WAN-IFRA congress offers digital perspective

Key address

Mark Contreras, chairman of the Newspaper Association of America and senior vice-president of the newspaper division of The E W Scripps Company, will join the congress to look at the digital firestorm that has engulfed the US media industry and address such issues as:

• Where the US business model stands;
  
• Larger issues for the industry in a time of content explosion and revenue constriction;
  
• What he considers it means to be a newspaper in America today;
  
• Financial reality behind the US journalism model;
  
• Demands of addressing these issues in a landscape that demands a new sense of urgency

Key speakersOther key speakers joining him:

• Tim Brooks, MD of Guardian News and Media, who is responsible for its core division, which publishes the Guardian and the Observer as well as the Guardian.co.uk website, which attracts more than 36 million unique users a month. With a focus on expanding audiences beyond the UK borders, it is expanding the definition of a newspaper in the digital age.
  
• Rainer Esser, MD of Germany's Die Zeit, which has seen substantial subscriber growth over the past seven years, thanks to a focus on target audiences, core competencies and a willingness to adopt new ideas.
  
• Jack Matthews, CEO, Fairfax Digital in Australia, the online division of Fairfax Media, responsible for Australia's leading online news sites and many of its category leading transaction sites.
  
• Torry Pedersen, CEO, Verdens Gang, Norway, which includes Norway's most profitable and most read news site. He is well known for recognising early that print and online news operations have different formats and different attributes and for exploiting these successfully. VG has been a leader in web-TV, user-generated content and other multimedia initiatives that have made it a magnet for consumers and advertisers alike.
  
• Alfredo Triviño, director of Creative Projects for News International in the United Kingdom, who will speak in a joint Congress and Editors Forum session devoted to the new surge in electronic readers for books, notably ‘tablets', and the multiplication of mobile devices with easy and comfortable access to news sites.
  
• Oliver Fleurot, CEO for public relations, corporate and financial communications and events management for Publicis Groupe. As a former chief executive of the Financial Times, he believes not enough is known about advertising effectiveness on the web and more research is needed.
  
• Roman Gallo, the CEO of PPF Media, whose Nase Adresa (Our Address) in the Czech Republic is one of the most talked about hyper-local news projects in the world. It is in the process of blanketing the country with 200 different hyper-local weeklies, whose reporting teams are based in company "news cafes". The combination of newsrooms and Internet bistros is designed to facilitate contacts with readers and potential sources (and bring in revenue).
  
• Mohamed Alayyan, the chairman of Al Ghad newspaper, the leading independent daily newspaper in Jordan, which has been at the forefront of multimedia development built around the core value of providing relevant, local content, no matter what the platform.
  
• François Dufour, editor-in-chief and founder of Play Bac Presse in France, who will present new evidence that children and their families do, in fact, continue to read newspapers in print ¬ and often prefer it to digital delivery.
  
• Per Bowallius, president of GISAB in Sweden, a Stampen Group company that has "conquered" the capital, Stockholm, with a string of suburban freesheets that ring the city and provide a compelling product for advertisers and readers alike. The company has found a new avenue to success in a highly competitive market.

For the evolving programme, registration information and other details, go to www.wanlebanon2010.com.