Benton interview continued - Part Two

Newspapers are like Wonder Bread? What?!

What about video on the Internet - will it save TV and the rest of the news media?


What is the role of journalism schools? What should recent grads do?

What will the future of news be like online? What type of coverage do we need to retain most?

Will people be willing to pay for news online?

How can newspapers survive in the digital age? What's a sustainable model?

Harvard Journalism Lab Director has strong words for newspaper industry

Joshua Benton is young, smart and on a mission to change the way journalists and traditional news organizations act and think.

Benton is a Yale grad, former reporter for the Dallas Morning News and a former Nieman Fellow in journalism at Harvard.

He now directs the new Journalism Lab at Harvard which is self-described as "a collaborative attempt to figure out how quality journalism can survive and thrive in the Internet age."







I interviewed Josh in the Walter Lippman House at Harvard for almost two hours on March 2. His comments were entertaining and somewhat surprising for a Harvard guy.

He talked about why the audience is bored with newspapers, what reporters can learn from bloggers and why he compares newspapers to Wonder Bread.

Here are some edited clips of that interview:

What does the Internet have that newspapers don't (besides an audience)?



What is the role of "citizen media"?



Why are blogs so appealing? What can reporters learn from bloggers?


Continued in next post

Going Mobile

The biggest buzz among those watching the future of the news industry is mobile. Some say we are in a similar spot with cellphones as we were with the Internet 10 years ago - right on the verge of relying on it more for news and information than we do more traditional formats.

A story in today's USA Today confirms that. Local stations in selected cities will begin airing newscasts via cellphones this year. The article says shows will be simulcast - no word on whether they also would be available on demand. Also no word on whether cellphone technology will allow us to skip through commercials (and if so, what further economic impact will that have on the industry).

Imagine the possibilities in the event of a disaster, though. News on the go.

Bye, Bye American Paper?

"This might go down as the week that they took paper out of the newspaper business."

James Rainey in the L.A. Times today predicts the demise of the paper part of news, based on several more announcements this week from newspapers cutting back on print delivery.

I couldn't help but notice the columnist's last name, having predicted the same fate about an hour before I even saw his story on my RSS feed. In a last attempt to support newspapers, I gave into the endless calls and resubscribed to the Union Tribune a few days ago (I think they offered me a round trip ticket to Paris or something similarly enticing). Of course, I had to first lecture the poor telemarketer on the other end about the meaning of media convergence and the impending doom of the product he was peddling (he agreed with my predictions, by the way).

Today is Day Three of my resubscription period. And thanks to a Southern California rainstorm, that paper is still in my driveway - a soggy mess.

Last night, Day Two, my 8-year-old daughter and I spent some quality time with the paper after dinner. We perused the news and talked about topics we wouldn't otherwise have known about or discussed. Try doing that over a computer. 

On Day One, the paper came in handy for housetraining our new puppy.

There's no question that the printed product is old once it's delivered and environmentally unsound once it's produced. But I'm still hoping for at least a Sunday edition. Some traditions just shouldn't die with the Times.

And as I write this ... I have another realization. I only subscribed to the Thurs-Sunday edition. Isn't this Wednesday?

Covering the Plane Crash: Online Media Mergers

When an F/A-18D jet crashed into a San Diego neighborhood yesterday, my multimedia class and I watched as our local media attempted to cover the aftermath online.

I found out about the crash through a text message alert from the San Diego Union Tribune. (That was progress in itself because most of their previous text alerts in the last year had been sports related.) If I had been logged into Twitter, I would have known about the crash through a KPBS tweet.

Within an hour after the crash, however, the Union Tribune's Web site,  SignonSanDiego, had little more than a paragraph of information. Meantime, the local ABC affiliate, KGTV, was providing the best live coverage online, streaming video and interviews from the crash site.

When one of my students emailed an online editor at the Union Tribune telling him about KGTV's live coverage, the Union Tribune responded by linking to the KGTV video! Gone are the days when convergence meant a formal agreement had to be signed for media outlets to share resources. 

This past year's State of the Media report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism made it clear: news is a service, not a product. Consumers are looking for the most reliable information when they log onto a media Web site. And at that critical time, KGTV was providing the best coverage - kudos to SignOn for recognizing that and not being afraid to merge!

Border Battle: Convergence Example

Our local PBS/NPR affiliate, KPBS has done it again - in an even bigger way. The online convergence staff, headed by Leng Caloh, received national attention for its interactive Google map during the 2007 San Diego wildfires.

Now, Leng and KPBS Border Reporter Amy Isackson just completed Border Battle: Bringing Home the Drug War - a joint effort with TijuanaPress.com. The presentation includes maps showing drug-related crimes and trends, videos and a glossary of terms and key players. Now that's information!

Covering Mumbai: From Mainstream to Twitter

Citizen journalism may not be a term or force that is fully formed, but in major breaking news events, blogs, Tweets and other forms of user generated content are a powerful source of information.

Global Voices Online featured special coverage and blog posts from India, Pakistan and Israel.

Twitter  continued to get dozens of updates every few minutes during the worst of the attack. Note: to perform an advanced search on Twitter - go to http://www.search.twitter.com/advanced

For a 3D live global view of updates, go to Twittervision at http://twittervision.com/

As for the mainstream media, the New York Times showed off its multimedia talents again with a photographer's slide show  by Michael Rubenstein and an interactive map of the attacks. 

And kudos to my former colleague Sara Sidner for her unflappable coverage of the attacks for CNN International. Sara remained calm despite enduring an angry mob and a bomb blast at the Taj. Wolf Blitzer called her courageous - and since she babysat my cat for me once, I'd have to agree!