ChicagoNow: Coherent execution of coherent strategy

By now you've probably seen the spiffy video produced by the Chicago Tribune about its soon-to-be-launched blogging/aggregation site ChicagoNow.  They're dealing with the foray of Huffington Post and ESPN into their market, plus the drip drip of social networking sites like facebook eating into their core franchise.

It's only a matter of time before this happens here in Dallas too.

So give the Trib staff credit:  They dreamed this up in December and have clearly executed in a coordinated fashion across the entire company toward a defined goal.  They have taken the time to create the business plan, hone the editorial concept, build the technology, design the Web 2.0 interface, aggregate the voices and develop a marketing pitch.  So it's a good play, well executed, by the way it looks from the outside.

That's how news organizations need to act if they've got a prayer of survival.

Know any companies which could use a dose of that kind of business discipline?