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Nov. 18, 2008, 7:08 a.m.

Morning Links: November 18, 2008

— Blog company offers a temporary “bailout” for journalists — free blogging software. Plus membership in an ad network that promises to pay more than AdSense. Worth grabbing, not for money-making reasons (the coin will be small), but for this reason: “[T]he first result for a Google search on your name will be an active, engaging blog, instead of a neglected LinkedIn page or a placeholder ‘coming soon’ site or your old articles from a publisher that doesn’t even pay you anymore.” (My old buddy George Kelly has more.)

A rather stunning chart of where today’s ad spending goes by medium. That little orange slice won’t be getting any bigger. And, to use the language of the presidential race, it’ll be awfully hard to “grow the pie” in the coming months.

— Internet founding father Dave Winer proclaims online advertising dead. “Remember that perfectly targeted advertising is just information.”

— Murdoch is planning its AmEx Black Card: a super-elite premium level of content higher than the mere premium content those $79-a-year-paying proles get. It’ll include “the ability to customize high-end financial news and analysis from around the world.” Perhaps the way to save newspapers is to give all Americans they can expense their subscription costs to — seems to work for the Journal.

Joshua Benton is the senior writer and former director of Nieman Lab. You can reach him via email (joshua_benton@harvard.edu) or Twitter DM (@jbenton).
POSTED     Nov. 18, 2008, 7:08 a.m.
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