The Future of Newspapers?

The future of newspapers, as of right now, looks bleak. Journalists John Lumpkin and Jerry Grotta addressed this sensitive subject today to many journalists and journalists-to-be at the SPJ conference. Grotta started the lecture with a quote expressing the nature of traditional media:

“The traditional mass media are actually shrinking in size relative to the economy…”

This actually seems to accurately depict the state of our media today, but don’t be fooled. It’s talking about 1972. So it seems as if the journalistic prospects 37 years ago were about as grim as they are now. This goes to show that the decline in newspaper readership and circulation are not necessarily new problems but in fact, have been stifling the industry since the 1960s. What’s even more staggering, according to Grotta, is that adult readership is declining. Since adults are the primary consumers of newspapers and are the primary intakers of news in general, what is the fate of the industry if its only audience no longer cares to pick up a daily on the way to work?

Experts predict that 2040 will be the year when the last newspaper will be printed. Grotta, on this subject, is a bit pessimistic. He predicts that formidable day may arrive even sooner.

Why exactly is this happening to something so crucial in our society? Why are our newspapers dropping like flies?

The people are beginning to realize that they can acquire all the same information from newer and more innovative sources that didn’t exist 20 years ago. For example, today, people can access online articles. People, who aren’t fond of reading, can simply watch the news on TV. Instead of grabbing the paper on the trek to work, most people tune in to the radio when stuck in commuter traffic. On top of that, our younger generation have access to thousands of blogs that target their unique interests.  The New York Times is pioneering technological transition as either a means of getting ahead in the game or purely demonstrating to the entire industry the need to adopt the inevitable changes that might in fact salvage the dying industry.

On the subject of change, it is important, if not foremost, to urge newspapers to adopt change. Grotta says that journalists are not operating in the “newspaper business”; they are operating in the information business. The competition does not reside in other newspapers; it dwells in information as an industry. Television, internet, radio, books, magazines, and films are our competition. We are in a continuous battle for the most precious human commodity: time. In an era where mutli-tasking, practicality and efficiency are valued, activities that reduce burden and time are top priorities. Unfortunately for newspapers, they consume time. Sitting down with a paper not only wastes the time that could be spent running errands or feeding the kids, but it also takes up space. Who has the physical capacity to sit wide-elbowed anymore?

Therefore, since newspapers are in constant competition with other media that offer more practical means of accessing the same information, newspapers need to embrace new technologies in order to survive. There is a newspaper motto out there that states “We do it this way because we’ve always done it that way.” Grotta says those are the newspapers that will surely disappear. Now is not the time to be resistant. “If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.” The blunt truth is that in order to hold any relevance, any substance, any value in this society, one has to keep with the temper of the times. And the NYT is putting up a good fight as one of the only newspapers making an effort to move into the electronic medium.

After Grotta’s PowerPoint, Lumpkin took his turn at the podium.

He advocates media convergence, stating that newspapers should not be shackled to a single means of distributing content. A little variety will keep things alive.We, as society, have approached a time where it is very easy for a small number of people can do more than one thing at once. The age of specialists is over, says Lumpkin. Everyone needs to be well-versed in just about everything: blogs, film, editing, writing, etc.

The highlight of his speech, though, was his proclamation that old journalism still has a chance in the midst of the new bustling mediums. The preservation and possible revitalization of traditional media depends on a three part process:

1. We must protect our intellectual property. Meaning we cannot allow others to scrape off news content and pass it off as news. He cites John Stewart and Rush Limbaugh as prevailing examples.

2. We must focus on what is critical to democracy, which is objective reporting. Our business is to communicate facts.

3. We must continue fulfilling our watchdog role.

There is no doubt that this was possibly one of the more depressing sessions at the SPJ Region 8 Conference. However, at the same time, it was one of the most motivating. The future of the newspaper lies in the hands of the very people who read this blog. The future of the newspaper lies in the hands of the journalism students, who bring with them new talents and new abilities into an old business. The future of the newspaper makes me want to try even harder.

