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Local Journalists Remain Hopeful About the Future of the Industry
If attendance was any indicator at the “Future of Journalism” forum Wednesday night, Santa Barbara residents really, really care about journalism and where it’s headed.
The Santa Barbara Central Library’s Faulkner Gallery was packed with attendees to hear a panel of experienced journalists talk about where they see the industry going, nationally and in Santa Barbara.
The city has been a “petri dish” of journalistic experimentation, said panelist Nick Welsh, editor and writer for the Santa Barbara Independent, largely instigated by the Santa Barbara News-Press meltdown in 2006.
The event was moderated by local media blogger Craig Smith, and sponsored by the Santa Barbara County Action Network (SB CAN) and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
The first speaker of the night was the Los Angeles Times’ James Rainey, a media columnist who has worked in the industry for 27 years. In a broad overview of what the industry is going through, he recounted the past and how anyone populating the newsroom in those days had a strong distaste for anyone in advertising, often referring to those who sold ads for the Times as “ad goons.”
“We’re not quite like that anymore,” he said. “At this point, if we can pay the bills and keep the lights on and pay reporters, you can wrap it in almost anything you want. We really are at a crisis in print journalism.”
Rainey said he was surprised to learn how much lower prices are for online advertisements than print ads, and he said he thinks the industry will keep flailing until it finds an equilibrium. “I don’t think we’re really going to find that for several years,” he said.
Several reporters have left the Times, he said, and are now working for Pro Publica, an investigative journalism site sponsored by foundations.
Another successful model Rainey mentioned was Voice of San Diego, a nonprofit online newsroom that operates with a small staff of investigative reporters. “That gives me some hope ... and I see that there is a way to pull this off, but I think for the next few years it’s going to be a little wild,” he said.
Panelist Susan Paterno, who directs the journalism program at Chapman University, recounted her experience being sued by News-Press owner Wendy McCaw, a libel suit she eventually won.
“I have much hope for the future of journalism,” she said. “We’re entering a time of great innovation.”
Paterno talked about how Twitter was being used in Iran to dispute election results and how a rape in China had been brought to light because of the Internet. “If it had not been for those citizen journalists, justice would not have been served,” she said.
Jerry Roberts, co-founder of calbuzz.com and a former News-Press editor and publisher and former San Francisco Chronicle managing editor, was upbeat about the future of journalism online.
He cited a Nielsen online study that says 75 million people now read newspapers online, 25 percent more readers than two decades ago.
“They’re reading newspapers, they’re just not reading it in print,” he said. “The Internet is far more democratic than anything that has come before.” He has seen that firsthand with the instant feedback via reader comments.
“It’s really a conversation,” he said. “It’s not longer a lecture.”
Aggregation is also a strength, and Roberts plugged local aggregators such as Edhat.com.
Investigative journalism is so expensive that newspapers are no longer able to sustain the reporters needed for those undertakings. Sites such as ProPublica and the Center for Investigative Reporting are starting to address those needs and look for new ways to report, sans print.
“It’s early on, it’s the Wild West out there, there’s a lot of experimentation, but I think you can begin to see the seeds of how this is changing,” he said.
It’s easy to romanticize the “golden days” of journalism that lend newspapers a certain haze of nostalgia, but Welsh was quick to dispense a dose of reality about those days.
“They weren’t necessarily that great, and daily papers have a lot to answer for,” he said. “I think it’s a little grandiose among print reporters to think that if they’re not around in their present configuration, the world will cease to spin on its axis. Unfortunately, even in the golden age of journalism ... we didn’t really save the world from itself, we didn’t save people from themselves and we didn’t save anybody from their elected officials.”
Welsh praised the world of blogs and citizen journalism, but he said that the day-to-day, such as school board meetings, more than ever need to be covered consistently.
“It is a complex, bizarre language that they speak at those school board meetings,” he said, garnering laughs from his audience. “We have yet to figure out quite how to monetize this,” he said, before mentioning that the Independent’s paper is smaller than it was this time last year, but that its model is working well for now.
UCSB sociology professor emeritus, radio host and community activist Dick Flacks said a gap remains in Santa Barbara’s coverage, one that has existed since 2006. Flacks asked Roberts how many employees the News-Press newsroom had when he worked there, and Roberts said about 55.
Flacks said the combined number of full-time reporters for Noozhawk, the Independent and the Daily Sound is significantly lower. “Excellent reporters, but they don’t come near even 20 percent of what the News-Press was able to provide,” he said. “There is a gap.”
