Message from Michael -- FCC Media Report - Part Two - June 22, 2011

 

Okay, help me pick a lead for my story on the Federal Communications Commission report on the news media.  Here are the choices:

 1.  A report on the news media by the Federal Communications Commission finds that there is a shortage of local, professional accountability reporting.

 2.  The Federal Communications Commission report on the news media is like the story of two men whose plane crash lands in the desert.  While one works on the plane, the other scouts the area, returning several hours later with good news and bad news.  The bad news – the only thing to eat is camel dung.  The good news – there's lots of it.  Well, the current media landscape is sort of like that desert, according to the report.

 3.  Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. The Biblical admonition could easily be the motto for journalism organizations, except for one problem.  As the recently released Federal Communications Commission report on the media notes, while information may want to be free, labor wants to be paid.  And that is the challenge facing news groups.

 4.  Despite all the financial problems facing the media, people are actually paying more for media and information now than ever before.  But the money is not going to the ones who create the content.  Instead it is going to those who distribute it.  And that, according to a Federal Communications Commission report, is a problem.

 5.  A wide-ranging series of recommendations by a special Federal Communications Commission group, designed to help improve news media, have been described as disappointing by so-called liberals and conservatives alike.     

Okay, here are my thoughts:

Lead #1. It is probably the main point the study authors want to make, but it's a line straight out of the report.  And that's not reporting.  What few news organizations that covered the report have used the same line, so it's old.  Anyway, I wouldn't let my journalism students use it, or at least not without very clear attribution, so why would I?

As I say, it is the main point that the authors want to make.  Much further down in the report, they make the point much more strongly, saying, "To be clear the shortage is not in news or information but a very specific kind of journalism: labor-intensive reporting on civically important topics."  It's what you sometimes hear referred to as Big J Journalism. 

To back that up, here are some factoids from the report: Membership in the Investigative Reporters and Editors' association has dropped a fourth, from 5,391 in 2003 to 4,000 in 2010.  And submissions to the Pulitzer Prize investigative awards has dropped by nearly a half (43%) in that time. A study by the Annenberg School of Communication, cited in the report, says that only a little more than one minute of the average 30 minute newscast in LA was devoted to education, health or government.  The same study found local government was the lead on local LA newscasts only 2.5% of the time and the state's budget crisis was the lead only once in a hundred newscasts. Another 'old fact' from previous Messages, but also still worth noting is that one out of six people (17%) have gone 'newsless', meaning they didn't use any news media the before before.  The percentage is almost double (31%) that in the 18 – 24 demographic.  The Independent News Network produces newscasts out of Iowa that are used for 'local' newscasts in a dozen markets around the country.        

Lead #2.  Good start.  Different.  Kind of folksy, but maybe trying a little too hard to be clever.  As I tell my students, clever is hard to pull off.  Jon Stewart might get away with it, but not many of us can.

The report makes the point that there is a polarization in news viewing with people watching what news programs that corresponds to their views, raising the question --   Does that make it harder for "less-opinionated news" to reach the scale to become a successful business model.  The report also makes the point that there is a 'power shift' in news coverage from the media to government because, it says, the demands on journalists are such that many news releases and statements from governmental agencies are getting on air or on line or in print unedited, un-reviewed, 'as is.' 

The report notes that the ratio of public relations professionals to reporters is four to one; compared to a one to one ratio 30 years ago.  Then there are the national efforts to develop hyperlocal websites.  Examiner.com, for example, has operations in 233 cities "employing" – yes, that word is deliberately in quotes – 67,000 'examiners.'  AOL's Patch has started news websites in 800 communities with a paid editor-reporter in each site.  The report – rightfully or wrongfully – gives short shrift to these efforts saying, they "add tremendously to the media ecosystem, but they also leave many crucial gaps unfilled."

Oddly (to me at least), the report had nothing about "content farms" which generate so-called content in the guise of news and information but aimed purely at driving search engine results.  The report authors do acknowledge the issue obliquely, noting that advertisers are finding ways to reach consumers directly without using content creation sites.  The report also says little about the growing practice of deciding what stories to cover, based on their click rates or popularity.  It does make a big point about so-called "pay for play" in which video news releases are used in news stories – a practice that is questionable, but what is also questionable is just how widespread it is.  

