Here’s the latest 4MR audio report from MediaShift. In this week’s edition, I look at the latest moves by Google to make nice with online publishers. First came word the search giant was working on a micropayment solution. Then came the release of Fast Flip, a visual browsing service for news sites, with publishers splitting ad revenues with Google. Also, BusinessWeek magazine is nearing a sale as McGraw-Hill puts the 80-year-old magazine on the block. The magazine lost $43 million last year, and its online revenues have been flat.
Check it out:
Background music is “What the World Needs” by the The Ukelele Hipster Kings via PodSafe Music Network.
Here are some links to related sites and stories mentioned in the podcast:
Google micro-payments system at P2PNet
Google developing a micropayment platform and pitching newspapers at Nieman Journalism Lab
Google’s Fast Flip — a Cruel Joke on the News Industry at Online Journalism Blog
Can Google Save Your Local Paper? Not Likely at Infoworld
Google Fast Flip: Internet Research Gets a New Look at Web Worker Daily
A Not-So-Fast Flip Through Google’s Shiny New Toy at Media Decoder
Google Fast Flip: The platypus of news readers at News.com
BusinessWeek, on the Block and Ailing at NY Times
The Sale of BusinessWeek — What Went Wrong? at BusinessWeek
What Went Wrong With BusinessWeek? ‘Culture, Offers One Genius at PaidContent
The Great Debate on Micropayments and Paid Content, Part 1 at PBS MediaShift
Here’s a graphical view of last week’s MediaShift survey results. The question was: “What do you think about a possible tablet computer from Apple?”
Also, be sure to vote in our poll about what you think about the future of business magazines like Fortune and BusinessWeek.
Mark Glaser is executive editor of MediaShift and Idea Lab. He also writes the bi-weekly OPA Intelligence Report email newsletter for the Online Publishers Association. He lives in San Francisco with his son Julian. You can follow him on Twitter @mediatwit.
Thanks for the update. I have been waiting for Google to go to this model. I will also look at Fast Flip as well. This is the first place I have seen it discussed.
Thank you for the news. I just don’t understand how anyone could be mad at google when google is what helps them get views. It is kind of confusing. The solution is that people want to visit sites without ads.
Hi, let me make a suggestion: you should consider making a “4 Minute Roundup” podcast, so that users wouldn’t need to come to the site to listen the audio.
Thassius,
You can indeed subscribe to the 4MR podcast by going to this feed:
http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/audio_podcast.xml