Flacks said public broadcasting is a good example of publicly funded news organizations and a viable model for the future, and advocated for investigative projects locally to be funded by individuals and foundations.
“This turnout suggests that people are hungry for more,” he said to the audience. “Let’s get engaged ourselves, together here and online, in making these things useful ... Our future really does depend on it.”
— Noozhawk staff writer Lara Cooper can be reached at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Comments
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» on 06.17.09 @ 08:49 PM
The event had more than 200 people in the audience in totality.
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» on 06.18.09 @ 02:27 AM
The emergence of so called “citizen journalism” is indeed a great step toward the spread & exchange of information on this planet. The effect of this exciting new medium of interactive and free flowing journalistic communication has been and will continue to be a blessing to all who read and participate in it.
The print and electronic media has become nothing more than a de facto “ministry of propaganda” for monied interests. Kudos to noozhawk and the hundreds of other local & national news sources that are springing up across America & the world. The return of Thomas Paine…..This quote by former US Congressman Oscar Callaway speaks volumes:
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In March, 1915, the J.P. Morgan interests, the steel, shipbuilding, and power interest, and their subsidiary organizations, got together 12 men high up in the newspaper world and employed them to select the most influential newspapers in the United States and sufficient number of them to control generally the policy of the daily press….They found it was only necessary to purchase the control of 25 of the greatest papers. “An agreement was reached; the policy of the papers was bought, to be paid for by the month; an editor was furnished for each paper to properly supervise and edit information regarding the questions of preparedness, militarism, financial policies, and other things of national and international nature considered vital to the interests of the purchasers.
- U.S. Congressman Oscar Callaway, 1917
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» on 06.18.09 @ 05:51 AM
The manipulation and suppression of the news that befell the News Press is far too common. The economic crisis in the industry has excacerbated these improper tendencies because negative news about those who are spending the most on advertising, never appears in print.
As one example, crime is rampant, particularly drugs, even prostitution at the Chumash casino and hotel. The body of a security guard was found in a ditch where he had been laying for a whole day without discovery even though he was supposed to report in every hour. Traffic and accident rates on the 154 have more than tripled as have crimes of theft, robbery and embezzlement in the nearby comunities. Suicides along the 154 have increased.
One deputy Sheriff working an extra duty job for overtime in and around the casino made 36 arrests, all by himself, for drug violations and in only 6 weeks time, mostly felony amphetamine drug cases yet there was not a word about these events in most of the so-called “mainstream media”.
It is no coincidence that Travis Armstrong, a News Press editor, admits to family ties to an Indian casino in the midwest and refuses to publish any news or commentary that would put the Chumash or any other Indian tribe or tribal casino in a bad light.
The Independent (a misnomer if there ever was one) runs on average 5 Chumash casino advertisments weekly some as big as a glossy two page spread in the center of the paper. Coincidently, of course, there is never any negative publicity about the numerous and newsworthy matters occuring regularly at the Chumash casino and hotel.
The Santa Maria Times and the Lompoc Record are no better. They routinely run misleading editorials written by (or ghost written for)the
current tribal chairman Armenta and other tribal representatives and both papers bend over backwards to evade reporting any negative press about the tribe and it’s casino.
Channel 3, KEYT television sells it’s most expensive slot, the evening news, to the Chumash casino and coincidently never reports at length on the many newsworthy issues at the Chumash casino and hotel and has yet to do one of their exposes’ on the rampant crime and impacts of gambling addiction and traffic on the nearby communities, all caused by the Chumash gambling casino.
Rather these co-opted media want to report on what a faux economic “benefit” the casino is based on the claimed number of people that are employed there in low paying unprotected jobs. Meanwhile they carefully avoid reporting that fact that the tribal casino, resteraunt and hotel businesses do not pay any property taxes, sales taxes, state income taxes even on the $45,000 paid out each month in profits and distributed per capita to each and every tribal member every month, monies from obtained from the gambling losses of gamblers patronizing the casino.
The tribe and it’s casino and the adjacent hotel pays no bed taxes, corporate taxes or personal property taxes to state or local government which are all taxes needed to pay for the public services and infrastructure they use daily at the non-Indian taxpayers expense. These sales and bed taxes appear on the bills given to customers to decieve them into thinking the tribe is helping to pay for government but these monies do not go to the state or local government. Rather they are “tribal taxes” that are pocketed by the tribe.
