Coming a bit late to this discussion of The Economist – I’ll leave the heavy lifting to Jeremy at the loose wire blog. His point:
There’s a lesson in here for all mainstream media. Well, several, actually:
- Don’t focus on eyeballs. Concentrate on attention. Your readers won’t thank you for wasting their time with more stuff to read. They want the digest.
- Don’t try to be trendy. The Economist looks little different than it did in the 1970s. That, actually, is the selling point.
- Online has lots of different opportunities. I don’t think they’ve made full use of them yet, but at least they haven’t thrown out the baby with the bathwater. That may prove the smartest thing they’ve done so far. As Hirschorn says in the TV clip, when you can get a subscription to a magazine for virtually nothing, what kind of commitment does that demonstrate (on either side?)
I’ve been more or less spectacularly wrong thus far on the economics of long form journalism – my optimism clearly exceeded the business reality. Still, I believe the form and format are and will remain important. In an age of 140 character thoughts, depth remains valued.