-Stephanie Kuo, SPJ UT Austin

Portfolio Critique

During our portfolio critique session with Scott Cooper from the Oklahoma Gazette, Larry and I learned three main things: 1) References are VERY important, especially for copy editing. Include some on your resume; 2) TAKE INTERNSHIPS! Take an internship and try to get clips from it.  Tell them what YOU want; 3) Think about the beat you are applying for and relate your clips to THAT beat.  However, keep in mind that you want to be diverse and put in other kinds of clips.

–Jessi Propst, SPJ UT Austin President

Region 8 Conference in Fort Worth

This weekend five SPJ members are attending the Region 8 Conference hosted by the Fort Worth SPJ Chapter.  The theme for this year’s regional convention is, “Staying Big In A Shrinking Industry.”

Today students attending the conference have a great opportunity to meet with professionals for a portfolio critique.  Larry Dechant and I are excited to hear a critique from Scott Cooper from the Oklahoma Gazette.

Tonight four of us are heading to Medieval Times in Dallas for a fun evening out on the town.  Honestly, I am a little nervous because I hear they make you eat without silver ware.  It will be interesting, for sure.

Tomorrow morning, bright and early sessions start.  The opening session at 8:30 a.m. is called Journalism 2010 and Beyond: What You Need to Thrive.  During this session, we will have the opportunity to hear from Hagit Limor from WCPO-TV in Cincinnati.  Among her list of accomplishments, Limor has won NINE Emmys at WCPO-TV!

For the rest of tomorrow, the five of us will be able to go to any sessions we wish to attend.  I know my list is pretty full!

The Mark of Excellence Awards Luncheon is tomorrow from noon to 1:30 p.m.  There we will have some delicious food and have the opportunity to meet people from other chapters as well as listen to Gilbert Bailon, a very distinguished Hispanic journalist with quite a resume, including being named by Hispanic Business magazine as “One of the Top 100 Most Influential Hispanics.”

The confernce will end tomorrow at 4 p.m.  From there, the five of us will be able to wander around the Metroplex until we will check out of the hotel at noon on Sunday.

–Jessi Propst, SPJ UT Austin President

Project Watchdog Panel

 

 

 

Project Watchdog is SPJ’s initiative to engage the public in a dialogue about the role of a free and ethical news media in American society. The Panel will feature four Texas journalists who have demonstrated the Watchdog role and excel in serving the public interest.

Forrest Wilder, The Texas Observer
Jay Root, Associated Press
Bill Minutaglio, Clinical Professor, J-School
Chris Tomlinson, Associated Press

Project Watchdog will happen Tuesday, Feb. 24 at 6:30 p.m. in Burdine 216. Join us!

Limiting the Diversity of News

Can you believe only six companies own everything we see, hear and read? I have more cereal choices than that, something just isn’t adding up!

As the number of media companies shrink, so do the number of voices, minority owners, and local stories. Media consolidation hurts our democracy in a myriad of ways, and SPJ at UT says “STOP BIG MEDIA!” In December the FCC decided to relax a 30-year old ban put into place to restrict companies from cross owning newspapers and broadcast stations in the same market. The lift would further limit the diversity of news, owners and opinions. Taking a stand, SPJ President Jessi Propst and I visited Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) and with the help of media non-profit Free Press, hand delivered a petition with signatures of outraged citizens in District 21. The Senate passed a “Resolution of Disapproval” which would nullify the FCC’s disastrous rule change and these signatures represented our community’s plea to urge Rep. Smith to vote on this bill during the congressional session!

With the mission of SPJ in mind (Most notably: “To promote the free flow of information”, “To encourage diversity in journalism” and “To protect the First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech and of the press”), Jessi and I, with hundreds of others around the country, let our local lawmakers know we are serious about media reform.

Media consolidation sounds like a boring, technical word you hear in Theories of Mass Comm. class, right? Well, learning about consolidation, media policy and the way the information system works will not only make you a more conscientious journalist but more critical citizen.