Where is the news coverage of these facts? Instead there is widespread coverage of occasional and often token “gifts” made to the community paid for with the gambling losses of gambling customers, mostly people who cannot afford to lose that money ! Gifts which on an annual basis, do not even equal the two ($2,000,000) million dollars in federal grant and welfare monies the Chumash still collect from the federal government irresepective of the $300,000,000 million a year they rake in from the casino and related businesses, half of which is pure profit.
Where is the news reports that if the Chumash, their casino and businesses and enrolled members, just those located on their Indian lands, were treated like every other business, they would be paying the state and county over $25,000,000 million dollars a year in various taxes that would prevent teacher lay-offs, infrastructure degeneration, the costly improvements having to be made at taxpayers expense along route 154 largely because of casino traffic, and the losses of many other public services that we read about daily?
Unless the print and non-print media can reclaim the reputation as being the unoffical “fourth” branch of government and part of the system of checks and balances on government, reporting the news fairly and impartially, exposing crime and corruption without fear of losing advertising dollars, then they will never regain the public’s trust.
I always enjoyed reading print media when it was more factual and informative, honest, fearless, and had ethics and integrity. I am afraid those days are long gone!
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» on 06.18.09 @ 06:16 AM
I missed this event and wish I was there: the more we can come together to discuss the community’s interest in local journalism (civic survival, even), the more we promote fledgling experiments and boost the odds of something professional, responsible and lasting. I’m guessing the News-Press was not invited (nor were they last year at a similar event)—which is too bad in a way. They could be part of the solution. Then again, their hopeless malaise is stoking this inventive discussion by others. Still, I’d find it more hopeful if the N-P sponsored such a civic discussion of its own. I still believe there’s a need for a powerful fourth estate. (And I don’t buy Jack W’s cynical view of things. Sorry Jack!)
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» on 06.18.09 @ 06:31 AM
What an incredible evening last night. Thank you for the recap of the presentation. I forgot my pen and paper (a real no-no for a journalist), and I wanted to visit the websites that were discussed last night. Keep up the good work here.
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» on 06.18.09 @ 06:32 AM
Publicly funded news organizations? I hope not. NPR is so one sided that it can hardly be called fair or balanced. Nothing Bush did was right and St. Obama gets a pass on everything. (Example: Bush was severly criticized for the deficits he was running up but not a peep about Obama running up deficits three times as large).
And speaking of journalism in general, what happened to its watch dog status. They are more like lap dogs for politicians. Journalists have earned their extinction fair and square.
One more point. I don’t see myself reading my computer over ham and eggs in the morning. It ain’t gonna work for me!
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» on 06.18.09 @ 08:58 AM
rtetz accuses Obama for running up the deficit. He would do well to read the recent NYT column pointing out that Bush ran up 1/3 of the deficit while the downturn in the economy, mostly attributable to Bush policies I believe, ran up another 1/3 of the current deficit. Obama’s deficit spending is largely to deal with Bushes Iraq and Afghanistan war, Bush’s failure to do immigration reform, and trying to stimulate the economy which is in shambles, largely because of Bush administration’s failure to control excesses in the financial markets.
see http://tinyurl.com/lvwbqh
Of course you might try to dismiss anything from the NY Times, which is an independent, rather than government subsidized paper. But common sense says the column is right on.
And I can’t help but notice that conservatives who want no government participation in the free market have no problem with government with government subsidies to agribusiness, free logging rights for loggers, investment tax credits to corporations, and the biggest of all, allowing homeowners to deduct interest expenses on our mortgages while not allowing any deduction for renters.
Let’s be a bit more logical and a bit less ideological.
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» on 06.18.09 @ 11:21 AM
Sorry Richard but rtetz is right on. You can argue all day long on the details but the point is the bias. And the bias has become a national disgrace in the media business. There is no watch dog when the dog is obedient to an ideological master, so much for being logical. Journalism has become as corrupt as the monied interests that own them (George Soros et all). If investigative reporting is to survive at all then journalist need to be the most objective human beings on the planet, listening Nicky? If you don’t believe me take a look at what some very liberal journalists are saying about the embarrassingly favorable behavior of their colleagues toward Obama and this after 8 years of the worst hate fest ever witnessed in this country toward a sitting president. I’m no fan of Bush but the disgusting behavior of journalists toward the man on ideological grounds was despicable and a stain on the profession. Journalism should be about getting to the truth of a matter not finding evidence to support your version of it or supporting your particular political position. The same disgraceful behavior has corrupted our higher education system and finally the science community. These are the three institutions where ideological interests should be absent and yet they are completely infected and diseased with it.
