Motor Sport Business Forum preview: the future of F1 media, part one – commercial realities
On the second day of next week’s Motor Sport Business Forum we’re going to set down our cappuccinos and canapés long enough to listen to a panel on the media. It’ll feature some of the most authoritative people writing about Formula 1 in the English language.
Media people talking about the media? It sounds painfully self-indulgent, and elements of it probably will be. But the flow of information from source to audience affects us all; and the media industry is undergoing a colossal realignment that has already started to change the way we consume Formula 1.
We’ll hear from Jonathan Noble of AUTOSPORT (apologies for shouting, but as an occasional contributor I should probably remain ‘on brand’), Joe Saward of grandprix.com, former ITV commentator and pre-eminent F1 blogger James Allen, and Ian Burrows, the commercial director of F1 Racing. It’s a big subject so I’ll leave the editorial aspects for separate posts and talk about the commerce-driven structural changes – for good or ill – in this one.
Had you noticed we’re in a recession? Mercy me, so we are. Actually, though, the media industry has been in an ersatz recession for a decade; it’s just that the rest of the world has caught up all of a sudden, tipping the industry properly over the edge.
The media industry has been in an ersatz recession for a decade; it’s just that the rest of the world has caught up all of a sudden
At the tail end of the 1990s the publishing world went wild over the world wide web. In a mediaverse where a blackberry was still just one of the ingredients of Vimto, directors and proprietors who had only just become aware of the ‘inter-net’ stubbed out their cigars and decreed that their companies must immediately have an all-singing, all-dancing ‘web-site’.
The later they woke up, the more money they spent. Even after the dotcom bust in March 2000, one newspaper group (the one whose former proprietor helped himself to the pension fund and then fell off his yacht) went on a hiring spree in which it recruited an entire online editorial team to operate in parallel with the print title. Within a year it had realised its folly and was forced to lay the majority of them off, at substantial expense.
Thus, the quandary: to keep in step with their competitors and to retain control of their brands, publishers had to stay on the net. But online revenues weren’t big enough to pay staff the going rate. The result has been an insanely self-destructive process in which the print titles (which make money) subsidise their online equivalents (which don’t), all the while reinforcing the customers’ expectation that content is and ought to be free. Meanwhile, paper costs have been creeping up, forcing cover prices to rise and accelerating the desertion of readers to online sources.
On the basis of “If you build it, they will come,” publishers have spent the past decade chasing online traffic numbers in the hope that someone will find a way of making money out of the internet before people stop buying newsprint entirely. Perhaps it would arrive in the form of some great Victorian machine, hissing and steaming and farting out alchemical chunks of gold. The inventor could go on Dragons’ Den and even Deborah Meaden would invest.
Perhaps it would arrive in the form of some great Victorian machine, hissing and steaming and farting out alchemical chunks of gold. The inventor could go on Dragons’ Den and even Deborah Meaden would invest
Anyway, this much-anticipated device never arrived. And now that the rest of the world is in recession, the downturn in ad revenues has forced publishers to cut budgets, because the print titles can no longer subsidise their online siblings. Those cuts manifest themselves in many different ways: from sending fewer reporters to events overseas to having fewer reporters on staff in the first place, and reducing the number of ‘back room’ personnel (both permanent and freelance) who police the quality control. Some newspapers have unified print and online teams and even expect writers to make their own copy fit on the page. You only have to look at the stylistic dog’s dinner that is the Telegraph to see this is a bad thing.
Sub editors can be querulous and annoying people who enjoy nothing better than to halt work for a 10-minute debate about whether the term ‘motorsport’ should be one word or two. But for all their foibles, they perform a useful function. A good sub can save a writer from minor illiteracies, self indulgence and outright egg-on-face anfactualities; sadly, bad ones can introduce wrongness to otherwise fine copy, which is why many writers are hanging out the bunting to celebrate the impending death of this profession.
Champions of new media will tell you that reader interaction has made this strand of quality control obsolete. The theory goes that if what you write is inaccurate or untrue, your readers will call you out on it. And that’s true – up to a point. But why should your customers have to correct your mistakes, or point out that what you’ve served up is essentially cant, piffle and tosh?
Why should your customers have to correct your mistakes, or point out that what you’ve served up is essentially cant, piffle and tosh?
