In a recent interview on Video Nuze, Bob Pittman, former President and COO of America Online and a co-founder of MTV, explained why he likes (and why his Pilot Group is buying) broadcast TV stations.

We have focused on small market television, where local advertising is the predominant revenue stream. We have done that because we believe national advertisers will slow down spending in economic downturns, whereas in local market when you’re dealing with a local retailer he still has to sell everything that’s on the shelf, come good times or bad. And we believe that in small markets, newspapers and yellow pages are getting wildly disproportionate share of the revenue, so we think there’s a great growth opportunity as well. In smaller markets the station’s coverage area nicely matches the advertiser’s reach goals. It’s also a fantastic free cash flow business.

He also says they are setting up “what are in essence ‘newspapers online.’”

Interesting that Pittman would see newspapers as vulnerable to attack by local broadcasters, while I think the situation is just the opposite. An explanation comes when he explains why he doesn’t believe online video will have a great effect on broadcast TV:

Well, you may occasionally watch a program online if you can’t get to your TV, or it wasn’t available, or you’re a little geeky, but as a replacement offering, I don’t think so. TVs are big screen, public viewing devices, computers are not. They’re 18 inches away and are private experiences, you don’t want people looking over your shoulder at it. They’re completely separate uses and devices, so to try to put the wrong kind of programming on either one limits your audience severely.

While he accepts that things may change if online video can be brought to the TV screen, he believes that the process to do that will be too difficult for the average consumer, severely limiting its impact.

The problem is that Pittman is thinking two years out when he should be thinking 5 or 10 years out. He’s right - the ability to watch tiny videos on a computer screen won’t hurt TV, but that’s simply a short-term development phase we’re going through. We will be able to watch good quality video on TV screens in the not too distant future, and that’s when the world changes for broadcast stations.

It’s good to know that Pittman has so much faith in what newspapers are currently doing online that he wants his stations to emulate them, but that too, is a phase. A large dose of video must be a part of any successful media company’s future, in preparation for the day when large capital investment in equipment and licenses is no longer necessary to bring consumers their “TV” news. TV broadcast stations can certainly participate, but in this battle I like the chances of newspapers.

One final quote, that should make anyone in the newspaper industry cringe:

People keep talking about Internet as if it’s competing with TV. But what the Internet has really done is replace print - things like yellow pages, newspapers and traditional research books. It’s also replaced communications - phone calls, voice mail. So when you hear these stories about the Internet replacing TV, I think they’ve got it all wrong.

Yes, people do keep talking…

While discussing EveryBlock with a colleague, he said that he was somewhat less than enamored with the site (and some others like it) because it really just provides data. He said that he doesn’t simply want data, but he wants to know what it means and why he should care. By way of a related example, he pointed to Consumer Reports which certainly gives its subscribers data, but through its rating system it also tells them what it means and why they should care. Consumer Reports, of course, is one of the few web sites that can charge for consumer content.

Consumer Reports is a nice success story for paid content, but it also has some pretty unique content. A lot of time and effort and money is put into creating objective ratings of products, ratings which can’t be replicated through simple consumer reviews. Interestingly, objectivity is a trait CR shares with news companies. While both claim to be objective, however, CR’s objectivity ends once the analysis is done. The value is created because CR takes a stand on the products it reviews. News companies, on the other hand, try to maintain their objectivity throughout all of their reporting. Could it be that value would be added if they more frequently took positions on subjects they cover? The popularity of blogs, talk radio, and certain newspapers and cable networks with points of view suggest some movement in that direction.

Perhaps more important, though, is that Consumer Reports’ content is actionable. A consumer typically reads a review or checks ratings when she is ready to buy, and CR’s reviews and ratings help prepare her to act. So much of what we find on the web is nice to know, interesting, and makes me feel smart and part of my community, but ends there. CR data helps me save money, make the best purchase decision, or keeps me from making a mistake. For that, people pay.

So, back to EveryBlock data. EveryBlock data is not particularly actionable, even though it may have some information I’d like to take into account when, say, buying a house. I certainly agree that this data would be more valuable if I was provided with some context and helped to understand what it tells me, but I still do find some of it useful. Take, for example, zoning agenda items or liquor license status changes. I suppose if I were renting an apartment and not particularly invested in my neighborhood, I wouldn’t be too interested in that data. If, on the other hand, I owned a home and planned to stay there for a while, I’d really be interested in that stuff. In fact, when I used to receive township newsletters, I turned first to zoning changes and then development plans. And I’d surely want to know if a business near my home was applying for a liquor license. Ultimately, the value of this data depends on your own personal circumstances.

