Anthony Gottlieb, Economist.com

Name: Anthony Gottlieb

Job title: Executive Editor of The Economist and Editor of Economist.com

How long have you been in this role? Since 1997.

How much of your working day is based in the office? Practically all, and lots of evenings too.

What does it entail? Editing, subbing, planning, managing, investigating new ideas, finding solutions to problems (which are legion on the web) and trying to find better ways to do things.

What inspires you to come to work each day? The stimulating work and colleagues who are fun.

How did you enter the industry? By accident. I was looking for distractions from academic philosophy.

Any top tips for new journalists? Don't believe anything in other news media: start afresh yourself. Write as you speak. And remember that most words are unneccessary.

How has journalism changed since you started? The business of research has been transformed by the web. And the web provides a quicker and more intimate way to communicate.

But otherwise not much.

What's the biggest challenge of publishing online? Keeping up the old standards, and finding new ways to hold attention online.

Do you still buy newspapers? Yes, about the same number as before. But I also read lots of others online.

Which web sites do you use the most? Google, Amazon, Abebooks and Arts & Letters Daily.

What can web journalism achieve that print journalism can't? Speed and ease of delivery, and the ability to let readers dig deeper into a story if they want to.

What would make online journalism even better? Print journalism still has greater prestige; if this weren't the case, greater talent might move towards web journalism.

Will paid content be the future for web publishers? I'd say that a mixture of a paid and free is the way that most general-interest publications, like us, will go.

We've always followed this mixed model, and plenty of others are now joining in - partly because of the need to make money, and partly because it has emerged that people will indeed pay for the right sort of product.

What is the creative force behind the development of The Economist.com? The desire to expand our horizons, both in terms of the size and type of audience, and of what we cover.

How much content is unique to the website? An increasingly large amount: our Cities Guides, our daily coverage of global politics and business (Global Agenda) audio interviews, hundreds of constantly updated background briefings, some of our Country Briefings, much of our management section (Global Executive), some book reviews, some extra material that accompanies print-edition articles (such as our recent dossier on Silvio Berlusconi), and our devious and funny daily current-affairs quiz.

How will new media influence the future of news provision? In general, it makes it easier to get more of it quickly. Thankfully, this has not yet led to any significant dilution of quality.

Economist.com:
http://www.economist.com

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