Summary- Newspapers Innovate:  An innovative approach to newspapers is being launched in the Czech Republic:  A (very) well-funded group will open cafes linked to the newsrooms of hyperlocal papers (to be published by the group).  Many Europeans like their espresso with their newspaper (and vice versa) so why not?

Yes, we have promised that this blog is not about newspapers, but we cannot help but look for innovations while all around us people are singing dirges.  The New York Times reported that a new venture has launched in the Czech Republic to publish hyperlocal newspapers in four cities and to open associated cafes.  View NY Times Article

PPF Group will soon publish multiple local newspapers on a weekly basis, in addition to multiple websites (can you say “repurpose?”), plus they will open cafes that will be next to—I mean right next to—the newsrooms for these papers.  Literally, the door will be open to the newsroom of each paper.

OK, so file this under "retro-convergence."

No, it is not true that I am being paid by Adobe, given that my post five minutes ago was also about Adobe (Flash on TV sets in the home), but this piece in the New York Times caught my attention. "Digital Designers Rediscover Their Hands"

Adobe is sending designers to a seminar or class.  to make things with their hands and soldering tools.  The founder of the "Tinkering School" has been hired by Adobe to teach these classes to their designers--all of whom usually limit their contact with the mouse and keyboard.

OK, file this one under "convergence in the home."

At NAB, Adobe announced that they were working with partners to get Flash into home TV sets, with sales of such units to start later this year.

 Snore, you say?

File this entry under Convergence in the Home, subfile It's (Almost) About Time.  Or file it under home convergence or telco to the home convergence or Android convergence. 

Wherever you file it, pat yourself on your back---and the backs of your CTC colleagues because over a year ago CTC hosted a panel on the Open Handset Alliance and Android and we discussed some of what is now hot news.  OK, before you fall off your chair in anticipation:

Android in Your Home

Summary:  Internet "sleuths" pick up a scathing analysis of Sir Stanford's multi-billion dollar funds, which allegedly leads to the mainstream press getting hold of it and then, presto!, the SEC launches a criminal investigation and arrests Stanford.  Expect more of the same.

Most of us know about the phenomenon---the thus far successful phenomenon---of "crowd-sourcing."  For example, it is used by large corporations to solve R&D problems.  The "wisdom of the crows" has also given us Wikis, especially Wikipedia.

Now, a new form of crowd-sourcing arises.  Obviously, it is not on a scale of any of the examples above, but it may yet have its financial and social benefits.  Bloggers as sleuths---at least ones that get the word out enough that someone other than other bloggers notice.

Simulcast of TV shows to your mobile device?  It's about to happen, by the end of this year, in fact.  Call it a step forward for convergence.  There are a few caveats, however.

Later this year, more than 60 US television stations will broadcast their programming to mobile devices.  Those TV stations cover markets in more than twenty cities.  Thus far, the cities announced include New York, Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Washington, DC and Philadelphia.  As far as we can tell, the programming will not be stale re-runs (Hey, I liked Star Trek the first 3,000 times but now . . .) but will be the actual programming found on your living room TV.

The launch is the work of the members of the Open Mobile Video Coalition (www.omvc.org).  Those members include commercial and public broadcast stations.  OMVC also provides useful information for broadcasters trying to navigate true convergence.

Reluctant to use social networking sites?  Don’t really like to use the browser on your smartphone?  You are not alone.  The Pew Internet & American Life Project reported the results of a survey,, which got picked up by mainstream media (and blogs, etc.) for some of the findings.  You can download the Adults and Social Network Websites report here .

What really got everyone’s attention was that there is a group labeled the "Ambivalent Networkers," those who aren’t really keen on all this networking.  And what was really interesting to many was that these are males in their late 20’s.  The AP picked up this story and reached a few conclusions that were not the only ones in the report.  Quoting from that article (and reported at TechnNewsWorld ), the Pew director, Lee Rainie said that technology "feels like an obligation."

Uh-huh.

Convergence is now occurring in the collapse of the print newspaper industry with newspapers, if they survive at all, migrate to the Web (e.g., Seattle Post-Intelligencer).

Well, along comes Global Post, started by print-era journalists but with no such baggage.  Visit www.globalpost.com and bookmark it for regular visits to see how it develops.  (Full disclosure:  One of my colleagues in our consulting firm, The Global Capital Strategic Group, advises them but independent of that group.)

GlobalPost is hiring "stringers" (or freelance journalists) around the world ffor a modest stipend, who then post on key issues in other markets.  Their coverage is pretty good--part news, part commentary.

Reports are out that reality is, well, really weird--in a way that raises interesting questions about quantum theory.  Why is this important to the CTC community?  Well, it's the process--the data collection process--that is interesting.  (Hint:  Use the concept for data mining and data analysis.)  And, anyway, it is kinda cool.  Even if some people say "Well, duh." Sometimes, science has to catch up with common sense.

Depending on how you phrase it, quantum theory tells us that you cannot know everything about the world;  that you can know the position or the speed but not both of certain subatomic particles, for example; and that observation mucks things up.  So, someone thought up a way about finding out if reality exists if it is not observed--sort of answering the question as to whether a falling tree makes a sound if no one hears it.

And what did they do?  They didn't observe the reality they created.  At least not directly.

OK, so you can file this one under "Screed" or more precisely "Screed about Site Designs" and especially blogsites.

I write not only because I am frustrated (and want others with the same frustration to start using their market influence) but perhaps some enetrepreneur can do something about this problem. 

I just spent, on and off, much of the late afternoon trying to login to a noted Silicon Valley news site where I have contributed, etc., etc.  Three hours later and they still could not get me my forum username.  I had the same experience here but Robin and Mel, who run this blog, have enough workarounds to make everyone happy.