Random Mumblings

Newspaper newsrooms need to adjust the metabolism

2010-08-31T11:40:05Z

The Knoxville News Sentinel ran Part 2 of the Scripps Howard News Service package on the "Future of News" today. The first installment ran Sunday. (Other E.W. Scripps newspapers ran the series or parts of the series earlier. Several, like the News Sentinel, also did local pieces to go along with it.

My contributions were Q&As with Dave Morgan and Elizabeth Spiers. I mentioned the Dave Morgan piece in a Sunday blog post. Here's one of the questions and answers from the piece with Spiers.

Q: How do traditional mainstream get digital products wrong?

A: (I gave a talk about this a couple of weeks ago, so from my notes:) They don't understand their audiences because they're not used to using data aggressively.

They view their sites as mere brand extensions and fail to treat them as stand-alone media properties.

They don't understand usability and make their sites pretty but impossible to navigate, and then naively think they'll educate their users to find their content.

They don't understand Web metabolism and produce content that's stale.

They think Web content is inherently inferior when it's merely different, and create inferior Web products as a result then wonder why they're not succeeding.

They fail to monetize their products properly, then underpay talent and wonder why they can't recruit good writers.

As someone inside a newspaper and who has worked on newspaper websites for over 15 years, much of what Spiers says resonates, particularly what she calls the "web metabolism."

Even with convenient phrases like "Web first" and "continuous news," newspapers remain all too often the final, but authoriative confirmation of the already known. That market position, the confirmer of the already known, is not likely to be a winning business model, no matter how trusted the source.

Some of that comes from just not thinking; some of it from a failure to embrace the new news environment; but often the answer from editors and reporters is they were just too busy focusing on getting out the print edition to think to get the news out on the newspaper.com website or even send a text alert. Blame it on staffing cutbacks if you want, but newspapers typically have the largest editorial staffs covering a local geographic market.

While a "platform agnostic newsroom" (another of those buzz phrases) sounds like a transformed newsroom, the rhythm of newsroom life is still predominantly based on the 24-hour cycle of print deadlines, stubborningly resisting efforts at change.

Print certainly demands the focus. It still generates the majority of the revenue for newspapers and my guess is that most U.S. newspapers still have a larger local market audience in print than digital (although the gap is rapidly shrinking). It is also clear that the future will be digital. The argument shifted from "if" to "when" some years ago for all but the most curmudgeonly of print stalwarts.

But can newsrooms change their metabolism?

(Photo provided by Elizabeth Spiers)

There's a future in news

2010-08-29T18:09:10Z

E.W. Scripps newspaper editors and online managers collaborated on a "Future of News" project this summer that ran in some newspapers last weekend and is on knoxnews.com today and Tuesday.

It was a challenge put forth by Chris Doyle, the company's new vice president for content. It was part self-education and part reporting project for the group as Doyle and top managers in his division chart a course for the future. Editor Jack McElroy provides the big picture.

For part of my contributions, I decided I wanted to tap into the thoughts of a couple of smart people outside my familiar ground of newspapers. I reached out to Dave Morgan and Elizabeth Spiers. Both answered a series a questions that we are using as Q&As in the Future of News package.

The Q&A with Morgan, founder and chairman of SimulMedia, went online and in print today. The Q&A with Spiers, a media launch consultant, entrepreneur, and writer, runs Tuesday.

One the quotes I particularly liked in Morgan's answers was his advice to journalism students:

You will have a great future if you recognize that there has never been a better time to practice great journalism; that great journalists are the eyes, ears and analysts for their audiences; that great journalists listen more than they talk and write; and that great journalists can now - more than ever before - get truly close to their audiences.

No longer is the media world one of a publishers-top editor-section editor-subeditor-journalist hierarchy. Today, audiences are in charge and they want direct access to, and interaction with, journalists.

I found Spiers' comments equally insightful, but I'll wait until Tuesday to comment on those.

Some of the reaction to the series on Twitter is that it is what you might expect from a bunch of newspaper editors.

