Open letter to The Daily
Please don’t turn The Daily into just another news website. That is what it basically is now, except I have to pay for its content and view it on the iPad. Apple’s iTunes music store proved that you can compete with free if your product is better. The Daily has to be better than the NYTimes.com and HuffingtonPost.com. Currently, it is not.
Here are a few ideas to make it better. Cover fewer stories. Be very selective in what you consider the biggest stories of the moment. Put as much human resources as you can into the stories you’ve decided to cover and present your coverage in a comprehensive format.
For example, the biggest world event at the moment is the uprising in Egypt. Not only should The Daily have up to the minute updates of what is going on, The Daily should have an archive of articles about Egypt dating back years, even decades. These articles should be organized into an easy to navigate timeline or outline so that readers can switchback and learn the historical events that led to the current uprising. I’m not talking about a history of Egypt from the time of the pharoahs. I’m talking about the war with Isreal and the peace accord, the assassination of Sadat, etc. Relevant articles from the past organized in a way to help me understand what is going on in the present. In short, each story should be a constantly updating college term paper.
The Daily is a great opportunity to move beyond the simplistic model of the hyperlinked-filled news blog. On the internet, news is free and plentiful, but research isn’t. The Daily should provide its readers with in depth research . On the internet, commentary is free and plentiful, but editorial isn’t. In the paragraph above, I wrote that each story should be a constantly updating term paper. I am not suggesting that you present each story as an aggregation of twitter feed. What I mean is that the shape of the outline and timeline should change with the news. It should change in the way that will best help the reader navigate the story and understand what is going on. You’re editing the entire “term paper”, its presentation, its navigational structure, and the written word content. And all of this is done in the service of the reader, to help him understand, not just to entertain him.
