Tags containing: "content creation"

The Washington Post, The Associated Press and LA Times get an assist from Artificial Intelligence

August 9, 2016 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

Robots aren’t taking over the media (yet) but Artificial Intelligence and automation are lending a helping hand.

The challenges of running a profitable media company have resulted in a “streamlining” of these organizations, often requiring staff reductions that create holes in coverage, particularly in areas that require domain expertise or a nuanced interpretation. What if there was a way to free up the increasingly valuable reporters from some of their tedious or time-consuming tasks to focus on telling complex stories or digging into subjects deeply? Enter Artificial Intelligence (AI) for journalism. An increasing number of media companies are employing robot journalists—or, more accurately, artificially intelligent algorithms adept at analyzing data and writing serviceable prose – to do just that. (Fusion’s Kevin Roose does a terrific job explaining how it works.)

Here are some of the ways AI is making its mark on journalism:

The Associated Press, working with Automated Insights and Zacks Investment Research, automatically generates almost 4,000 stories about U.S. corporate earnings each quarter—about twelve times what AP reporters and editors previously created. For a small fraction of these stories, editors add “the human touch” to provide more nuanced interpretations.

More recently, the AP added sports reporting to its automated journalistic endeavors. The move allowed the company to expand its coverage of Minor League Baseball (and could offer similar possibilities for other sports coverage). AP baseball editors and reporters worked with Automated Insights to configure the Wordsmith platform to ensure that it would follow AP standards for baseball coverage.

The Washington Post is also taking a crack at automated journalism, developing its own proprietary artificial intelligence tool, “Heliograf,” which automatically generates brief, multi-sentence updates. The Washington Post will roll it out to report key information from the 2016 Rio Olympics, including results of medal events. Heliograf, which will continue to be developed by Post engineers to enhance storytelling for large-scale projects, will also be leveraged for data-driven coverage of major news events, including the U.S. election. This technology can process a combination of different data sources, such as crime and real estate numbers, customize stories depending on individual user actions, and help look for anomalies in data to alert journalists to a potential story—all of which The Washington Post plans to leverage as it further develops Heliograf’s utility.

Algorithmic journalism is not limited to sports and finance, however. One of the longest-running robo-journalists in the game is Quakebot, which was written by Los Angeles Times Writer Ken Scwenkie. According to Business Insider, Quakebot is an automated system that resides on the Los Angeles Times’s servers, which receives emails from the US Geological Survey, runs that data through an information checklist, and then determines if it’s newsworthy based on the magnitude. It then parses out content from the email and inputs it into the Los Angeles Times’s content management system. Posts are structured using a formula based on previous posts.

It is interesting to note the LA Times also uses its own brand of automated journalism for The Homicide Report, which tracks every homicide victim in LA County. This sort of approach (visualized data journalism) is particularly suited to the algorithmic approach in that analyzing huge (and possibly constantly growing or changing) data sets is a massive undertaking. With solid structure and oversight, these can be reliably created, updated and presented in a dynamic visual way by leveraging AI.

The momentum for automated journalism has been building for years now and is definitely picking up steam. The New York Times reports that Tronc, Hearst, Bonnier, Gannett and the Weather Channel use automation to do everything from streamlining video production to analyzing and summarizing text and finding photographs and video clips to go with it. And, in an April memo to Bloomberg’s staff, Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait announced that the news organization is creating a 10-person team to determine how automation can be used throughout the company’s portfolio of editorial products.

As Dr. Andreas Graefe, author of the Tow Center for Journalism report “Guide to Automated Journalism” noted, automated journalism is particularly useful in generating routine news stories for repetitive topics for which clean, accurate, and structured data are available. He also outlines the potential for algorithms to generate large volumes of news quickly, potentially in multiple angles and personalized for reader preference.