If you would like to learn more about consolidation and who own the media, here are a few links to check out:

Free Press

http://www.freepress.net/media_issues/consolidation

 

Stop Big Media.com

http://www.freepress.net/stopbigmedia

 

Who Owns What? CJR

http://www.cjr.org/resources/

 

Media Reform Info Center

http://www.corporations.org/media/

 

-by Mary Tuma, Former UT SPJ President 2007-2008

What Will I Do When It Happens to Me?

What will I do when it happens to me was a session that made me think about the stress journalists go through.
How many of us will cover a huge fire?  How about a murder?
How will you report that?
What if you get captured and held hostage?  What if you are threatened with a gun?
Just some things I never thought about before this session.

Chris Cramer, who has worked for CNN and BBC, was held hostage for a little over a day.  His first though was, “Gosh this is fantastic!  Can you believe it?! This is going make my career!”  That to, “Oh shit! What I am going to do? I’ve got to get out!”
He feels now that there are other ways to be an exceptional journalist “instead of running around like a crazy cowboy.”

Lois Norder, the managing editor for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram gave us the perspective from her position.  She said she picks the reporters who go on these scary/scarring stories very carefully.  Then in the event a reporter goes out to cover a hurricane or a fire and comes back scarred, she recommends that you “make them feel like they are not a failure if they want help” from someone.  It is important to ask your reporters if they are OK after they come back from a rough story.

Journalists tend to think they are immune to danger or pain or even death sometimes, so many of us take these hard stories without thinking about what it will do to us.

Mike Walter, an anchor from WUSA-TV watched the plane hit the Pentagon on 9/11.  “I thought I was a jaded journalist,” he said. “But I found myself fighting back tears.”

Cramer says it is important to create a culture where it OK to say “NO.”

Cramer, Norder, Walter and Ron Martz, the president of Military Reporters and Editors agreed that it is important to be prepared for situations where you might be in danger.  Only in the last 10 or 15 years have newsrooms started offering classes for preparation. After these classes, many journalists feel confident that they could survive in hostile regions.  Their work was better.  Photos were amazing.  Stories were real.

It is important to know we as journalists have support in the newsroom.

A great support system is the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma and the Dart Society.

Telling Historic Stories in a Multimedia World

This was one of my favorite sessions of the entire convention.

Bonnie Stewart, an assistant professor from West Virginia University gave us a few helpful tips on writing historic stories.
First of all, is it important enough to invest any time in? Why do we care about the issue 50 years later?  Did Congress change a law because of this event?
Putting the story in context will help the reader get a better grasp of the event or issue.  What was the political climate when this took place?
Actually go to the place and recreate it for the reader.
Stewart told us how to find some photographs, documents and record that may have been overlooked at the time the event was happening.
She said it is important to make friends with librarians because they KNOW where to get good information. Photos can hide in university and community libraries, in government agencies, at local churches, with families, in newspaper archives and with affiliated organizations.  For instance, if you were writing a story about a mine collapse in the 1960s, you may ask the United Mine Workers Association for some more information.

By using these photos, a historical story could be brought to life through multimedia.

Next up, we listened to Gary Schwab from The Charlotte Observer.  He told us how his colleague Tommy Tomlinson retold the story of Dorothy Counts, a 15-year-old African American girl who walked to Harding High School in Charlotte, North Carolina in a crowd of white kids who spat on her.  The photo is iconic.
Tomlinson took a different approach to this historic story. He found and interviewed the kids surrounding Dorothy Counts in the picture and got their side of the story.  For multimedia, Dorothy retraced her walk to the school.  The other people in the photograph were invited to come as well.
Schwab’s advice for writers was to show not tell the story.  He suggested we narrow the focus and keep the story tight.

