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Gannett newspapers major change to emphasize websites and user generated content

November 6, 2006

In a sure sign that newspapers are shifting to the net and user generated content, Gannett Newspapers, the USA’s largest newspaper group in terms of circulation with 90 daily newspapers, is changing all of its newspapers into ‘local information centers.’

The initiative emphasizes four goals:

  • Prioritize local news over national news.
  • Publish more user-generated content.
  • Become 24-7 news operations, in which the newspapers do less and the websites do much more.
  • Use crowdsourcing methods to put readers to work as watchdogs, whistle-blowers and researchers in large, investigative features.

For complete details read ‘Gannett explodes the newsroom‘ from Jeff Jarvis and Amy Gahran’s ‘Gannett Information Centers’ — Good for Daily Journalism?

Reading from Jeff’s post and cite to Jeff Howe’s crowdsourcing, this is not going to sit well with many of Gannett’s reporters and editors. Gannett knows that and still made the change apparently knowing it was adapt or die.

Sure makes Mike Davidson and the guys at Newsvine look pretty good. They’re a year ahead of Gannett and don’t having traditional journalists resisting the inevitable.

And for lawyers and other professionals publishing blogs, the opportunities for syndicating your content are forever expanding.

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