In this downsized world of digital dark satanic mills, fewer permanent reporters will be travelling to grands prix (I’ll examine the implications of this for the depth, accuracy and honesty of F1 coverage in a separate post). The British press has been spared a major cull over the past year or two thanks to the popularity of Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button, but this is an expensive sport to cover. When the interest of the mass audience in F1 dwindles, the axe will swing.
Those who remain will have to be more entrepreneurial – if they’re freelance – or work for companies that are exploring new ways to tap into the marketing budgets of companies involved in F1. It’ll be interesting to hear from James, who has obtained Tag Heuer sponsorship for his site and self-published a 2009 yearbook in collaboration with F1’s greatest photographer, Darren Heath.
Joe has a different approach, hedging his bets somewhat: a blog with Google ads and a sort of virtual ‘tip box’; a site with conventional ads; and a paid-for e-zine. He’s happy to admit that none of these individually makes a mint, but in combination they enable him to carry on reporting from the front line.
Next up, I’ll explore how greater reader interaction is driving the flow of content. And, speaking of reader interaction, it’s comments time. Which sites do you value most? What kind of ads do you find intrusive? Do you respond to web ads or do you use blocking software? Also, if you have any questions for the delegates at the Forum, I’ll try to put them across.
they are some big questions right there. to answer the easy one…
i used to use adblockers a couple of years ago, but decided they gave me a false view of the web. now i don’t block any ads, but instead try to avoid sites with many animated commercials.
if people are prepared to play fast and loose with your experience, i figure they’re just as likely to do the same with their content, in which case it’s not worth reading anyhow.
i do click on some ads, but not all that often. i prefer micropayments as a more direct way of contributing to a site, either as a donation or in return for extra content.
Salut,
For me AUTOSPORT still remains as my first port of call when it comes to a trustworthy source of motor sport news and titbits. Nearly all the other F1/racing websites out there pale in comparison and just regurgitate the same stories over and over again. It’s also the only website I can think of where I’ve been happy to fork out for a subscription on.
Thankfully, there are a host of more original sites out there, which offer a different slant or provide an interesting perspective on things. Sidepodcast.com is thoroughly enjoyable and includes a thriving community (as well as excellent podcasts) and blogging-wise, Joe Saward and James Allen have pretty much got everything under wraps.
Flashing .gifs or just Flash movie ads royally do my noggin’ in. So long as they’re subtle I don’t mind – but then, subtle won’t ‘entice’ the punters to click on them.
In the ten years of so I’ve been online, I could honestly count on one hand the amount of times I’ve clicked on a banner ad. These days I hang out with the cool kids and we roll with the Ad Block plugin for Firefox. Gnarly.
I bid you good day *doffs cap*
I really enjoy:
http://www.sidepodcast.com
http://joesaward.wordpress.com/
http://www.jamesallenonf1.com/
I use advert blocking software, but have donated money to Sidepodcast and have purchased James’ book. I will be subscribing to Joe’s GrandPrix+ in the new year.
Hey Stuart, nice place! Great article too. Hope to see more content like this from you in the very near future.
In terms of F1 news, the recent onslaught of content aggregation has meant I’ve needed to be more weary of who publishes such articles. But at the same time, speed is still at least somewhat important for me in delivering news. As it stands, I have a criteria of 2/3rds cred, 1/3rd speed.
That partly explains why Joe would be my Top 1 choice. While Joe and James Allen, for example, are not far apart in terms of cred for me, JA’s site fails way too often for it to be a top 1 choice. While I do understand that certain WEBSITES need to be more deliberate in publishing news, Joe is able to balance that a bit better than mainstream outlets.
I HATE popup ads – absolutely abhor it – and the blocker takes care of those more often than not. Google ads are non-obtrusive, and that’s good for me as the reader, because it allows the writers I read to make a tidy profit with readers who do use it, while it stays out of my way.
I have a general question for the folks at the Forum (aimed for any of the key F1 paddock players), that is somewhat related to this topic. One thing I think that is severely lacking in F1 right now is transparency, and that tends to reflect on the vast numbers of rumors published, aggregated, and republished elsewhere. Do the F1 people agree with this assessment, and if so, what are they doing to fix it?
My thoughts too. Does the ‘casual reader’ pick up on this kind of thing, though?