But, as the report points out, there are limitations to automation that must be carefully considered as more organizations use artificial intelligence to augment their journalism. Given many of the current implementations reliance on data, the quality of that data is paramount. And, as Micklethwait points out in his memo, “one irony of automation is that it is only as good as humans make it.” That, of course, extends to the media organizations that deploy algorithmic approaches, which must balance efficiency, transparency, and the consumer demands of more information, faster—but who also love a good read.

Industry-Research | Perspectives

Maybe the internet hasn’t killed our attention spans after all

May 26, 2016 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

Remember that study from last year that claimed computers and the internet had transformed human attention span to roughly the equivalent of a goldfish — you’ll be forgiven if you’ve forgotten because after all the internet supposedly has turned your brain to mush. However, a new Pew study on long articles has found we might have longer attention spans than the goldfish study would indicate. (Though actually, studies have shown that the goldfish may have been getting the short end of the attention span myth as well.)

Dueling studies aside, the Pew research team took a long look at people’s smartphone reading habits. Conventional wisdom suggests that we want to just dip in and out on our phones: We might review headlines, but we won’t do much more.

In fact, the Pew study found the opposite is true. We spend almost twice the amount of time reading long articles — 123 seconds for long form versus 57 for short — and long and short articles get almost the same number of visitors. (For the purpose of the study Pew defined long form as over a 1000 words and short form as 101-999 words. And lest you question the methodology, Pew clearly put in the work.)

“All told, Center researchers spent months digging deeply into the details of 117 million anonymized, complete cellphone interactions with 74,840 articles from 30 news websites in the month of September 2015,” according to the research organization

My gut response to these findings would be, Duh! Of course people spend more time on longer articles than shorter ones — because they’re longer. But the fact we are reading these long articles on our smartphones at all is news in itself because it flies in the face of our preconceived notions of how we interact with content on our phones.

Julia Beizer, who is director of product at The Washington Post told Digital Content Next in a recent article, There ‘s more than one way to succeed at digital that research suggests our smartphone usage might vary more than we believe.

“One of the early misplaced assumptions around mobile was that mobile users are standing in line waiting for coffee. A lot of people are doing that, but a lot of people are on their couches at home too. Research shows upwards of 70 percent are at home,” she said.

We are also on long flights and commuter trains and other places where we are captive and have a lot of time to kill with our phones in our hands. It makes sense that we would be using our phones — which are getting bigger and higher resolution screens — to do more reading.

But a single study doesn’t necessarily prove anything, even one as comprehensive as this one appears to be. That said, there are plenty of long form content initiatives that seem to be capturing their share of attention.

Last year the Huffington Post without the benefit of this study took a leap of faith and launched Highline, a long-form article site designed to let writers and readers dig into a story instead of getting a short, high-level view. A year later, while the editors aren’t sharing their numbers, they’re still around and they claim it’s been a huge success and the articles on Highline are among the most read on the Huffington Post site. It suggests that when you produce quality work people will read the articles, no matter how long they might be or on what device they might be reading them.

What this all means is the attention studies could be wrong or at least misguided. Certainly, we lack patience. We won ‘t wait around if your content is taking too long to load, but it is important not to confuse that lack of patience (or the expectation of a good mobile experience) for short attention spans.

This is a big lesson for digital content creators, whether writing an article, creating content marketing pieces or writing website copy. If you write good stuff, you can keep people engaged regardless of the length. And given that time spent is increasingly being touted as the true measure of engagement, understanding the value of long form content is essential.

There ‘s tons of other data in the Pew study including the impact of social media to drive traffic, the topics people like most (crime is big), the days and times we are more likely to engage with content and so much more. It’s worth digging into, but if your only take-away is that we will read an article whatever the length if it’s good enough, that’s more than enough.

Industry-Research

Making automated journalism work for you

January 12, 2016 Research Team—DCN

As The Tow Center for Journalism’s newly released Guide to Automated Journalism points out, the use of algorithms to automatically generate news from structured data is increasingly impacting the journalistic industry. These algorithms can quickly and inexpensively create high volumes of news stories for a given topic. According to Tow, this has fueled journalists’ fears that automated content production will eventually eliminate newsroom jobs, while at the same time scholars and practitioners see the technology’s potential to improve news quality.

