Big news earlier this week when Canwest Global Communications Corp announced initiatives to reduce their annualized operating costs by approximately $61 Million. The move translated into 560 layoffs - about five per cent of the company's workforce through voluntary buyouts, attrition and reductions. Canwest management pointed to the current economic environment as well as the structural challenges in the conventional television model as the reasons why.
Interestingly, CEO Leonard Asper stresses in the announcement that Canwest is still eager to transform into a multi-platform media company and build its audience using digital media.
"Having completed an assessment of our Canadian operations and, after careful consideration, we are implementing a number of initiatives that will provide savings that will allow us to better compete in the current economic environment, without compromising our core products and services,” said Leonard Asper, President and CEO, Canwest. “It will not impact our strategy to invest in growth media like digital online, mobile and specialty channels.”
I'm not sure why Asper felt the need to assure shareholders and employees that the operating cost reduction wouldn't impact their digital media strategy... until yesterday.
Word on Vancouver streets is that NowPublic is about to be acquired by Canwest. While a NowPublic acquisition may not seem like a significant transaction, keep in mind that Canwest's current market capitalization is a paltry $80 Million - down from $700 Million only one year ago. NowPublic raised $10 Million in venture capital in July of 2007.
This rumour may have legs. NowPublic Co-founder Len Brody has advised Canwest in the past.
Canwest is Canada's leading international media company. Representing a portfolio of world-class brands, the Company creates and distributes some... [more]
NowPublic is a participatory news network which mobilizes an army of reporters to cover the events that define our world. In twelve short months,... [more]
To date Vancouver has been the Canadian capital of citizen journalism with Orato.com and NowPublic calling the West Coast home. But now there's an upstart from the prairies that wants to change that and according to their research, there's plenty to room.
According to Statistics Canada’s most recent Canadian Internet Use Survey, a full 20 percent of Canadians say they were involved in posting images, writing blogs or participating in online discussion groups using their home Internet connections. While many may not realize it, they are helping contribute to the growing phenomenon of citizen journalism – an all-inclusive form of journalism where anyone with an Internet connection can help disseminate news and information. In a sense, they are helping document history in a new and innovative way.
Winnipeg's Global Reporter wants to take the citizen journalism trend one step further by allowing users to upload video news reports. Unlike other video-sharing sites, Global Reporter will be strictly for news networking with each video report open for discussion.
NowPublic was able to completely erase Orato's six year headstart by being creative in their adoption of new users (some would call it user trolling). So, that begs the question - is Global Reporter considering an appeal to YouTube's most active news videographers a potential user acquistion strategy?
Launched in October 2008, Global Reporter is an interactive Social Networking site Where YOU Report and comment on current events. Global... [more]
Thousands of bloggers around the world are coming together in an online effort as part of the Blog Action Day '08 to raise awareness about poverty and encourage readers to do something about it.
And a great way to make a meaningful impact is through a site called Kiva - where anyone can make microloans (normally around $25 and up) to entrepreneurs of their choice in developing countries. Instead of giving people donations for causes of poverty, Kiva has provided a system where regular folks in the developed countries can make microloans to budding entrepreneurs in developing countries and help them to escape poverty in a smarter and sustained way.
The loans are administered by a local Kiva field partner and used by the entrepreneur to grow his/her business. During this time, the lender (you!) receives regular updates on the progress of entrepreneur, and since these are loans at the end of the day, you get paid back (in most cases; Kiva doesn't guarantee payback and there is some risk involved). You can then re-loan the same amount to another entrepreneur. This is such a powerful idea and brilliantly executed by Kiva, as it is transferring surplus wealth from the haves to the have-nots, in a very efficient way.
And the good news is that it seems to be catching on. $30 million has already been invested through Kiva within the past few years alone! Fortune called Kiva the "The Only Non-Profit That Matters".
With $25, you can change someone's life - try it out ! :)
TechCrunch managed to post another incorrect story over the weekend. Serkan Toto made it to the last paragraph before he misspoke, calling Cambrian House “now-defunct”. Let me tidy up some facts: VenCorps, for those who follow these things, is a site built by the not-defunct Cambrian House.
Luckily, the “not-defunct at all” Cambrian House team was on top of the situation and released this blog post to combat the misinformation. This post contains an official letter from their counsel, a detailed FAQ, and the wit and humor we have come to expect from the Calgary company.
Thanks for clearing things up... again!
