What was interesting — though not completely unexpected — was that no one even seemed to notice that we were flooding the site with previously published content. A lot of the articles were enthusiastically shared by people who had shared them the first time around, too. No one seemed gripped by a sense of deja vu, or, if they were, they didn't mention it.Vox is so pleased that they're adopting a policy of re-running old stories as if they weren't old, to give them another chance to win traffic. Here's the spin on why this is a good — as opposed to lame and lazy — policy:
On the modern web, content tends to arrive via miscellaneous streams rather than coherent chunks. So the meaning of strict chronology is breaking down regardless of what publishers do. If we can use our archives as a way to deliver more great pieces to today's audiences, then that's a huge win — for us and for them.Let me re-spin that in the opposite direction: The internet is completely incoherent anyway, and nobody's going to notice, so why shouldn't we take advantage of this strategy?
Question: Why call attention to the strategy? Answer: To immunize themselves from criticism if anyone ever notices and cares. Or: Because they actually do think they're very clever and deserve credit for this journalistic efficiency.
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15 comments:
It's a lot more honest than how most news agencies do it, which is to slap on two new paragraphs to the top and re-push the piece with a new headline.
Eh, I don't think I've ever gone to a Vox story because I can get my analysis from better places, but I'll admit: This was an interesting experiment, even if it was pushed by sheer laziness.
VOX? Who reads VOX? It's tripe.
As long as VOX is upfront using the original date line, I like it.
Other than the Althouse blog which I watch daily, there are plenty of other information sources I can't follow daily. This gives me a chance to see "best of ..." at a later date.
Telling you all you need to know about the folks who read VOX.
VOX is total BS. Good idea though.
I guess this is about the time I should make a "broken clock" comment, eh?
Mathew Sablan: "Eh, I don't think I've ever gone to a Vox story because I can get my analysis from better places, but I'll admit: This was an interesting experiment, even if it was pushed by sheer laziness"
This is not a Vox only strategy for recycling what they believe might be content that maintains it's relevance, it's also a heavy topic/tactic for other more traditional commercial firms as well. This is particularly true for financial services firms who are focused on the long term. The desire to "re-purpose" content from one target audience to another may very well require a time-late offering tactic with some modification of the original content/insights.
Lots of mommies and daddys and friends. That is, Facebook friends. Awww….aren't they cute at Vox?
It is the Hee Haw Effect. The show was on for 25 years and eventually was replaced with Hee Haw Silver. Hee Haw Silver showed bits and pieces of the classic shows. Ratings went up after they converted to showing reruns.
So in this scenario Vox is LBJ and the readers are MLK, and Vox is bragging about getting away with running their Big Lie (or I guess Big Truth) over again wihtout anyone noticing, after Hitler's example?
"no one even seemed to notice that we were flooding the site with previously published content. A lot of the articles were enthusiastically shared by people who had shared them the first time around, too."
Heh. Sort of telling on the readers.
Mindlessly "shared" without actually reading the story the first, second, or third time. Like those same ol' jokes forwarded over and over again to everybody on the senders email list.
Why stop running old material? It's still an outrage that the evil Israelis won't let Palestinians use their handy bridge from Gaza to the West Bank.
The things I've read at Vox have fallen into one or both of two categories:
1. Stuff I've already heard.
2. Stuff that isn't true.
So why not reprint old material? Saves time and money with no loss of quality.
People who read Althouse knew about Vox when it started, but the typical liberal who shares stuff on Facebook didn't. So running a bunch of earlier stuff that wasn't seen by most of their current audience will help them get a good deal of mindshare, as their new audience shares the reprints, and their Facebook friends see it.
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