Tow’s guide summarizes recent research on the topic to provide overview of the current state of automated journalism, discusses key questions and potential implications of its adoption, and suggest avenues for future research.

Among the key findings…

For news consumers

People rate automated news as more credible than human-written news but do not particularly enjoy reading automated content.
Automated news is currently most suited for topics where providing facts in a quick and efficient way is more important than sophisticated narration, or where news did not exist previously and consumers thus have low expectations regarding the quality of the writing.
Little is known about news consumers’ demand for algorithmic transparency, such as whether they need (or want) to understand how algorithms work.

For news organizations

Since algorithms cannot be held accountable for errors, liability for automated content will rest with a natural person (e.g., the journalist or the publisher).
Algorithmic transparency and accountability will become critical when errors occur, in particular when covering controversial topics and/or personalizing news.
Apart from basic guidelines that news organizations should follow when automatically generating news, little is known about which information should be made transparent regarding how the algorithms work.

Advertising | Innovation | Perspectives

The rise of VR for immersive storytelling and advertising

December 3, 2015 Mark Glaser, Founder and Publisher – MediaShift

Bearing witness has been one of the essential boons for journalists when it comes to delivering stories few have access to: “I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it,” is one such adage that comes to mind.

But with the rise of cameras that can record a scene in 360-degrees, stereoscopic video (which creates depth) and a new generation of headsets accessible to consumers, the ascent of VR as a new storytelling staple is clear. Coupled with collaborative partnerships across the technological and media landscape, the chance for VR to enable the “presence” of a user — in other words, to make her feel as if she is actually reacting to the environment she is immersed in — is now unprecedented. With this, “bearing witness” is taking on a different meaning.

The bottom line? The chance for VR to encourage empathy can potentially transform journalism and viewers’ understanding of the world. Plus, it might also create the type of immersive advertising and sponsored content that no ad-blocker could deny.

New York Times as Pioneer
The world took notice when the New York Times recently gave away 1.31 million Google Cardboard headsets to its print subscribers, solely to bring them into the VR experience. The simplicity and crudeness of the cardboard is its genius, Wired’s Marcus Wohlsen argued. “It’s cheap enough to be handed out for free; we smartphone users supply the only part that’s expensive,” Wohlsen wrote.

This sort of accessibility is key to the potential for VR to actually reach mass audiences instead of a tiny subset of early adopters. Producing VR work is already an expensive endeavor. While outfits like the New York Times Magazine, Frontline and Vice News — with their stories on the refugee crisis, the Ebola outbreak and last year’s Millions March against police brutality, respectively — have made major dives into VR storytelling, they are part of “the 1 percent” of news organizations that can afford to do so. Headsets like the one from Oculus Rift and other apparatuses for viewing VR are expected to become cheaper and therefore more mainstream, but it’s a far cry from the ubiquity of simply the smartphone. (Although YouTube, for one, has said it wants to bring VR to anyone with a smartphone.)

That’s why the Times’ home delivery of Cardboard units to use with a smartphone was a win in more ways than one. First of all, it delivered the headsets with its newspaper, acknowledging that traditional distribution system — and subscription — as a precursor for this modern news consumption. The Times is also planning to extend its virtual reality endeavors into sponsored content, as Sebastian Tomich, the Times’ senior vice president of advertising and innovation, told Contently. “Any format the newsroom is pursuing, you can assume that we’ll pursue it on the brand side as well,” he said.

Enticing for Brands
It’s not a surprise, then, that other brands and publishers are considering VR’s potential. Writing for TheMediaBriefing, Chris Sutcliffe notes that a VR environment can be enticing to brands and other publishers, as brands are already relying more on “experiential events” to help communicate their brand messages. The “rawness” that VR environments offer and the audiences they attract could potentially provide a new revenue stream, he writes. Designer Rebecca Minkoff, for example, is selling her own cardboard VR viewer for $30 for viewers to see how she filmed her runway show.

