What is Publishable?

What is the right level of editorial and artistic effort for online publication?What quality controls are required?  How do you know when you're making a difference and when you're wasting time?

Tech/
Content/
Management

Competing for the News Audience: Getting the Story to Text

Much of the news gathering online happens quickly, as people skim pages of text.  If this is true: are the current techniques of importing audio/video competitive? And if we wanted to get news into text, how would we do it?

Content/
Management

Covering Elections: Thinking Forward to 2008

This session will bring together national and local producers of election Web sites to share their strategies in 2006 and brainstorm for the presidential election in 2008.

Content/
Management/
Policy

National/Local: Getting the Right Mix

Almost every news site combines local, national and even international news. But online news is everywhere.

Content/
Management

Gaming the News

A look at pioneering the use of gaming and simulations to create unique audience experiences. Beyond pictures, text and audio, how are companies using these experiences to inform, engage and learn from users? How can games and simulations make complex issues like state budgets and sustainability more accessible and understandable?

Content

Music Discovery

Under development

Content

Music Rights

Under development

Content

New Media and Democracy

What is the role of public media in the increasingly crowded "news arena?"  Major session.  Industry leaders discuss their visions of online news.

Content/
Policy

Real Social
Media:  Applications
that go Beyond Broadcast

Presentations detailing the effective application of social media techniques for public service publishers.

Social Media

Applying Social Media to Elections

Focusing specifically on the 2008 election, we will explore how social media tools could be used in creative way by pubcasters at the local and national level. Virtual primary debates like www.e-democracy.org; aggregating user content covering local races, etc.

Social Media

Social Media 101: starting with the basic online community and user-generated content

How well do you understand the basic toolkits of social media? This hands-on session is designed for those who may have dabbled but could benefit from a deeper understanding of how these services work and how to make the most of them in your work.

Social Media/Tech

Social Media 201

Managing online communities, moderating comments, using Feedburner, Podzinger, Newsvine, Newsvibe, etc. This is for graduates of Social Media 101 and for more advanced strategies for using social media tools and applications in public media services.

Social Media/Tech

Station Social Media Experiments

Over the past year a growing number of public radio stations have begun experimenting with social media. We will hear from 3 or 4 of the stations themselves, reporting on their progress, challenges, successes, metrics, resources, tools.

Social Media 

Advice from the Best e-Fundraising Pros: Their tactics and tips

The panelists, from non-profits outside of the public broadcasting world who have had recent success in online fundraising, will talk about their strategies and current best practices in new member acquisition and renewing donors.

Revenue

Leveraging Social Networks

How can public broadcasting stations can leverage social networks to increase engagement and build audience? Best practices, tips, and the etiquette of social networks will be presented.

Revenue/
Management

Core Values and Online Revenues

As we explore potential business models for our public service online, what do we know about what our constituencies will embrace, tolerate, or resent? What revenue strategies should we test, and what should we avoid on principle? In this session we'll examine online sponsorship and paid-access content through the lens of public broadcasting's core values. We'll review what's been learned about core values and traditional underwriting, and will discuss how current focus group research from NPR and PBS is influencing stations' online sponsorship strategies. Then we'll look at a successful transactional model from outside -- paid access to content -- as a springboard for further discussion of core values and our approaches to revenue generation.

Revenue/
Management

Driving Traffic Online: Search Engines & Blogs are Your Friends

Presenters will discuss how both search engine optimization techniques and outreach to bloggers & paid media on blogs can be low-cost, effective ways to drive new traffic to both local and national Web sites. You'll leave this session with helpful tools that will bring measurable traffic increases to your sites.

Revenue

Models of Paid Content

Still in development

Revenue/
Managment/
Research

Google Analytics

In November, IMA launched a major pilot project to determine the efficacy of Google Analytics as >the< system metrics provided for public broadcasting.  Hear about GA from the people who run it, and learn what has happened so far in the IMA pilot project.

Revenue/

Amazon and Google Ad Words

Many sites with good levels of web traffic could raise significant revenues--$10,000 annually and more--by implementing passive revenue project, such as developing a partnership with Amazon and installing Google Adwords.  Do these services work within non-commercial sites?  If so, how do you do it?  Who's doing it and what are they earning?

Revenue/
Management

Big Picture - Metrics

Research/
Management

How are people using Media today?

A major study in daily media habits and the realities of simultaneous media usage from the Online Publishers Association

Research/
Management

Research: 10 Things I Didn't See Coming

Tim Davis, Director of online services at Jacobs Media, is gathering a group of foresighted media "gurus" to discussion the stuff they didn't see coming--and why.  

Research/
Content

PBS/NPR Metrics

PBS.org and NPR.org have installed powerful analytics capability that will help them learn what how people are using their sites.  The thing is: those are the very same people who are visiting your site.  What have they learned and what are they doing with those insights?

Research/
Policy

Education and Impact

 Under development

 Research

Planning for Major Redesign

Making major changes in your web site and strategy can be a delight and a disaster--and usually a little bit of both. This session will explore the subject of redesign from a management perspective: how do you think through your requirements, how do you select a firm to work with, what will you be asked to do.  Real life examples will allow you to share both the ecstasy and the agony of a major design overhaul.

Tech/
Management

Mobile

Just open the newspaper and see what your cell phone providers are promising: photos, music, streaming, e-mail, text messaging--all on that little phone. Hear what's coming. Get advice on how you can plan for its impact.

Tech/
Management

Podcasting

How large is the audience for podcasting? Where are people getting podcasts? How can you compete?

Tech

Gaming and Simulations

This session features a panel of news and media folks who are pioneering the use of gaming and simulations to create unique audience experiences. Beyond pictures, text and audio, how are companies using these experiences to inform, engage and learn from users? How can games and simulations make complex issues like state budgets and sustainability more accessible and understandable?

Tech/
Content

Audio Metrics

Measuring site traffic is hard, but solutions like Google Analytics will give you some reasonably reliable numbers at a cost you can easily afford. But measuring the use of audio--streaming, archives and podcasts--is much more difficult. Hear why, and see how some people are dealing with this issue.

Tech/
Management