The Media Business: It's the Perspective, Stupid

Over the weekend, I read The New Republic's report on the Politico -- an article that, unto itself, exemplifies the incestuous, self-absorbed problems in the journalism business that the article sought to examine.

In light of the media's self-absorbed chatter about its own economic future (note to editors: writing about your business's plight is not a way to attract new readers), the piece looks at the Politico's business model, its often irresponsible propaganda packaged as "reporting," and above all else, its singular focus on catering to a tiny audience of media and political elites in Washington, D.C. Of course, the New Republic suffers from the very same myopia, as evidenced most recently by the fact that it is a Washington-centric publication publishing a long article on another Washington-centric publication. Indeed, the magazine's circulation has plummeted not only because it spent so much of the last 8 years cheering on the Bush administration's neoconservatism, but because, like the Politico, it is written as if its target reader is a six-figure K Street lobbyist or congressional staffer, and in terms of building a mass audience, there just aren't a lot of those people.

The numbers really prove the point. Consider, for example, the Politico bragging that it attracted 4.6 million unique visitors in September of 2008. Now remember, the Politico employs 36 full-time reporters (and pays some of them in the neighborhood of $250,000 a year), an entire editorial staff and three full-time publicists. It is supported by a robust budget that pays for promotional ads for itself, operates out of a super-expensive tower in Rosslyn, Virginia, and is bankrolled by a multimillionaire banking and media mogul. For all that, they got 4.6 million unique visitors at the height of the election season.

By comparison, OpenLeft, which operates with 2 part-time employees at a fraction of a $250,000-a-year salary, no promotional ads, and no multimillionaire mogul behind it, attracted 1.2 million unique visitors in the same month. In other words, OpenLeft achieved 25 percent of the traffic that the Politico did, at far, far less than 25 percent of the investment. The same comparison can likely be made with DailyKos. It has more writers, more revenue and more promotion than OpenLeft, but certainly not nearly as much as Politico. And DailyKos got 74 million visits in September 2008, to Politico's 4.6 million.

There are two really important lessons from this.

First and foremost, you have to find yourself a trust fund baby willing to invest an ungodly pile of cash (and willing to lose that pile) if your goal is to generate traffic and reader interest in publications who promote the Versailles perspective -- that is, the perspective that focuses only on talking to, debating, and communicating with people inside the Beltway. There may be a proportionally big audience for that inside the Beltway, but that pool -- Washington, D.C. -- is not all that big, and as an audience, already cannibalized and oversaturated. In terms of a mass audience, the Politico's stunningly miserable investment-to-readership ratio (not surprisingly, depicted as stunningly good in the New Republic) is only the latest example that there clearly isn't a huge audience for the Versailles perspective in the much larger pool of the United States of America as a whole. And so to even try to create a decent-sized audience, you need to have a private benefactor like Rupert Murdoch or (in the case of the Politico) Robert Allbritton who personally bankrolls the operation, because the audience itself isn't big enough or interested enough to support it.

On the flip side, there is ample evidence to suggest you can create a pretty sizable audience in a cost-effective manner if your publication's perspective is what we can call The Rest of Us -- a perspective that (whether conservative, progressive or non-ideological) believes the target reader isn't a K Street lobbyist, but just a regular normal American and therefore focuses its work on how public policy affects ordinary people, and how ordinary people can impact public policy. OpenLeft and DailyKos's perspective are progressive-flavored examples of this, but so are other blogs like Firedoglake and certain magazines like In These Times, which operates on shoestring budgets and whose writing is almost singularly focused on the Rest of Us perspective. The same dynamic is at work for some television shows. Rick Sanchez's CNN slot, for instance, has built up solid ratings. Likewise, MSNBC's Countdown and Rachel Maddow Show have garnered huge audiences. Sure, these shows benefit from being on major networks, but it's safe to say they are also overperforming beyond their built-in platforms because of their Rest of Us perspective.

The problem -- especially in print and Internet publications -- is how most of the big-time money flows to publications that focus on a Versailles perspective rather than a Rest of Us perspective. There are obvious reasons for this. For instance, many media moguls like the social prestige of owning outlets that give them status inside the Beltway. Some, like Murdoch, use their investments in Beltway-focused publications like The Weekly Standard as a political and ideological weapon that helps them secure the public policies that are profitable for the rest of their business. And others believe that the only way to build good ad revenue is to create an elite readership, because that will attract elite, high-end advertisers.

But on top of all this, it's a safe bet that more mogul money (as opposed to actual audience) flows to the Versailles perspective than to the Rest of Us perspective because the latter is dangerous and anathema to the demographic that privately invests in the media business. For the super-wealthy investor class, a country whose political conversation is dominated by Beltway elite talking to Beltway elite is desirable, because it ultimately preserves the status quo. How? By confining the parameters of the political debate to boundaries that make sure no real change happens.

In the Versailles publications, for example, the debate over globalization is whether we should pass some corporate written trade deals, or every corporate written trade deal, the debate over health care is whether to subsidize the private insurance industry or do nothing at all, and the debate over economic policy is whether to throw $1 trillion or $10 trillion at the private banks. The list is endless (and now -- hilariously -- the New Republic is taking to attacking media critics as the source of the media industry's troubles).

