#2
The first time you go to it thru Google, it isn't pw protected, second time it is.
Anyway here is the text
THE British are coming, not by land or by sea, but on the internet, seizing readers who might otherwise visit US websites.
British media have been making inroads in the US market by invading online space, seizing readers who might otherwise visit websites of domestic outlets like Fox News or The New York Times.
And, even though US news organisations are widely respected around the world, the Brits are peeling away American readers.
According to data from research firm comScore, the tabloid Daily Mail's Mail Online overtook The New York Times last year as the world's biggest newspaper website and held the top spot in June with 44.7 million visitors.
Separate data from Web analytics site Alexa.com showed that The Guardian and BBC websites are among the top 15 news sites, holding their own among CNN, Yahoo! News and others.
"In the English-speaking world, the divider of the Atlantic Ocean is ebbing away because of the Internet,'" said Ken Doctor, a media analyst with the research firm Outsell.
The transatlantic gap had made it difficult for print editions to make it to US shores.
But British media groups are eager to expand on digital platforms just as US media such as The Wall Street Journal and New York Times are growing their international audiences.
In June, the Financial Times launched a multimillion dollar marketing drive in the US, saying it was "underscoring its position as the authoritative source on US and global business, economic and political news".
"This campaign reflects the FT's unwavering commitment to delivering a sharp perspective of global business news and analysis with intelligence, insight and wit," said FT marketing director Caroline Halliwell.
"It also represents a substantial investment in the US, one of our fastest growing markets," she added.
The FT did not provide a breakdown of its subscribers by region but one survey showed the newspaper and FT.com reach 761,000 US readers. The company said it has 300,000 digital paid subscribers worldwide.
The London-based paper said mobile users account for 25 percent of traffic to FT.com and 15 per cent of new subscriptions.
"If you talk to the major British quality publishers, about a third of their traffic has been over the years in the US, which is a surprise," Doctor said.
The analyst said gains came in the past decade, with some theorizing that the United States' previous president and his policies had been so unpopular and so little questioned by domestic media that readers looked abroad.
"George W Bush was so unpopular and the New York Times aided the development of the Iraq war, and people wanted media they thought they could trust," Doctor said.
But he said these gains have been extended even after Barack Obama took over the White House.
One factor is how internet news searches work.
"Google has democratised the sourcing of news, so you are as likely to find a story from the BBC as from Chicago Tribune," Doctor said.
"There is an audience of people who want another point of view, there is an expat audience, and you put all those together and it's significant."
Rebecca Lieb, analyst with the Altimeter Group, said paywalls on some US sites like the New York Times have driven readers elsewhere, and social media also can help drive momentum for sites from the British.
"Tweets and social mentions are becoming a significant driver of traffic to news sites," Lieb said.
"Digital media has always been available across the pond but there is a component of cross-promoting now that enables them to be found."
The Guardian, which has heavy financial pressures threatening the home print edition, has been nonetheless expanding its US presence. Last September, the London daily launched a new US homepage aimed at the American audience.
The Guardian said in a statement it had opened the US office "largely because one-third of our audience is in the US so we wanted to offer more content relevant to their daily lives".
"Our continuing growth and increased reach in the US is a testament to the US appetite for Guardian's internationalist, online journalism
"We're currently at over 20 million unique viewers a month which is up approximately 80 percent from last year."
The Daily Mail meanwhile has managed to get a profit out of its Mail Online Web operations for the first time, according to the British-based Media Week, citing sources at the company.
The industry publication said Mail Online would show a profit of 30 million ($46 million), amid 80 per cent revenue growth, and its use of a team of fewer than 30 people in Britain, 20 in New York, and 10 in Los Angeles.
Mail editor Paul Dacre told The New Yorker earlier this year that the site has been successful in the US market by delivering what readers want.
"Unlike mainstream media sites in the US, where, quite frankly, readers' interests are not very high on the agenda, we are driven by what readers want to read," Dacre said.
"At its best, American journalism is unbeatable. But the problem with many of your newspapers is that they became too high-minded, too complacent, and self-regarding.
