How the media pros know their audience?

This is a very tricky subject. Knowing one's audience can be simple or difficult depending on the medium of the text. For instance, if you publish a print-only news journal, the only way to understand your audience is through direct research, surveys or other wise. However, with the dawn of web-based media, it's become much easier to track an audience. Website hits, podcast downloads, e-mail, all enable producers to track their stats and viewer feedback. Other methods of success have seen great boom in user-generated content. Websites like youtube (user videos) or digg (user-submitted news) or StumbleUpon (user recommendations) allow both control of the media while allowing creative influence on behalf of the audience.

We with the expansive growth of the web, we are seeing less of a need for personal analysis are some are working towards a "web 3.0" in which all the content is personally tailored and catered to you based on your browsing history and other preferences. This has the potential to seriously violate certain privacies we enjoy. Although that's still conceptual and a long ways off from fruition.