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Cablevision is valuing Newsday at more than twice the amount Rupert Murdoch thought it was worth, according to a side-by-side comparison of the two deals. While the Cablevision offer for Newsday appears at first to be “only” $70 million more than the $580 million originally offered by News Corp., a proper comparison of the deals has to take into account the considerable benefit that News Corp.

School's out and my summer blogging will be limited or obsessively compulsive... I haven't decided yet.

But here's some "other journalism" that just flew in the e-mail window from a reader who noticed the blog's title -- a visitor from www.LiveNewsCameras.com

"The concept is simple, let people watch news as it happens anywhere in the world[sigma]raw, unedited on your computer at work or home," says the e-mail from Andrew Finlayson at FoxTV.com

"It officially was made public on Super Tuesday (although we had been tinkering with how to do it for months) with just a couple of feeds focusing on the Republican and Democratic candidates," he says.

Now the site has 150 streams, and Finlayson predicts the total will double soon.

Alas, I can't get any of them to work on my iBook and http://www.radnetva.com/ municipal WiFi here at home. The connection just grinds to a stuttering stop when the page loads, attempting to automatically stream some video and open a chat window on my screen at the same time... without giving me a choice in the matter.

I'll try it again from the office to see how it works with the university's broadband connection, and how the originators keep all that video from being videobabel.

Here's more from Finlayson's mail:

"We streamed the hearings about Iraq, we streamed the Pope almost from the moment he arrived to when he went home[sigma]nothing unusual about that[sigma]but we also stream the presidential candidates live every day[sigma]sometimes two or three times each a day as they go around the country. No one else is doing that."

"Imagine what will happen when every mobile can stream live video[sigma] We are working with such a phone right now. Every major news story could be shown live from a dozen different points of view."

He says the site's informal motto is "'Veritas odit moras,' from line 850 of Seneca[base ']s version of Oedipus. It means 'Truth hates delay.'"

That reminds me of another old proverb, sometimes attributed to Mark Twain, but old enough to have been quoted this way by an English preacher in 1855:

"If you want truth to go round the world you must hire an express train to pull it; but if you want a lie to go round the world, it will fly: it is as light as a feather, and a breath will carry it. It is well said in the old proverb, 'A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on.'"

For online journalism, I wonder if there's a connection to "re-booting" the computer when all that new media locks it up?

For the less bandwidth-deprived, here's another interesting video project from my long-lost distant cousin, Robb Montgomery... a report on Camp VideoJournalism, a hands-on training program that Visual Editors sponsored in partnership with Viewmagazine.tv and Newsvideographer.com. 

KIFI, Local News 8 in Idaho Falls, ID has found a way to break the traditional bonds of an ENG truck with a technology it calls WiNG - or Wireless Internet News Gathering. While doing a live shot via the Internet isn’t technically a new thing - KIFI is doing it on a shoestring in a very small market.

KIFI’s WiNG project uses WiMax from Digital Bridge Communications - with upload speeds of 2 MBps - paired with an encoder/decoder system from Streambox. Field crews plug their cameras into a laptop and the video is sent back to the station via WiMax where it is decoded and put on the air. KIFI General Manager Mark Danielson (disclosure: my old boss) has been working on the WiNG dream since he was news director at KTVB - but the upload speed just wasn’t there. Now in Eastern Idaho, Digital Bridge is testing the waters with WiMax, making transmitting video either LIVE or on tape a possibility.

“The technology from both partners worked well and effortlessly,” Danielson told Lost Remote. “It is critical that WiNG is simple and dependable for our staff to use.”

The video image is near broadcast quality, and while there’s currently a delay - it’s something that should improve as technology gets better. In a market that can’t justify the cost of an SNG truck, and where terrain and other limitations make ENG coverage spotty, the WiNG solution gives the station more options for news coverage.

You can see it in action here (click the video link in the story)

Wow. NBC left iTunes in part because Apple refused to offer flexible pricing, but now HBO will offer its shows on the download service under a flexible pricing scheme. “Episodes of some HBO shows are likely to be sold at the standard price of $1.99 per episode or higher, these sources said, marking the first time Apple has agreed to selling television shows at different prices in the United States,” reports Reuters. It’s also the first time HBO has sold downloads of its shows. The deal is expected to be announced on Tuesday.

It’s upfront week, and that means a steady stream of announcements…
    - NBC names Jimmy Fallon to succeed Conan O’Brien
    - CBS picks up 4 new dramas, 2 comedies
    - “Flat is the new up,” says Broadcasting & Cable about the upfronts
    - Latest upfront stories from TV Decoder blog, B&C and Variety

Salt Lake Tribune
Ombud Connie Coyne explained the paper's position to callers but some "went wild and accused me of protecting 'illegals' who were sneaking into this country, taking jobs and government benefits and failing to learn English. ... I also explained we were about to launch a Spanish-language weekly, Ahora Utah, for those who did not read English well. The same folks went ballistic on that." || More editor/ombud columns:
> Plain Dealer's Connors overwhelmed by response to her rape story (PD)
> "Bleeding" was unfortunate word choice in Express-News fire story (E-N)
> FOIA has been central to two major NYT stories in recent weeks (NYT)
> Howell: Washington Post's approach to corrections isn't consistent (WP)
> Hartford Courant anticipated complaints about TV Week changes (HC)
> Newsobserver.com had a 20% jump in visitors on election day (N&O)
> N-R murder-suicide story had more views than election results (N-R)
> Temple explains why plug was pulled on redblueamerica.com (RMN)

