Weekend read: looking back, ahead on journalism

(via Flickr: jj_pappas423)

Time to catch-up on worthwhile reading:

"Historic Changes in the News Business" (The Atlantic): Former foreign affairs journalist Peter Osnos uses the announcement of the Aol-Huffington Post merger to take inventory of the past couple of years in journalism -- the bankruptcies, the nonprofit initiatives, the "fire sales" -- and concludes that "history, I predict, may well be as much about what has been added in this era as about what has been lost."

"Eight Trends for Journalism in 2011" (Nieman Journalism Lab): In a talk in Toronto, lab director Joshua Benton offers predictions not only for the year but also for the evolution of journalism -- such as the loss, perhaps, of some of the new nonprofit news models as foundation money wanes and is not replaced by memberships, donations or subscriptions. "I think we will see a thinning out that will be difficult, because it will counterbalance the optimism that these organizations brought with them," he says.

Video interlude: A spot-on take on aggregation by cartoonist Mark Fiore. (Love the announcer's "newsreel" voice!)

"Print Newspapers Have a Place in a Tablet-Heavy Future" (Nieman Journalism Lab): Jason Klein, head of the Newspaper National Network, defends newspapers (as you'd expect) against the claim that their days are numbered in the era of tablets. Rather than being driven by Gen Y's love of technology, he says, the tipping point for print will come when significant numbers of older, loyal print readers make the switch -- and that could take decades, not just a few years.

"Speed-Reading The New Mary Meeker Deck about Mobile" (PaidContent): Former Wall Street analyst Mary Meeker made a name for herself at Morgan Stanley for her tech stock calls. One well-watched analysis was her annual call on The Mobile Internet, an exercise she continues in her new gig at a big Silicon Valley venture capital firm. The bottom line: mobile has hit critical mass.

Musical interlude from "Tommy".

Post-Thanksgiving readings in journalism

(via Flickr: jj_pappas423)

Turkey eaten, house guests gone, it's time for some late-weekend reading:

"Why Spreadable Doesn’t Equal Viral: A Conversation with Henry Jenkins" (Nieman Journalism Lab): If you remember nothing else from this piece, take away its catchphrase:

"If it doesn’t spread, it’s dead."

In other words, if something isn't compelling enough to share ("spread"), it might as well not exist ("dead"), says author and academic Henry Jenkins. In a Q&A with Nieman, he's asked to talk about his idea's implications for traditional news media. (One hint: pay walls inhibit spreadability, destroying any value the corralled information had.) 
 
"Weekness and Endurance" (New York Times): In case you missed it, David Brooks offered a paean to the weekly news magazine, which once fulfilled the country's "earnest self-improvement ethic" but more recently lost ground to the Lake Wobegon effect: that everyone already is above average. Now, says Brooks, referencing the Newsweek-Daily Beast marriage, "There must be room for a magazine that offers an aspirational ideal to the middle manager in the suburban office park, that offers a respite from the deluge of vapid social network chatter, that transmits the country’s cultural inheritance and its shared way of life, that separates for busy people the things that are enduring from the things that aren’t."
 
Music video interlude.
 
"Another Setback for Non-Profit News" (Reflections of a Newsosaur): Alan Mutter takes a look at the recent stumble by the American Independent News Network, a nonprofit that set up franchised news sites online "to inform public debate through journalism that adheres to the highest standards of the profession." But the recession hit the nonprofit as badly as any other news operation, resulting in the planned closing of The Washington Independent and cutbacks elsewhere. To Mutter, it shows the fragility of the new model that looks to foundations, subscriptions and other benefactors to fund journalism.
 
"My 2010 Holiday Gift Guide for Independent Online Journalists" (OJR: The Online Journalism Review): Since we're now officially in the holiday gift-giving season, Robert Niles offers a list of toys -- er, tools -- for the backpack journalist who want or needs to do it all.
 
Video interlude: Sesame Street offers parents an "app" parody.

Transparency key in new journalism

"Revenue promiscuity" is the catch phrase coined by John Thornton, chairman and financial maven at The Texas Tribune, the nonprofit investigative news site focused on government in the Lone Star State.

It's meant to convey the idea that money for a costly effort like investigative reporting should be sought "everywhere and often", and not from just a couple of deep pockets.

But as the nonprofit model becomes one of the new forms of journalism to succeed legacy media, how do you keep the source of the money pure?

It's a question set to be discussed Friday at an ethics conference at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. (Note the day's sessions will be streamed and blogged live.)

The college, in collaboration with two others, this week released a report, "Ethics for the New Investigative Newsroom," that will be part of the discussion. The document grew from a January meeting on the topic by academics and practitioners. (UW-Madison has a Center for Journalism Ethics in its school of journalism.)

According to the report, "Nonprofit [investigative] journalism changes the way journalism is done; alters its economic base; and develops new linkages between journalists, funders, and audience. ... Importantly for ethics, the distance between journalist and funder in the nonprofit newsroom is reduced."

And that's a new playing field for journalists accustomed to the Chinese wall that has separated them from the revenue -- traditionally brought in by advertising departments -- that supported their work. "From whom will the centers [newsrooms] accept funding? Which donors might threaten the center's integrity?" the report asks.

It offers a number of "best practices" in the realm of funding and ethics, with transparency the watchword: in raising money, in spending money, in vetting donors, in setting editorial policies, in collaborating with other old- and new-media ventures in reporting projects.

Certainly one way to be up-front with news consumers -- increasingly skeptical in what some call today's "media revolution" -- is to lay out ethics policies and funding sources in great detail.

The Texas Tribune's Thornton, who makes his living as a venture capitalist, offers some of that insight in a letter (and pat on the back ) posted on the nonprofit's website.

While backers of the project had a goal of raising $3.5 million by the end of launch year 2009, $4 million actually was raised. The site has 1,500 individuals, or "members," who donated an average of $98 each, and 68 corporate sponsors who pledged $2,500 each. (A print publication, Texas Weekly, and "large contributions from wealthy families and foundations" also support the site.)

Some businesses might cringe at letting out that kind of information, but not Thornton. Why? Because within three years he wants readers contributing $3 million, or about a third of operating costs.

How's that for being promiscuous?