for some time, but all parties are going to have to change faster than they will be comfortable with." And former Merc columnist Dan Gillmor has his doubts: "This won.t be the only move the newspapers make to take the digital world as seriously as they must. They.ll have to try lots of ideas, acting like companies facing massive secular change, which they are. I still don.t see how they can bring a monopoly business model successfully into an age where not only is the monopoly disappearing but the competition is most seriously from companies that want to take only the revenues and leave the journalism to someone else."

McAdams: http://tojou.blogspot.com/2006/11/hotjobs-yahoo-another-desperate-grab.h... [18]
TechCrunch:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/11/20/can-yahoo-and-local-papers-save-eac... [19]
Dan Gillmor:
http://citmedia.org/blog/2006/11/20/yahoos-partnership-with-newspapers/ [20]

Staci Kramer at PaidContent:
http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/its-official-yahoo-hotjobs-seven-newspa... [21]

The New York Times article, excerpted below, notes an important fact in the last paragraph: Hillary Schneider, who headed the Knight-Ridder digital operation, has joined Yahoo. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/20/technology/20yahoo.html [22]

By MIGUEL HELFT and STEVE LOHR
Published: November 20, 2006

A consortium of seven newspaper chains representing 176 daily papers across the country is announcing a broad partnership with Yahoo to share content, advertising and technology, another sign that the wary newspaper business is increasingly willing to shake hands with the technology companies they once saw as a threat.

In the first phase of the deal, the newspaper companies will begin posting their employment classified ads on Yahoo's classified jobs site, HotJobs, and start using HotJobs technology to run their own online career ads.

But the long-term goal of the alliance with Yahoo, according to one senior executive at a participating newspaper company, is to be able to have the content of these newspapers tagged and optimized for searching and indexing by Yahoo.

In that way, local news -- one of the pillars of the newspaper business -- would become part of a large information network that would increase usefulness for readers and value to advertisers.

-- SNIP ---

"There is significant opportunity to materially grow local advertising," said Hilary Schneider, a former executive for Knight Ridder who recently joined Yahoo as senior vice president for marketplaces. Ms. Schneider is responsible for an array of Yahoo sites that include autos, real estate and jobs, and the three largest classified categories.

Also see:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_con... [23]