Finally I could not agree more with the ham and eggs. I read the news paper in the morning with breakfast. I want the whole damn story not a sound bite. I look for objectivity not someone’s opinion based on ideology. So far the N-P is a great disappointment and I don’t get the Daily Sound. Noozhawk and the Daily Sound online fill in but are more tuned to the sound bite instant gratification generation than us old timers looking for the whole story we can read at the breakfast table, the back patio or our favorite room in the house.
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» on 06.18.09 @ 04:51 PM
Writers who work for media outlets dependent on ad revenues can NOT be objective. This is just a sad fact. JAX’s example about the lack of reporting on the Chumash is one good local example. Why offend one of your biggest advertisers? And given the media bias in this country (against “conservatives” and for “liberals” at all costs) RTETZ is absolutely right: “Journalists have earned their extinction fair and square.”
So right on for the Citizen Journalists like JAX, RTETZ, AN50, etc. WE can still tell the truth, even if we have to use pseudonyms in this honky liberal town.
Now about about the firing of the Inspector General Walpin, for instance? Any investigative journalism happening about that? Obama FIRED the guy, illegally, and then smeared him, Jerry-Roberts style. All for exposing fraud—with your tax dollars—committed by one of his cronies. Excuse me??? Where’s THAT story? While I’m at it let me insert this link - to the next TEA PARTY in Santa Barbara on July 4th as part of the parade: http://www.santabarbarateaparty.com/events/
The Iranians get it. May the spoiled lazy liberals in this town (and Sacramento and DC) take note of that. WE are starting to SPEAK UP - “Enough is enough.”
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» on 06.19.09 @ 11:21 AM
AN50
I don’t want to give you more idigestion but your stomach should be churning at the recent proposal from the Sacramento “Sad-Sacks”. The California Legislature wants to take control over the University System and disband the Board of Regents. I am not crazy about the Regency system but imagine what it would be like with our State Legislature at the Helm of the Universities of California!!
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» on 06.20.09 @ 07:00 AM
Yah, heard about that. Absolutely despicable! As if the indoctrination camps aren’t sinister enough? I know Sacramento is doing this for the money first and foremost (they cannot help being the biggest pirates on the planet), but the implications for the indoctrination camps (sorry, UC system) is imposing. Sbnative, thanks for the link and more examples of south Chicago politics live from the white house!
Want more heartburn look at the SB N-P this morning covering Maureen Gorsen. When will people in this state realize that they have been royally had by the enviro-religion?
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» on 06.20.09 @ 09:55 AM
COMMENTS FROM A WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE RE THE FIRING OF IG GERALD WALPIN:
It would seem that Mrs. Obama had something to do with this—she was responsible for putting her chief of staff into the office of the Inspector General. Are we back to the Clinton years with “a two-for-one” presidency? This IG was investigating a friend of the president—anything to do with the IGs firing? We have a president who is drunk with power and I am concerned about the direction in which my country is going. Posted by: evelynadele
Going forward we will likely see a lot more of the IGs being taken offline and replaced with insiders that can be controlled. Who wants the Sheriff looking over your shoulder when you are trying to slip one over on the people? Posted by: brooksjc3
Sounds to me like the “Change” to believe in is there will be no change from Bush? Posted by: bnw173
Have to hand it to Ed for staying with this story. Nice job. Posted by: tomtildrum
The firing of Gerald Walpin and others who were looking into some financial irregularities of friends of Obama’s is being called “an act of courage” by the administration. Hah! There are other names for it such as “Bushlike!” or “an act of hutspah”. Posted by: afed27
AS usual main stream media is giving the WH a pass. Bush had every legal right to fire U.S. Attorneys who workd at the pleasure of the president. A Congressional firestrom erupted. In this case, there was no such legal right, in fact, there was a requirement to give Congress 30 days notice and to provide detailed reasons for the firing. Neither were done.
