IFRA

Answering for Comyan is Peter Resele, the company's managing director. Customer comments (below the interview with Resele) are from Babuprakash Kalathil, Publishing Technical Services Delivery Manager, Al Nisr Publishing LLC, Dubai, United Arab Emirates, publishers of Gulf News.

WAN-IFRA: Why is digital asset management (DAM) important for news publishers?

Peter Resele: Because it is the central database of *all* content, and it is integrated with *all* systems. Even modern "content management" newspaper editorial systems cannot store all the content that is available (present and past), and it is also not efficient to do so. And editorial/content management systems cannot produce all media (newspaper, online, TV, Radio,...) nor are they always the same in all sub-companies of a large publishing enterprise – so there will always be various systems from various vendors.

The Media Asset Management System is central to all the production systems - not only the point of storage, but actually the point of *sharing* all the content in the organisation.

WAN-IFRA: How is DAM different from a database?

Resele: A very powerful, scalable database is essential at the center of the system, as well as a full-text search engine. The most difficult part – and key of a successful system – is the integration layer, though. The goal is that all systems in the organisation (print editorial system, web content management system, TV production system...) can seamlessly access the content in the MAM (e.g. drag & drop) and also archive all their content (images, text, articles, pages, audio, video,...) in maximum quality into the system. Especially editorial archiving is very complex, articles should be archived not only in text, but also as cut-out previews, linked with the respective images, and those published images must be linked to the original images from the agency. This is why it is necessary to use a specialised MAM for newspapers rather than a general archive from any vendor.

WAN-IFRA: What benefits do users get from DAM?

Resele: The can search and find all content in one place, from a single user interface – no matter what was the source (publication, production system, agency) and time of publishing. They have a central place for sharing and re-using content and can easily take it over into any production system – whether for print, online or TV.

It also makes them more independent from the CMS vendor(s), allowing for a mix and match.

Finally, because of the high quality of stored editorial data, the Comyan Media System also is creating all kinds of digital editions (ePaper, mobile editions) automatically for the newspaper, in addition to syndication to partners in various formats. So the publisher does not need a separate system for that.

WAN-IFRA: What is the future role of DAM for the news publishing industry?

Resele: We strongly believe that the role of the central backbone to all other systems is even more important in the future cross-media organisation. Also, the consolidation – acquisition of other newspapers/brands – will increase the demand for a central hub and integrating component in the publishing industry.

Publishers who are integrating another organisation usually cannot change all their production systems (newspapers, magazines,...). So the MAM becomes the system that is common to all of them.

WAN-IFRA: What are the strengths of the Comyan Media System?

Resele: Integration is probably Comyan's biggest strength. The system has already been integrated with over 14 other systems, and really at a very deep level, e.g. not only archiving the text of a newspaper article but also cut-out-article previews, links to the images and pages, and even links from a published version to the original agency image within the image system.

According to the users, it is extremely easy and intuitive to use – almost no training or no training is necessary, and a web-browser is everything users need to get started. Very much like "your own Google," a single mouse click brings up images, agency text, articles, pages, audio and video, as well as their relations.

Additionally, the system is very scalable – currently up to 1400 users or 17 million objects, across all media, and has proven installations with leading newspapers in five countries (e.g. Süddeutsche Zeitung, NZZ, Der Standard, Times of India, Gulf News).

WAN-IFRA: Once the contract has been signed, approximately how long does it take for a publishing client to begin working with the Comyan Media System?

Resele: This depends very much on the parts which are installed and also on the editorial/production systems with which it is integrated.

For an image system that has been integrated before with the editorial system, the installation time is two weeks.

For a complete integration (production and archiving) with a new editorial system, through Comyan's flexible integration layer, the integration effort (cost) is typically 2-4 man-weeks, and the total project time about 3-6 months.

WAN-IFRA: How much training is required for a publication's staff to start using the Comyan Media System?

Resele: Typically half a day only.

WAN-IFRA: What developments in this area are you working on now?

Resele: Extending our new "Universal Search" strategy to further integrate content that is stored in other systems, and make it available through several specialised search engines and data mining systems.

For further reading, Resele suggests Comyan's white paper "Eight good reasons for integration" available as a download from Comyan's website. Also available on the site are case studies under "Client success stories."

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Customer comments: Gulf News

The responses below are from Babuprakash Kalathil, Publishing Technical Services Delivery Manager, Al Nisr Publishing LLC, Dubai, United Arab Emirates, publishers of Gulf News.

WAN-IFRA: Is Comyan's digital asset management solution system fully operational at Gulf News, and if so, when did you begin using it?

Babuprakash Kalathil: We have been using Comyan for the past three years, and it is operational as an archive solution.

We were using the same as an image workflow solution too for two years for a particular publication until we implemented Prestige from Atex. We are still importing data to Comyan as a part of our archive project. (migrating assets from various systems like Quark QDMS, Televisual and other digital assets). Once this part is completed Comyan will serve the function as a centralised archive solution

WAN-IFRA: How did Gulf News decide in favour of Comyan for digital asset management?

Kalathil: We did a lot of research and communicated with lot of companies. We did site visits (NZZ, Switzerland) and found the system is very stable and end users are really happy with the performance.

WAN-IFRA: What are some of the benefits of using Comyan's solution?

Kalathil: These are the main benefits we have noticed:

• Purely windows and SQL based
• Very robust and never gives us any headaches
• Ability to accept any type of formats (TEXT / Images) as per customer requirements
• Queries are really fast
• User friendly.

WAN-IFRA: Approximately how many people at Gulf News work with the solution?

Kalathil: We have 95 user licenses.

Interviews conducted by Brian Veseling, senior editor for Publishing, Editorial and General Management and WAN-IFRA Magazine.