If, like me, you’re a regular reader of The Guardian‘s media coverage, or you listen to their Media Talk podcast, you might have been surprised to have read the following in the February 2010 UK edition of Wired:

The Guardian… hopes users of it’s £2.39 (iPhone) app will pay extra for privileged access to in-demand columnists. (p.89)

This seems to fly in the face of what I know about The Guardian‘s digital strategy. The Guardian have always seemed to be staunch opponents of paywalls, and Emily Bell, Director of Digital Content at Guardian News & Media, always seems to me to take a particularly strong line that she doesn’t want to charge for online content. I asked her to comment on Wired‘s claim. “I’m not sure where the ‘columnists’ assumption comes from, not us, that’s for sure. Bit off beam” she told me on Twitter (incidentally the ‘columnists’ in question include David Rowan, Wired‘s Editor, who co-wrote the piece).

So, order is restored to my universe: The Guardian is still the bastion of free online content, creatively looking for another way to make digital pay. But wait, what’s this? Wired have weighed back in, with this tweet:

@jonhickman @emilybell Came from a senior Guardian exec who demonstrated the app in person, actually

So, are The Guardian really thinking about paywalls? Was this loose talk? Has there been a misunderstanding? Is someone fibbing?

I don’t know, but I think it matters. The Guardian‘s online brand seems to be about free: free data, free access, free comment. If there’s a grain of truth in Wired‘s claim, what does it tell us about the future of online access?

PHP Freelancer

Amidst the recent furore over Max Gogarty’s unblog-like/allegedly nepotistic travel blog entry on the Guardian website, a phrase caught my eye: Director of Digital Content Emily Bell’s reference to their “duty of care” to blogger Max.

It particularly interested me because I had a similar experience recently with a student blogger, who was on the receiving end of ferocious (and partly justified) criticism on an Australian alpha blog.

What was my duty of care to her?

On the one hand, it seemed, was an editorial role: to help guide her in responding to and managing the responses. I suggested splitting them into the constructive, the witty, and the insulting. To then dismiss the insulting ones, and write up a blog post compiling the best of the rest and admitting (as she did) that her original post was ill-informed or at least ambiguously phrased – this to be the first stage in a meaningful and hopefully constructive dialogue.

On the other hand was a pastoral role: to help her to deal with the emotional impact of such criticism. Thankfully she took it relatively well, and not too personally, even though some of the insults were personal. Various tactics were discussed for dealing with the responses, in terms of framing them more positively (as an opportunity rather than a threat) and in terms of taking emotional control.

The two roles mirrored the tension between serving both readers and writers, particularly when bloggers are not directly employed or paid by the news organisation.

So I’d like to ask you about your organisation:

Do you have a formal duty of care or contract drawn up with bloggers?

When a blog post goes viral like this, what procedures are put into place (e.g. increased monitoring of comments, informing or discussing with the blogger, dealing with comments off-site etc.)?

What would your advice be to bloggers caught up in a similar situation?

What would your advice be to publishers?

Anything else you could add would also, of course, be wonderful.

This blog post is part of the March Carnival of Journalism, this month hosted by Journerdism. 

PHP Freelancer

The Guardian has brought its typical idiosyncratic approach to social bookmarking with the launch of ‘Clippings’. But for once I think they’ve missed the mark.

By clicking on the scissors icon () next to a story users can now ‘clip’ an article to their own account. They could do this before anyway – but importantly, the revamped service means they can see others’ saved stories and subscribe to a feed, or publish their own feed elsewhere.

These are welcome additions to an older service, but there are some glaring oversights.

Firstly, although the phrase ‘social bookmarking’ is not used, this is clearly an attempt at that, and it isn’t social. There is no way to discover other bookmarkers apart from, as Inside Guardian suggests, ‘guessing’ their name.

Equally, new articles are not suggested as a result of what you bookmark – although you can click on Guardian-defined categories to see the latest stories about ‘ITV’, for instance.

To add insult to injury if you want to import your old ‘saved stories’… you can’t. You have to visit every one, and clip it all over again. Nice.

Here we have a centralised service which requires you to be logged in and is generally controlled and defined by the publisher.

Why would I use it when I can’t use my own categories? When it doesn’t help me discover new things, or organise old ones in new ways? When I can only bookmark Guardian stories?

Where is the benefit?

So here are my suggestions.

Firstly, allow tagging and user categorisation. Make them into links so you can see what else is being tagged with the same. Allow people to discover each other through shared interests.

Secondly, create a widget/bookmark so people can clip material from – shock, horror – other sites.

But most important – and easy – is this: The fact that I can see Guardian Unlimited Editor-in-chief Emily Bell’s clippings is a massive draw (sadly, no clippings yet for Jemima Kiss).

But do they make this visible on Emily Bell’s articles? No.

Not even her profile includes a link.

What a missed opportunity.

Every Emily Bell story should include a link to ‘Emily Bell’s clippings’, it’s as simple as that. If I respect her work as a journalist, there’s a chance I’ll want to be reading what she reads. And that’s where The Guardian – and news organisations generally – have an advantage: the editorial angle; the brand; the relationship.

And what a great way to keep readers on your site.

More broadly, I’ve posted previously about the concept of letting readers see ‘What the journalist read to write this’ as part of the model for a 21st century newsroom. And Radio 4′s iPM del.ico.us account is a great example of this in practice. So I won’t repeat myself on that.

Having said all that, I’m guessing this is actually a stepping stone to The Guardian’s planned social networking service, where user profiles will link to their clippings pages and, I hope, allow for more serendipity and linkage.

In the meantime, however, here’s an opportunity to iron out those glaring problems first.

PHP Freelancer