All this is not to say VR doesn’t have its hurdles. The recent Tow Center report on virtual reality acknowledged producing such work involves a series of trade-offs, especially around production time, quality and the capacity to reach wide audiences. Tom Kent, the standards editor at the Associated Press (which is also stepping into VR) also wrote a strong statement on Medium of some of the ethical questions that could impact VR journalism in the future, which New York Times public editor Margaret Sullivan also discussed.

The Times’ release of its VR documentary “The Displaced” coincided with a range of critiques, from the difficulty of using the Cardboard unit to questions of the authenticity of the story. Michael Oreskes, NPR’s news chief and a former Times editor, cautioned, “Our stories can’t be virtually true. They must be fully real.”

As we ponder how VR fact-checkers would operate, we can also consider the vast potential of what immersive journalism—and advertising—could do to create a whole new dimension in audience engagement.

Perspectives

Why The Future of Data Journalism Is… Less Data

March 4, 2015 DCN

photo credit: r2hox

“Data is the new oil.” That is the modern maxim across a host of industries. From shopping to shipping, businesses are being urged to gain better insight and improve performance by delving into their underlying numbers.

News media are no different. In the last couple of years, journalists have been encouraged to adopt analytics software as part of their daily editorial efforts. Now it is common to find newsroom editors checking their page views, time-spent metrics and social referrals on a minute-by-minute basis.

This kind of data used to be kept under lock and key, used only by website technical administrators and advertising auditors while journalists gave two hoots. Now, with always-on dashboards from tools like ChartBeat, Parse.ly and Outbrain’s own Visual Revenue in the hands of editors, content producers are becoming skilled numerical interpreters. The industry has come a long way. However, it’s time to go to the next level.

Modern journalists are constantly being told which new skills they have to learn—a dizzying array of video production, coding, even drone-flying. Those who also up-skill sufficiently to become their newsroom’s virtual data analyst can manufacture higher user engagement for their employer. After all, when particular stories cause traffic to spike, writing more of the same is a quick win.

But more data doesn’t necessarily produce better journalism. The danger with the growing role of audience numbers in publisher strategy is the risk of over-reliance, creating a belief that every reader data point should be responded to with an editorial outcome: quantity and category of story over quality and ambition.

The Data Endoskeleton

The first wave of newsroom analytics has served its purpose (we now know that stories about kittens and celebrities trend well, for example). What the professionals now need is a support system that does not encourage them to make snap decisions based on reams of numbers, but one which is more in harmony with the craft of editorship, playing a softer and more symbiotic role as editors’ sidekick, not their auditor.

Just think of the way Apple’s Siri hides from users so much of the underlying data that rival services like to bombard them with. When you ask Siri a question, it returns not unlimited options but fewer, more directed opportunities.

In the same way, in the next wave of publishing analytics, software would suggest publication improvements after noting not just the raw, blunt performance of site content but also the priorities and goals of conscious managing staff.

In the future, editors should be able to pre-populate their software with their own, qualified goals and ambitions, helping tailor system recommendations that are in line with publications’ true missions.

By allowing editors to make smarter decisions that are based on their own instincts, not just being a slave to the spreadsheet, the industry can keep readers coming back and rediscover a lost metric: lifetime value.

You can already see the beginnings of this new philosophy being applied. Despite often being accused of publishing low-brow click-fodder, BuzzFeed looks at engagement and virality in a whole new way. Publishing purely to the numbers could have prompted it to publish even more cat slideshows and quizzes. However selective insight led it to also make risky bets, such as its commitment to long-form journalism, which have ended up surprising success stories.

Publishers who are excitedly following the data trail to clear traffic growth should pause to reclaim their own part in the process. In a world becoming familiar with the concept of automated “robo-journalism,” I envision the future of journalism not as this replacement of flesh with circuitry, but as an endoskeleton—a perfect combination of the best qualities of each.