I'm glad people are taking a few minutes to read it. Here's some of the conversation:

@jayrosen_nyu The latent purpose Scripps 's staff confab was as pep rally to reassure staff & readers company's derelict course is soundSun Aug 29 18:10:28 via TweetDeckVin Crosbie
vincrosbie

To sum up: Scripps has confab about future of news. Writes future of news series. Decides it will be future of news. Brilliant.Sun Aug 29 17:40:15 via webMark Glaser
mediatwit

@jayrosen_nyu Response to Scripps ' report: Mobile's not a "trend;" technology's not a "bias;" folks don't follow news -- it finds them.Sun Aug 29 17:37:50 via TweetDeckchris martin
ctonk144

@jayrosen_nyu RE: Scripps-Howard piece. [Jaw-creaking yawn.]Sun Aug 29 17:41:02 via Tweetie for MacSteve Mays
smaysdotcom

.@jacklail @jayrosen_nyu I just searched & Tom Rosenstiel isn't on Twitter. Why quote someone who doesn't know what he's talking about? 2/2Sun Aug 29 17:23:11 via webSteve Buttry
stevebuttry

@jacklail I admire the effort, but there's too much "woe is us, the center of the universe" and some dubious claims (piracy?) in that piece.Sun Aug 29 17:14:00 via webJay Rosen
jayrosen_nyu

(Photo provided by Dave Morgan)

This post has not been tape recorded

2010-08-27T20:30:41Z

Among the AP Stylebook changes announced Friday:

video recording Precise term for digital audio and visual recording. Digital has largely replaced videotaping.

videotape (n. and v.) Largely replaced by digital recording. The terms apply only if tape is used.

Train, train

2010-08-27T18:40:54Z

OK, Dolly Parton doesn't have anything to do with this, but we should "train, train."

Two training opportunities are coming up that might interest journalists in Tennessee (and elsewhere).

APME's NewsTrain rolls into Nashville, Sept. 23-24.

Some heavy hitters will be on hand:

* KEYNOTE SPEECH ON THURSDAY, SEPT. 23: TOM CURLEY, president and CEO of The Associated Press: "The Renewed Power of the Press"

* KEYNOTE SPEECH ON FRIDAY, SEPT. 24: JOHN SEIGENTHALER, founder of the First Amendment Center: "The First Amendment, a Cornerstone of Democracy"

See the full schedule for the workshop at the John Seigenthaler Center and register.

A bargain at just $50.

Also at the John Seigenthaler Center is a Multimedia Boot Camp for Journalism Professionals and Educators Nov. 17-21, 2010.

Put on by the Freedom Forum Diversity Institute, "the multimedia training is tailored for journalists but open to anyone with an interest in multimedia storytelling, regardless of the individual's background. For an additional charge, successful participants can earn 3 college credits. The courses are accredited by the Media Studies Department of Belmont University, which awards the credits."

Tuition is $850. Registration is open until Oct. 31 or until the class is full..

Learn more.

That vexing pay wall question

2010-08-26T13:06:23Z

A University of Kentucky gradudate student is doing an online survey on whether readers would pay to access newspaper content. Help him out by taking the survey.

While Tim O'Brien was in Knoxville

2010-08-25T20:18:41Z

Knoxnews' Talid Magdy recorded one of my favorite musicians, Tim O' Brien, at a recent WDVX Blue Plate show. O'Brien has a new CD out, Chicken and Egg. This video is of him doing "Suzanna," which is on the CD.

O'Brien, who first came to my attention as a member of the Colorado-based band Hot Rize has long been one of my favs -- and for good reason!

Magdy posted a couple of other videos of O'Brien as well:

Workin'
River Ridin'

Hear a distrusted media source discuss the distrusted media

2010-08-22T15:34:13Z

I'll be on George Korda's "State Your Case" radio show form 1-3 (eastern) today. The show is on Newstalk 98.7 FM and is streamed on the web.

From, 1-2, I'll be talking about near-record-low confidence in newspapers and television news. A recent Gallop organization poll found that those with "a great deal: or "quite a lot" of confidence in newspapers remains at a low level and the percentage dropped to a 20-year low for television news. Some solace, however, was that both rate higher than Congress. Maybe we need to distribute these with each copy?

From 2 to 3 p.m., I'm hanging around as friend and newspaper consultant Kevin Slimp talks about his recent customer experiences with Delta Air Lines. A frequent traveler to speaking engagements and workshops around the country, his summer of flying has been more about sitting in airports than flying. He started sharing his experiences on his Facebook page; and received support and war stories from many other weary airline passengers.

Should be fun. The show is on the same station, but it has a new home at 98.7. It's also streamed on the Internet.