To read Tomlinson’s story visit:

http://legacy.charlotteobserver.com/615/story/260059.html

Leap the Digital Divide

Kay Madati, vice president of Consumer Strategy and Audience Development for CNN Worldwide, said that CNN is focusing on bringing content into technology. Where content was once at the center of their consumer strategy, now the audience is at the center of their formula, with content, forms of interaction and sharing news as the peripheral facets of their tactic.

Carlos Caban, senior director of ESPN Deportes, showed how the company has redesigned its websites. They have broken down their Hispanic audience into smaller communities, geographical areas, dedicated to the different regions of South America and to Mexico. They will shortly add the possibility to upload fan profiles. Currently readers can follow the game online, with live blog commentaries and animation.

He showed the front page of the Mexican site, and the front page of the Panam region, and though both were covering the soccer games leading to the World Cup, each was featuring the countries related to its respective geographical niche.

Madati continued the conversation saying that the rules nowadays are “customization and personalization.” The way CNN will ensure that citizen journalists don’t steal all their viewership is by giving them exposure. For example, a few bloggers were invited to be on CNN to cover the Democratic National Convention, and though they weren’t paid, he said they were thrilled by the fact of publishing on CNN.

Dialogue from citizen journalists and content by professional media can exist side by side. Madati said there shouldn’t be a need for outsourcing, which will be part of the campaign to incorporate non-traditional sources into their media to maintain readership.

It’s all about Storytelling: Criteria for Telling Effective T.V. Stories

“It’s all about Storytelling: Criteria for Telling Effective T.V. Stories,” another broadcast seminar, was taught by Western Kentucky University Professor Terry Likes. This class was very informative and gave several tips on storytelling through the broadcast medium. Remember than news goes beyond the facts and needs to involve the local element. “Aim for the heart of a good human interest story,” Likes said. Below you will find some helpful notes!

Visual Storytelling Criteria

1. Package introduction should set up the story… and peak the audience’s interests.

2. Tell the story through people, not individuals. Use “official” facts in the introduction and tag them… let the story on the human, interest who was impacted by the story.

3. Short sharp sentences: Never more than two sentences before a sound bite or nat sot.

4. Avoid passive (to be ) verbs

5. Memorable close: needs to close as strongly as you open… use nat sound, can have sound in sig out.

Visual Storytelling: Effective Video

1. Sequences? Shoot in wide, medium close-ups—then edit in that sequence

2. Avoid pans/zooms

3. Bites framed. Are they lighted well? Make sure to have a proper looking room.

4. Steady, well light video is essential. Use a tripod and light.

5. Capture natural movements.

6. Avoid jump cuts and flash frames.

7. Remember Delivery and Overall Impact are crucial.

-Delivery needs to involve proper pacing, mood, energy, vocal emphasis and conversational sound.

-Overall impact should be a central character with which the audience can identify.

Effective Stand-Up

1. Stand-up with movement/demonstration

2. Use a stand-up bridge

3. Need stand-ups for your resume tape.

4. Nat sounds make you feel like you are there.

Likes said “people need to remember what they feel, longer than what they know.” And that we as reporters, need to “tell complex stories through these characters.” Edward R. Murrow said that “television can educate, illuminate and inspire.”

Some important future job advice from Likes is that we should seek gradual improvement throughout our lives, never think we “know it all,” don’t make excuses for our work, get as much feedback as possible and learn from the great reporters of our time.

“Be as versatile as you can,” Likes said. “Get your first, second, maybe even third job and do the best you can at it, prove that you can do it.”

Carving Out Character

Lane DeGregory, a features writer for St. Petersburg Times, used her story about Evel Knievel three weeks before his death as a guideline to create personalities in your feature stories. She tells her editor she needs two reporting days for each subject – one to do research, take your source to lunch, go to his home, etc and the second day to follow around and observe a scene/collect dialogue instead of just quotes. Her main recommendation is to set the scene with the five W’s – and to do police background checks before you meet with your subject.

Another recommendation (also made to me by our very own Wanda Cash) is to write your story without notes. That way, your feature takes on a conversational tone instead of a news quality. You can fill in the details from your notebook later.