Posted by: csanders1
Transparency and suppression of IGs do not go together. Action to squelch two IGs appears to be the beginning of an effort to deny the American people and the Congress proper internal controls and to thwart democracy. It is vital the Post stay with this story; it may be the beginnings of another Watergate! Posted by: LELANDJORDAN5
Interestingly, the board meeting of May 20th, which is being cited now as the time when Walpin was disoriented, confused or adversarial (whatever), at least in part involved board members peppering Walpin about his St. Hope investigation and the possibility that Walpin was going to issue another statement about the situation in Sacramento. This date is critically important because it is the same day when the Sacramento Bee published the text of an explosive letter of resignation from former St. Hope director, Rick Maya, in which Maya alleged, among other things, that emails were deliberately erased from the St. Hope system while they were under federal subpoena. Walpin’s statement undoubtedly was related to the serious matter of potential obstruction of justice during a federal investigation. By the way, the FBI, along with criminal prosecutors in the US Attorney’s office are now actively investigating these charges. Please keep on this story. Posted by: lorijab
I am outraged that this has happened to one of our Inspector Generals. What is our country coming to? Doesn’t anyone here at the Post see that a violation has occurred in firing an IG without the 30 day notice to Congress and a reasonable cause? Why is this story being presented without concern for the actions of our government? Too many decisions are being made by the President without checks and balances in order. I am considering going to another newsfeed if I don’t see the Post more concerned about our Constitutional Issues and procedures over being friendly to a man who lied to gain public approval of his position to run for President. America wants to hear and read news that defend the people and our Constitutional rights! We don’t want to hear about how a man in a position to help “we” the people has been fired as if it is a slight problem; “we” the people want to know where this money is actually being spent, penny for penny and we don’t want to hear a bunch of cover-up language to protect the government. Our Constitution clearly was written for “the People,” and not those who choose to run our government in secret. STOP SPENDING OUR MONEY AND LET WALPIN DO HIS JOB!!!!! That’s what should be all over the press for ...We the People of the United States… Jefferson and Adams would be ashamed of this government and so should all of us. When the Declaration of Independence was penned by Thomas Jefferson, it was penned with honesty and integrity. Is there any one in our media that can stand and report with honesty and integrety today? Show me some concern and I will know that the Washington Post is worth standing on the First Amendment of Freedom of Speech. I vote for Walpin for standing up and challenging his agency bosses. We need more politically courageous people in government and in the media. Thank you for hearing my concerns.
Posted by: Pamy1
The firing of Gerald Walpin seems just about as courageous as Richard Nixon firing Archibald Cox.
This is not the kind of change that I voted for!
SUBMITTED FOR THE BENEFIT OF LIBERALS WHO WILL CARP I ONLY CITED “Right Wing” SOURCES.
More links:
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., calls for a “fuller and more complete explanation” as well as more evidence of the “reasons and process” that led to the firing of Gerald Walpin, former inspector general for the Corporation for National and Community Service.
“While firing an investigator who uncovered the abuse of funds by a political ally might be considered an act of ‘political courage’ in Chicago politics, for most Americans it raises troubling questions,” Issa said.
Before his firing, Walpin had investigated Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, an Obama supporter, for allegedly misusing federal funds. A settlement was reached in that case under which Johnson’s organization was to repay some of the money. Walpin points to that investigation and others as the root of his dismissal, suggesting political motivations were behind it.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/06/18/republicans-satisfied-white-house-explanation-walpin-firing/
“The days when ‘whistle blowers’ were popular on the left are gone, I guess,” said John Hinderaker in Power Line. Otherwise, left-wingers wouldn’t be trying to justify President Obama’s firing of former Inspector General Gerald Walpin. The president’s apologists insist it’s just conservative conspiracy-mongering to suggest there was anything wrong with getting rid of a public servant “whose only offense was to investigate an Obama crony.”
“Conservatives are starting to smell blood” on this story, said Zachary Roth in Talking Points Memo, and Gerald Walpin “certainly doesn’t seem inclined to go softly into that good night.” He’s on a tour of conservative media outlets trying to drum up support for a congressional inquiry into his dismissal. The story is complicated, but one things for sure—it “isn’t going away any time soon.”
Nor should it, said Bill Wilson in The Washington Times. Gerald Walpin “was the lead federal investigator into financial abuses committed by Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson—a major Obama backer caught misappropriating hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayer money.” This kind of political retribution shows that despite Obama’s promise of change, “many of his actions are nothing more than glorified political thuggery.”
http://www.theweek.com/article/index/97885/Obama_and_the_firing_of_Gerald_Walpin
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» on 07.13.09 @ 07:41 AM
Today, Plumb resides in Laguna Beach, California, with her second husband Kenneth Pace, a business consultant. She works as an artist, has served as a member of the Laguna Beach Board of Adjustments/Design Review Board since February 2002, and was elected chair pro-tem of that board in February 2005. She served as pro-tem of the board until her third eve plumb term expired in January 2008, at which time she declined to reapply for the board.
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» on 08.23.09 @ 08:06 PM
Terrific!
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