Launched in 2006, Cambrian House began as a crowdsourcing community using a wisdom of crowds based approach to discover new business and technology... [more]
What is Web 2.0? Is it a sideshow for small companies or a worthwhile strategy for the mainstream? KPMG hosted a session last night in Vancouver on The Corporate Adoption of Web 2.0. The evening session introduce some of the core concepts behind Web 2.0 for an audience that may be familiar with the terms but not with the core principles and whether they have value for large companies.
One featured speaker was Mike Sikorsky, CEO, Cambrian House, Calgary who addressed, “How crowdsourcing is changing the way companies do business.”
Sikorsky, in his inimitable style, explained the difference between two ways to tap into the crowd: “implicit” is by people clicking on links and “explicit” which is by deliberately voting in response to a posed question. Thus, people may be contributing to the wisdom of the crowd without being aware.
He distinguished different methods of pplication: from tapping the wisdom of crowds (which can be quite passive), to participation (which requires a crowd of interested people) and commerce (where there is some potential to make money). Sikorsky gave examples of larger companies (such as Starbucks) that are integrated crowd participation into their websites.
Another speaker was Leonard Brody, a partner of Vancouver success story, NowPublic, who focused on “The truth about user generated contents and the future of news.” Brody gave his customary candid and insightful views on his sector and the web in general.
He noted that the news business has been devastated by the internet. The challenge for traditional news organizations, such as newspaper chains, is that the source of news is no longer controlled. Brody explained how it’s all about eyes and ears and experience. For NowPublic the assumption is there is almost always somewhere to record the news when it happens. Their objective is to build the next generation of Reuters/AP.
In this fast-changing environment it is hard to define new companies. NowPublic is a good example. They are often referred to as a “citizen journalism” site. Brody points out that this is a term invented by journalists. He explained that NowPublic is not in the news business - they are instead a “global news intelligence network.” They have cracked the code on how to gather information.
NowPublic functions because society has evolved from a “witnessing population” to a “participating population.” People are involved in the process. Brody notes that, “The events of our time will be captured by amateurs.”
Another insightful comment was that our society has gone from “hyper local” to “hyper personal;” in other words, geography is not the determining factor in what people are interested in. Instead, they want news that relates to their interests. As an example, Brody cited Facebook which dominates news feeds—people only get the news that they think is important.
One of the issues that come up around Web 2.0 is to determine why people are involved. Brody admitted that if it was just about money, then the tasks of companies would be easer. However there are varied motivations. The list according to Brody: money (this is the smallest); vanity and ego; discussion about a specific issue; accidental bystanders; and people who are simply nuts (the last was a crowd favourite).
This KPMG event session is a positive development that reflects how web principles are seeping into the mainstream. This is a standard method of the diffusion of innovation. The new ideas typically appear on the fringes and then work their way into the mainstream. This is the path to “intrapreneurship”—innovation within larger organizations.
As with innovation generally, it may be a game changer in some contexts and in others it can be an additional tool. As I point out in ePreneur, Web 2.0 principles, such as crowdsourcing, may be the basis for a company (such as Cambrian House or NowPublic), but they can be a strategic tool of implementation for other companies.
NowPublic is a participatory news network which mobilizes an army of reporters to cover the events that define our world. In twelve short months,... [more]
Launched in 2006, Cambrian House began as a crowdsourcing community using a wisdom of crowds based approach to discover new business and technology... [more]
San Francisco based Yelp has quietly penetrated the 49th Parallel this month with their successful hyperlocal recommendation site and are now delivering Canadian city content at Yelp.ca.
Yelp is the fun and easy way to find, review and talk about what's great (and not so great) in your world. You already know that asking friends is the best way to find restaurants, dentists, hairstylists, and anything local. Yelp makes it fast and easy by collecting and organizing your friends' recommendations in one convenient place.
Canadians has been waiting for Yelp to come North for some time and now reviewers in Calgary, Edmonton, Halifax, Hamilton, Kitchener, London, Montréal, Ottawa, Québec City, Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, and Winnipeg can get busy. Canada's YellowPages.ca - The Find Engine - and the local restaurant user review sites that are scattered across the Canadian tundra should be getting nervous.
Job Opportunity Alert: Yelp is looking for part-time Marketing Assistants (a.k.a. Scouts) in Vancouver & Toronto:
We're looking for witty, well-written and in-the-know insiders to help us prep Yelp for prime time in the cities mentioned above.
This critical role includes:
- Editing local business listings to ensure they have the right categories and address info
- Writing witty and insightful reviews of all the places you frequent
- Photographing your neighborhood businesses and uploading these images on Yelp
Coming soon.Yelp is the fun and easy way to find, review and talk about what's great (and not so great) in your world. You already know that asking... [more]