 As a counter to this, the report cites a study by James Hamilton of Duke University who contends that a web user in the U.S. today has more 'raw data' on foreign cities available to him or her now than a network news producer had ten years ago.

#3.  Another effort that may be too 'cutesy.'    We used to call this a 'drop lead.'  It has the advantage of not being the obvious, over-used lead, and it is 'different' although different in what may be an off putting way. It does though hit one of the key points made by the lengthy report in a kind of pithy way, although it should be noted that shareholders also want to get paid.

The study says it would take between $265 Million and $1.6 Billion to "bridge the gaps we now see in the provision of civically important information."   If you're like me, you probably just went… wwwhhhhaaattt???? Okay, here's how they calculated it…. At the height of local journalism in the 1990's, about 20% of reporters were on beats – so-called accountability reporting, as they call it.  Based on current staffing, coming from Burrelle's Media Director, news media would need 5,000 reporters at $265 Million.  Yes, if you do the math, that's about $53,000 per person.  Or if you want to go whole hog and get 30,000 reporter positions, that would be $1.6 Billion.

#4.  Like this one.  It is more of a straight lead.  Gets right to the point.  What I would normally tell my students to do – when in doubt, play it straight.  But actually it's intriguing and interesting as well.  And it is probably the standout factoid in the report, in my view.

Personally I found this factoid incredibly interesting -- From 2003 to 2008 the average annual spending per person on media and information rose from approximately $740 to $882, an increase of 19%.  The average for consumer spending was 9.8%. But the report says most of the increases went to Cable and Inernet Service providers.

The report notes that cable providers are supposed to provide 15% of their channel capacity to independent programming.  In reality it's less than one percent and in one of the few strong statements in the recommendations, the authors say this so called lease capacity is 'grossly ineffective.'  Similarly, satellite providers are supposed to allot 4% of their capacity to PEG (Public, Education, Government) programming but complain they can't because of carriage capacity challenges.  Oddly the report makes a strong recommendation about the FCC looking at the 'leased access' rule for cable providers but waffles about the set aside rule for satellite providers.  I will resist the temptation to say anything about the dozens of paid programming and shopping channels on satellite.

#5.  Probably too much of a reaction lead, and not the report itself, although the argument could be made that the media's coverage is the point of the report.  It also would provide a segue into the recommendations themselves, which have been the focus of coverage.

The report does make some clear recommendations – for example, recommending terminating the localism initiative because it says it contains "unworkable or burdensome rules" and recommending against reinstituting the Fairness Doctrine.  But in an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review, primary author Steve Waldman admitted the main complaint was the recommendations were too "restrained."  Here's an example of their 'restraint.' Talking about the question of cross-ownership, the report authors say they could see how tv newspaper mergers could help localism but also could see how it would just help the bottomline and not local news.  Then they add, "we are not persuaded that relaxing the ownership rules would inevitably lead to more local news, information or reporting or that it would inevitably lead to less."  Okay, commentary on my part, but it says NOTHING.

Also, in the line of commentary, the authors hardly ever say "do" in the recommendations.  Instead they say "consider" as in the commission should consider this, or 'policymakers' should consider that.  In fact, the words consider or consideration appear 41 times in the report.  Their other favorite word is "hope," as in the authors "hope" foundations will spend more money on media; they "hope" that support will be non-partisan and non-ideological.  Makes you want to introduce them to Jedi warrior/philosopher Yoda whose famous quote is, "There is no 'try.'  There is only 'do.'" Except in the FCC report.

Probably worth noting at this juncture is a factoid from the report that only one-tenth of one percent of total foundation spending goes to support media efforts.  But, gee, "if" foundations were to spend 5% and "if" philanthropists were to donate 5% and "if" 1% of Americans charitable giving went to non-profit media groups…. Well, that would be a lot of money and wouldn't that be nice.

Much of the report focuses on partnerships – between for-profit and non-profits, commercial and public, professional journalists and citizen journalists, ending on the note, "if the strengths of the new and old media economies can be combined, Americans will have the best local media system they have ever had."  And, no, that didn't figure into any of my leads, although, I think, for obvious reasons.  But then again maybe it should have.  The fact is the report – despite my caveats – is very comprehensive, and there are any number of potential leads in it.  So, yeah, if you have a better lead idea, let me know, because the next big question is – will anything come of the report or will it sit on a shelf collecting dust.