International News in the World of Globalization

I’ve heard mixed opinions about the state of journalism and whether it’s moving towards community-oriented or international-focused coverage. The panelists gave diverse opinions to this issue.

Cyndi Stand, director of Coverage International Newsgathering for CNN International News, said that although many newsrooms are closing down, they’re actually doing the opposite and opening more bureaus to cover international news.

But are people interested? Cyndi, as well as Chris Cramer, former managing director of CNN International and head of news gathering for the BBC, said yes. Cramer reminded those present that the focus is on the readers, and not journalists. He said you don’t have to travel the world to cover international news, that there is also international news happening at a local level, like if refugees are in your town or immigrants.

Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman and senior advisor for the United Nations Development Programme, said there are two classes of journalists: those who ask, and those who don’t ask. He reflected on the issues in the developing world, about how he’s seen a trend of victimhood instead of people helping themselves. The virtue in technology is that you can lower your costs, he said.

Yves Colon, lecturere for the University of Miami, said that Americans are happy, that they don’t care much for international coverage. And those who read international news are part of the elite, not the common people. He suggested making international news a commodity.

How do you attract blue-collar readers to international news? Make the news relevant to them. Cramer discussed a formula of connect-the-dots, in which different aspects of a story can be linked to broaden reader interest in your story. He also said that personal stories resonate more in audiences.

Someone in the audience asked the panelists how to become a foreign correspondent. The answers were divided between simply packing their bags and going where the stories are not being told, and between making calculated risks involving contacting news media where you want to go beforehand, doing your homework so to speak.

At the end of the panel I asked Cramer how journalists and citizen journalists will coexist, what will be our competitive advantage. He answered that trained journalists will have storytelling techniques to better engage audiences, the ability to put things into context, and the credibility to show things in an unbiased fashion.

Better Broadcast Writing

“The Better Broadcast Writing” session encouraged and taught students going into the Broadcast Profession to use visuals in their packages (in this case a package is the story). The main speaker at the session, Deborah Potter, President and Executive Director of NewsLab (a non-profit media organization), said we as journalists should “show people the emotion through the story and the people,” rather than “telling them how to feel, because when you tell people how to feel you are being condescending.” Potter displayed five scenarios (stories) to the audience, in which still photographs, audio, framing and parallel parking were used to make the stories more interesting, without the wordiness copy tends to make during a television broadcast. The scenarios also presented everyday story events that a reporter might face such as the sentencing of a murderer, a local church fire, a tornado, voting day and fogging at the airport.

The first story, Sentencing Day, was a follow up to the murder of a local man who was very loved by his community. Instead of focusing on the murderer completely and drowning the audience in complete facts, the reporter used close-ups, wallet pictures, yellow police tape, shivering hands and the crying audience to tell the story with pictures rather than words. The use of stills, coupled with the emotion displayed by the widow, created an effective story and engaged the audience in what would seem to be a pretty routine story. Potter said to “not necessarily stick yourself (the reporter) in the middle of the story” to make it effective. “Tell the story to provoke emotion using simpler language and not a bunch of tired adjectives,” she said.

The second story, about a local church fire, was similar in structure to the Sentencing Day story, but it involved a new technique I hadn’t learned yet. The new technique named “Parallel Parking” combines two pieces of sound from the same person in a track to provide a transition and tell the audience something new. This video used parallel parking to avoid long pauses and cut-aways which just pause the story and create a disjointed experience for the audience. The story started off with a couple who had just been married in the church, holding the photo album of their wedding, their last memory. Instead of cutting to another person, parallel parking was used to introduce the new individual. All of the interviewees were shot facing the church. The camera man/reporter relationship was crucial in this piece because it allowed them to work together. The reporter and the camera man had the same vision which was to angle the people toward the church and keep the reporter out of site. The people were all naturally looking at the burned down church which made it easier for the reporter and camera man to shoot the story. The use of positioning, parallel parking and great reporting created a unique story because it focused on the people who had lost the church that meant so much to them. Not once did the reporter say the cause of the fire. The church was personified in the sense that it was used in the story like a human object that meant more to the residents than anything else.

