USA Today Anti Social Media? Gannett CEO Warns Staffers of Blogger Speculation
Michael Arrington speculates that “USA Today’s social network experiment” may not be paying off, based primarily on traffic numbers supplied by controversial data house Compete.
Coincidentally, the head of USA Today owner Gannett, Craig Dubow, warned company staffers last week, of “unwarranted speculation generated by a few bloggers.”
“Dear co-workers” Dubow began in a memo to employees, as cited by Editor & Publisher:
I want to put an end to the unwarranted speculation generated by a few bloggers this week. A change in control of Gannett is not in the works or even anticipated.
This handful of bloggers made some incorrect assumptions about information in our quarterly filing with the SEC. None of the bloggers called and checked with us before speculating that we were preparing for a sale. We are not.
The principal goal of Dubow’s personal shoutout to the Gannett troops was to encourage his team to perservere with the “lots of good things happening throughout the company” and to look forward to more “interesting new approaches to innovation” slated for the fall.
“So, stand down. Relax,” Dubow wrote:
Gannett, along with the media industry, is facing some tough times but we are avctively and agressively moving forward with out strategic plan. We are seeing success and creating more of it everyday.
Dubrow acknowledges “it may feel like a tough ride at the moment,” but affirms his appreciation to employees for “all you are doing to make this transformation happen.”
After all, the “USAToday experiment” Arrington references began just months ago. Is it not premature to predict failure not only for Gannett’s social media endeavors, but for all of old media’s embrace of new media tools?
Arrington concludes his USA Today speculation by speculating on bad times ahead for the entire social news phenomenon underway:
Perhaps news and social networking just don’t mix.
Really? Perhaps Kevin Rose would suggest otherwise, and, as of yesterday, Scott Karp as well.
TechCrunch commenter Max undersocres the risks of extrapolating from Compete’s numbers:
The March to June comparison is fairly meaningless, particulalry in news segment, where traffic is driven by news events. Big stories in March versus a slow news month in June would easily mask smaller trends.
A visit to USAToday.com suggests that not only is an engaged readership actively interacting with ”real” USA Today journalists, USA Today editorial, itself, is embracing its citizens’ journalists.
The lead quotes on USAToday.com’s masthead come from reader contributors, NOT paid Gannett reporters.
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