By Ken Schachter

The New York Times, the gray lady of establishment journalism, plans to begin posting user-generated video in March, an executive said Wednesday.


Speaking in a panel discussion at the SIIA Information Industry Summit in New York City, Times executive Nicholas Ascheim said that developing video content is costly.

“The most expensive thing is the journalists themselves. That’s why user-generated content is interesting,” said Mr. Ascheim, director of entertainment for video and audio at New York Times Digital.

Another panel member, Cyrus Krohn, is director of content production at Yahoo Media Group. Yahoo commissioned a solo reporter, Kevin Sites, to report from global hot spots. But Mr. Krohn said the Internet company also is seeking to work out a “micropayment” system for compensating non-professionals for content submissions.

Without offering any details, Mr. Krohn also said that Yahoo planned to roll out a “different approach to news telling” around the end of March.

The Times launched a video player in November 2005, he said, and now has eight video journalists. Still, he acknowledged that amassing an audience for video has been daunting.

One notable success, Mr. Ascheim said, was a before-death video obituary with Washington Post humor columnist Art Buchwald.

The Times has conducted interviews with notable figures in advance of their deaths for years. The innovation was putting it on video.

“Hi. I’m Art Buchwald and I just died,” Mr. Ascheim quoted. “When you see it, it’s a no-brainer.”

Also on the panel were Randy Kilgore, chief revenue officer, Tremor Media, and moderator Jon Friedman, a Marketwatch.com columnist.

Mr. Ascheim also said that The Times no longer seeks to shackle its videos to in-house sites.

“We’re comfortable about embedding our video on other sites now,” he said. “Amassing an audience to make a business out of this on your own site is probably not a reality.”

Ultimately, will The Times abandon newsprint and become an online publication?

Mr. Ascheim said print has some advantages such as being easily navigable and highly portable. He said that a portable Times will exist in the future. “The question is whether it will be printed on trees,” he said.