Building the future on the web

Q&A with Advisory Board Member

CEO and Principal Consultant of WebbMedia Group, working with digital media for over 15 years; founder of several web-based companies.
Clients have said that Amy has "an encyclopedic knowledge of the tech industry," and "immediate access to all of the latest and most important trends."

1. How do innovations in online media promote press freedom?

In areas of the world where repressive governmental regimes have taken control of the press, new innovations in publishing have helped journalists report on critical news events. We've seen that recently: Facebook and Twitter were both used to help catalyse the Arab Spring. Elsewhere, we know that journalists are using disposable mobile phones to gain information without being tracked.

2. How can a start-up project become a successful online media business?

The most important thing to do is to meticulously plan in advance, and to develop a reasonable sustainability strategy. "Nonprofit" is a tax status, not a business model. Beyond wireframes, how will the site function? How will you iterate? What small number of features will you launch with, and what will be your plan for including more features as time and money allow? What is your marketing strategy? Who, exactly, is your audience? (It can't just be "people interested in news about X".) Most people who want to launch a digital media business have a vague idea of what they want to do, and they spend a lot of time focusing on the look of the site ... 99% of the effort should go into business decisions, workflows, monetization, marketing and audience development, which for most journalists isn't the fun part.

3. What are some of the most common mistakes made by traditional media when they seek to be involved in the “Internet revolution”?

Traditional media organisations don't do enough work to clearly identify their audiences and then select the right product/ tool/ app to develop for them. We once got a call from a potential client, who'd just launched an iPhone app. It was beautiful - it worked intuitively, had lots of great features, looked nice, was bug-free and had the right price point. Everyone agreed it was a great app. The problem? Nobody downloaded it. It took me less than a minute to diagnose the problem: that company's primary audience didn't own iPhones. They were BlackBerry users.

4. In your opinion, how do initiatives like the IPI News Innovation Contest promote the development of new media and strengthening of journalism?

Many people are too afraid to try something new. Because they're risk-averse, they are unwilling to take the time or money to experiment with the advancement of journalism via digital avenues. The IPI News Innovation Contest gives those projects a chance, because it enables journalists to work on a forward-thinking project.

Amy Webb is an author, speaker and future thinker and heads the Webbmedia Group, an international digital strategy consultancy that offers mobile, platform, social and emerging tech/media strategic services and workshops to Global 1000 and Fortune 500 companies, media organisations, governments, foundations and universities worldwide. Webb has spent more than 18 years working with digital media, founding several web-based companies and now advises various tech startups and media groups as well as Webbmedia's clients.

Webb serves on the Board of Directors for the Online News Association, the SXSW Accelerator Advisory Board, Knight-Batten Advisory Board, the Advisory Board for Temple University’s Journalism Program and the Advisory Board for the International Center for Journalists. She is the Dean of the Awesome Foundation Baltimore, a Delegate on the U.S.-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission and one of the Knight News Challenge judges. Webb is also a member of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (Interactive Media Peer Group) and serves as a judge for the Emmy awards. She is one of the co-founders of Spark Camp, a quarterly invite-only gathering of technologists, journalists, designers, policymakers and others working in emerging technology.

Webb’s work has been recognised with awards and nominations from Webby, Editor & Publisher, Investigative Reporters & Editors, Society of Professional Journalists, W3 and IAVA, among others. She has an M.S. from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and holds a BA in political economics from Indiana University. She also earned Nikyu Certification in the Japanese government administered Language Proficiency Test and speaks fluently. Webb has been a Lecturer at the Columbia University Sulzberger Program at the Graduate School of Journalism since it began in 2007 and has served on the adjunct faculty at University of Maryland, Temple University, Tokyo University and University of the Arts. She is a regular commentator on various broadcast shows and is a frequent keynote speaker at conferences around the world. She is based in Baltimore.