The third story involved another typical story assigned to reporters: a tornado. But the reporters did not focus on the tornado itself; rather on the things it affected the most: the trees. Now at first this sounded strange. Trees? But the reporter focused on the more than 15 Black Walnut trees that were destroyed. The beginning of the package started with the natural sounds of birds, and ended with the natural sound of birds. Numbers also played a pivotal role in the story. They counted the number of trees killed, the rings (identifying the years the tree had been alive, in this case 97 years, long enough to outlive 18 presidents) and the dump yard the trees will be placed in (said to be the size of a baseball field). One of the few trees that lived was one which was given to the wife of the man the story focused on. The story again came full circle, with the introduction of the man and the many trees he lost, to the one that survived, which would be a “legacy for his children.” The townspeople of Siren didn’t just lose their trees, but their “shades, privacy and lives.” Potter said to “write to the corners of the picture,” meaning that one can see what is in the frame, so tell the audience what they cannot see. So, we see that the trees have fallen; causing damage and excess debris, but we cannot see what they mean to the people of Siren, Wisconsin.

The fourth story was about Voting Day in a little town outside of Denver, Colorado. Although voting day is another boring subject to cover, this story really did have the “boring” motif throughout. The story was simply about people NOT showing up to the polls. The story starts off with the sound of an older man taping his fingers against a table due to the boredom he feels waiting for people to come. Wide shots were used to emphasize nobody was there. Potter said, to use the spice rack mentality. “Decide on a narrow front and don’t try to squish it all in.” In this case, they reported only on the lack of individuals voting, not who was ahead, not who won, but simply the people that were involved.

The fifth and final story was about the airport being fogged in. In this case, the fogginess provided the premise for the story, but it was the use of little children throughout the piece that made it interesting. “Imagine standing in this line (shows a picture of a long line) on Christmas Eve…and you’re five years old.” The Reporter started the story this way and zoomed in on all of the children passing time in the airport. His interviews were not of the parents, but the children, which made the story effective and interesting.

This was an excellent seminar because it gave typical stories that are assigned in the news room everyday and provided a new fresh take on something that could otherwise be redundant and boring.

War “Experts”

David Barstow of the NY Times provided the fuel for this panel with a story he wrote about the military analysts that major television networks used on their shows on a regular basis.   It turns out these TV stations were hiring retired army generals – this should seem like a good option.. they don’t share our “liberal media bias” and they are no longer with the military.  Plus they know what they’re talking about. However, in order to get the defense contracts necessary to maintain an appropriate style of living, these military analysts depend on access granted to them by the Pentagon.  Yeah.  Turns out the Pentagon had been giving prep sessions to these army generals any time they knew they’d be going on air.  Barstow said the transcript of these meetings sounded more like a sales pitch than a news briefing.

For instance, Major General James “Spider” Marcs, military analyst for CNN, was in the process of negotiating a translator contract with the Pentagon that would have made him a lot of money.  If he recommended that America pull out of Iraq, his contract would have been obsolete and he would get nothing.  What incentive is there to even entertain an alternative to Operation: Iraqi Freedom when that much dough is on the line?

It took Barstow more than two years to collect all the FOIA documents he needed to take on news networks, the Pentagon, retired army generals and the White House with his story, but once published, the NY Times received almost 1,500 comments.. the first of which asked Barstow why he took so long to get the story. 

Overall, the panel served mostly as a warning to journalists to make sure to ask the important questions to people they rely on for such expertise.  It is absolutely necessary to figure out who your sources work for and where their money comes from to make sure there are no hidden agendas.

Ron Martz, president of the organization Military Reporters and Editors, made a few good suggestions about the use of anonymous sources.  Government employees are pretty tight-lipped about giving out information, but never agree to go off the record. Anonymity is a privilege they need to earn before you agree you’re willing to go to jail to protect them (the promise you make when you agree to go off record).  Civilians in military stories represent a different matter as there is very little they’re actually in control of.  The Walter Reid Hospital story only broke because of anonymous tips civilians were willing to give – if they were disclosed, they could lose their military benefits.

