A content-provision alliance, where a newspaper or TV station agrees to provide content to the other, or both agree to swap content. A formal business relationship, where a newspaper and another media partner, typically a TV station or radio group, form a separate company to build a regional Web site with its own brand and identity. Not all alliances have anything to do with interactive media, of course, but in many cases, Web sites are the impetus for something that probably should have been done anyway. Sounds simplistic, and it is. But it's also the underlying process for negotiating some of the most difficult alliances imaginable.
Details can come later.
Be prepared to give. Too many newspapers, when developing an alliance, are very prepared to take promotion, content, services, and whatever else, but they are unprepared to give anything. That's a recipe for a disaster in an alliance. Make sure the alliance is at least an equal sharing of material and services. Ever better, feel like you're contributing 55 percent, and they're giving 45 percent.