Matt Crenshaw is the Vice President of Product Marketing, Engage at Outbrain. Matt is responsible for setting the product vision and delivering solutions to publishers that build their audience relationships and grow their revenues.

Innovation

Q&A: Jonathan Hunt, VP, Global Marketing and Partnerships, Vox Media on Media for Millennials

October 16, 2014 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

Q: In your opinion and experience, do millennial readers have brand loyalty as a rule? How do you develop brand affinity/loyalty with them?

A: Yes and no. Above all else, young people (and frankly everyone) value quality and honesty. If another media brand can come along and offer a superior product then they have an opportunity to usurp loyalty. The fact is we live in a time when we’re getting our information from hundreds of different sources — publishers, social feeds, mobile apps, our friends and family and coworkers — all day every day. This is referred to as an Attention Economy. So more so now than ever qualities like utility, entertainment, honesty, and personality can easily trump loyalty.

But what happens when you consistently provide premium, honest stories to your readers? You can create loyalty. It’s easier said than done, but that’s our approach to every aspect of our business and why we’ve been on an explosive growth trajectory.

Q: Do you approach the development of user experience or content differently for the millennial audience?

A: We have to, but again I wouldn’t say this is relative to Millennials only–it’s a fundamental shift in how we all discover and share content, it just so happens that young people are quicker to experiment and adopt new ways of getting what they want when they want. At Vox Media, we’re platform and content agnostic. We’re not precious when it comes to how we get in front of as many people as possible; this is how we’ve been able to scale so quickly. So you may experience a Vox Media brand through one of our responsive sites, or on Tumblr, or as a video or a cinemagraph, through Xbox or Yahoo, or on a partner’s mobile app. As long as I can reach you and give you a reason to care about what we have to say, I know I have a better chance of getting you to experience our brand through other more premium experiences that impact our P&L.

Q: When working to attract and retain millennial media consumers, what would you say are the most important things to consider?

A: This is a question with no single answer. You want to cater to consumption habits (you going to them vs. them always coming to you); content formats (speaking to them through the types of content they create and share themselves); and providing them stories or news that have utility, are unique and entertaining, aren’t pandering, and don’t attempt to frame your brand as something that it’s not. This is the smartest generation ever, and they know it, so the best litmus test when building something for this audience is to ask yourself, “Who cares?” If you can’t answer that question unequivocally then there’s a good chance the answer is, “No one.”

Jonathan Hunt is the Global VP of Marketing at Vox Media where he leads audience development and distribution, co-sales partnerships, paid media strategy, and comms. Prior to Vox, he was the Global Marketing Director at VICE Media.

Innovation

Q&A: Kate Lewis, VP, Hearst Magazines Digital Media on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

May 13, 2014 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Kate Lewis, VP, Content Operations & Editorial Director Hearst Magazines Digital Media on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences.

Q: Where do you start in conceiving of a multiscreen user experience?

A: Honestly, that’s just not how we think about it. We think audience first. Our audience is coming through search, social and direct. We do find that social primarily takes place on the phone and when we factor in viral, we have to consider whether the content is something a reader is going to click on while looking at their Facebook page or Twitter feed on a phone. But we don’t obsess about whether you are on a tablet or at your desk. I don’t get data on how stories are performing on devices; I look at how a story is performing period.

To some extent, we are trying to think of everything from a mobile-first perspective now. A lot of our sites are female-driven and we find that female audiences are more phone and tablet oriented. But really, we don’t think about screens. We think about how to connect with audiences.

One thing we do look at is what we deliver at different times of day, when people are likely to be using different devices. Lunchtime is a big desktop time so we can think about delivering something longer and ways we can entice them to move around the site. At 6:00 p.m., we know it is a phone or tablet time of day. Then we are thinking about offering more “sound bites” or things like “23 Problems Only Tall Women Have.” It isn’t just a matter of device use at that time, though, it is also about how the audience is feeling and what they are in the mood for: “What can I relate to?” “What will free my mind from what I’ve been doing all day?” The content won’t change from desktop to phone.

