Moderator, Larry Kramer, President and Publisher, USA Today:
Jim Bankoff, Chairman, CEO, Vox Media: Only in the digital arena in sports and tech coverage. Started with advantage of starting with clean slate, but have the disadvantage of not having the cash flow of older companies. Model is to find web-native talent and empower them. Are a start-up but have grown to be one of the top 10 publishers on the net. In sports area didn’t want to “build a brand” because there are some very good brands already out there. Decided that fragmentation was the way to go. SEO for Google has hurt doing creative headlines.
John Paton, CEO, Digital First Media: Second largest newspaper company in US. Can’t see the roadmap ahead. Transition is easy compared to trying to see around the corner. Transition is not transformation. Digital first strategy is transition, not transformation. Most companies in transition now, but now in transformation. In many platforms now, but not doing it very well because don’t understand the platforms well enough as yet. In newspapers, digital advertising is not replacing the lost revenue from print editions. Nobody in newspapers has ever had a profitable sports section. The profits are in the entire bundle, not in the individual pieces. Their advertising revenue is literally half of what it was in 2006.
