As far as you know, I’ve got it all figured out
Some of you will remember Facebook. If you’re over 40, you probably visit Facebook on a regular basis. If you’re like most of the college students in my life, ask a parent or older friend. They can tell you about it.
Earlier this week, I checked my Facebook notices. I generally skip the “memory” notices. Those are the ones meant to remind us of posts we’ve made on this date in years past.
There it was. Seven years ago on this date, I spent the day in Manhattan, in front of 50 or so journalists at the CUNY Journalism Graduate School, recently renamed the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. Why was I there, you asked? To discuss digital journalism.
Beginning in the late 1990s, I began receiving requests to speak about the future of digital journalism at conferences and schools of journalism throughout the U.S. and Canada. Large audiences would pack rooms as I discussed online video, vodcasts, podcasts, slideshows, hardware, software and more.
Back in those days, like a lot of folks, I was enamored with the technology. I loved teaching folks how to use the software and gadgets needed to record and get videos online, create newspaper websites, and most of the hardware and software companies were more than happy to send me free samples of their products, in hopes I might include them in reviews.
Like a lot of folks, I was giddy with thoughts of how the Internet was going to change the newspaper business.
At the time, we anticipated converting our print publications to digital publications, assuming readers would gladly switch from paper to screen. We also assumed advertisers would be just as thrilled with the possibilities of digital media, and gladly pay hefty sums to fund our journalistic efforts.
It’s funny how time can change expectations. It didn’t take long to realize print wasn’t going away, at least not as quickly as we anticipated back in those heady days. It was tempting to ignore the facts and move full-steam ahead into the digital era, leaving print behind. Most of the folks I know who took that approach aren’t in the news business any more.
Like many things in life, most healthy papers came to realize the newspaper business isn’t an either/or proposition. For most newspapers, it became quickly evident that digital advertising dollars couldn’t sustain their publications without a serious reduction in staff and other resources.
Sure, there’s the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, but those are exceptions to the rule, not the rule itself.
As recently as last week, a publisher of a very successful community paper emailed me to let me know he was significantly reducing his newspaper’s digital emphasis. In his words, he put pencil to paper and came to the conclusion there was very little financial return based on the number of hours his staff was putting into their website and social media presence.
I still visit a lot of community newspapers. Heck, I still visit a lot of all types of newspapers. What I’m seeing is no increase in the digital efforts at most newspapers, especially community papers. Most have a website, with highlights of news. Most have a paywall for readers who want to see full stories. Most engage with social media, primarily Facebook and Twitter, to promote stories, share late-breaking news and attempt to draw readers and
subscribers.
In the past, I noticed the majority of the publishers I visited felt like they were missing out on something. There was a feeling that “everybody” else had a handle on the whole digital thing, yet they were somehow left behind.
This seems to be another area where time seems to alleviate many of our misconceptions. Sure, newspapers still try to determine the right “mix” of print and digital efforts. Metro and many dailies might have a hard time existing without income from their online presence.
Most – notice I wrote “most” – community papers have come to the conclusion that digital media isn’t going to be their savior, at least not anytime in the near future.
So they offer subscriptions to their newspaper online. They get a little income, usually not much, from online advertisers. They use social media to promote subscriptions. I’ve seen a few community newspapers make significant income by livestreaming area high school ballgames and other events, with sponsorships from local advertisers.
It’s becoming more common, as I visit community papers, to see live broadcasts of news or news-makers, usually on a daily or weekly basis. In many cases, the focus of the effort is to enhance what is happening in the local newspaper, not replace it.
Do I think print will totally give way to digital in the near future? No, as I first wrote ten years ago, print is going to be around for a long time. Do I think newspapers will give up on digital efforts? No, of course not. Heck, even the cupcake shop down the street has a website. It’s a normal part of business.
Then what do I think is going to happen? I think newspapers will continue to look for ways to incorporate digital efforts in ways to enhance their current products and, as time moves forward, find even more ways to benefit from their digital presence.
It’s my educated guess that we will continue to search for ways to benefit from the digital side of our business, without throwing out the products that still bring in the most revenue and reach the widest audience.
Just a reminder: In the latest Newspaper Institute survey of U.S. and Canadian newspaper publishers, more than 90 percent indicated print advertising is still their number one source of income. What was number two? Print subscriptions. Income from digital sources came in at a little under one percent.
So here’s my advice. Keep putting out a great newspaper. If it’s not great, figure out how to make it better. Look for ways to use your digital presence to increase readership and advertisers, but don’t think they will replace income from your most profitable product.
You’re not alone. Just about everyone is still trying to figure this digital thing out. Look at me. I started writing and speaking about digital news more than 20 years ago, and I’m still trying to figure it out.
