Here’s a short list of reporters who have covered cybersecurity surveys in the past 90 days. Not a lot of high-profile titles, maybe a couple. Small audiences. Bear in mind that other security reporters, absent from this list, might be moved to cover a compelling survey.
TechCrunch wants to know how TechCrunch+ subscribers like the product, so it has surveyed them. Here are the six screens from the survey, fielded last month. It’s good to see TC so solicitous.
Quartz wants to know why its readers renew, and this week launched a survey to get answers. Below is an analysis of the survey questions and what the brand is up to.
“The best surveys are ones that reveal unexpected findings or examine issues that have not yet been widely covered,” says Chain Store Age senior editor Dan Berthaiume.
If you’re younger than 43 years old, Steve Lohr was reporting for the New York Times before you were born. Imagine all the stories he has written… the interviews he has conducted… and all the pitches he has seen.
Tech vendors pour countless hours and dollars into surveys and ask the comms people to publicize the findings. How do you coax busy, skeptical reporters to cover these things? As we did in 2015, we asked reporters to give one reason they’d cover vendor surveys and one reason they wouldn’t. Here’s what they said this time.
YOUR ACCOUNT
FRIDGE NOTES
Sara Fischer of Axios nails another scoop: Time is merging its Time Ideas section into a new one, called Time100 Voices. It doesn’t promise big opportunity for tech PR — it aims so high that only the Benioffs and Nadellas stand a chance.
Recent research from Semrush, a data partner of ours, reveals the most searched societal issues based on average monthly Google searches between January 2019 and June 2023, and how they rank across 35 countries. Searches related to mental health are skyrocketing.
It is now called AI Time To Impact, and if you care about what’s real in AI and when we need to care about it, AI Time To impact is a must-read.
Says Digiday today: 40 percent of Gen Z uses TikTok or Instagram when searching for lunch recommendations. The younger you go, the tighter the grip held by platforms. Musk’s calculation that few will ever leave X might not be too far off in the long run.
Digiday granted anonymity to seven journalists working in shops that are experimenting with generative AI. “Nothing we have found is ready for prime time, at least not for serious journalism purposes,” says one, adding that “there is no way that AI results in more people being in journalism. This only can result in less.”
Some individuals said they dabble with Gen AI to find good headlines and story ideas.
The last word seemed to go to Insider EIC Nic Carlson, who said, “AI will replace, over time, journalists who refuse to use AI.”
We’ve been working on updating our CEO Profile cheat sheet and noticed that only the New York Times insists on calling these executives C.E.O.s. How stuffy. And the C.E.O.s they do cover always seem to be resigning for one reason or another. We’ll have the updated cheat sheet ready for you very soon. The FT’s ‘How To Lead’ feature appears to be in hiatus. The WSJ has some opportunity in WSJ Magazine.
