Tag Archives: Marketwatch
In 2007, the sexy media will be in business news
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Marketwatch columnist Jon Friedman writes Wednesday that the media’s most compelling battles will occur in business journalism with the launch of the Fox business news cable channel and the Conde Nast Portfolio business magazine.
Friedman stated, “Who will win? Who knows. Portfolio has deliberately kept mum about its contents, style and tone. Likewise, Fox News chief Roger Ailes has wisely offered no details.
“The ever-shrewd Ailes, however, has a history of zagging when the competition is zigging. So I expect Fox to pursue a niche that corporate-oriented CNBC has neglected. Look for Fox to focus on individual investors.
“Portfolio will face off against Fortune. Other business magazines are associated with investing and the stock market. Plus, BusinessWeek is a quasi-newsweekly and Forbes is quite idiosyncratic.
“To surpass Fortune, Portfolio must be, above all, SURPRISING.
“The knock on business magazines is that they’re far too predictable. They tend to feature the same old people on their covers. Is there anything about Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Rupert Murdoch, et al that we don’t already know? And aren’t you a little tired, already, of those Google Guys?
“For its part, Fox has to find ENTERTAINMENT value in otherwise ordinary business stories. Fox will need to develop something fresh. In its presentation of general news, its highly successful formula has combined the catchiest elements of talk radio (chatty morning anchors and in-your-face hosts at night), with (detractors charge) a right-wing spin.”
Read more here.
New CNBC site more like ESPN.com than competitors
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Cassimer Medford, who writes for the tech-related Red Herring, critiqued the new CNBC.com web site and noted that its look and feel was more like ESPN.com than competing financial news and investing web sites.
Medford wrote, “The site is more ESPN.com than it is Google Finance, MarketWatch.com, or TheStreet.com, none of which has a TV network devoted to financial news and newsmakers acting as its knowledge base.
“Between 1998 and 2001, CNBC operated its own web site, but after that the station, which is part of NBC Universal, operated as a data feed for Microsoft’s MSN portal.
“The re-launched site has a very busy design offering text-based stories and analysis along with business video streamed from the TV network. The web site will also offer archived stories and video.”
Later, Medford added, “The site has a look-and-feel similar to ESPN.com, which mirrors CNBC.com in every way except in actual content. Both cover very fast-moving markets, where numbers and analysis are closely studied.
“Both are fed immense amounts of content from a TV network, and stay true to the kind of designed-in clutter that seems appropriate in fields where the news comes fast and furious from multiple sources.”
Read more here.
Meanwhile, Dealbreaker.com critiques the blogs on the site. John Carney wrote, “It looks promising but right now there are very few substantive posts up. Mostly they are introductions to the blogs. Quite a few of the links bring up a 404 error page. And nothing’s been posted at all today. But we’ll cut the kids a little slack, since it’s their first day.”
Steiger: Reporters need to adapt
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In a Q&A interview with PR Week about the redesign of the Wall Street Journal, Paul Steiger said that the changes to the paper will continue to force journalists to think about the best format to present a story.
Steiger said, “Back in the late 1990s, we started the relationship with CNBC. There was a real culture shock. We had a lot of reporters say, ‘No way am I going to let my story loose to TV’ or ‘I’m keeping my scoops for the morning.’ That’s over. That is so over.
“Readers understand, reporters and editors understand, that more of their impact is being felt in the 24/7 space. They have a vibrant, growing, profitable Web site to write for. And they’ve embraced it.
“The challenge is not so much keeping them interested and providing new opportunities, it’s adapting the coverage and business model[s] so that we remain a vibrant business enterprise and hopefully become more vibrant.
“The way you do that is by penetrating deeper into the Web. The acquisition of MarketWatch was a big help in doing that, along with organic growth internally. And then making the best use of our print position, which is why when everybody was trying to shy away from print, we made this huge investment to go into Saturday.
“I think this is a great place for reporters now. We still provide the best [daily] platform for long-form journalism, even as we’re offering all kinds of additional opportunities – on TV, on video, online, blogging. All of that stuff is proliferating here all the time. Today, I had three proposals from reporters for new blogs or verticals.”
Read more here.
CNBC.com: A Bloomberg for everyday people
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Variety’s Michael Learmonth takes a look at the launch of CNBC.com and what it will mean for the cable channel’s journalists, as well as its strategy.
Learmonth wrote, “Until last summer its Web activities had been undertaken in partnership with MSN. That deal expired in July, and the net hired a staff of 55 to launch the new site, designed to take on Dow Jones’ Marketwatch, Yahoo! Finance, Bloomberg and Reuters.
“‘I look at it as a Bloomberg Box for everyday people,’ said CNBC business news senior veep Jonathan Wald.
“CNBC has a relatively small audience of wealthy viewers, many of whom keep it on in the office. But net execs believe there are many more viewers who don’t have TVs at work and could be reached through the desktop.
“Launch sponsors are a host of CNBC TV sponsors including Ameritrade, Fidelity Investments, Etrade and Scottrade.
“In a departure, CNBC on-air personalities and correspondents will be asked to write stories and file blog dispatches in addition to their video reports.”
Read more here.
Meanwhile, a Reuters story on the launch focused on the search function of the site. It stated, “Searching on any given topic will consolidate CNBC’s myriad stories, blogs, videos and other financial information on one page.
