The Reach - Podcasting and other Portable Media Strategies

Over the weekend, there was some splash about a new trend - de-portalization.  One of the best posts was from edgeio with great graphics to demonstrate the definition.  The focus is on distributed content and less demand for portal sites.  The only reason I call it a misnomer is that what this is really saying is that the LARGE portals (Yahoo, etc) are becoming less significant in our overall web experience and that there are other “portals” that have new signifcance. 

For example, one cannot tell me that YouTube is not a portal.  Or that iTunes is not a portal, in the true sense of the word.  Keep in mind content aggregation is still a hot topic, so I’m just jousting on symantics.

Until search is so sophisticated that I can type in a word and get back relevant words, images, sounds, videos, etc, then I think there will be plenty of room for content aggregation. 

The good news is that the lock the big portals has had on us is loosening and many sites that are lower on the value food chain are seeing opportunity for niche plays.  Niches have value now and I think that is a trend that will continue for a long time.

At 6:55P, CST today, 9 out of 17 headlines on TechMeme are not traditional bloggers, but instead are newspaper reporters - mostly for the New York Times.  This has been a trend over recent weeks to the point that I now believe more firmly what I’ve said many times before - if traditional media begins to “get” new media, then there won’t be new media anymore - it will just be media and those thinking they had old media cornered and dead will find they have cornered a rabid dog…..

Yesterday, Steve Rubel articulated the issues around RSS and large, profitable web properties - specifically Yahoo!.  He updates today with a broader discussion of this issue here. I’ve been discussing this in presentations for the past year that RSS, while a phenomenal “new” service that web users can benefit from, requires a web property focused on pageviews to rethink their advertising strategy.

Namely, should a frequent reader only subscribe to your feeds, there is NO reason for them to come back to your website.  That is, unless you are primarily an e-commerce website.  So, can you monetize your RSS feeds significantly enough to replace the the money you’ll see disappear from your CPM reduction?  So far, advertising in RSS feeds is still nascient, so I’m thinking that you won’t be able to.  Thus, those web properties focused on ad sales to survive have to reconsider how quickly they adopt an RSS strategy. 

The big surprise for me is that Yahoo! appears to not have considered this when they started or at least when they saw RSS taking off.  Poor strategic planning, guys.

What do you think CNN, WSJ, and Time should/will do in light of this discussion?  AOL already has enough revenue problems and now, they have a new leader (Randy Falco) who doesn’t appear to appreciate email - is that a sign that he’ll adopt RSS or that he doesn’t yet know what it stands for….?