Indeed. Whenever I read a story that’s simply been regurgitated from elsewhere, I find myself asking “What’s the point?” Fan sites play such an important role in helping fans connect with one another and discuss the issues of the day; I think they deserve better, because I hate to see people getting their knickers in a twist over a non-story. Subject of another post in this series…
Tricky one, this. The 24-hour news cycle seems to have inculcated us to believe (a) that we have a right to know exactly what’s going on at any given time; and (b) that somewhere there’s a news source which can provide exactly that. Slip the boot on to the other foot for a second, and picture yourself as an F1 figure – a driver, for example – in the middle of a complex and confidential negotiation. Would you want someone standing in the same room broadcasting all the discussions – as if they were commentating on a cricket match?
Still, that doesn’t stop people wanting to know what’s going on. Curiosity is natural, and sadly there are people out there on the interweb who prey on that in order to sell shabby goods.
Thanks for the comments. More posts coming up…
Taking your questions in order:
Which sites do you value most?
I value, in order:
sites that give me accurate and original information (e.g. grandprix.com, pitpass.com, autosport.com)
sites that build on such information to come up with original conclusions (e.g. sidepodcast.com, joesaward.wordpress.com, jamesallenonf1.com)
sites that discuss the above (e.g. gpwizard.co.uk, f1rejects.com, forum.giancarlofisichella.com)
sites that give stream-of-consciousness rumours where the information is so inaccurate that it becomes funny (e.g. yahoo.co.uk, planet-f1.com… …and that’s about it)
While I enjoy long detailed analyses on the internet, I supplement such analyses with a considerable amount of printed material – a subscription to F1 Racing, the occasional Autosport (one every 1-2 months, depending on when content likely to be of enduring interest to me appears), even more occasional issues of other magazines, whatever F1 books I can borrow from the various library systems near my house and a book collection (including the Formula 1 Yearbook every year). At the moment, I vastly prefer paying for print than online because the print stuff tends to age better. I’m still getting value from the Formula 1 Yearbook 1997-1998, while I’d struggle to find much on the internet that would still interest me in 12 years’ time.
What kind of ads do you find intrusive?
I don’t think you’ll like my answer very much – apologies in advance. Due to the way I process sensory input, any ad involving text is intrusive to me. As far as I know, every ad ever involves text of some sort, if only the company name at the end… (This annoyance level may explain why I don’t buy anything based on ads).
All I can suggest is that the more complex the coding, the more annoying it is likely to be for me because it will take longer for the adblocker to block it. This is necessary because I got fed up of badly-coded ads locking my computer up a couple of years back and discovered the ad blocker was the only way for me to be able to continue using the internet in a meaningful way.
If it helps, I think I am on the extreme end of the scale when it comes to the advert aggravation scale.
Do you respond to web ads or do you use blocking software?
See above – I use blocking software to enable me to use the internet without ads crashing the browser every five minutes.
I have been known to donate to Sidepodcast.com, but I am limited on what I can spend on the internet – for example, an Autosport.com subscription would set me back nearly as much as a F1 Racing subscription (both for a year). And I can’t read Autosport.com unless I’m on the internet… My F1 spending is almost exclusively off-line.
I read quite a few but it’s Autosport and then Joe and James’s blogs. Also Will Buxton is pretty good. The rest of the news I get from Sidepodcast as we only post news from reputable sources.
I cannot stand sites like Planet-F1 who have merely descended into tabloid rumour and mudslinging. I also boycotted Pitpass because of a lack of editorial control and subsequent bad handling of the complaints…
To be honest, I accept that ads have to be there but most ads are truly annoying. This includes pop ups (in a new window and more annoyingly, in front of the article), flashing ads, autoplayable video ads (especially when I am at work!), and finally the more risqué ads that seem to be appearing.
I never click on banner ads. I don’t block them either, I just don’t visit sites where the annoying ones are prevalent!
Hmm, how about asking “The teams have promised to cut costs in various ways, but how could the teams and the sport in general cut costs for the reporters and journalists to ensure that they are able to attend and that the profession remains sustainable?”
Answer to that one will probably be “Fewer races on the other side of the planet!”
in truth, i suspect not. itv still has an audience (of sorts), despite regularly hitting its daytime viewers with the kind of annoying and repetitive commercials i would run a mile from.