Google: The Article Is Key

Search engines have shifted importance from news websites to individual articles, according to a Google advisor.

And this means newspapers need to readdress how they structure their digital content as the unit of consumption moves from the whole site to a single story, said Richard Gingras at a recent conference.

Blogger Pam Maples notes that Gingras compared the current news situation with online music where the unit of consumption has changed from albums to individual songs following the success of iTunes and similar download services.

He then urged delegates to take a leaf out of Wikipedia’s book and create “living stories” which can be regularly updated.

Gingras was echoing ideas earlier espoused by Google’s vice president for search and user experience, Marissa Mayer.

Here’s a short video of Mayer explaining the atomic unit shift and the concept of “living stories”.


Google VP Marissa Mayer on the atomic unit of media consumption from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.

Gingras was speaking at this year’s conference of Associated Press Managing Editors in Las Vegas.