Of course the majority of our sites are designed responsively so the experience is good on desktop and mobile. On mobile, the experience cannot be convoluted; it has to be straightforward with really clear pathing. That is affecting how we design all of our digital experiences. We want to let the content speak for itself.

Q: Describe a recent multiscreen experiences that you think worked particularly well.

A: Well, like I said, that isn’t really how we approach things. But Esquire published a piece that shows how all these screen experiences blend together:

They—rightly—felt compelled to cover what is happening in Ukraine. Yet they wanted to do it in a way that was appropriate to the brand and would take advantage of what is wonderful about digital. They didn’t want it to feel like a formal news site and they wanted it to feel connected in a human sense. The approach they took was to collect Instagram photos from before and after the uprising in the Ukraine and juxtapose them against each other. Think about it: It is so internet friendly, and nothing is more mobile-friendly than Instagram. Plus, it allowed them to tell a real news story with something totally relatable as the medium—everyone is on Instagram from Crimea to L.A.

Q: What do you see as the biggest opportunity in developing multiscreen experiences?

A: The ability to be with your audience all day, every day, everywhere. We are literally in the reader’s pocket. It is incredible. We used to think in terms of one deep experience a day. Now we think about delivering a core reader that deep experience plus making ten other touch points a day. We are holding their hand in line at the grocery store and keeping them company on a long subway ride.

This also lets us gauge in real time how stories are performing and if they resonate with our audience. There is still a lot of long tail success in our content, but there’s a lot of in-the-moment content and today we can react very quickly. We can see things in social that weren’t happening on our site and react very quickly.

All of this deepens the relationship with our audiences. They swipe the phone open and we are there. And that connection is more intimate than ever, which influences the editorial voice and how we communicate. Facebook, for example, has changed the tone of digital. Content needs to feel friendly, it also needs to feel urgent because there are so many things competing for attention on someone’s. And it needs to be engaging in the first sound bite because, on a phone, you only have a tiny screen, and a small window of opportunity, to engage.

Kate Lewis is the Vice President, Content Operations & Editorial Director at Hearst Magazines Digital Media, responsible for managing the content organizations of 24 sites, including digital brands Cosmopolitan.com, Esquire.com, Elle.com, CarandDriver.com, and HarpersBazaar.com, and pure-plays including Delish.com. January was Hearst Magazines Digital Media’s best month with 85.5 million uniques. Prior to Hearst, Lewis worked at Say Media in a similar role, overseeing content strategy and operations for a number Say’s own sites including xoJane, Remodelista, and ReadWrite, as well as a number of network sites. Originally a print editor, she spent 18 years at Conde Nast working on brands like Vanity Fair, Glamour, and SELF. Her last role there was editorial lead in the Human Resources department.

Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.

Also in this series:

Q&A: Ryan Spoon, SVP Digital Product, ESPN on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Q&A: Rob Hayes, EVP Digital Media, NBCUniversal on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Innovation

Q&A: Rob Hayes, EVP Digital Media, NBCUniversal on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

May 2, 2014 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Rob Hayes, Executive Vice President Digital Media, NBCUniversal on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Q: Where do you start in conceiving of a multiscreen user experience?

A: The best place to start is at the beginning. That may sound obvious, but really, the most effective multiscreen experiences happen early on before a project is too far down the path of content development. For a multiscreen experience, we like to get into the digital DNA of the show and develop that story organically.

In my experience at NBC, digital is tightly integrated with the programming department. We all report up into the same chairman and we are not siloed. When we have an idea for a show, digital is there in the early stages. I have a team that sits with the programming executives. Our digital executives, who develop what those digital extensions will be, work in parallel with other creative channels, which allows digital to develop more holistically. At the end of the day, it delivers a better user experience because digital is not an add-on; it feels natural to the program. You need to be involved from the beginning and it needs to start with the content and programing itself. Really, if a user is thinking about screens and not the content, you have failed to make a true connection with your audience. All of the experiences, from one screen to the next, need to act in concert with one another, resulting in an overall experience that is greater than the sum of the individual parts.