Calling it the “Digital Health Network,” NBCU is syndicating health video produced by NBC News, NBC Local Media and Healthology.com. Distribution partners include Healthline Networks, RightHealth and YourTotalHealth.com. “Today’s announcement is another example of how we are focused on building rich, niche digital networks,” said George Kliavkoff, Chief Digital Officer, NBC Universal. “We will continue to look at niche categories that have a passionate user base and also happen to fit the criteria of a top advertising category that we think is underserved by professional quality video on digital platforms.” (Full disclosure: NBCU is a joint venture partner of MSNBC.com, which is my new employer in two weeks.)

"On the Media"
"I do think that there are similarly tabloid, similarly scurrilous, similarly potential ratings magnet stories about the other candidates, particularly about John McCain and his albatross right-wing pastors," says Air America/cable news talker Rachel Maddow. "But they haven't been exploited in the same way. And that decision, that decision by the media, I think, is worth interrogating, because I think it does have political implications." || More audio and transcripts from the latest show.

Editor & Publisher
"I would have happily stayed at the [Washington] Post for my life. But it became untenable because of the decision they made three weeks ago," says Peter Baker, whose wife was removed from her AME/national news post. Baker, who is joining the New York Times, tells Joe Strupp: "I am very sorry it has come to this. I am sad it has come to this. The Post was my home for 20 years. This is a very difficult thing for me."

If you've seen a bit of Bloomberg TV or heard Bloomberg Radio or been in front of one of its terminals, you may have recently wondered: Why isn't it doing more with what it has?

Its reporters are some of the fastest moving on the web, and know data better than most covering the news industry.

So what might today's announcement that news industry veteran Norm Pearlstine is becoming "chief content officer" of Bloomberg mean?

My quick take:

* Right now, Bloomberg derives almost all its revenues from Corporate markets. With Pearlstine at the hub, it plainly will look at leveraging its assets beyond Corporate, most directly to B2C markets. I hear that has made recent forays into Legal markets as well, competing with Reed Elsevier's LexisNexis and Thomson Reuters' West Publishing.
* Key question is one familiar to all legacy news companies. Can it keep its grip on stable (in this case, installed terminal) revenue, while competing in markets new to it. It faces risk of commoditizing its core business, unless it executes a Free Web B2C strategy smartly.
* Business advertising draws among the highest CPM rates, more than $100 CPM for business news video and above $50 CPM for graphical ads, for high-branded content. But the overall pie of online business news ad revenue is still small -- that's why News Corp decided against eliminating wsj.com subscription wall. There's simply not enough money in web business news advertising to make up its online sub revenue loss.
* Pearlstine's experience tells us that this is all about leveraging the content assets across all modern media platforms. So expect Bloomberg to go where the growth is -- advertising. Web advertising is still growing around a 20 per cent rate, and Bloomberg should cash in there.
* The new Bloomberg view should be more global. It drives 47% of its revenues from the US, 38% from EMEA and only 10% from Asia. Asia should be bigger. So look for Bloomberg to become a more global player, both through acquisition and greater use of partner distribution channels.

In sum, I think there are three words that define the Pearlstine announcement:
---Consumer
---Advertising
---Global

Bloomberg sees a similar opportunity as Rupert Murdoch saw in buying Dow Jones -- the global business news opportunity leveraged over all platforms. Today's announcement means more competition for Dow Jones -- and Time Warner's business magazines, McGraw Hill's Business Week, Forbes, the New York Times and the Financial Times.

Let the new business games begin.

Editor & Publisher
Union leader Zachary Dowdy wonders how Cablevision will treat the paper, which has seen cuts and belt-tightening in recent years. He says he might have preferred to see Rupert Murdoch acquire Newsday "because he has run and is running newspapers."
> "In hindsight, Zell orchestrated the Newsday sale flawlessly" (Fortune)
> For Rupert-watchers, the sale is something of an enigma (Ken Doctor)

> Raines winds up as the filling in a shouting-head sandwich (Portfolio)
> El Espectador has always found a way to get ahead and stay open (WP)
> It's hard to justify using expensive newsprint to run stock listings (EH)
> "Whaddya cryin' for? Shut up and write," Breslin advises Cullen "(BG)
> LAT's Hiller heard from only four people who protested A1 ads (Ad Age)
> Russ Smith blasts media's obsession with athletes' personal lives (Splice)
> The idea of one paper suing another to get sources is beyond weird (SBI)
> New York Press owner buys 02138, a magazine for Harvard alums (NYT)
> Send link suggestions, letters, etc. to jromenesko@poynter.org
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> Visit Romenesko's Obscure Store & Reading Room and Starbucks Gossip

Seattle Times | Asbury Park Press
The newspaper trimmed its payroll by 125 employees from various departments last week. Of the total, 73 were laid off and 52 left voluntarily. Most suburban reporters were laid off. || ALSO... Gannett offers buyouts at five of its six New Jersey papers.

