With all of the hand wringing over the Seattle Post Intelligencer and
Rocky Mountain News going down for the count, and broadcast news
operations taking hits across the country, nearly every journalist in
the United States silently is asking him or her self "what is becoming
of my profession?" Based on the current stats in the Pew Center for Excellence in Journalism's 2009 "State of The News Media" annual report
issued online, the future is the Internet, and we should just get used
to it. The reality is that the only sharply growing share of
audience/reader/listener/viewer attention, besides subscription cable
television, to show significant promise is the Internet audience. What
the Pew study reveals is that this could be both a boon and a bust for
different kinds of journalistic endeavors, depending on the commitment
of the journalist to get their story out there in a ubiquitous
fashion. Whether the journalist will get paid for doing their work,
and whom will pay for that work, still are open questions.
Digging
deeper into the issue is harder when you consider that business models
in both media and entertainment ventures seem to be upended every
week. Newspapers, terrestrial radio stations, and television news
operations all seem to be scaling back in their overall coverage, even
as the numbers of online consumers for news content seem to grow. Just
in the past two weeks alone papers like the Rocky Mountain News, the
Seattle Post Intelligencer, San Francisco Chronicle, and even the
once-mighty Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune, with their fingers
in seemingly every area of media, this year are falling victim to the
economic realities of the day. Meanwhile, new media models that once
were heralded as the "future" are being upended due to the
"de-coupling" of advertising from much of what we used to consider to
be "the business of news."
The New York Times has seen a massive
surge in its online readership, yet the print version of the Gray Lady
has been providing most of the operating revenue. Estimates of most
studies reveal that likely only 10% of NYT's operating budget comes
from NYTimes.com's advertising stream, despite the reality that
NYTimes.com has surged in the number of "consumers" it serves through
its main site, its sub-sites, its RSS feeds, and its affiliate
distribution platforms, including mobile.
When it comes to
broadcast, since the beginning of the year, operators across the
country, including the nation's largest radio company; Clear Channel
Communications, have seen massive bloodletting. On the flip side,
though, CBS has seen an uptick in its content distribution and related
ad revenue, a reality that has analysts pouring over its properties
asking "what are they doing (at least partially) right?" CBS Radio's
integration of its radio content with Last.fm is seen as a major reason
that part of the Tiffany Network's business is doing better than other
areas. Meanwhile there continues to be massive inequity between
"conservative" and "progressive" political talk radio, widely seen as
dominated by corporately-owned, tightly-controlled and protected, large
media conglomerates.
Then, of course, comes the
800-pound-gorilla of online growth in news. The Huffington Post, once
seen as just a "liberal online blog site" has grown to carry mainstream
news content, and indeed seems to continue growing, in some cases
scooping "old line" news organizations. HuffPo, has engaged a
part-pay-part-no-pay model for its content, with only a small share of
its journalists actually being paid to write for the site. More
likely, citizen journalists submit content to the site, and paid
editorial staff sift through it to create the news mix; along with a
significant share of re-posted content from content partners across the
web. As much as a "farm" for news and opinion, The Huffington Post's
own model is one of the reasons many journalists fear the future of
news, as they can't imagine not being paid to report or comment. Many
of these same "old-line" journalists have seen "citizen journalists"
eating their lunch so to speak, getting scoops, and even seats at White
House press conferences these days. (FULL DISCLOSURE: Scott Foval is a contributor to The Huffington Post.)
In Chicago just two weeks
ago, 400 journalists gathered for a "Town Hall" event where the best
and brightest gathered in one room to discuss the future of
journalistic endeavors. Included in the crowd were representatives
from GapersBlock.com, ChiTownDailyNews.org, and ChicagoPublicRadio.org,
each serving as growing "models" for what the future of Journalism may
be. An important distinction these models represent are in the way
they have embraced the online distribution paradigm while producing
quality content. Each has a little different spin on how they operate,
whom they pay, and how they are modeled from a business perspective;
but each seems to be growing in a market (Chicago) that has seen an
incredible number of newsroom positions either eliminated altogether or
newsrooms "reorganized" in order to adapt to the changes in the habits
of news-gobbling customers.
