Adrienne LaFrance of the Nieman Journalism Lab writes about The Wall Street Journal‘s recently completed “Startup of the Year” online show that recently completed.
LaFrance writes, “The project was a way for the Journal to continue experimenting with video at a time when there’s huge demand for it. (Last year, then-Digital Network managing editor Raju Narisetti told me that ‘from a business point of view, we cannot generate enough video streams.’)
“But Startup of the Year is also a way for the paper to go after an untapped audience of young entrepreneurs and business students. The Wall Street Journal believes it can convert this demographic into a new generation of Journal readers by showcasing a ‘dramatic slice’ of their own world, Regal said.
“The Journal’s definition of ‘dramatic’ means exploring the travails of launching a business without the traditional reality-television format of ‘taking entrepreneurs to bars and showing them in bikinis,’ Regal says. So it’s not surprising that much of Startup of the Year feels a bit closer to C-SPAN than E! on the reality TV spectrum. Still, the Journal learned that this kind of storytelling benefits from a lighter approach — combining a ‘documentary feel with more drama and suspense.’
“And although the show traced the path of 24 companies through elimination rounds to a single winner, video producers at the newspaper insist the storytelling approach was meant to be nonlinear.”
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