The legal battle between CNN and the White House over the suspension of Jim Acosta’s press credentials is done, at least for now. But it is likely that the larger war—in which NENPA has lined up with other press advocates to ensure fair and open access to press conferences—will continue.
Making the Web, Social Media ‘Better’ Places — with Caution
We’d all like a “better” internet in terms of privacy, politeness, taste and safety. And who would oppose eliminating false or misleading information from social media sites, or preventing online bullying and such?
Last week, some of the world’s most significant, influential and powerful figures around such issues — in the words of The Wall Street Journal, “the giants of the web” — gathered at the 2018 Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal and in Brussels at an international conference on data privacy and policy.
At the Lisbon meeting, an audience reportedly cheered for a proposed international institute to propose regulations worldwide on social media. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned in a speech that “the weaponization of artificial intelligence is a serious danger” and Microsoft President Brad Smith called for “a digital Geneva Convention” to end state cyberattacks against civilians.
Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee called for private companies, governments and internet users to unite around what he called a “contract for the Web,” a nine-point plan with goals to protect personal privacy, create online methods to counteract harassment and hate speech and for universal access to the web.
In Brussels, Apple CEO Tim Cook advocated for the U.S. to adopt the European Union’s strict data privacy law, enacted in May, allowing consumers to review, edit and delete personal information on the web. Cook warned that technological advances are leading to a “data industrial complex” and that “our own information, from the everyday to the deeply personal, is being weaponized against us with military efficiency.”
So much for the once-hoped for era of “peace, love and harmony” that the World Wide Web was supposed to usher in on behalf of all humanity.
Still, we’ve been here before — and need to keep in mind we’ve overreacted to the threats, real and imagined, posed by new technology before dialing down regulations and codes to a reasonable compromise on free expression, privacy and safety.
Early concerns about privacy noted that the new-fangled telephone could ring into a home at any hour of the day, while proper guests of the day would knock on the door and announce themselves.
Content on radio was relatively unregulated, with government attention directed more to the actual problems with frequencies and interference — until the Communications Act of 1934 gave the Federal Communications Commission power not only to govern the technology but what was said over the airwaves via the so-called “Fairness Doctrine.” Intended to ensure that all voices were heard on public airwaves, the doctrine was abandoned in the 1980s as no longer needed in a world of virtually unlimited cable and satellite channels, but also with the realization that it actually diminished discussion on matters of public interest.
In movies, the “Hays Code” was adopted by Hollywood filmmakers in the early 1930s to head off moves to have Congress set strict standards for what movies could show across a wide range of topics and issues — from comments about the law and drug use to sex and violence. One silly example of the code’s restrictions: Childbirth was considered a “taboo” subject. In the acclaimed film “Gone with the Wind,” as a character was giving birth, actors in the scene could only be shown as shadows on a wall.
The code was on the books for decades but was weakened in the 1940s and 1950s — particularly in 1952 when the U.S. Supreme Court, considering a case involving the movie “The Miracle,” extended First Amendment protections to films.
Likewise in television, the “Television Code” was adopted by the National Association of Broadcasters under threat of a government council to set rules. From 1952 to 1983, the code ruled on everything from how actors dressed to references to religion, sex, family life and more. Famously, the code resulted in married couples shown on TV only using double beds and in 1952, when the star of “I Love Lucy,” Lucille Ball, became pregnant, that word was not permitted — the show was allowed to say only that she was “with child” or “expecting.”
When the sound of a flushing toilet was heard in 1971 in an episode of the groundbreaking sitcom, “All in the Family,” it reflected a growing demand by the public for realism rather than the unrealistic depictions of everyday life that the code had encouraged.
Note that all of those overreactive attempts to regulate came early in the development of those mediums of expression.
The web is barely out of its teenage years, in effect, and social media megaliths such as Facebook and Twitter are even younger. The web’s revolutionizing impact extends from newly accessible public records to instant global communication. And our reliance on social media as a means of reporting news, recording our lives and relaying our views is unlike anything seen in generations, if anything before.
But if history is a guide — and it is — we need to temper calls to “protect” ourselves from that which we do not like or find dangerous, lest we replace such with censored, sanitized and government-regulated messages or content intended to pacify rather than provoke and inform.
There may well be a need to rein in the wild web, to set privacy boundaries and fight real misuse. But we must be certain that the control over what we see, hear, say and access remains as close to our own fingertips as possible — and not handed over to some “National Nanny” claiming to act on our behalf, lest we be confined to a future of shadows on the wall, double beds and a view of life where no one ever uses a toilet.