In the case of Chicago Public Radio,
their website hosts a massive amount of content, much of which also
airs on WBEZ-FM radio, its flagship station. The difference, of
course, is the depth and breadth of additional content that
ChicagoPublicRadio.org serves up 24x7, including the full audio to the
aforementioned Town Hall. That kind of full online coverage has yet to
be embraced by commercial stations, and that is mainly because the
commercial stations haven't found a way to make money off such content.
The
days of the ad-supported model are indeed in question, but it would
seem that the pay-for-content and public-donation models may have
better future possibilities than were originally envisioned even 10
years ago. After all, it seems like only yesterday that
community-supported media were falling on hard times, and donors were
not yet seeing the value in supporting such endeavors. Indeed, in an
analysis piece on the News Hour on PBS Monday evening, the CEO of the
Knight Foundation noted ChiTownDailyNews.org as one of the key news
outlets it considers to be "one to watch" amongst the throngs rising
even in this global economic downturn. Not to be left out, aggregation
sites like WindyCitizen.com also are in on the act, literally helping
independent content producers through an agnostic and democratic "vote"
for content you like method for promoting and publicizing quality
stories.
An amalgam of the community news media model may be the
future of the journalism profession. Instead of separate sites that
feature print, video, audio, live or pre-produced programming, you may
have a set of "universal" partnerships between sites that allow for
cross-platform journalism production and content distribution to occur,
with the true ethical independence available to the journalists
producing it that in the past were only provided by "strong
ownership." This strength-and-variety-in-numbers approach, literally
empowering hundreds of independent producers and reporters, editors and
ombudsmen, could be a way for the profession to take hold of its own
best qualities and produce something that hasn't existed in the news
business. A truly ubiquitous news source that never stops, always is
aware, always is watching, and is always evolving its sources and
stories is a real possibility.
Much of the evolution of the
profession, though, indeed depends upon the willingness of working
reporters themselves to let go of the old mental constructs of what it
means to be a Journalist. Rather than being a "radio guy" or
"newspaper gal" we are going to have to embrace all forms of
technology, distribution, and even medium in order to communicate the
news in an effective manner. The most widely-accepted and visible
single individual in Chicago that embodies this future may actually be
one of its first real converts to the evolving journalist ideal. Her
name is Carol Marin. Rather than being a one-trick-pony, Marin seems
to be everywhere at once. She's at the Sun-Times, on NBC 5, online at
one of those properties' websites, and then later on WTTW's Chicago
Tonight, where she is a frequent host. She's visible both at press
conferences, in newsrooms, and in classrooms across the city. There
seems to be no medium to which she cannot adapt, always performing her
core duty to ask the tough questions and hold accountable the difficult
news makers. She almost always does so in a manner that reminds you of
your hard-driving college professor--the one you most respected because
she made you work harder and pushed you further than you thought you
could go.
The combination of the evolving platforms and the
evolving persons using them seem to be the keys to unlocking what the
future of the profession will be. Reading through the Pew report (and
I encourage you to do so), the clear message that comes through is that
we're on the cusp of what will definitely be a make-it-or-break-it
moment for the profession. In embracing this future, we as journalists
and readers and consumers of quality content must also be willing to
put our money where our preferences are, in order to support the
experimental models that are emerging. They won't all succeed, but
only by voting with our wallets and eyes, ears, and time will we be
able to collectively keep important stories and quality reporting, i.e.
the Fourth Estate, from withering on the vine.
In Chicago we
must remember that now so many other towns are struggling, the Chicago
journalism "community" must step up and prove once again that we have
the best and brightest reporting, producing, editorial, and ethical
talent in the world. Literally, as the 400 or so journalists that
packed the Town Hall are no doubt keenly aware, our "guts" are going to
lead us in the right direction. We seem to have the right direction
already firmly in our grasp, but we're going to have to pull up our
boot straps and lead by doing what we always do...Just Do It. After
all, this is Chicago we're talking about. We've always produced, we've
always led, and we've always proven in the end that we do it the right
way here.
