JEEcamp 2009: Experimentation and entrepreneurship in journalism

May 10, 2009 in Journalism
Tags: audioboo, bbc, business models, entrepreneurship, experimentation, flickr, getty images, jeecamp, jeff jarvis, Journalism, kyle macrae, qik, scoopt, social media, twitter

Standing before a collection of social media nuts as they update twitter, write blogs, record Audioboos and film with Qik, it is clear Kyle MacRae is brave man.

The founder of Scoopt is talking at JEEcamp, an unconference organised to explore issues in the news and technology industries with a specific focus on experimentation and enterprise.  He has essentially just told his audience they need to get out more:

“I think it does pay dividends to escape the echo chamber, to get out of the field you are working in and view it objectively from a distance. Most journalists here are all completely clued up and savvy about what is going on.

“I’m not convinved that is an advantage when it comes to starting a new business in the sector.  Look at the industry from the outside without getting specific knowledge and just try to spot opportunities.

The Scotsman clearly doesn’t scare easily, as he uses his keynote speech to dismiss the usefulness of consultants and new media gurus – gods to the geeky attendees.

“My advice would be stop listening to Jeff Jarvis and all the others – do they really know anything, are you actually learning anything from them, or can you work it out yourself?”

MacRae certainly has tried to work things out for himself, and he spoke about selling his user-generated picture agency to Getty Images and negotiatiating with the BBC to obtain seconday re-sale rights on their viewers’ photos.  These plans were thwarted when the Corporation felt unable to exploit the content in a commercial arena.

MacRae also attempted to provide images for professional outlets through Flickr, but the process dragged so much he resorted to asking anyone interested to tag their photos with ’scoopt’ instead.

He feels Getty failed to fully develop Scoopt’s potential and the site finally closed in February. However, despite this setback he is positive about the future for new business models in journalism:

“I am still convinced there are a lot of opportunities in journalism to do something professionally, to build something that can generate money.

“We all know there are precious few jobs and the industry doesn’t know what it is doing, but there are all sorts of ideas and startups and experiments going on – some of which will hopefully fly.”

This is a belief at the heart of JEEcamp, that journalism can flourish under new business models as enthusiastic new initiatives replace the tired old models that now seem obselete.

“I think being an entrepreneur in journalism right now is probably the best, and possibly the only, opportunity there is.

“If you can do it without funding it is a great time – really cheap, really easy.  Just go for it, commit and hopefully make a success of it.”

Photos taken by JemimahKnight on Flickr, video shot by Kasper Sorensen on Vimeo.