“‘Every aspect of the site is visibly tagged and searchable so our viewers can customize the business universe to their particular needs,’ Meredith Stark, vice president of cnbc.com said, during a demonstration of the site.
“Viewers who want the entire CNBC broadcast will now be able to subscribe at an introductory rate of $9.95 per month for CNBC Plus, which makes its U.S., Asia and European broadcasts and other video clips available for searching.”
Read more here.
New CNBC web site is live
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As of 10:20 p.m. Sunday, the new CNBC site has gone live. The business news cable network had said that it would officially launch on Dec. 4, splitting itself from MSN Money, where it had posted news and information for the past six months.
The network is planning a huge day on Monday to attract site visits. CNBC’s Steve Liesman will have an exclusive interview on the web site with Chicago Federal Reserve Bank president Michael Moskow on Monday at 9:01 a.m. EST. At noon, Maria Bartiromo will interview Goldman Sachs market strategist Abby Joseph Cohen on the web site.
Throughout the day there will be “Market in a Minute” video broadcasts on the site. Bartiromo will anchor the first one at 9 a.m.
The web site plans to air between three and eight hours of live programming daily, primarily covering events that could move markets. The site also has more than 15,000 videos of business and financial leaders available in a database, and will add 75 new videos each day.
In addition, there are seven blogs on the site being written by CNBC reporters. Among them are “Media Money” by Julia Boorstin, who came over earlier this year from Fortune, and a sports business blog written by Darren Rovell, formerly with ESPN.com. Boorstin’s blog, as well as the “Realty Check” with Diana Olick, only have two posts, while Rovell’s blog has at least a dozen posts from the past week, and some good stories.
The site also has a list of people who will be appearing on the network’s various TV shows, from “Squawk Box” to “Power Lunch” and “Street Signs.” The shows will have also their own blogs that will be updated daily.
CNBC President Mark Hoffman stated on the home page: “The extraordinary team at CNBC has created a Web site that combines all of the journalistic and production assets you have relied on for years on CNBC-TV. We’ll be gathering financial news from around the world with the latest in online technology to deliver a truly groundbreaking web experience.
“As you explore cnbc.com you will discover aggressive breaking business news coverage, in-depth analysis, and exceptional investment tools which you can personalize to best serve your needs. In addition–cnbc.com has the most extensive business video in web history, live video programming, a substantial list of topical blogs from CNBC’s anchors and reporters, and much more.
“Thank you for taking a look at the new cnbc.com. We hope you’ll be with us often on-air and online.”
First impressions: The site will be giving TheStreet.com, MarketWatch and others a run for their money. The site is nicely laid out with a good color scheme. And I like the ticker.
Is Jim Cramer headed to CNBC.com?
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MarketWatch columnist Frank Barnako muses on his blog that Jim Cramer will be used by CNBC to build traffic on its new web site when it launches next week in the wake of his radio show going away.
Barnako wrote, “Makes sense to me after learning this morning that the Booyah-meister is ending his ‘Mad Money’ radio distribution deal with Westwood One by the end of the year.”
Later, he added, “Why not some Cramer, too? He’s the Howard Stern of business news. Stern’s signing with Sirius boosted subscriptions. Cramer’s the same kind of act. Outlandish and extreme, with an enthusiastic audience.
“If I were in the programming meeting at CNBC, I’d want to have Cramer on the site. Remember Dan Dorfman on CNBC in the mid-90s? His stock picks drove viewership before his appearances and trading volume after it. Cramer on CNBC.com would be sure to pull people through the tollgates.
“A call for comment from CNBC has not yet been returned.”
Read more here. There’s also this post on TVNewser that states that the site will allow viewers to watch CNBC on their computers, and for $10/month, be able to watch CNBC’s US, Asia/Pacific and Europe versions.
Union membership at Dow Jones "engaged"
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Steve Yount, the president of the union representing journalists at Dow Jones & Co. operations such as The Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch and Dow Jones Newswires, posted a note on the union’s web site Tuesday morning noting that members have never been as “engaged” this early in contract talks before.
Yount wrote, “The ‘long-timers’ among us have told me they’re never seen the membership as engaged this early. It has to be a surprise to the company as well.”
Yount is asking union members at Dow Jones to wear buttons at work and while they’re on the air and to post fliers at their desks to show solidarity in their contract talks.
Yount wrote, “It has been clear since the very beginning of contract talks with Dow Jones that the company believes you’ll ‘roll over’ in six months and accept a quintupling of your health care costs. We need to show the company it’s wrong.
“It is important to continually remind Dow Jones that we’re engaged in the fight — every last one of us — and that we’re unified as never before.”
Read more here.
Union slams decision to run breakingviews.com column in WSJ
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The union that represents journalists who work for The Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, Dow Jones Newswires and MarketWatch criticized a decision by parent company Dow Jones to run a column from Breakingviews.com every day in the Journal.
Later, he wrote, “When it produces news in-house, the Journal and Dow Jones can ensure that strong controls are in place to prevent this kind of abuse. Once it relinquishes that control to an outsider— whoever that outsider is— the famous and time-tested Dow Jones guarantee of quality becomes that much weaker. That’s particularly true if the outsider has a wide range of clients with competing interests.
“Is this the formula for the WSJ of the future— homogenized news, prepared by outsiders who don’t ask for healthcare or retirement, and who can’t talk back?”
Read more here. It should be noted that the union is currently in negotiations with Dow Jones on a new contract.