 

Message from Michael -- FCC Report on Media - June 14, 2011

Message From Michael                              

                                                                                                            June 14, 2011

 

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT VERSUS THE MEDIA ON THE MEDIA

 

 

The Federal Communications Commission has just released a lengthy report on the state of journalism, but if you want to understand the state of journalism, take a look at how the report itself was covered.  Or not covered.  An informal survey of news websites (by yours truly) found many media outlets had nothing on it.  Or at least nothing I could find.  And the ones that did have something, mainly relied on the Associated Press' Technology Writer Joelle Tessler.  Even in those news operations that didn't use her actual story, you could still see the main theme of her story running throughout their story.

 

That may be explained, in part, because of the report itself.  For starters it's 475 pages long.  For another thing, you remember that news cliché – the key word in NEWS is 'new.' Well… here's how some of the other reporters say it.  Reporters Jeremy W. Peters and Brian Stelter of the New York Times say while some things in the report were "alarming," many of the report's findings were "often self evident"… Rem Reider, Editor and senior vice president of American Journalism Review says it was "packed with useful if not staggeringly surprising information"… Megan Garber of Nieman Labs says that while the report is "perhaps the most substantial and comprehensive look at the state of the news media that's been so far produced… much of it is a summary of what we already know."  It's worth noting here that much of the report relied on the Pew Center's annual State of the News Media report, which has been covered in previous Messages.

 

The main theme – as pronounced by Tessler and re-pronounced by other media outlets – is that there is a lack of so-called "accountability reporting" – in-depth, local journalism needed to hold government agencies, schools and businesses accountable. "Professional reporting."  Yes, there are many, many more news sources, or news platforms, or news delivery systems, but there isn't any more real reporting.  The report doesn't say this, but it's implied – it's regurgitated news.  Sort of like the report itself.  A concurrent problem that arises out of this, and the more critical one in my view, is that the 'spin-meisters' in government and business are setting the news agenda because, in the rush to feed the news hole, their news releases and statements are being published and broadcast almost intact, with very limited editorial review.

 

Those media outlets that just re-posted the AP story include the Huffington Post which prides itself on its political and media coverage.  But not on this story.  The Washington Post which apparently couldn't afford to send its own reporter a few blocks down the road to cover a national story in its own backyard.  ABC News and NBC News/ MSNBC also used the AP story.  Fox News had its own report by Shannon Bream on the study focusing on the recommendation that the FCC repeal the Fairness Doctrine.  But several major news organization websites didn't have anything, or at least anything I could find.  It may be a fault of my online search abilities, but I could find no mention on CBS News' website, USA Today, or for that matter, The St. Petersburg Times or the Atlanta Journal Constitution.  The Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune had pieces written by their columnists.  And both were good.  The LA Times Joe Flint focused on the part of the report that talked about the newspapers investigation of Bell, California, town officials who padded their payrolls.  The Trib's Phil Rosenthal had a cute line, talking about how a huge report like this used to land on your desk with a "thud" but now it's a "digital belch."  Both columnists used Tessler's "shortage of local, professional, accountability reporting" point.

 

The report's primary author is Steve Waldman, former national editor for U.S. News and World report as well as a Wall Street Journal Columnist and co-founder of Beliefnet.com.  That last part may explain the several mentions in the report of the role of religious broadcasters in the media market.  It should be noted though that the National Religious Broadcasters' association says that 40% of their product is news and information.  The religious broadcasters association probably also have the best quote in defining the role of the federal government, saying its job is just to "fertilize the conditions under which the media works."  The report titled Information Needs of Communities also contains a disclaimer about a governmental agency looking at journalism because, "the media, after all, should be examining the government – and not vice versa."  

As Nieman's Garber and AJR's Reider note, the report is packed with some interesting factoids, and you know how I love factoids.  Here are just a few:  Quoting former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, the report says humans now create as much information in just two days as we did since the first appearance of home sapiens did through 2003.  Facebook didn't even exist in 2003, but now it reaches more people than all the other major media outlets combined.  And here's one of the more unusual factoids.  Noting that Reuters originally started its service using carrier pigeons, the report says a pigeon today could carry a 256-gigabyte flash disc which is the equivalent of eight million times the amount of information one of the original pigeons could carry.  The report gives a 'shout-out' to Time Warner and Cablevision for their regional cable news operations while at the same time noting that only 25% to 30% of TV homes have access to such operations.  The federal government spends roughly $1 Billion on advertising everything from military recruitment to public health messages – money which the report authors recommend should be directed to local media. 