Miami Herald
Edward Wasserman asks: Where will news media find their next durable source of subsidy? He suggests papers start start charging for self-serving content -- town-council actions rendered as news reports, and barely rewritten company press releases, for example -- and label it for what it is. "Let those who benefit pay, and free up reporters for journalism."

Indian Express
"How do we know exactly what the reader wants?" asks ex-New York Times executive editor Joseph Lelyveld. "I think you should give the reader a fresh and original paper that's very well-written and covers all sorts of things -- social trends, fashion, the works but I think you are at your best when you give the reader something the reader wants that the reader didn't know he or she wanted it till you gave it to her."

I've long compared the cable and phone companies on the one hand to the newspaper companies on the other.

Newspaper companies saw there business being upended by the Internet, made small bets and have lost out on the big ad growth the web has generated.

Telephone companies -- the successors of monopoly Ma Bell -- first consolidated and then saw that old vanilla phone service was disappearing, well, almost as fast as newsprint-based news. They moved into internet service provision and then into more lucrative broadband, acing out the many small companies that had at first parted the waters (some of which, including Infinet, were owned by newspaper companies). They invested heavily (and often clumsily) in mobile and have figured out how to wring many new dollars from all of us.

Cable companies saw that they were reaching a saturation point in their own penetration, and then felt the hot breath of the formerly telephone companies moving to offer .... cable TV. So they've gone after both internet service providing and local voice, understanding that boomers still want the comfort of the old landlines.

Triple Play, once a novelty, has become the standard. Cable + Internet + Telephone.

Now Cablevision's stuck out its neck, $650 million worth, to swing for fences.

Cable + Internet + Telephone + Newspaper. A combo that could give Cablevision an edge against Verizon, its biggest competitor.

A home run?

My betting is that it's one of the best labs for everyone in the news industry to watch.

What stands in the way of a big Cablevision win? In a couple of words: strategy and exectuion.

In strategy, Cablevision must move beyond the hazy notion of Long Island Convergence (some say the Dolans may have had a bit too much Long Island Tea in offering $70 million more than their competition for Newsday) to a true strategy. That strategy, in a nutshell:

---Create a new ad vision of how Cablevision/Newsday can serve local advertisers, from its Long Island home base to metro New York to southern Connecticut to northern Jersey. Providing advertisers reach to mass and targeted niche audiences, through cable, newspaper and internet is what must be done.
---Create a new content vision for how Cablevision/Newsday can serve local news readers, sports lovers, business observers and entertainment seekers. The company will have a newsgathering/production force of more than 500. The goal has got to be to get out of text/TV/audio silos, creating text and multimedia content, distributing that content to become dominant in its key geographic areas
---Connecting the ad and content engines to the wider web distribution world. The new independent-of-Tribune Newsday may well move out of its Tribune partnerships (nothing in release one way or another on CareerBuilder, Classified Ventures, QuadrantONE, etc.) and look at joining the Yahoo News consortium, among others. The Daily News is in it, but has no market exclusivity.

The Execution? Tougher than the strategy. It should be streamlining as many of the cost centers of both companies as possible, but doing that in a way that builds the company for success, rather than crippling it.

Yes, ad staffs and selling propositions can converge and yes, scribes and TV producers are really members of the same species. But the human dimension here is what's tough. Habit, tradition and skill set are all obstacles. As I wrote last week, someone is going to surmount them; Cablevision's just one of the newest and potentially most interesting to try.

For Rupert-watchers, the sale is something of an enigma. Why did it go this way less than a week after his public boast that he'd win the prize? Questions to be answered:
---Did Tribune's latest double-digit declines convince him that it really wasn't a prize at all, that the the Post's $50 million loss really wouldn't turn to profit, given both a bigger Newsday pricetag and the detiorating newspaper ad market?
---Is News Corp thinking that further investment in newspapers just won't pencil out?
---Back to the overpay question. Did Rupert overpay for Dow Jones and did the Dolans overpay for Newsday?
Both are long-term investments, and you can't make judgments based on today's pressures and short-term trends. This is all about real convergence and its value.

Somebody who reads this blog (if there's anybody left after the long interruption between posts) knows what this means for our business. Sadly, that person isn't me.

If this strikes any chords with you, write and let me know, please.

Facing an advertising downturn, soft ratings on The CW, and an inability to land new financing, 13 Pappas stations have filed for Chapter 11. The company said station employees will continue to be paid. Meanwhile, Pappas is looking for a buyer for all 30 of its stations.

Aggressively expanding overseas and in smaller U.S. cities, for one. But Craigslist is also fighting a lawsuit from eBay, which has a competing free classifieds service, Kijiji.com.

Bloomberg
In this newly created position, former Time Inc. editor-in-chief Norman Pearlstine will partner with Bloomberg News editor-in-chief Matthew Winkler to seek growth opportunities for its television, radio, magazine and online products. The two worked together in the 1980s at the Wall Street Journal.
> Hall quits Orange County Register to become TheStreet.com editor (TBN)