Check out Barstow’s story

Covering China

We had high hopes for this session on Covering China what with the Beijing Olympics finishing recently and journalists from all over the world returning home with hundreds of stories about their interactions with the Chinese government’s censorship.  The description was a bit misleading in that it said we would be getting to hear three panelists discuss how to find sources and story ideas and how to report with fairness and balance.  What we listened to instead was David Lynch, of USA Today interviewed by Richard Lui, an anchor from CNN Headline News.  The audience was barely noticed. That is not to say we left without gaining some interesting insight about foreign reporting.
Although the Chinese government agreeing to loosen some of the regulations for required approval of news stories from the beginning of 2007 through October of 2008, Lui brought out a recent blog that suggested those where empty promises.
Lynch disagreed saying he had more trouble with his own editors from USA Today than the Chinese government.
Lynch did give a few of his own observations about American media and the coverage of the Olympics.
“American readers don’t get the full perspective [of China],” he said.  “It’s almost cliché to say there are many Chinas, but there are.”
Helpful tips were given to journalist aspiring to write in China after Lui questioned Lynch what he would advise young up-and-comers to do if given such an opportunity.
“Think about the person you are interviewing,” Lynch said. “As a journalist, at the end of the day there’s not much [the foreign government] can do to you.”  He then reminded his listeners that a Chinese citizen cannot simply leave his country.  The citizen must live with the consequences of talking to a journalist.
“You can’t depend on a person that has no experience with the Western media,” Lynch said.  “You almost have to weigh his options for him.”
One situation Lynch described was people literally hanging through the windows of a two-room shack in a rural Chinese village to see him.  That village had never seen a journalist, no to mention a “foreigner” in the village.
It is also important to set up interview in advance if you are doing a controversial story, Lynch explained.  He suggested to get to wherever you are going early, do as much reporting as you can and make copies of everything (interviews, etc.) before you check into your hotel- which you should do very late in the evening- because once the hotel sees your journalist passport they may seize your material.  Bring an extra memory stick for your camera in case they take that, too. Try to give them the empty one.
Lynch does agree that China has become less strict on its censorship.  “It’s not France,” he explained.
Reporting in China requires patience, Lynch said.
“You won’t get anywhere in China yelling and screaming,” he said. “You have to be patient.  Everything takes twice as long.”

Too Close for Comfort

The panelists were fabulous – we got to hear the personal stories of Mike Walter, a WUSA-TV news anchor who broke down after watching a jet fly into the Pentagon on 9/11; Luis Sinco, a photojournalist who told the Marlboro Marine’s story to the world; and Mary Meehan, a Lexington Herald-Lead reporter who followed the tale of a drug addict mother for four years.   At one point, Luis got so caught up in saving this marine that his youngest son asked his father why he loved Blake, the marine, better.

While their stories were so compelling, they offered little advice on how to not get sucked in by the disparity of their subjects.  What they did mention was that it is important not to become an agent in your own story.  It is not your job to make sure the drug addict checks into a rehabilitation clinic.  It is not up to you to make sure the homeless man has a roof over his head for the next four years.  Make your story compelling and reader response should more often than not leads to initiative.

Perhaps there’s a reason for old-timer cynicism in the field too.  Anchor Mike Walter heard the tale of a homeless veteran who moved around too often to receive his disability benefits.  The story generated enough reader interest that a lawyer offered to take his case and a homeless shelter guaranteed him a place to sleep.  Walter contacted the attorney to do a follow up story, who quickly showed him clips from five newspapers around the country with the same story about the same man.  He’d been scamming money out of the community for years!  Right or wrong, Walter chose not to let his viewers know this information.

Click here to read Meehan’s story

Click here to view Sinco’s presentation on the Marlboro Marine