"They forgot that there's a huge market out there of people who are serious-minded but also want some fun in their reading."
While British websites can attract US readers, making a profit is another story.
"It's very hard to make money on media," Lieb said.
But she noted that if sites can expand their footprint with minimal costs, any additional revenue would be "gravy".
Doctor said that to get themselves back in the black, news organisations need to invest in sales staff for local advertising.
"It's hard for the British media to sell advertising in the US just as it is hard for the New York Times and Wall Street Journal in Europe,'' he said.
"The greatest investment is in on the ground sales people. They have to put in place a sales forces and agencies which know the territory."
The Daily Mail meanwhile has managed to get a profit out of its Mail Online Web operations for the first time, according to the British-based Media Week, citing sources at the company.
The industry publication said Mail Online would show a profit of 30 million ($46 million), amid 80 per cent revenue growth, and its use of a team of fewer than 30 people in Britain, 20 in New York, and 10 in Los Angeles.
Mail editor Paul Dacre told The New Yorker earlier this year that the site has been successful in the US market by delivering what readers want.
"Unlike mainstream media sites in the US, where, quite frankly, readers' interests are not very high on the agenda, we are driven by what readers want to read," Dacre said.
"At its best, American journalism is unbeatable. But the problem with many of your newspapers is that they became too high-minded, too complacent, and self-regarding.
"They forgot that there's a huge market out there of people who are serious-minded but also want some fun in their reading."
Daily Mail's website is a lot like People magazine, but with more content, and without the political correctness. An American online paper that provides hard news based on news wires, but with a right-wing tilt, could make money, much like the Daily Mail. It's overly expensive content (i.e. armies of journalists) combined with politically correct news emphases that combine to hike expenses while preventing many online papers from gaining a mass readership. It's an indictment of the American newspaper industry that the Daily Mail, a British paper whose print edition is garbage, has been able to steal their online audience.
#9
I don't care if the Brit media is left of the Dems, it still defies belief to say that Bush was "so little questioned by the domestic media". He was nothing but questioned by the domestic media.
It's the Daily Mail, they say what the hell they want, true or otherwise.
Just don't get sucked into the comments, because it is a true reflection of the moronic majority in this country; which will leave you seething with despair. Immature, ignorant, self-centred, absolutely appalling at spelling and with lashings of conceited ineptitude to quote some of the thought which come to me.
Ironically, a "fairground" is where I first met my friend Karen Verona, aka Guam Taotamona's + Nostradamus' ALMOST-MTV's-Tawney-Kitaen, and I know for a fact Karen's uniform never looked like that.
[An Nahar] A raid on an army base in Abidjan left at least six dead Monday, in the latest of a string of attacks targeting the military in the Ivory Coast economic capital.
President Alassane Ouattara ...the current president-for-life of Ivory Coast. He actually beat his predecessor in an election before having to eject him from the presidential palazzo.... has struggled to stabilize a country still awash with weapons and demobbed fighters, more than a year after the end of a deadly post-election crisis.
A firefight broke out at dawn around the Akouedo military camp in Abidjan's Cocody neighborhood, according to residents and officials who were unable to identify the attackers.
"Several gunnies attacked the Akouedo camp, breaking in before heading for the powder magazine," an official in Ivory Coast's military command said.
"The men posted in the camp had to regroup before retaliating. The attackers fled towards Bingerville," a nearby town, he said,
Four bodies could be seen strewn on the blood-splattered floor of a building at the entrance of the Akeoudo military camp and two others at a sentry post and another gate, an AFP correspondent reported.
All the victims were wearing military fatigues.
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08/07/2012 00:00 ||
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(Reuters) - A Japanese chef for the late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il visited Pyongyang for the first time in 11 years and met the new young leader and his wife Ri Sol-ju, whom he described as "pretty and charming", Japanese media said on Saturday.
Kenji Fujimoto, a pseudonym, who worked as the late leader's personal chef in the late 1980s and 1990s, told reporters in Beijing on his way back from the secretive North that the leader Kim Jong-un was happy to meet him during his two-week visit, Kyodo and Jiji news agencies said.
