Gawker for Colleges July 3, 2008
Posted by sdpurtill in : Web 2.0, Money, Ideas, Gawker , trackbackIf you follow SamPurtill.com I’m sure you know that I’m a huge fan of Gawker Media and anything Nick Denton touches. I’ve been kicking this idea around for awhile and felt like publishing it because 1) ideas are cheap and 2) the amount of energy/passion required to execute on this idea are so great that I think the only people that could do it need to contact me. Here are my thoughts.
College Gawker
Overview:
Basis of the idea comes from what we’ve seen Gawker do. There is a huge market for a college gossip blogs with campus reporters. There are several issues that would need researching before launching the company, mostly on the guidelines for what the reporters aren’t allowed to write about (preferably nothing, I don’t believe in censorship).
The Problem:
I think the best way to gather gossip in college right now is through Facebook. Gossip news is the most addicting kind of news because people are infatuated with the lives of others (instead of living their own).
The Solution:
Instead of letting Facebook decide what comes into the News Feed, why couldn’t you hire a few reporters to create news feeds for each college? Although Facebook will report on only the people you let in your Friends list, this would be much more interesting because the reporting would be more unique/funnier/original/HUMAN.
Reporters:
Hire 3-4 students to be reporters. Have 1 managing editor. For the first few reporters, try hiring sophomores/juniors as they would be better for getting to know the audience (as opposed to seniors who are leaving and freshman who don’t know enough people yet). Hire reporters that are well connected, have a large following on Facebook, attend all the parties. Hire from various social crowds.
Reporting Guidelines:
Minimum of 2 posts per day on weekdays. On weekends have 1 reporter make all the posts (SPIEGELMAN!). Posts of all different sizes, whatever drives pageviews. Controversial posts are good. Posts with pictures are better. Posts with videos are even better than controversial posts with pictures.
Reporter Topics:
Party Report. Fameballs. Caption Contest. Drunk People. Fights. So Indie. The Brotherhood. We Read The News So You Don’t Have To. Religious Fanatics. Sorority Girls. Hipsters. Emo Kids. The 90’s Called. Valley Girls. Fanboys. Nerds. Rumors. Someone Needs To Graduate. Dorm Stories. Pure Racism.
Reporter Pay Scheme:
Reporters are paid per amount of views. Every 1k PERMALINK (very important) pageviews the reporter gets $6-7 (depending on how the ad/promotion dollars come out). Also paid a base salary (at the beginning $1-200/mo), but this is contingent on having a following on the site (can’t be paying reporters with a dead site).
Commenters:
Anyone with a school address would be allowed to comment on their school’s blog. Anyone else that would like to comment has to audition, and if the reporters like them they can become a regular. Just like Gawker, commenters can be followed and have friends.
Technology:
Would need to program a simple blogging platform. Record all unique page views to each post. Run a cron job every 10 minutes that updates the # of page views on a post. Posts, comments, users, star commenters, followers, etc. Very simple. Could even use movable type.
How is this going to make money?
Some ideas
1) A hardcore/highly targeted audience is worth a ton of money — more than just the ad dollars that can come from the page views. The INFLUENCE you can have on these people.
2) Using the influence you have on the readers, you can begin to promote parties/events that are going on around the school. Do deals with the event organizers saying for every 100 people that show up, certain amount of money would go to us. Could be big for concert/party promotions around campus that need a minimum amount of people show up to break even
Seeding the network:
The hardest part about this idea will be the beginning of it at each campus. How are you going to get those first 1000 that follow/comment? What’s going to draw them? How will you get the word out? Several ideas
- Controversial posts that get in the news. Mainstream news.
- Be the first to break all the stories around campus, beat mainstream news.
- Post videos/pictures about popular people, promote like crazy on Facebook
- Facebook/MySpace promotion - sharing links, etc.
- Advertising in school newspaper
- Advertising around school - putting up posters/flyers in dorm rooms and apartments
- Advertise on school website (if allowed)
- Events for “elite” commenters
- Slow and steady will win. Will have a very hard time first 4-6 months I think, but after you get your initial commenting users things will start flying. More important than viewers is commenters, because commenters will make the site GREAT.
Downside: defamation lawsuits, getting kicked out of school. I’m sure there are loopholes and ways to get around these laws, would consult a lawyer about it.
Highly doubt I’ll ever do something like this but if I do… Well, you saw it here first.
Comments»
Been done. JuicyCampus.com. And it’s just as much of a dredge on society as all those other gossip rags, imo.
@breck JuicyCampus is a lot different from what I’m describing above - all their content is submitted by users/anyone from the school. This is the main thing I’m trying to avoid, the “wisdom” of the crowds doesn’t makes sites like these useless. I am proposing a group of 3-4 reporters to create the content. Yes it will be trashy but will also be informative about what really goes on at the campus, and I think it will be much more interesting than any school newspaper/user generated garbage on Facebook.
Setup a reddit site, or private FriendFeed room.