Multimedia takes center stage but without AP service

By Dan Lamothe
Gazette Staff

Multimedia journalism will be the topic of no fewer than four sessions at the Associated Press Managing Editors conference today.

One thing that isn't on the agenda is "asap." A multimedia wire service launched by The Associated Press two years ago and aimed at the readers ages 18-34, it will fold Oct. 31, according to the AP.

The service's main problem was simple, experts say: It struggled to connect with readers and viewers under a model that distributed content through newspaper websites.

"I wouldn't say it was frustrating, but it was a challenge trying to make that connection with readers and viewers when you're working under the membership model," said Eric Carvin, an "asap" news editor.

At its peak, "asap" employed 27 people, producing content for a premium wire service distributed to about 300 clients. The service is now down to 19 employees and about 200 clients, Carvin said.

Carvin said "asap" allowed its staff to pursue journalism in a variety of forms and required them to be inventive.

"It shows what's possible in a multimedia world. There's a lot of types of stories we did that the AP had never done before, and I think you'll start to see those types of stories appear with the AP in the future."

One recent example Carvin cited: "asap" released a video package that explored whether there was a "Colbert bump" - a spike in book sales - after authors appeared on <i>The Colbert Report</i>, a Comedy Central TV show. It's unlikely the AP would have tackled that kind of topic without "asap," Carvin said.

But industry analysts said "asap" failed to reach a younger crowd because younger readers and viewers do not go to a single website but instead visit a variety of specialized ones.

It also may have used too many "trying-too-hard-to-be-edgy bells and whistles," said Scott Anderson, a content director at Tribune Interactive.

Anderson, who manages a Tribune blog on new media issues, said "asap" was doomed to fail because it distributed content through the "big, fat, steel-reinforced, spiked spider-covered wall of newspaper companies."

"I've used (media critic) Jon Katz's line  about newspaper companies online being akin to 'Lawrence Welk trying to dance at a rap concert' so many times that I probably owe him a fortune in royalties," Anderson said. "But it played out in this case in many ways."

The perceived struggle to be "hip" resulted in negative reviews from numerous media blogs and websites. Gawker, for example, criticized "asap" numerous times, most famously in 2005 when it compared it to "the scene in an 'urban' comedy in which a middle-aged white character actor talks like Snoop Dogg - equally embarrassing to young, old, black, and white."

Doug Fisher, an instructor of journalism at the University of South Carolina, said "asap" produced some good work. But he said the service failed to take into account that it was competing with Websites such as MySpace and YouTube when it comes to multimedia.

"The AP's whole model is predicated on the idea of being a utility and having monopoly," said Fisher, a new media expert and former AP editor. "Selling everything through the members may have worked at one time, but we're beyond that point."

An example of a failed opportunity, experts say: The AP launched an "asap" blog, Far and Wide, but didn't actively reach out to other bloggers, solicit comments from readers or link to material the didn't produce, all commonplace in the blogosphere.

"They were blogging, but they really didn't get the ethos of the blogosphere," said Fisher, who runs the blog Common Sense Journalism. "There's a lot of blogs on newspaper sites that are just like that."

AP editors involved in "asap" said they plan to apply what they learned, and will continue to incorporate multimedia in a variety of ways. Far and Wide, for example, will be used as a prototype as the AP goes forward with new media ventures, Carvin said.

In an e-mail, Ted Anthony, "asap" editor, said his staff will be working in many parts of the AP after "asap" folds.

"We expect the kinds of storytelling that our laboratory environment helped to develop will prove very useful as AP helps its members and customers negotiate this changing landscape of journalism," Anthony said.