Monthly Archives: November 2009

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They’ll Pay for This!

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So news is going around that billionaire media magnate Rupert Murdoch is not only going to begin charging for all online content at his various media properties (which include The Wall Street Journal and The New York Post in the United States, and The Sun and The Times in the United Kingdom), but he is also going to try to stop Google from referencing any of this content in news searches. Somehow, that this news broke the same week Jim Carrey’s A Christmas Carol topped the box office in the U.S. seems like not much of a coincidence.

Alas, I digress. Murdoch has long advocated a pay model for fixing what’s wrong with the business of print media. He is onto something, at least in theory, when he says that if content is good enough, then people will pay for it. However, he seems to have overlooked a few things. One, The Wall Street Journal went this same route about a decade ago and was ignored in such droves that it eventually abandoned the practice. And this was at a time when online consumption of print media was a small fraction of what it is today, so expecting people to go full reverse against a much stronger freebie culture seems optimistic, to say the least.

And that is the situation for a respected media brand such as the Journal. What of the Post? From my own experience, the Post is best known for trumping the New York Daily News in sensational headlines, as well as providing train commuters with some light (read: brain-dead) reading to occupy them after a long day of work. I know my senior designer for the magazine reads Page Six on her lunch break; surely she can watch Hulu or read any other website when Rupert tries to charge her a buck a day or whatever the going rate will be.

The point is, I see where Rupert is coming from, but the world of media is changing too fast for a stark policy such as this to succeed. If he wants to restrict his online offerings, then simply don’t puiblish your entire print edition online. Make there be some exclusive content to the print edition and run the online version as a free loss leader to get people to subscribe. Or something like that. I can’t pretend to have all of the answers here, but I know that when the WSJ starts spamming me to buy its online version, I’ll be only too happy to tell them to unsubscribe me from their mailing list, too.

For a better take on this than I can muster, check out our cover story from earlier this year on old media and new opportunities. Clay Shirky’s the real expert on this, and if Murdoch was serious about protecting his investments, he’d bring on Clay as an advisor.

Storm Summary 12

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Welcome to the twelfth “Storm Summary” post of the hurricane season.

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Most Fridays from now until the official end of the season (November 30) I will post an update on past and present hurricanes in the Atlantic and Pacific, like the following:

NAME PEAK STATUS DATE LOCATION DAMAGE
Carlos Cat. 1 7/10 to 7/16 East Pacific None
Felicia Cat. 4 8/3 to 8/11 East Pacific None
Guillermo Cat. 3 8/12 to 8/19 East Pacific None
Bill Cat. 4 8/15 to 8/24 Mid Atlantic No major damage
Fred Cat. 3 9/7 to 9/12 South Atlantic None
Jimena Cat. 4 8/29 to 9/4 East Pacific No major damage
Linda Cat. 1 9/7 to 9/11 East Pacific None
Rick Cat. 5 10/15 to 10/21 East Pacific No major damage
Neki Cat. 3 10/18 to 10/27 Central Pacific No major damage
Ida Cat. 1 11/4 to 11/5 Caribbean No major damage

The only addition we have to the hurricane list is Ida, which was a short-lived and quite uneventful hurricane that is now a Tropical Depression hovering off the coast of Honduras. As was predicted, the 2009 hurricane season is shaping up to be a (thankfully) dismal event.

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Though the Atlantic has only seen two official hurricanes, the waters of the Pacific are seeing constant activity, due, in part, to El Niño, which is “the periodic warming of central and eastern tropical Pacific waters [that] occurs on average every two to five years and typically lasts about 12 months.” Although most people think of this phenomenon in negative terms for the damage it can spur on the West Coast, it is actually beneficial to the East Coast/Gulf Coast in the sense that warmer waters in the Pacific usually create conditions that suppress Atlantic hurricanes.

Why exactly this occurs is not something I’m qualified to explain but, as I recall, it has something to do with warm and cool air mixing in a different way and creating a “wind shear” that helps prevent storms from developing. The International Research Institute for Climate and Society can probably explain it better. For hard proof of El Niño, consider the fact that the Pacific has seen 23 named storms, mostly tropical storms and hurricanes, while the Atlantic waters have seen only 10.

For constant, up-to-date storm information, visit NOAA. And for breaking information on the insured losses the storms create, check out the Insurance Information Institute and the Insurance Services Office.

Most importantly, don’t forget to check back next Friday for our twelfth “Storm Summary” installment.

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The Insurance Industry and Climate Change

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This morning, AIR Worldwide, in collaboration with the the U.

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K. Met Office and the Association of British Insurers (ABI), released their findings on the financial implications of climate change to the insurance industry.

The report, “Financial Risks of Climate Change,” focuses on insured risks in both the U.K and China from dominant natural hazards in those areas, including inland flooding, winter windstorms and typhoons.

Results from the study include:

  • The average annual insured inland flood losses in Great Britain could rise by 14 percent assuming a global temperature rise of 4°C (39 degrees Fahrenheit). Within Great Britain, the results vary by region (increases range from less than 10 percent to nearly 30 percent).
  • The insured inland flood loss in Great Britain occurring on average once every 100 years could rise by 30 percent. The insured inland flood loss occurring on average once every 200 years could rise by 32 percent.
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    In both cases, the estimates assume a global temperature rise of 4°C.

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  • The average annual insured losses from typhoons affecting China could increase by 32 percent; the 100-year loss could increase by 9 percent, and the 200-year loss could increase by 17 percent. In all cases, the estimates assume a global temperature rise of 4°C.The average annual insured inland flood losses in Great Britain could rise by 14 percent assuming a global temperature rise of 4°C. Within Great Britain, the results vary by region (increases range from less than 10 percent to nearly 30 percent).

“The earth’s climate system is constantly changing,” said Dr. Peter Dailey, assistant vice president and director of atmospheric science at AIR Worldwide. “Not only does a change to any component of the system influence the risk from natural catastrophes, but the interactions between components bring about an inherent uncertainty surrounding how climate will evolve in the future. By conditioning our models on future climate scenarios developed by leading climate researchers at the Met Office, the study we have conducted on behalf of the ABI advances our understanding of the relationship between these complex climate relationships and insured risk.”

The research brings together unique climate model projections with state-of-the-art catastrophe models. And as we’ve recently seen with Typhoon Ketsana, which demolished parts of China, the Philippines, Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos and killed almost 700 and caused more than $1 billion in damage — research in this area is greatly needed. Nothing can stop Mother Nature, but cat models can help prepare for her wrath.
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Asteroids Over Manhattan

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It’s unlikely to happen — some say we’ll never see it, some say it’s inevitable and right around the corner.

Either way — if a comet does in fact hit the United States and, more specifically, Manhattan, it is expected to cause trillions in damage and 3.2 million deaths.

This is according to Risk Management Solutions, the Newark, California-based catastrophe modeling company. They based their study on the 1908 asteroid explosion that rocked Siberia. The Tunguska Event, as it’s often referred to, occurred near the Tunguska River and knocked over an estimated 80 million trees covering 830 square miles. Several amazing eyewitness accounts of the event are listed here.

The entire RMS report is available here. I highly recommend it as it includes a history of the Tunguska event, along with probabilities of such an event happening again and an in-depth analysis of insurance implications for this type of catastrophe.

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