The Publishers and The Posers

(MoneyWatch)  It's Friday, and rather than digg into specific companies, just this once I feel like stepping back and taking a long view of the media industry we monitor here so closely.

Think about it. What now qualifies as "media" -- in one form or another -- theoretically could include virtually every website published. That was not true in our brick and mortar past, but now that everyone is a virtual publisher, every website can attract users from all over the world.

This, in turn, makes every website essentially an advertisement (whether monetized or not) for its own content. Users stumbleupon your web page, and if they like it or find it useful, they might just return. Eventually, if you are lucky, they become more or less "addicted," returning to your site frequently.

Before the web, we used t0 talk about trying to addict our audiences at the newspapers, magazines, radio and TV companies where I worked. It meant that we tried to create and present the most compelling content we could muster -- our assumption being that quality would drive adoption and build the desired habit.

Online, a different sort of mentality prevails at most web publishing operations. Quality of content isn't necessarily valued very highly; quantity seems more important, as do orthogonal factors (such as how to help your content score higher on Google) that never, ever before entered into the calculations made by media execs.

The many people working through this transition into the new media world can be forgiven if they occasionally feel overwhelmed. It requires a new lexicon, a new structure, and a new strategic approach that takes time to develop. Even then, the competition is fierce and the technological barriers to entry are higher than they appeared to be at the outset.

Sure, anybody can be a publisher, but how many will make money? This is what will set the "industry" players apart from the rest. Web publications, Blogs, community sites fall into two distinct categories -- hobbies and business. Here in this space, we do not track the hobby sites. If there is a unifying theme behind the companies we cover it's their relentless search for an effective way to monetize their content.

Our goal is to be their partner in finding that answer.