I'm still optimistic

OK, business sucks. The economy tanked even worse in the last few days. Mrs. Peterson and the rest of our longtime print customers are dying off. And online news doesn't bring in the bacon like the cash cow has for so long. (Plus this news outfit is for sale.)

So why am I still optimistic about the U-T's prospects?

Because we're just getting started.

We have yet to build a modern newssite (I am coining that word for lack of a better one) that properly showcases our wares. We have barely begun soliciting and using content created by average folks. There are countless lucrative partnerships out there we could be taking advantage of. And there is a huge amount of money waiting us in self-service advertising, oodles of small businesses that would each pay a little for a little advertising; tons of little transactions that would add up to a lot. We're developing niche products around customer demands and our expertise which will attract and retain new audiences, and those audiences will also add up to a critical mass.
Not only that: We still own the news in this county. We still have the largest news-gathering staff in town, and remain San Diego's most reliable and thoughtful and enterprising news source. Rumors of our demise are greatly exaggerated.

If we did a halfway decent job of aggressively selling our wares , marketing our content outside the paper and the newssite (that word again), we could reach scads of customers we're not reaching now.

Granted, the challenges are huge. Along with the major downer factors listed above, we just went through our third round of buyouts. We're operating with Rube Goldberg-like technology. And there's no telling whether who'll buy us, whether it will be a penny-pinching Simon Legree or a visionary Steve Jobs.

But the economy will turn around, advertisers are going to follow readers online, we'll get better tools and the online news world is bound to grow and blossom. We're well-positioned in a highly enviable market, and we know what we need to do.

This brand has meant news in this county since 1868, and I -- for one, at least -- am not willing to give up that important role just because things have changed. Things always change. They always have.

And we can't give up; having a independent enterprising news source like the U-T to cover the news of the county is too important .We have to make this work. We have got to prevail.

Some good ideas -- and one not-so-good one

The case study presented to this year's Super Panel was a once-thriving newspaper in Trenton, N.J., that had fallen on the same hard times we're all in right now. The question: Can this media company be saved?

The panelists were Eduardo A. Hauser, the CEO of DailyMe.com; Lauren Rich Fine, a media analyst at Kent State University; Thomas Brew; deputy editor at MSNBC.com (who was channelling his boss, Charlie Tillinghast, the top news site's top boss); and Wendy Warren, editor and VP at the Philadelphia papers' site, Phillly.com.

Their responses were all over the map. But they had a common theme: Strip away what the mythical paper used to do but can no longer do best to focus on what is unique to the outfit, local news coverage and local investigative reporting.

Here are some of the better ideas, copied from a book-length PowerPoint presentation:

Hauser:
- Separate journalism from such functions as printing and delivering the paper.
- Develop diverse revenue streams for the content, not just home delivery.
- Slowly and carefully increase price for home delivery.
- Don't bother investing in trying to attract younger subscribers. "Very few newspapers retain a new reader within a year."
- Cut the D.C., New York and L.A. bureaus to focus on local news
- It could be cheaper to give away Kindles than to print and deliver the paper every day. (Fine also mentioned this. I include it because it is innovative thinking, but not because I think it's a particularly good idea.)

Fine:
- Redesign front page to be highly local, with just short summaries of top international, national stories.
- Reduce number of days classifieds are put in print and heavily promote them online.
- Heavily promote ability to contribute news and comments online. Use as much as possible in print with real names of contributors.

Brew:
- Spend resources only for reporting local news and information. For any other category, rely on syndicated content.
- Combine print and online newsrooms, with functions separated by type of media (text, video, images).
- Use flexible online templates as much as possible. Automate story assembly and layout for all but the top stories and special features.
- Either spin off printing as a separate business or shut it down and contract it out to other papers.
- Sell the trucks. Use a local freight company, which probably has trucks sitting idle at that time of the early morning.
- Provide comprehensive local reporting, particularly sophisticated investigative journalism.
- Embrace local bloggers and aggregate your content on your site. (We have got to do this.)
- Push reader comments and publish best ones in the paper.
- Partner with classified ad providers and share the revenue.
- Enable self-service advertising for both print and online to reach small businesses that want to advertise locally but are not profitable to service directly. (Another must-do.)
- Use the paper's brand strength to host events and conferences on local news issues, such as small business, technology or consulting; and make them a money-making enterprise.

Warren
- Split company into a content-generation business and a distribution business.
- The content-generation business would be much smaller than current newsroom and will not only produce products but aggressively and strategically sell its wares to other companies as well. (Think U-T headlines in elevators around town.)
- A news-filled constantly updated free website is crucial. (Hey, at least we have that.)
- Develop targeted microsites, some of which could be for paying customers only. (A third must-do for us.)
- Create a unified production desk that copy-edits and serves both print and online.
- Create a community and syndication desks that aggressively markets newsroom content to outside customers.
- Offer ad-agency services such as creative and campaign design.