A distrusted news source

2010-08-15T03:23:29Z

With nearly all news organizations struggling to keep up with the up-to-the-minute news cycle and to remain profitable in the process, Americans' low trust in newspapers and television news presents a critical barrier to success. The Pew report asserts that 80% of new media links are to legacy newspapers and broadcast networks, making clear that traditional news sources remain the backbone of the media. But so long as roughly three in four Americans remain distrustful, it will be difficult to attract the large and loyal audiences necessary to boost revenues.

-- Gallop

This is the time of the year that newspapers executives around the country gather in off-site meetings to do strategic planning, often utilizing SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis. If you go to these things with any regularity, you will hear that one of the strengths of the news organization is that it is a "trusted news source." But these Gallop numbers say that hasn't been true for years for media in general.

Perception of political media bias doesn't appear to be a big factor in the low-level in the last couple of years, since that's remained much the same since 2003, according to Gallop.

Just another highway sign the media has to be refashioned.

(via Instapundit)

These young journalists will have them dancin' in the streets

2010-08-14T22:46:23Z

Linda Nguyen, who graduates from the University of Tennessee at the end of the fall semester, and April Alexander, who will graduate from Hampton University in the spring, were a great pair of interns with our online editorial group this summer.

.

I wish them well and I expect them to have great success.

A brand of journalist

2010-07-29T12:19:37Z

Below are a few links I pulled together for a pizza lunch (and I wonder why so many accepted the calendar invite) at the News Sentinel today on "Brand Me" for journalists.

Personal branding and the use of Social Media networks can be a controversial topic for journalists, after all more than one has been fired (euphemistically forced to resign) over something they said on Twitter or Facebook or in a blog.

Also, many journalists are uncomfortable about promoting themselves or their work even in the information overload world we live. The early adopters in our newsroom have had few concerns or issues about getting involved in Social Media buzz, but as more journalists are being encouraged to get involved, concerns or frets have surfaced that often don't have easy answers.

it is clear many journalists, however, are using Social Media, the Internet, and all the digital media at their disposal to draw readers/viewers/audience to themselves, to enhance their credibility and reporting authority, and to find stories, even scoops.

News via social networks and having an identity on social networks is becoming a "must have" within news organizations. Just this week, Facebook published "Facebook + Media" to promote best practices for journalists, developers and media partners.

Where do you weigh in on "Brand Me" for journalists? Are there additional links I should have included below?

YouTube video - 7 Steps To Building Your Online Identity

Using social media for better journalism: @Sreenet at #ONADC « digiphile

Headlines and Deadlines: Some conflicting thoughts on Facebook

Facebook | Facebook + Media

SmartBlog On Social Media » Social media tips for journalists

Sree Sreenivasan - @sreenet, @SREENET'S SOCIAL MEDIA GUIDE - a work in progress

12 Tips for Journalists: My Semester on the Personal Branding Beat at Brand Me a Journalist

View your profile

It is NOT personal branding - it's Just living your life online. « DigiDave

Building your career brand as a journalist | JobsPage

Teaching Online Journalism » Journalists must build a personal brand: 10 tips

As journalists, are we our own brands? | Medill | Washington

Colonel Tribune: Chicago's Unlikely Social Media Pioneer

Boned! - Age columnist sacked over Twitter comments - Digital Media

Octavia Nasr Resigns from CNN Following Controversial Tweet

What the Tennessee candidates for governor are saying on Twitter

2010-07-28T09:40:33Z

Giving a Publitweet a spin. Do you like this widget?

Just how did Benton's Bacon become a craze?

2010-07-25T13:57:01Z

Benton's Bacon has gone totally viral in the last couple of years.

Benton's Smoky Mountain Country Hams, the Madisonville, Tenn., maker of hams and bacon has become something of a food legend in the Internet age. At a recent checkup, my doctor recommended trying Benton's Bacon (he was not extolling its healthful benefits, but, hey, compared to most cereal ...) and then the bag boy at Butler and Bailey commented on how much he liked as he was bagging it at the checkout counter.

How did the albeit excellent products of the company, started by a dairy farmer in 1947 in rural East Tennessee, because a connoisseur item for serious foodies (and others) in places like New York City? Dunno. Good products and a lot of media sizzle is my best guess.

