Within your system, you'll be able to track stats of various pages and stories. You may be able to access an analytics program, which gives you a complete report on the site -- your unique and repeat visitors, how people find your site and the times of day that your site is the busiest.
That information will help you understand the power and reach of new media. You are now a step beyond reading a message board to see what people are saying. You're looking at graphs to see which stories they're clicking.
Use that knowledge to further tailor your content so that it reaches the largest audience possible. You'll find that you can quickly become the "web expert" at your company as you report to your bosses on how their audience really uses their site. You may even be surprised that people higher up in your company have no idea that you can provide these stats, which they can use at board meetings to chart the future of their business.
Talk about having a lot of power. Whether you choose to use these skills to make yourself a more valuable employee at your current job in traditional media or take this knowledge to launch a career in new media is up to you. Either way, you have ensured you have that something extra that will boost your chances of survival as the media landscape shifts, and takes out the stubborn dinosaurs who are stuck in a media environment that no longer exists.
