Oct. 26, 2006

Once, if we created it, they came. To our print editions, that is.

Now, we still write stories and take pictures and put them in our newspapers. But that's only the first step – and it's not nearly enough anymore.

We must find our young readers and go to them, offering our content in varied ways on the platforms they use. We should let them talk to us – and each other. We should find ways to let them create communities around our content. We should let them rank stories and lots of other things. We should listen to their opinions. And we should use their expertise to expand our credibility with readers.

"I'm wherever the readers are," said Marian Lieu, a music writer at the San Jose Mercury News, during this morning's APME/APPM general session on attracting and keeping young readers online.

"I think the key to getting younger readers is you have to reflect them, not just in the kinds of stories you write but in the way they read those stories."

Lieu finds that hip-hop bands in the Bay Area still love it when she writes about them in the paper. But she makes sure she also posts her stories on her MySpace.com page, updates her daily blog, sends out a pod-cast, produces a video-cast, and writes magazine articles.

Miami-based Noah Robinson of the Machina Group, a consulting firm, said it's crucial for newspapers to figure out how to help its readers talk with each other.

"I feel like the newspaper industry comes from a position of credibility," he said. "Now it needs to move to an area where it's enabling people to connect. Can your users connect with each other? That's the next step, and it's very rare to see that in newspapers today."

Matt Thompson, creator of the "Epic" video and now deputy editor of StarTribune.com, where he's leading an effort to create an arts and entertainment site aimed at young readers, said the secret is creating communities.

"It's about letting them connect," he said. "And the ability to rank is increasingly important."

Others are figuring out how to use our content creatively, aggregating it in ways that appeal to viewers on their Web sites, said Jon Fortt, senior editor of Business 2.0 magazine.

"It's important for newspapers to figure out how to get in that game," he said. "We're playing in the same world that the Googles are playing in."

Our viewers want to interact with our unique content, and with each other, he said. Local content – something newspapers can provide – particularly provides that unique information, he said.

"I see our credibility in two layers," he said. "One is the journalistic layer and nothing's changed about that. But another type is your community credibility, what sorts of tools you're giving your readers to interact with other in more meaningful ways."

One of the key developments in online content is "tagging," which allows viewers to identify areas of interest and to form a community around that interest.

Moderator Jennifer Carroll, vice president of new media content for Gannett, ended the session by asking each of the panelists to list their must-have, desert-island Web sites. Here they are:

Noah – MySpace.com, Digg.com and Dailykos.com

Jon – Digg.com and Mybloglog.com

Marian – MySpace.com

Matt – Metafilter.com and Wikipedia.com