Newspaper ad revenue dropped by half (48%) from 2005 to 2010.  In 1920, nine out of ten newspapers were independent; eighty years later, only one in four newspapers is independent.  Just about as many people subscribe to newspapers now as did in 1945… But, the population in the meantime has more than tripled.  Online ad revenue at newspapers has risen a Billion dollars in five years, from 2005 to 2010… But, losses in print advertising have risen to $24.6 Billion.  That is why the report says each 'print dollar' is replaced by four digital pennies.  More than 47 Million people visit Craigslist every month in the U.S.  Aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes links to more than 200,000 movie reviews. 

The transformative event which changed radio from a one-to-one to a one-to-many service was the boxing match between Jack Dempsey and Frenchman George Carpentier which was transmitted to town halls in 61 cities using a 600 foot antenna strung between a clock tower and an office building.  While newspapers saw their ad revenue drop by nearly half (from $800 Million to $450 Million) during the Great Depression, radio saw its ad revenue double, from $40 Million to $80 Million.  In 1933 newspaper and radio owners reached an agreement called the Biltmore Agreement in which radio agreed not to do news gathering, to air only five minutes of news at a time and not to air morning news only after 9:30 am., and evening news only after 9 p.m. so as not to impact the newspapers.  The agreement only lasted a few years.  There are 185 self-defined all-news public radio stations.  The number of news/ talk public radio stations has risen to 681 from 595 from 2005 to 2009.  Only 15% of public radio stations have more than three reporters.  A quarter (23%) of Americans have downloaded a podcast, but only four percent have downloaded a 'news' podcast.  In November, 2010, there were 1,110 news podcasts, compared to 2,991 business podcasts, 10,524 music podcasts and 48,984 general podcasts.

The U.S. began licensing "experimental" television stations in 1937.  No advertising was allowed during that time.  After WWII, the FCC was hit with 158 new applications for licenses, many from newspaper and radio groups trying to stave off the competition.  Using data from the National Association of Broadcasters, the report says the average local TV station cash flow is 23%.  And you know that experiment by the Houston station to introduce anchor-less news, that was tried in the mid 1950's by another Texas station, WBAP.         

So, at this point, the smart readers are saying, 'hey, Michael, you're as guilty as those media groups you criticize, for not saying anything about the report recommendations."  Got me.  Well, not really.  That's going to be in part two of this report… coming soon to a newsletter and website near you.

 

Message from Michael -- The Digital Future -- June 8, 2011

Message From Michael                              

                                                                                                            June 8, 2011

 

§  A LOOK AT THE DIGITAL FUTURE

 

 

§  Trust Me, I'm From the Government.  It's a line attributed to former President Ronald Reagan who used it sarcastically.  Well, sarcasm or not, a survey released by the University of Southern California Annenberg shows more people (79%) believe government websites are "generally accurate and reliable" than believe in mainstream media websites (75%).  But the gap is narrowing.  Two years ago there was an eight-point difference between the two as opposed to the four-point difference in the latest survey.  The finding is one of many from the school's annual Digital Future Project which, for the last ten years, has surveyed people about their use of the Internet and views of the Internet. 

The reliability quotient for government and media though is nearly double the percentage (40%) that believes information generally on the Internet is reliable.  A slightly different measures finds that less than half (45%) of those surveyed said they have "some trust or a lot of trust" in the Internet.  Despite that, three quarters of the Internet users 17 and older say the Internet was an "important or very important" source of information to them.  And that, my news brethren, is higher than the percentage reported for television, newspapers or radio.  Further emphasizing the growing news role of the Internet, the survey shows Internet users spend more time going online for "non-sports news" than any other media.

To finish up the trust and reliability issue, the study shows only one in seven Internet users (15%) believe – not surprisingly – that information on individual websites is reliable.  At first it may seem somewhat surprising, and the report authors make a big deal of the fact, that a majority of Internet users "have almost no faith" that information on social networking sites is reliable or accurate.  But then look at the numbers.  That is 51%.  Now, stack that against the numbers for the Internet in general.  If only 40% believe that information is reliable, then theoretically that means 60% don't believe the information is reliable. 

