These are going to be some dangerous confessions from a new media guy.

While we should try to make cool, new features, we should always keep an eye on what is useful. Written content is immensely useful. It can be viewed in a variety of formats, even mobile, and when written well, it delivers a form of immediacy that video, Flash and other online content cannot.

I suspect my preference for written content is not that far off of what the average Internet user feels either. It helps explain why 57 million Americans read blogs in 2006, while 50 million Americans still buy daily newspapers.

Now, when I say written content, I mean much more than just standard journalism writing with an inverted pyramid (And a lot, lot less feature ledes. Please?!?). I want writing with immediacy, impact and focus. A lot of what appears in newspapers does not fit that description.

One reason I love tech blogs like TechCrunch, Silicon Alley Insider and Engadget so much is that they are not encumbered by the legacy of journalism. Their posts are written with an amazing sense of immediacy, and their headlines are clear and concise. I can get in and out within a matter of seconds.

That’s news I can use in a fiber optic world. I’m a RSS loving, Google Reader using, on the go kind of guy. Do you really think I have time to watch video news reports?

Speaking of video, I can’t remember the last time I watched a newspaper video clip. Why watch a video at NYTimes.com when I can watch one at CNN.com? Although, often I just want to read CNN’s stories, instead of watching their long videos.

Even short videos take time to watch. So, they better be good and often they aren’t. With a written story I can get the gist of the story in under 10 seconds. I could never say the same about video content.

I confess, I’m not a big fan of Flash. I think some newspapers have hitched their futures to this technology for unclear reason. At it’s worst, Flash makes a user experience worse by causing users to wait for some slow loading content that has serious accessibility issues that adds nothing to a Web site. At it’s best, Flash be can an incredible, interactive info graphic or database-driven story.

Most uses fall in between. The problem with using too much Flash is that it is a resource hog. I keep around an old computer so I can do usability testing. Yes, I have a Core 2 Duo Macbook, but that’s not what the average Internet user has, and we should always keep that in mind.

Flash has an uncanny way of tripping up my older computer, especially when I have multiple tabs open on my browser. There is also another rule of thumb that newspapers have a hard time following: If it can be done with a standards-based solution, it should be.

Far too many times I see Flash used on a newspaper site, when the same could be done with CSS or javascript.

Now this doesn’t mean there isn’t Flash content I like, because there is some that really gets me going. There is also Web video I like from news organizations. But it is to say that written content is still king.

This doesn’t mean we can keep writing like we have for decades in newspapers. It means we have to rethink written content on the Web. Many of the top blogs have the right idea.

The Internet and the Web are here to stay, but how we connect with both will be changing.

The personal computer isn’t going anywhere, but people are increasingly accessing the Internet and the Web via mobile devices like smartphones. The iPhone in particular was a watershed moment for the mobile Web because of the power and grace of its user interface and how easy the phone makes using the Web.

Unlike virtually every other mobile device, the iPhone has a full Web browser, Safari 3. It can display Web content like it was meant to be displayed. Despite lacking 3G support (a much faster data network than what the iPhone uses — EDGE), the iPhone’s Web browser is used a lot more than the browser on the typical smartphone.

In fact Google says it gets 50 times more search requests from iPhones than from any other mobile handset. Vic Gundotra, head of Google’s mobile operations, told the Financial Times that mobile Internet searches may overtake fixed Internet searches within the next few years. People want access to information from anywhere, not just when they are seated at a desk.

Apple has caused other manufactures to step up their game in order to compete with the iPhone. Samsung has several phones that will operate on their new TouchWiz UI. The interface looks quite similar to the iPhones, and many other handset markers are looking to mimic Apple’s groundbreaking touchscreen UI.

Mozilla announced late last year that a mobile version of Firefox is in development. A mobile version of Firefox, with its strong standards support and extensibility, might be another watershed moment for the mobile Web. Imagine having access to a full version of the best Web browser available wherever you go.
Te iPhone should improve considerably this year when Apple releases its second-generation iPhone with 3G. The EDGE network that the iPhone connects to is alright for surfing Web pages, reading news, checking mail, etc, but it’s not very good for consuming rich multimedia content. 3G isn’t as fast as the broadband that many people enjoy at home, but it still has a good deal of bandwidth (and other data networks will overtake 3G within the coming years).

That’s bandwidth that can support streaming video, audio slideshows and other bandwidth-intensive task. This is the kind of content that newspapers should already have on their Web sites. All those newspapers struggling to get the Web, are really positioning themselves to fall further and further behind.

And, frankly, many of those papers will probably die within the next 5-10 years. I’m continually amazed by how many newspapers have bad Web products that are merely poorly recreated versions of their print products. A lot of publishers, editors and journalists are saying that they finally get the Web and why it’s important for the future for journalism.

The time for getting the Web was 10 years ago. Now you need to get the Web and the mobile Web. People want to consume content on the go.

Why do I need to be by a computer to get access to the information I want? I shouldn’t, and I no longer have to be tethered to a computer to have access to the Web.

Waiting to meet someone at Starbucks? Why not surf over to NYTimes.com and read a few stories? (NYTimes.com looks great on the iPhone by the way. Many Web sites do not because they were not properly coded using Web standards) Maybe you’ve been out all day, away from your computer and you want to be updated with the latest going on in the world.

That’s the power of the mobile Web. A lot of journalists will say, “why would I need the Web when I’m away from my computer?” These are the same kinds of people who have willfully kept newspapers in the dark ages and have allowed for the catastrophic erosion of a cherished institution.

If you don’t get the Web, you sure as hell won’t get the mobile Web. But then again, the kinds of people who don’t get the Web and why it should be our focus are the kinds of people who should be unemployed.

We have to go where consumers are going. They are going mobile.

I’ll meet you there.