Obviously, the confinement of the political debate on Beltway elite terms is bad for democracy, and goes a long way to explaining the rootsgap (ie. the huge gap between what's considered "mainstream" in Washington, and what polling tells us are mainstream positions in the country at large). The Washington media is obsessed with blogging, twittering and talking about itself exclusively to itself -- and really isn't interested in communicating with the country at large, much less representing its opinions, beliefs or aspirations.

That said, I think this could all change. The hope is that as the journalism business comes under increasing economic pressure, those investors looking to revive it will leave their ideology aside and evaluate a publication's perspective as part of their overall evaluation of sustainable business models for the future. I say that's the "hope" because it's not yet clear that is what will happen just yet, as evidenced by the high-profile conversion of Newsweek. The magazine, suffering from declining readership, has opted not to make itself more vigorously focused on reaching a mass audience, but instead more focused on trying to become a "thought leader" -- industry jargon for becoming a conservative-leaning journal focused on an elite readership already being cannibalized by the Politicos and New Republics of the world.

My guess, though, is that ultimately, other than the stratospherically rich who can afford to lose money on their personal ideologies, most regular investors don't have the luxury of focusing on their social prestige on the Washington cocktail party circuit -- they just want to make money. And if that's the case, they will come to see the ample evidence showing that in the political journalism business, a Rest of Us perspective is a far safer economic bet than a Versailles perspective. The ratio of investment to readership in the blogosphere (inherently a Rest of Us medium) tells that story better than anything -- but there are plenty of other examples everywhere you look.

Comments

[gro]

Why would I want to spend money on a satellite dish connection instead of a satellite TV connection? Because of the variety. Because I like to read. Because of the opportunity for feedback.
But I can still read print media when the connection is down.
The key is choice. I don't waste time on fluff, gossip, how the rich and powerful are spending their money, or about the latest wingnut tantrum. Unless it's ironically outrageous, of course!

[FairTalk]

Wow! I loved your piece! I especially enjoyed the paragraph that ended with "By confining the parameters of the political debate to boundaries that make sure no real change happens."

Another point I would make is who owns, controls or dominates the media, and therefore the message? I believe, that to insure an "independent" press, we need controls or regulations so that no one identifiable group, race or religion dominates the media and therefore the message we recieve.

It is not just about the free press, free to circulate anything they want, but it is about the People's Right to Know, as you so aptly express in The Rest of Us.

[DuPageDem]

It isn't just the Versailles publications working against us. Most mainstream media delivers an anti-American, anti-people message because that's the agenda of its transnational corporate ownership. That isn't going to change until and unless we outlaw media conglomerates and restore enforcement of FCC public interest regulations.

[dadw5boys]

THERE IS NO TRUTH IN THE MEDIA PERIOD !!!!!!!!

DO NOT TRUST THE MEDIA !!!!!!

[Ouroboros]

Eloquent.

[hjfraser2002]

One that has been lost.

[Gitmo]

Politico is Drudge-lite.

They carry water for the GOP but most of the time they aren't as obvious about it as Drudge is.

[truthglow]

All I know is that I only watch MSNBC (after 9:00AM) these days. I will not give CNN the time of day, or any of my advertising dollars. I never watched FOX, and I won't watch CBS or ABC either. Once in a while I'll watch NBC, when they can produce an intelligent program. Otherwise, it is PBS and the internet for me. David Sirota makes a lot of sense, and I read his "Open Left" every day!

[dillydawg]

This also has become my viewing pattern.

[johnie2xs]

Truthglow --- I have a question for you. This is not a solicitation. Rather, since you mention "advertising dollars" I'd like to get your opinion, within the context of this article, and your status and concern and interest relative to political dialogue. I have had a radio program for the last two years with a decidedly progressive bent. I've gone through all my money,a good bit of borrowed money, and some from a former partner. I am now off the air, looking to get back on. In my situation right now 100k, or possibly even less, would cover all my production costs, a modicum on which for me to survive, and even provide me with some promotional money to advertise the show in other media. For this I could be on the air five nights a week, three hours a night, for an entire year. How is that for a prospectus. I am not by definition a business man,so any advice I can get would be useful.
One thing the right wing has for sure is the ready availibilty of conservative money.
Progressives, not so much. I'd love your opinion.

[Scarabus]

Nice. I like it when arguments are supported by accurate data. (As opposed to George Will's Post article, supported by falsehood.)

The Versailles analogy is trickier. Personally I love it. It's absolutely perfect. On the other hand, how many of The Rest of Us will recognize the reference to Louis XIV's moving his court out of the city and into a compound over which he exercised unquestioned autocracy?

In other words, what's the audience for an essay on... well, audience?

[karinova]

In defense of the author, I do think he's (theoretically) addressing the Beltway navel-gazers, not "The Rest of Us."

The Rest of Us clearly already get it.

[larry278]

Talk isn't so cheap anymore.

[sunny123]

I hope you are right. We need to get "the Rest of Us" more involved. The more these organizations help "us" with letters, politicians addresses and phone numbers, talking points, e-mail addresses, the easier it is for "us" to let them know how we feel.

Thank you for your post, it is spot on as usual. Great job, David, keep it up!

[philistine]

"...they will come to see the ample evidence showing that in the political journalism business, a Rest of Us perspective is a far safer economic bet than a Versailles perspective."

I hope you're right, but I'm not holding my breath. Decades of New Right money transferred from the groundlings are at the disposal of those ideologues who fund claptrap like Politico and The New Republic. Zealotry is redoubling your effort when you've forgotten your aim. They are zealots. We still have some slogging ahead of us.