§  Big Brother Is Watching You.  In keeping with the government reliability result and despite the anti-government rhetoric dominating politics, the survey shows people are more worried about big business than big government.  A little more than a third (38%) are concerned about the government checking what they do online, but nearly half (48%) are worried about big business checking up on them online.  BUT… But… but… despite those concerns, the study says concerns about privacy and security when buying online has declined AND the percentage of Internet users who say you put your privacy at risk by going online has declined to the lowest level in the ten years the study has been going.  Go figure.  And while you're trying to figure that one out, consider this.  While a third (33%) of Internet users believe it is "safe" to voice their opinions about politics while online, even more (36%) believe it is NOT safe.  Yet two thirds (66%) "agree or strongly agree" that people should be able to criticize their government while online.  More than half (52%) go so far as to say you should be able to express your ideas online "even if those ideas are extreme."  So, let me say it again, a little differently, just to drive the point home.  Most people believe you "should be" able to express your opinions freely online, but many of them believe it isn't safe to do so.  Yes, this should have been the lead for this report, but I wanted to build up to it.

As a footnote to this, it should be noted that the study found two-thirds of those surveyed (69%) don't believe the government should try to further regulate the Internet.

§  Make The World Go Away.  They're not exactly singing those lines, but a substantial minority of people just doesn't want to have anything to do with the Internet.  It's easy for those of us who spend most of our time crouched over a computer to forget that there is another world out there.  For one in five people (18%) that world does not include the Internet.  They are the ones the study classifies as "non-users" and that figure has been pretty consistent throughout the time of the study.  Most (37%) for the simple reason that they don't have a computer or an Internet connection.  But a quarter (25%) of them say it's just because they're not interested.  What is interesting is that more than a third (39%) of those 'non-users' are people who have kicked the habit.  They used to go online but have stopped for various reasons.

When they do go online, the report says the average Internet user spends 18.3 hours a week.  That actually is a slight dip from the year before, say the authors, and the first time there has been a dip in use.  If they're at home, they spend an average of 12.3 hours online; if they're at work, they spend an average of 12.9 hours online.  And they make "active use" of the Internet at work for an average 9.2 hours a week.  Yes, I know the numbers don't quite add up, but I am presuming there are issues of overlap and of definition. 

Anyway, to provide a little more perspective on the Internet interest, here's another number to consider.  Four out of five Internet users (82%) "sometimes or often go online without a specific destination."  That is what the study authors call "a new high response."  I should note that the figure is in line with other reports, such as the Project for Excellence in Journalism, which also found that a lot of people are just surfing the Web.  Anyway, in a separate part of the report, the authors note that the largest percentage of Internet users go online simply to browse (79%) versus online banking (47%), or getting product information (46%), or visiting social networking sites or video sharing sites (also 46%), or playing games (39%), or downloading or watching videos (39%), or downloading or listening to music (38%).   

§  SOME GENERIC FACTS AND FIGURES.  Or, put another way, things the study reports that probably confirm what you already suspect.  For example, most of those surveyed have more than one computer in their home with one in six (17%) having three or more computers.  Most people now use laptops, with laptops accounting for three quarters of computers owned, up from just one in five (18%) seven years ago.  Most people have Broadband access, which at 84% is an 800% increase in the ten years the survey has been done.  Most people (68%) have made an online purchase with the average adult user making 31 purchases online a year.  But while many people buy online, even more people do research online before buying.  Young people continue to be the dominant users of text messaging, averaging 104 messages a day – more than twice the number (48) sent by the average Internet users.  In the previous year, the average Internet user sent 38 text messages while the average 'young' Internet user sent 81 messages.  In both cases, the increase over the past four years has been 300%.  Not just "most" but nearly "all" Americans (97%) use e-mail, with users maintaining contact with an average 7.5 persons a week, up from 6.7 the year before.  

Finally, the report says the percentage of people visiting social networking sites or video sharing sites continues to increase, with under half (44%) visiting such sites at least once a day, compared to a year ago when just over a third (36%) said they visited such sites daily.  And, just under a third (32%) create content for such sites.  The report makes a distinction between social networking sites and "online communities" which it defines as groups that "share thoughts or ideas, or work on common projects, through electronic communication only." Yes, I am struggling with that, too; but in any case, the report says more than half (56%) of such online community members are involved in their communities on a daily basis.  The vast majority of these online community members (93%) is involved in, or wants to be informed about, social causes.