The Washington Post Company (WPO) launched it’s newest online venture WhoRunsGov.com today. From their about page:
Who Runs Gov offers a unique look at the world of Washington through its key players and personalities. Our site will feature profiles of a select group of government officials, including members of the new presidential administration, legislators, senior Congressional aides and committee staff, and experts at think tanks and interest groups who influence how policy is made.
For our initial site launch, creating and editing profiles will be limited to our editorial staff; in its second phase, our site will evolve into a moderated wiki.
I don’t see how this site can succeed in the face of competition from local competitors like Politico, national competitors like TalkingPointsMemo and international competitors like Wikipedia.org. These three (and many more) are established and have great communities surrounding them. Additionally, the mere presence of whorunsgov.com dilutes the already smallish pool of advertisers looking to get on politics sites.
I would have liked to see The Washington Post do something a little more daring and valuable by creating a Washington DC wiki. When I worked down there last summer I used Google Maps, Yahoo Local, and random blogs to find eateries and entertainment. I should have been using a local newspaper’s wiki to do this.
Why would it work?
- Everyone in your local geographic community is an expert… that local pizza shop? yeah I’ve eaten there, and here are some supporting links.
- This is a no brainer that can easily be monetized by lots and lots of small local businesses advertising on the site. Think small text ads appearing alongside all pages and competitor’s pages.
- This site can be launched and maintained by 2 people, maybe one. Wikimedia is run by 23 people!
- Community, Community, Community (metafilter and wikipedia practically police themselves)
- Micropayments, Micropayments, Micropayments (google adsense makes $billions on $50 transactions). Make advertising placement easy and cheap.
How is WashPo helping their local community by launching a Political blog? How are they helping their existing readers and advertisers with the launch of this website? What is the income potential for their shareholders? The Washington Post really needs to figure out what community they want to serve, Locals or National Politics. If the answer is BOTH then a fundamental change needs to occur in the way they are attempting to reach their audiences.
I do not see this site filling a need for readers or advertisers.
UPDATE/RELATED LINKS:
MindTouch today announces that MindTouch Deki is powering WhoRunsGov.com
LittleSis.org – Profiling The Powers That Be
Related posts:
Robert, as you suggest, there are two different audiences and two different wiki needs here. Yes, they should have a local wiki. But if WhoRunsGov evolves into an actual news wiki, this is the first (to my knowledge) paper to launch such a thing. And they foresee its evolution to a “moderated wiki”, which has enormous potential. The future of news needs to involve much more active, online interaction and collaboration between reporters, editors, bloggers and readers. This is a smart first step. Let’s hope the White House kicks off a wiki pretty soon, as well.
The mashup of multiple media types, web services etc in a wiki is really powerful. MindTouch Deki, the platform that powers WhorRunsGov, does these mashups natively with point-and-click ease. For more information about WhoRunsGov , specifically platform and technology, can be found here: http://cli.gs/Gov
As for competing with TPM, Politico etc I do not think this is the intent of the property. Indeed the property could be viewed as a powerful tool for these properties to leverage.