Scripps closed the Rocky Mountain News today– it was a great newspaper, a great website, a model of how a news operation can change. Unfortunately, the JOA in Denver didn’t give Scripps enough flexibility to stop the losses it had seen this past year ($16 million).

Here’s a long video on the end of the RMN (21 minutes, but it’s worth it.).  If you can watch it in full screen in HD.

The whole concept of paying for newspaper content is making its way around the journalism blogosphere again. Except this time it’s also had endorsements from print journalism celebs like Walter Isaacson, Mort Zuckerman and Steve Brill.  For the most part I’ve tried to ignore it all since I feel like I’ve been there, reputed the arguments and fought that battle and won before.  Of course this all stems from the fact that newspapers as we know it are dying and the old hands are pulling out all the stops to save the old way of doing things so they don’t have to change.

At times I’ve really had to admit that I’m not part of the old newspaper tradition and wonder if I’m even part of the new newspaper tradition because I really agree more with what the webbies/techies have had to say about the newspaper industry rather than the newspaper industry itself. For example, Techdirt responds to the claims that google devalues everything (ridicolous!)

This is wrong on so many levels it’s hard to know where to begin. Google doesn’t devalue things it touches. It increases their value by making them easier to find and access. Google increases your audience as a content creator, which is the most important asset you have. It takes a special kind of cluelessness to claim that something that increases your biggest asset “devalues” your business.

The latest issue of A List Apart examines how building “a website without a content strategy is like a speeding vehicle without a driver.” It looks at what content strategy is, why it’s important and how it effects design.

Chris Bogan has posted a great list of 40 Ways to Deliver Blog Content. Not that I follow it, but if I wanted to have an awesome blog, I would.

Morris Interactive is launching a new drupal powered site for their Jacksonville Newspaper and have developed some great new features. My favorite feature extolled by Morris Interactive VP Steve Yelvington allows editors to design new home page and feature page layouts with no html knowledge– that’s right you heard me no html needed!

If you compare that to the Ellington/Django powered templating system that we ran with Scripps Newspapers it is light years ahead. In the Django system you had to not only be html and css proficient but able to sort out it’s python powered templating tags.

Here’s a hilarious promo for the Austin American Statesman newspaper breaking news as they rip TV for being slow about breaking news.

John Naughton from the Guardian looks at which health care sites you can trust as a follow-up to Microsoft’s cyberchondria study. Most of the data he quotes is old, but the general premise comes down to the fact that you have to be very careful how much trust you put in healthcare websites.

Jeff Jarvis follows up on the conversation looking at medicine as information. Jarvis advocates “doctors should act as curators, selecting the best information for their patients and making sure they are better informed.” I like the concept of the doctors helping us sort the good from the bad, but I’m not sure how most health care practicioners feel about losing control of the information.

I got a new Blackberry Bold and it is compatible with the qik live video streaming service so you can check out my latest live video on my qik page or follow me on twitter and check in live whenever you see the live streaming note.

The video quality is decent (320 x 240) for the web, but it is dependent on the quality of the video camera/lens on your cell phone and the speed of your data connection on the cell phone.

When I worked at the newspaper, we played around a lot with qik and it just came available for Blackberries that have video camera built it in– also, it works a lot better on phones with a 3G connection that have a faster data service.

Seth Godin has a great post on his blog about the NY Times struggle to remain profitable (and if the Times is struggling so is everyone else) and some advice about where they missed the boat. He concludes with this point that is really relevant for any business to ask whether they are all about looking back and maintaining their position or moving forward to find their next business model.

I guess it’s about the difference between:

• senior management playing defense, supporting and protecting the status quo and avoiding offending the elders upstairs vs.
• using existing momentum and clout to build assets for the next business.

I admit that maintaining your current business model is important to maintaining profitability, but many times businesses fail to think of the future. Many newspapers owners lived high from their publications high profit margins and failed to reinvested and find the next business model and are suffering the consequences today.

• Too many people waste their time straining to do things that aren’t right for them.
• Too many managers ask the wrong people to do the wrong job– the job that isn’t a good fit.
• Too many companies focus on doing business outside their core competency.

How do you solve this problem?

• Find a job that let’s you do the work that you’re the best at.
• Don’t grasp at straws when you’ve fallen, rather refocus on your goals.
• Help your employees find their strength and then put them to work using their strength.
• Determine what your company does best and stay sharply focuses while outsourcing and spinning off every thing else.