Q: Describe a recent multiscreen project that you feel was particularly innovative and successful. A: There are actually two shows that are great examples of this and while they’re extremely different from one another, both exemplify innovative and successful multiscreen initiatives.

The first one is The Voice. While the show was a hit internationally, it was virtually unknown domestically when Talpa brought it to NBC. From Season One, with several other music shows already established, we knew we had to take The Voice to the next level. So we set out to create a deeper, more compelling interactive experience than any show before it had done. It was essential to make the fans feel part of the show from the moment it premiered.

The Voice pioneered the use of real-time social mentions on-air, igniting social conversation that began with the airing on the east coast and continued throughout the season. Our embedded social team was on set day in and day out capturing behind the scenes content that’s only possible by being physically on location. Our social experts then crafted custom social art and conversation specific to each social platform, creating a richness and organic feel to new and existing fans in ways that felt personal and relevant to them individually and collectively. Most recently, we added “the live Twitter save,” which lets fans at home instantly save their favorite artist from those who are at risk of elimination moments later.

A second example of our approach to multiscreen is around a show we launched last fall called Million Second Quiz. From the start, this show was created to be a multiscreen experience. It premiered in September but in early August, we launched a robust app and site where people could go and compete with others, answering trivia questions that appeared in the show itself. While the game could be played just for fun, once you hit certain levels, you were qualified to be a contestant on the show. This let the digital experience not only create awareness for the show, but also allowed us to use digital for prequalifying, serving as a casting call for people to appear on the show itself. I think that Million Second Quiz was groundbreaking in how it removed the disconnection between a show and its digital experience. Users of the app and site were now part of the show, competing in the same way and for the same prize as those who were on the air. This is the power of an interactive, multiscreen experience in that it can turn TV into a massive multi-player game. And we have only really scratched the surface of what we can do creatively to empower more viewers to activate around the television experience and change the definition of storytelling.

It worked well for us in all of these areas, but the gaming experience alone was incredibly successful. We had had more than 2 million downloads. We trended at #1 for a time on iTunes and stayed in the top 25 through the premier and run of the show. When the show went live, you could play along with the show, but you could also play any time. We had up to 500,000 concurrent players.

The Voice and Million Second Quiz are great examples of what you can accomplish when digital is part of your strategy right from the beginning.

Q: What do you see as the biggest opportunity in developing multiscreen experiences?

A: I think that this is the big opportunity: To create shows that incorporate organic multiscreen experiences. I think that it reflects how consumer behavior has changed. Consumers and creatives expect digital extensions for more and more experiences and television programming is no different.

And from the programming perspective, digital allows shows to live beyond the 30 or 60 minutes they are on the air each week. These multi-platform experiences let users engage with that content and the brand for the rest of the time until the show airs again.

Multi-platform experiences give brands a way to participate along with consumers. Think about the nature of live programming: As television viewing becomes more and more fractured, innovation in this area gives the industry a way to engage fans and get them to view live.

And if through these multi-platform experiences, we can engage fans in a way that increases ratings even one-tenth of a point that falls right to the bottom line.

Robert Hayes was named to the newly created position of Executive Vice President, Digital Media, NBC Entertainment, in May 2012. He reports to Len Fogge, President, NBC Entertainment Marketing & Digital. Previously, Hayes was COO of Iconic Entertainment Inc., where he was responsible for creating premium VOD channels for YouTube and other premium over-the-top distributors.

Prior to that, Hayes made his biggest impact at Showtime Networks Inc. where he oversaw all things digital for the premium network, developing robust multi-platform identities for such critically acclaimed shows as “Dexter,” “Weeds,” “Nurse Jackie,” “Californication” and “The Tudors.” Earlier in his career, Hayes served as Vice President of Business Development and Vice President, International Business Development, assessing opportunities for Showtime and other Viacom brands. Hayes has received numerous industry awards, including a 2010 Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Achievement in Engineering Development for Showtime Sports Interactive.

Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.

Also in this series:

Q&A: Ryan Spoon, SVP Digital Product, ESPN on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Q&A: Rob Hayes, EVP Digital Media, NBCUniversal on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Innovation

Q&A: Ryan Spoon, SVP Digital Product, ESPN on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

April 29, 2014 Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director – DCN

This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights… If you want to learn more, keep an eye out on our site for more interviews. Today’s Three on Three interview is with Ryan Spoon, SVP Digital Product, ESPN on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences.

Q: Where do you start in conceiving of a multiscreen user experience?

A: We think about multiscreen experiences in two primary and important ways: First, we program for the best screen available and optimize the experience and functionality accordingly. For instance, what a fan wants and expects on a mobile phone differs from the tablet which differs yet again from the big screen television.

Second, while the functionality might change based on screen size and capability, the interactions and design should be familiar and cohesive. We almost always conceive of products and experiences as capable of being multiscreen and part of a larger product portfolio / offering.

Q: Describe one of your recent or forthcoming multiscreen initiatives/projects.

A: WatchESPN is a very good example because we have worked hard to make it available on all screens but special for each screen’s platform and use-case. WatchESPN has been released or updated on Apple TV, iOS, Android, Kindle, Roku XBox One and XBox 360−with more to come. We were careful to design the product specifically for each use case and platform and to take advantage of different functionalities and capabilities.

For instance, the iPad application introduced the Live Toolbar which enables fans to watch multiple videos at once and access live scores. This functionality was specifically crafted for that device and platform. With Apple TV, we introduced Airplay integration and a standalone application. For example, you can fling a game from your iPhone to the television using airplay and now use your phone to follow gamecast or fantasy scores. In that case, the screens are interacting but each play a specific, standalone role.

Q: What do you see as the biggest opportunity in developing multiscreen experiences?

A: There are two big opportunities−and challenges−with multiscreen experiences, in my opinion.

First, if you define multiscreen as functional across all devices and platforms, personalization and user familiarity are critical. For instance, if I move from iPhone to desktop and then to tablet, everything should be synced, familiar and painless. Login and personalization are the key.

Second, if you define multiscreen as two screens functioning concurrently, the challenge and opportunity are to eliminate friction. Simply asking users to open multiple devices at once is a logistical and funnel challenge. Making it simple and contextual is very challenging. But ultimately, it is the right way to do it. I think we are making strides through cross-application deep-linking, Airplay integration and improved television integration, as examples. I think Twitter is also doing interesting work with their “See It” button integrations. These are all steps forward.

Ryan Spoon was named Senior Vice President, Product Development in July 2012. In this role, he is responsible for digital product development across all screens, including ESPN.com, ESPN Mobile, WatchESPN, ESPN3, Fantasy, and Social Media. Prior to ESPN, Spoon was a venture capitalist at Polaris Venture Partners and specialized in early-stage consumer internet, social media and e-commerce investments. Previously, Spoon served as Vice President, Marketing and Business Development for Widgetbox (now Flite) — a platform for brands and publishers to create dynamic, shareable ad units. Prior to that, Spoon spent 2003 to 2007 at eBay, focusing on internet marketing, user acquisition and social products, while launching and managing eBay’s U.S. Classifieds business. While he was a collegiate swimmer for Duke University, Spoon founded beRecruited, an online recruiting platform for high school student-athletes and college coaches. beRecruited was acquired in 2007 by RVS Ventures.

Note: This Q&A is part of OPA’s “Three on Three” series where we ask three industry executives the same three questions on a topic to uncover actionable insights.

Also in this series:

Q&A: Rob Hayes, EVP Digital Media, NBCUniversal on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences

Q&A: Kate Lewis, VP, Hearst Magazines Digital Media on Delivering Compelling Multiscreen Experiences