In the Knoxville News Sentinel's electronic archives (which date back to September 1990), the earliest mention I could find of the company and its now legendary hams and bacon is a 1995 feature by reporter Morgan Simmons.

Today, it's often mentioned when serious foodies turn to talking country hams and bacon.

It was news, but was it working?

2010-07-23T10:42:31Z

Long-time Knoxville radio news broadcaster Dave Foulk has built up 4,229 friends on his Facebook page. Maybe Foulk personally knows over 4,000 people and counts them as friends; I kind of doubt it. They were there for another reason.

They had grown accustomed to his frequent, short police-scanner type posts throughout the day.

Stalled car- Chapman Highway- southbound at Stone Road

Wreck: Maynardville Highway at Brown Gap Road

Delta airliner blew a tire taking off from Atlanta for Portland blew a tire. Circled Alabama, then landed safely back at ATL

Traffic signals not working at Emory at I-75

All that ended Thursday when Foulk posted a Facebook post that said:

That generated 57 comments (at least by early this morning); most of them were sad, many of them thanked him for the service he had provided, several were mad at the radio station he works for.

I'm not privy to all (or any of) the factors the radio station's management or Foulk considered, but discussions about the role of Social Media within news organizations and how it fits into newsgathering is a hot topic. How Social Meida fits into the organization's image and how it figures into the company's bottom line efforts are questions being discussed by news executives and publishers and general managers and station managers nearly everywhere.

If I had the answers, I'd be a Social Media consultant, or failing at that, a mere media mogul. Lacking answers, I do have some observations.

While Foulk's posts to Facebook weren't generating ad revenue for the station or even page views for its website, he had built an enviable following (over 4,200 friends) that 1) realized he is a radio news guy posting news to Facebook, 2) that accepted him as a "trusted source" and 3) valued his posts as a timely service.
From my outsider observer's view, his posts weren't detracting from his ability to do news on the radio.
If you read the comments, he was providing a news service where the audience wanted to read it.

This last point cannot be overlooked as much as news organizations would like people to go our website or channel or newspaper. The audience now wants news to come to them. Or as a college student told a market researcher: "If the news is that important, it will find me."

Ubiquity of the media organization's brand is a smarter strategy than a "play in my sandbox" approach. If you don't have audience as a media company, you have nothing in any media supported by advertising. But where's the money? Hopefully, that ubiquity will draw users to your station or channel or newspaper or website where you do have advertising environments.

Where does the individual's brand begin and the employer's brand begin? Unfortunately there's no bright yellow line because the person is the human face of the faceless company. How that is managed is an evolving exploration for both the people and the companies they work for with various strategies and policies being tried, modiied, abandoned and implemented.

I think Foulk, accidentially or intuitively, had hit upon an extremely powerful way to build the credibility of himself and by extension his station as a source of real time news with his Facebok page. As a competitor, I wish his company well with their new approach. If you liked his Facebook page, you might like this one.

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Oh, no, not again Delta

2010-07-21T15:19:19Z

Image of Kevin Slimp

Knoxville-based newspaper consultant Kevin Slimp's luck with Delta Air Lines continues to be a muddled mess of delays and cancellations.

A column Slimp wrote on a June trip to and from hell and the resulting customer service torture appeared on KnoxvilleBiz.com on Sunday (we also wrote about it earlier).

And so just yesterday on a flight from Knoxville to Bismarck, N.D. his Delta flight began to go horribly wrong in Memphis.

He posted a Facebook update yesterday:

OK. I'm flying on ... you guessed it .. Delta today. Decided not to go through Atlanta. You just can't get from Knoxville to Atlanta. So I took the Memphis route. Mistake. Big Mistake. I hope to see you good folks in Bismarck tomorrow. This might require another rental car before it's over. Stay tuned ...

Later in the evening, he said:

Latest Latest Update: My latest flight has been delayed from Memphis to Minneapolis. Yes, it's been 6 lovely hours here. Unless my flight from Minneapolis to Bismarck leaves late, chances are I will be ... yes, driving 8 hours in a rental car (from Midnight till 8) to be at my gig at 8 a.m. in Bismarck. Anybody got a s...pare tire? If anyone from Delta is reading this, go ahead and start writing the check.

Below is a post after he finally made it to Bismarck, six hours late.

Innovation winners

2010-07-19T23:52:50Z

Congrats to the Knight-Batten Innovation Award winners! All 30 ideas look exceptional.