Adrian Drury, a media analyst, says. "Fundamentally, at a brand-value level, you are killing the idea of times.co.uk as a channel choice for news online. That is something that is very difficult to recover" ... "The most disappointing thing for me is that there doesn't seem to have been any strategy to create unique, compelling content that would differentiate the online product," says Paul Bradshaw, a specialist in new media journalism. "I think it's 'business as usual' – which probably betrays that this is really about protecting the print product rather than establishing a genuine business around online content."

That said ...

The News of the World website is set to introduce charging next month. This is seen as a "statement of intent" by industry observers, and an indication that the other paywalls have not been disastrous.

"This is not a numbers game," says Greg Hadfield, former head of digital development at Telegraph Media Group and now an executive at the media agency CogApp. "The Times and The Sunday Times have a near-unique opportunity to build a one-to-one communication with someone about whom they know their name, email and credit card number." ... Bradshaw too believes that "the strategy is more about gathering consumer information than selling content."

News Corp. plans national newspaper for tablet computers and cellphones

News Corp. Chief Executive Rupert Murdoch is embarking on an ambitious plan for a new national digital newspaper to be distributed exclusively as paid content for tablet computers such as Apple Inc.'s iPad and mobile phones. The initiative, which would directly compete with the New York Times, USA Today and other national publications, is the latest attempt by a major media organization to harness sexy new devices to reach readers who increasingly consume their news on the go. The development underscores how the iPad is transforming the reading habits of consumers much like the iPod changed how people listen to music. via latimes.com -- COMMENT -- As opposed News Corp.'s pay-wall strategy deployed on The Times, this play makes a lot of sense. Delivering content to a device on which readers are more likely to pay for content is a much easier sell. Crafting content specifically for tablet and mobile usage makes even more sense.

The high tech industry and those who watch it have become so enamored with facts and figures from comScore (SCOR), it seems to have become the official record keeper for everyone's Internet activity. There are just a couple of problems: all data is suspect, particularly if you can't find out exactly how someone created a forecast, and publicly-held comScore has a vested interest in being seen as the place to get the figures.

So it was interesting today to see often embattled Yahoo (YHOO) smack down comScore for being enormously off in its estimations.

COMMENT -- Media groups have complained about ComScore for years, but had to grin and bear it. But when you're off by a billion pageviews ... in one month ... tracking a site like Yahoo? To me panel-based metrics by nature underreport work-based audiences which is pretty significant, especially for media clients.

We need to stop the metric abuse today! If we’re going to change the face of marketing, we need to ensure our analytics foundations are sound. I’m making the pledge to not tolerate metric abuse any longer, and solemnly swear to:

1. Only refer to actual metrics as metrics
2. Be specific and never use vague metrics
3. Never give fancy, meaningless names to metrics
4. Avoid renaming well-known metrics and go with standards if they are in place whenever possible
5. Ensure new metrics are well-defined and documented for anyone that will be consuming the reports/analysis
6. Only use acronyms that are well-established and understood
7. Make sure metrics are meaningful and actionable
8. Be careful with complex, calculated metrics that may be less actionable
9. Avoid “nice-to-know” metrics that waste time and mostly go unused
10. Strive to correct people that misuse the terms: metric and KPI

The Interactive Advertising Bureau is quietly trying to change that, spearheading the creation of a gold standard for Web measurement.

“The limitations and the confusion are very disruptive to our conversation with the client,” said Chris Hiland, president of media networks at Geomentum, a hyper-local marketing unit of IPG. “When you see a different number on the ad server and a different number on a log-based server, you don’t have confidence, and that keeps spend rates down,” said Dave Morgan, founder of Simulmedia, a company that helps TV companies improve the effectiveness of tune-in spots. ... Local newspapers have it tough because panel-based measurement isn’t well-suited to local sites, resulting in erratic results.

That’s why Mark Contreras is a vocal backer of the IAB’s standardization effort. He’s svp of newspapers for Scripps, he said that third-party audience estimates for Scripps’ sites range from 30 million all the way to nearly 100 million.

-- Comment --
Pick your company -- NielsenNet, Comscore, Compete -- their web audience measurements all have their flaws. So this IAB initiative is a good start to address some glaring weaknesses. Take for example that panel-based systems virtually ignore the workplace audience, which is pretty darn important to digital media properties. Add to that Scripps' audience estimates that range from 30M to 100M (really?) for their sites, and you can see why advertisers say, "Uh, I'm not paying top dollar until I'm sure how many people I'm really reaching."

Jeff Moores

Law firms, particularly those that represent plaintiffs, are increasingly devoting resources to developing a presence online, where consumers—and potential clients—congregate. And some of those firms are also creating news sites, such as newsinferno.com andconsumerwarningnetwork.com, with content created by employees.

-- Comment --
You can see this troubling trend, -- DuPont, IBM and law firms are asking themselves -- "Why should I rent a media group's audience via advertisements, if I can create my own with targeted microsites?" This WSJ.com story points to a law firm's investment in "20 technology specialists who write copy for its roughly 300 websites" as the marketing avenue of choice. To compete, media groups need to be more savvy about developing custom presentations like the award-winning Gatorade campaign. These carry greater value for the client and can't easily be duplicated by in-house digital ad copy teams.

Gatorade has faced stiff competition in recent years from Coca-Cola rivals Powerade and Vitaminwater and -- believe it or not -- tap water. (The recession had a lot to do with that.) As Gatorade's senior manager of consumer engagement Morgan Flatley observes, the target consumer is "all about getting that performance edge" -- and Gatorade would have to promise them that.

That gave Porcaro an idea. He tapped Stack Media (which produces and distributes performance, training and lifestyle content for die-hard athletes) to develop a dedicated site known as the Gatorade Performance Center. It would be a one-stop training destination for teens, complete with training tips, customized workouts, and an interactive "Ask the Experts" feature.

The effort (which captures the honors for digital Media Plan of the Year in the under-$1 million category) went beyond Gatorade's standing reputation as a sports drink and helped establish the brand as an athletic-training authority.

As Porcaro puts it: "It was a classic example of what happens when [a brand] finds the right [media] partner and they're both on the same wavelength."