Journalism: Local public newsgathering needs defending

Posted on Sep 26, 2011 by John Doucette   |   Subscribe to this RSS feed   |  

Shortly after Hurricane Irene had left southeastern Virginia behind and power returned to my house, I met with the journalist Tom Robotham, my friend and sometimes editor, for a pint at a Norfolk watering hole.

As we tend to do, we talked shop — particularly the means by which public interest newsgathering happens where we live.

On the south side of the Hampton Roads region, an area that includes Virginia Beach, Norfolk and a few other cities and counties, the dominant newsgathering organization is a newspaper, The Virginian-Pilot. It’s a great local paper. I used to work there, and I still subscribe.

To a lesser extent, local TV stations and small newspapers, conduct public interest newsgathering, but they don’t match the quality of The Pilot. There are two alternative media outlets in our area, a monthly arts and culture print pub and an online site that works in first-person opinion and arts coverage, as well as some political blogs and small publications.

However, with very few exceptions, they don’t really gather public interest news.

The Pilot does this, and does this better than anyone. But The Pilot, like newspapers across the country, is suffering from online competition, media fragmentation, and the poor economy, among other things. This had led to continued belt-tightening and a process of (hopefully) evolving the business toward a sustainable model that lives and breathes within the modern technology — publishing in electrons and not on paper.

What that model is remains to be seen. For now, the newspaper industry here continues to publish a daily paper. In five years, I expect I will still get a hard copy of the newspaper if The Pilot survives. But in a decade? Fifteen years? Thirty?

In our discussion, Tom and I discussed various forms of delivering news, and some other folks joined the talk. Some spoke in terms of newspapers, specifically The Pilot. Save The Pilot. Save the newspaper. That sort of thing.

The question I kept asking, was what do citizens need from a local news source? I ask this because I suspect what we are often discussing confuses a means of production with the product itself. This confuses the real goal of those who care about the local newsgathering tradition newspapers represent.

People don’t need newspapers, per se. They need the public interest newsgathering capability that newspapers generally represent, particularly on the local level.

This is a big, and a very important, difference.

I’ve written before about various potential ways to fund the newsgathering capability, and I’m convinced non-profit is one way to go at the local level. Public subsidies, a very sensitive topic that is widely misunderstood, have been mentioned in various outlets, including by me. But I think we need to stop talking about saving specific businesses and start talking about defending our capability to gether news that is in the public interest.

I have a stake in this argument because I’m a former journalist. As a citizen, voter, homeowner, husband and dad, I also depend on local news to keep me informed and protect the interests that touch my public and personal lives. But this matter touches my professional life, too. It impacts all of us public relations professionals because a vigorous press helps protect our clients in a number of ways, such as covering trends and regulatory agencies. And as businesspeople and individuals, of course, who must deal with local, state and federal government agencies in a variety of ways.

Recently at the online Monday Note site, press industry experts wrote about subsidies for the print industry in various countries, noting that assumptions about subsidization and market penetration don’t really square. The discussion is based upon a study of media subsidies in six nations, basically looking at broadcasting and the print media. Which is fine, but also limiting.

Some points by author Frederic Filloux:

• Quality information plays a critical role in democracy.
• Good reporting remains quite expensive to produce. Remaining able to preserve non-commercial formats (such as NPR or the BBC) leaves no choice but public support.
• The industry — especially the print press — is in the midst of a radical and costly transformation, and many organizations don’t have enough capital to undertake it.
• We are facing an historical wave of mediocrity in the information business with wealthy aggregators eager to repackage anything that fits their obsession with eyeballs. (I’m appalled to hear Le Monde is about to strike a deal with the Huffington Post.)

Here is one of his “critical conditions” for providing funding: No life-support finding. Only support for transformation.

When we consider public or, more likely, non-profit support, I think we need to be a bit heartless. The form — print, TV or online — matters little. It’s really about the newsgathering itself, not how it is disseminated. Our industry, to represent clients and our own businesses, is adapting our methods without abandoning our core purpose — representing an issue, product or organization. How effectively we represent clients is the commodity, the core business. Everything else is the means of achieving effective representation, and thus keeping our core business alive.

So consider the questions I have about what I really need, at heart (or in the core), from my local newsgathering organization. These all came up during my talk after the storm, when Robotham and I debated and discussed with any and all who joined our conversation. First, I am thinking local because I live in a community. And here was my logic, the math behind the final point I’ll leave you with:

• Do I need opinion? I’m not sure, but we already have plenty of it. As blogs proliferate, we’ll only get more. So let’s say no.
• Do we need arts and entertainment coverage? Well, yes, particularly local information. But that exists, a bit overwhelmingly, in alternative media. So no, other than local issues in the public interest, such as involving public subsidization.
• Do we need comics and crosswords and Hollywood gossip? Maybe we want it. But need? Not really.
• Sports? I consume this, but this is less important than hard news to me. Local issues should be covered, such as involving subsidization or consumer concerns.
• The core capability of public interest newsgathering is what The Pilot does best. It’s what sets it apart. And, generally, it’s the least sexy thing on earth. But it is needed. So this is where non-profit, not-for-profit or public support should go. City hall coverage. Planning board meetings. Investigations of finances and social issues. Public safety. This is a newsgathering organization’s meat. The rest, effectively, is a series of condiments that dress up the civic purpose of newsgathering.

So? We don’t need to protect the newspaper industry or TV or radio or even online. We need to protect local newsgathering capabilities.

The question is not saving Brand X. So consider these questions:

• If there was a local public interest newsgathering organization that offered state and local government, community, social, business and, as pertinent, some local sports and arts coverage, would you support it?
• How would you support it?
• How would you build it and keep it going?

You’d start small, I suppose.

Indeed, from around the table, my companions handed me pocket change and, in one case, a dollar. It’s little more than $5, but I’m keeping it in a jar in my office. I think I’ve identified that the real problem with saving newspaper is that they don’t really need to be saved. When someone comes up with a local solution to protecting the newsgathering capability I have associated with newspapers, it will be time to invest.

And if anybody knows a good accountant, do send them my way.

A former U.S. Navy, Virginian-Pilot and Times Herald-Record journalist, John is a member of our Vox Optima Norfolk team.  He is a prolific social media writer, so you can always find him on Twitter, on Facebook, his personal blog, or by shooting him an email.

Tagged: journalism, public interest, newsgathering, public funding, virginianpilot, hampton roads, financing

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