In it’s article “The Web Trail“, the Guardian announces today “From tomorrow, the Guardian will publish stories first to the web”. This is, they say “ending the primacy of the printed newspaper”. Lofty words.

The Guardian is not, of course, the only paper to be putting a lot of focus into its online offer. And this seems much more like the normal development of news transmission. And it will be interesting to see how the medium changes how news is accessed. On the one level, how news publishers decide to make a profit.

It could go the way of Salon.com which shows non-members a few seconds of advertising. Or a “premium” membership with three different plans: one year premium ($35.00), one year premium with ads ($22.50), monthly premium ($6.00).

Or the way of The New York Times, which has free registration which gives basic access to news and archives, and paid subscriptions ($49.95/year) for “exclusive access to Op-Ed and news columnists on NYTimes.com, easy and in-depth access to The Times’s online archives, early access to select articles on the site, as well as other exciting features such as News Tracker and Times File.”

And despite the dire concern that online newspaper versions “have cannibalised sales”, this fear just ignores that going online gives newspapers the chance to have fast, trackable revenue options. Relevant online marketing can increase a newspaper’s value to readers (do you mind links to where you can buy the book after a book review?). And unlike offline advertising (which newspapers haven’t opposed) it’s easy to tell which advertising is valuable and effective.

The other level of course is technology. Like the NYT’s offer, it will be interesting to see what services (specialised news, exclusive access, etc.) news services create. And the tools they will add. Already, blogs are integrated to news websites. The Washington Post (which has required, but free, registration), for example, uses technorati to link all blogs that site articles (with the blog-integration company BlogBurst). And offers del.icio.us tagging as well.

The Guardian’s call that it will break news first online seems like an inevitable. But the claim that “we will take the internet seriously, but we must not let it get in the way of our primary business which is publishing a paper each night” seems unnecessarily fearful (not to mention their “revolutionary” claim). I don’t think it’s reckless to say that catching up with the way readers consume media (and pay for media) is the only way to remain journalistically and financially viable.
As Ten Red Roses writes:

Thinking about it, I used to buy newspapers regularly, definitely every week, and I went through phases of buying a daily paper. Now I tend to buy a daily paper only if I am going on a train journey, or if there is something I am particularly interested in; I rarely buy a Sunday paper. I get all the news and comment I can handle through [the] internet these days.

There are elephants in (chat)rooms. These are exciting times.

Catania’s football team got into the Italian Series 1 and the city went crazy (more photos to come). In the meantime, I saw this this morning. Awesome.

World Cup is on. Who are you cheering for? (Me: Italia. The party’ll be amazing).

From the fine folks at yeeeah. While we’re rotting our brains, here’s a fantastic video.

The Spreadshirt Shop WC ended yesterday with one shop taking the world champion title: Fussball-shirts.com. With great designs and a chique setup. With shirts for each country, a few soon to be classic designs. And lots of sayings in German (well, they are hosting the game).

A few of the translateable ones: “Kein Foul ist auch keine Losung” (something like: no foul is no solution), “Leitwolf” (which means leader but sounds tougher), and “Ich liebe wunderschone Frauen, Bier und Fussball” (I love beautiful women, beer and football”). But written so it looks like “Ich liebe Frauen Fussball” (I love women’s football). Very clever. But with a heavy dosage of testosterone (see second image), comes great design. And that’s how they got the prize. Have a look:

See more shirts at the shop: www.fussball-shirts.com.

See the competition, the second and third place runners-up and all about the Shop WC event here: www.wc2006.spreadshirt.net.

The competition where you get an England shirt when England wins the World Cup ends tomorrow! Enter it by using coupon code ENGLANDCHAMPIONS at fans.spreadshirt.co.uk.

Over at Seth’s Blog there’s a list of over fifty insights into “how to get traffic for your blog“. To list a few:

• Use lists.
• Be topical… write posts that need to be read right now.
• Learn enough to become the expert in your field.
• Share your expertise generously so people recognize it and depend on you.
• Write short, pithy posts.
• Write long, definitive posts.
• Encourage your readers to subscribe by RSS.
• Start at the beginning and take your readers through a months-long education.
• Assume that every day is the beginning, because you always have new readers.
• Highlight your best posts on your Squidoo lens.
• Write about blogging.
• Edit yourself. Ruthlessly.
• Don’t be boring.
• Write stuff that people want to read and share.

And many many more. I really like “assume that every day is the beginning”, as new-agey as it sounds. But whew, I guess I have my work cut out for me.

I was staring at my computer screen, and staring at myself. The combination digital camera + highly reflective screen + flickr + blog is proving dangerous.

What were you doing?

We try to showcase English shops, but this one caught our eye. A clever response from the people at www.6002mw.net. I don’t really understand what’s the MW they’re referring to, but “Vermarktungs Opfer” means “marketing victim”. Just in case you were curious. I also suddenly have the urge to eat FerreroTM NutellaTM for breakfast. Strange.

(This much fun must be illegal).

Spreadshirt expands its affiliate options: now affiliatefuture is in the mix. Why affiliatefuture? They’re strong in the UK market, are expanding European-wide, have great options for their affiliates (they should pay me!). Instead we pay you, now at:

More info about the Spreadshirt affiliate programme here. What’s the affiliate programme for? Selling shirts via the fancy flash shop Spreadshirt Designer.