Newspaper & Mailroom

News Media Evolution: Start the Year With New Skills and Knowledge

Monday 07. January 2013 - Editors and publishers seeking insight on how news media will evolve in 2013 - and how they can use these trends to advance their media enterprises - will be well served to check out the conference programmes and a "strictly digital" study tour that the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) has planned for the first months of the new year.

Four major regional and global events are scheduled between January and April, providing an array of presentations on everything from maximizing print profits to the latest digital developments. A full programme of study tours is also planned in 2013, covering print production, newsrooms, digital advertising and publishing strategies.
These include:
– Digital Media Europe 2013, a major conference on new media developments from across the continent that focuses on managing media industry change, growing digital revenue from all sources, and providing ideas for innovation from pure digital players. The event will be held in London from 15 to 17 April 2013.
Confirmed speakers include Donata Hopfen, Managing Director of Bild Digital in Germany, which will introduce paid digital content in 2013; Pierre Conte, President of FigaroMedias, the advertising branch of Group Figaro in France, which makes 20 per cent of its revenue from digital; and Tony Haile, CEO of Chartbeat, a leading real-time data service whose clients include CNN, the New York Times, Gilt Groupe and Starbucks.
– Printing Summit 2013, which focuses on maximizing the power of print, which remains the generator of most newspaper company revenues. The event, to be held in Hamburg, Germany, on 19 and 20 March, will examine printing process and business innovations, design, environmental issues, cost savings and more.
Confirmed speakers include Adrian Norris, Creative Director for Canada’s Globe and Mail; Josef Konrad Schiessl, Technical Director for Germany’s Süddeutscher Verlag, one of the most modern and efficient printing facilities in Europe; Takehiko Murase, Engineering Center Manager for Asahi Printech in Japan, which prints the Asahi Shimbun, the world’s second largest newspaper with more than 7.6 million daily copies; and many more.
– Study Tour: Strictly digital – SXSW Festival and West Coast Innovators, which will take a small, exclusive group of news media executives to the South by Southwest Interactive Accelerator Festival in Austin, Texas, and then to visit pure digital leaders in San Francisco, California.
– The 8th Middle East Conference, to be held on 26 and 27 February in Dubai, will will present an overview of news media innovations from around the globe for Middle East audiences.
Speakers include: Mario Garcia, CEO & Founder, Garcia Media Group in the United States, Mohammad Alayyan, Publisher and Chairman of United Jordan Press in Jordan; Ravindra Dhariwal, Chief Executive Officer of The Times of India; and many others.
– Digital Media India 2013, a conference and workshop for South Asian news media executives that presents successful digital publishing initiatives and strategies from around the world. The event will be held in New Delhi on 28 to 30 January.
Confirmed speakers include: Johnson Goh, Vice President for Strategic Marketing & Head of Singapore Press Holdings Online Classifieds, who will present SPH’s mobile strategies; Anita Nayyar, CEO of Havas Media for India & South Asia, who will present a digital advertising case study from an agency point of view; Stig Nordqvist, Executive Director, Emerging Digital Platforms at WAN-IFRA, who will present a digital trends overview; and other speakers to be announced.