As for the complaint that EveryBlock kind of sites simply give you data without analysis or meaning, I’d argue that that’s exactly what users could provide. Just as open source code applications can be enhanced through community trouble shooting and development, so can this kind of neighborhood data be enhanced through community analysis. The user who notices that an increase in a neighborhood’s liquor licenses coincides with an increase in DUIs and crime can do his own analysis to highlight what he sees as a cause and effect. If the data is out there with more eyes looking it over, more relationships and other information are likely to be found. Yes, good journalism can provide this kind of analysis and add lots of value to a local site, but good journalism can’t be everywhere and putting the data out there for the entire community to see doesn’t preclude analysis by news organizations. It just might, however, allow a user to unearth some important information on his own. In this world, value comes from supplying data, providing a platform for users to comment and analyze, and from journalists learning from and following up on what users unearth.

Today’s big news was the launch of EveryBlock. A product of a team of developers including wunderkind of the moment, Adrain Holovaty, the site launched to a great deal of fanfare. Covering Chicago, San Francisco, and New York (to start), EveryBlock provides local news and information down to the block level. The information comes from a myriad of sources, including newspapers, blogs, Craigslist, Yelp, and government databases. Brad Flora on The Methods Blog has a great rundown of the site and the information it contains.

TechCrunch also covers the launch and as is usually the case, the readers’ comments are a highlight of the post. A lot of the early, cynical comments suggest that much of this has been done before and wonders how the site can make money. Holovaty answers by pointing out that much of EveryBlock’s government data existed in inconvenient formats (e.g. pdf files) and hadn’t been aggregated before. As for making money, well, Holovaty notes that the project is non-profit.

I find it really interesting when people see these kinds of information aggregations as yawners. This is because of what they know already exists on the web, as opposed to what actually exists. We’ve become so used to having all kinds of data at our fingertips that unless you’ve ever tried to find some of this stuff, you really don’t know how difficult, or tedious, it is to locate. It means the bar is that much higher for those of us actually trying to bring it all together.

I agree with some of the commenters who think EveryBlock isn’t a business, but that misses the point. The EveryBlock team has put this site together with a goal of “experimenting with new forms of journalism.” (Of course, this doesn’t help those who actually need to make money with new forms of journalism.) This would fit nicely as a feature on a newspaper site, not only as its own section, but also as an engine to power supplementary information for news stories and other items. It would be a great addition to community sites like YourHub and NeighborsGo. Think too about all of that data newspapers collect for feature stories. It’s often some kind of government data that is only used for the original report. With an EveryBlock kind of product that data could be added to the database, making it more and more robust as time goes on.

The EveryBlock team has done a nice job with this site so far and I think it serves the Knight News Challenge’s goal of transforming community news. Experiments like these provide the inspiration, and now it’s up to the next wave to extend and refine.

We’ve been hearing for quite some time about the coming online gold rush driven by local advertising. Borrell Associates, for example, forecasts local online advertising to grow by 48% in 2008. For projections like these to prove true, however, those local advertisers need some encouragement. According to this story in the Wall Street Journal, newspapers seem to be doing an especially poor job of it. An awful lot of small businesses have discovered the value of online advertising, particularly paid search, but a lot more haven’t. It’s the second group that can use the encouragement, but the thought of visiting all of those small advertisers to make a personal pitch is daunting. As a result, as the WSJ article notes, most newspapers initially “focused on selling ads to bigger advertisers who were already buying space in their print products.” Now, facing the possibility of losing the local advertising market to national internet companies, newspapers are scrambling to figure out how to sell the local guys on online ads.

Meanwhile Google, in position to be the king of local advertising through its AdWords, AdSense, and mapping products, has also been thinking about how to reach more local advertisers. They’ve come up with a nifty plan called “The Google Online Marketing Challenge.”

Student teams will receive US$200 of free online advertising with Google AdWords and then work with local businesses to devise effective online marketing campaigns. You will outline a strategy, run your campaign, assess your results and provide the business with recommendations to further develop their online marketing. Teams submit their reports and are judged by a panel of independent academics from all over the world.

You have to admire this marketing program run under the guise of educational service to our nation’s youth. The teams, from Azerbaijan State Economic University to the University of California, Irvine, will fan out all over the globe running online ad campaigns for local advertisers using Google AdWords. Google gives up some AdWords revenue in return, they hope, for student and business owner converts to the power of online advertising.

The winning team will get “a chance to visit the Google Headquarters in Mountain View, California, and meet the team that created AdWords.” I think I’d rather meet the team that came up with this contest.