News publishers shouldn't just 'set and forget' their websites' automated tasks

Do you know what your bots are doing?

Many news websites have set up automated scripts and agents to handle a variety of tasks on their sites – from story migration to registration confirmations to page customization.

But how often do you check on your automated processes? Or do you take the Ron Popeil approach to Web publishing: “Set it and forget it”?

This week, when news of the Casey Anthony verdict broke, I just happened to be checking Yahoo! News’ mobile site. Here’s what I found:

First, a point to Yahoo! for not leading with the Anthony case, the latest media circus designed to channel public anger toward an insignificant person and away from anyone with actual power to abuse. But I take away that point and dock Yahoo! News an extra one for leading with a PRWeb press release instead.

That leads me to wonder if Yahoo! News has turned over its mobile site to an automated process that no human being is reviewing. Because I can’t imagine that any competent news producer would choose to lead what should be a major news site with a press release. Nor can I understand why a major news site would completely ignore such a popular story, as regrettable as it might be. The Anthony story didn’t show up on the Yahoo! News mobile site until it topped the “Most Popular” section about an hour later. Never did make “Top Stories” that I saw that afternoon.

Yahoo! News has been having other problems with its mobile site, too. I tweeted on June 25 that the site’s footer still read “© 2010.” A few days later, Yahoo! News debuted its new mobile design (with an updated copyright notice), and that’s when the PRWeb and other inconsequential stories began invading the front page.

Dead links began appearing behind stories, too, such as this one I got when I clicked one of the site’s designated “Top Stories”:

This is not an isolated incident. Every time I used the Yahoo! News mobile site after the new design debuted until I gave up on the site yesterday, I found at least one broken link off the mobile front page. Is anyone at Yahoo! actually using the company’s mobile site? It appears not.

Not that other news publications aren’t having problems with their mobile versions. Here’s USA Today’s front page, from the same day and hour:

The photo’s so large that it pushes the news off the front page. (Though USA Today does keep the ad up prominently, though.) You have to scroll down to get to any usable news:

I understand that frugal news managers are turning to automation to develop more and more complex services for readers and customers while keeping labor costs manageable. But automation never excuses a publisher from maintaining human control over the publication. You can’t ever “set it and forget it” in the publishing industry. All news publications should assign an actual human employee to review automated processes on a regular schedule, and give those people the power to order immediate changes when something breaks.

So assign someone to look at those mobile sites every day. (And not via a computer – they should look at them using mobile devices.) Look at the pages that your scripts are generating. Don’t rely on readers to tell you when something’s wrong. When I worked at Disney, we were told during our company training that 99 people would experience something wrong before one would complain. That’s 99 potentially lost audience members or customers before the complaint hits someone’s in-box.

Why take that risk? Use your own product. “Eat your own dog food,” as the developer cliche says.

Trying to run your website on the cheap by creating automated tasks that no one ever checks simply makes your website… look cheap.