Fujimoto, who published in 2003 a memoir of his time as the Dear Leader's chef, said the young Kim "very much enjoyed" eating tuna that he had flown in for him, Kyodo said.
The Japanese chef, whose book offered a rare insight into the goings-on behind the scenes in the ruling household, now always wears dark sunglasses, a variety of headgear and has moved homes frequently, indicating that he feels his life is threatened.
Fujimoto got to know the young Kim when he served as the chef for his late father for 13 years from 1988, at a time when more than 1 million North Koreans perished in a famine.
In his memoir, Fujimoto singled out the young Kim as being his father's favorite son. He called the youngest of Kim's sons the "Prince", and wrote that he most resembled his father.
Asked whether they discussed issues related to North Korea's relations with Japan, such as ways to address Pyongyang's past abductions of Japanese nationals, Fujimoto only said, "I did not visit (North Korea) for government work."
Among a number of issues straining Japan-North Korean relations is the abduction of Japanese citizens by North Korean agents decades ago.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
08/07/2012 11:47 ||
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#1
A standard warning, something for cause, or political theatre?
The examples given are certainly curious, but were they recent or 40 years ago? And all three are helicopters.
(U//FOUO) Employees of a coast shipping container retrofit company observed a helicopter that made eight passes over the property. A man wearing a harness stood on the skids and took photographs of the area.
(U//FOUO) A helicopter, flying at low altitude hovered over a dam, in violation of FAA regulations. Investigators determined that the registration number provided by the reporting party was not valid or on file with the FAA.
(U//FOUO) An employee of a chemical company reported that a helicopter hovered within 50 feet of a storage tank. Observers also spotted another helicopter nearby. Neither aircraft had tail numbers carried in the FAA Registry
On Friday Thompson Rooters, one of the internet's most visited sources for interviews, reporting, and analysis, was the victim of malicious hackers who gained access to the content management system [CMS] it uses to post blogs. While Rooters says it does not currently know the identity of the attackers, it is clear they were fixated on Syria and were looking to spread negative misinformation about the freedom fighters actively rebelling against the country's despotic regime.
In one of the blogs, a post claiming to be an interview with Free Syrian Army leader Riad al-Asaad was posted, saying that FSA forces were withdrawing from the city of Aleppo ...For centuries, Aleppo was Greater Syria's largest city and the Ottoman Empire's third, after Constantinople and Cairo. Although relatively close to Damascus in distance, Aleppans regard Damascenes as country cousins... . The the only problem was that it was completely false. The report drew swift condemnation from the real FSA, who blamed President al-Assad's government for spreading lies. Syria's ruling regime has shown itself to be tech-savvy, attempting to strictly censor domestic networks last year in a failed bid to stave off revolt.
Rooters briefly yanked its CMS and blogs offline. It released a statement, commenting, "Rooters.com was a target of a hack on Friday. Our blogging platform was compromised and fabricated blog posts were falsely attributed to several Rooters journalists. Rooters did not carry out such an interview and the posting has been deleted."
Rootersnews hounds on the ground say the FSA is still very much inside Aleppo. The FSA fighters wear masks, causing some westerners to mistake them for "terrorist" insurrgents, such as Al Qaeda.
And if anyone is an expert on "terrorists", it has to be Rooters.
However, by candlelight every wench is handsome... the masks serve a more pragmatic purpose for the freedom fighters -- keeping their identities secret to prevent their families from being murdered in retaliation by the ruling regime.
Or to keep their mothers from finding out they're really not at school studying the Koran...
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
(Reuters) - A Japanese chef for the late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il visited Pyongyang for the first time in 11 years and met the new young leader and his wife Ri Sol-ju, whom he described as "pretty and charming", Japanese media said on Saturday.
On Friday Thompson Rooters, one of the internet's most visited sources for interviews, reporting, and analysis, was the victim of malicious hackers who gained access to the content management system [CMS] it uses to post blogs. While Rooters says it does not currently know the identity of the attackers, it is clear they were fixated on Syria and were looking to spread negative misinformation about the freedom fighters actively rebelling against the country's despotic regime.
