The Emperor's New Transparent Clothes

Chris Anderson writes eloquently and provocatively, as usual, on his blog about ways  in which magazines could become smarter and more open.

If the key word is "participation", how could we encourage that to the fullest? If trust comes come from transparency, how might we open the entire process? What does open source media really mean? link

Some of the ideas Chris has: Encourage staff to blog (which would show, among other things, who's interested in what), publish wikis detailing what the magazine's writers are working on (which would allow the public to participate, suggest better stories, leads, etc.); "share the reporting" as it happens (let the public see interview transcripts and "working" versions of drafts as they're written); and let the readers decide what's best (make the magazine a pure democracy, a la Digg). As I snarked in the comments on his blog, I think this is an excellent plan. Wired should do it at once...

We don't compete with Wired, exactly. And Chris and I have lunch together many times in a year. But it totally ruins my day when my Wired arrives in the mail and... there's a feature (or worse, a cover!) on something we were working on. When that happens, I usually take our in-progress story out behind the barn and shoot it. And I know for a fact that when we do the same, he's been known to have a similar response.

So, I'd love to know what Chris is putting on his cover, and in his magazine, months in advance. It would be even better if I know what the story will say. In fact, I'd love to get all his reporters' notes, and find out who their sources are, and, would it be too much to ask to see the pictures and illos you're planning on using?

I don't mean to be too much of an old-media-reactionary running dog. And some of the things he says make immediate sense. In fact, I asked all my writers and editors to start blogging a few months ago. (See the sidebar of B2 bloggers on the right, or go here.) But Wired's radical transparency would help me—radically—when I make strategic decisions about how to put my magazine together. That's because one of the most powerful attributes of my medium—the monthly magazine—is the element of surprise. What Chris is describing might indeed be wonderful online media, and yes, surprising to watch as it's being created. But I bet the PAPER product that  rolls off the printing press months later would have a much smaller audience than it does now—and would be creamed by the competition.

Comments

[Pramit Singh]

Why all this attention to buzzwords and hype? Why not solutions? Will using Radical transparency ideas bring in more readers?

More on the mediavidea blog.

[Mike Haney]

Or even more to the point: will it benefit readers in any way? Isn't one of the things editors do, y'know, edit? I'd like to hear of any magazine that's had success with behind-the-scenes sorts of content. The value of a magazine, or any professionally assembled media, I'd think, is that we cull what's important, arrange it in an easy-to-understand way, and let you get it and get on your way. Sure, it'd be fun to watch the sausage being made once, but what makes Anderson think the public is clamoring for him to vomit out every bit of minutia involved in making the magazine or that anyone besides Long Tail fanboys and journalism students want to help him do it?

[mturro]

It seems to me that you're missing the point here... the print version of a magazine and the online version can never really be the same. They are fundamentally different types of media and to conflate them as you're doing here is a disservice to both of them. I would guess that Mr. Anderson's thoughts must be geared at how to give an information product (not a print magazine mind you) an online presence. He's seems to be talking about Wired the concept more than Wired the paper and ink magazine. Of course what makes the the print based product great will always be what makes the print based product great. You can never really make the print process transparent.

However... if we move back from the idea of a "magazine" being just a printed artifact and start thinking of it as an information product, we can start to see the real value in what Chris's posts are suggesting. Through the use of emerging online technologies that information product can bloom into something else entirely... it can become the forum and focus of a community. By taking advantage of what the internet does best (Anderson's transparency) the savvy publisher will naturally feed what print does best... longer, analytical prose... high production value art and imaging... less reaction, more repose. By offloading the rapid fire news elements to their rightful place in the hyperactive digital world, print will enjoy a resurgence.