A Researcher's Diary

Archiving relevant events related to new media journalism.

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To look into --

How does social media guidelines of news organizations reflect on the numbers in its internet performance report card? What is the relation between the two? 

Does an organization with strict rules of social engagement fare less than one with a more liberal and easy outlook?

If the culture of the organization determines its online success, the significance of these social media guidelines becomes more relevant and its examination and comparison more crucial to understand. 

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The numbers might not be impressive as yet considering this is only the second year or so since social reading was introduced on at least, Facebook. Also, in the light of The Guardian's revelation that that their Facebook app has started churning out profits, it would be fair to let the system evolve a bit at least, before a final conclusion is drawn upon it.

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When the Pew Research Center released its 2012 State of the News Media report the other day, one of its findings was that tech companies — rather than news organizations — were benefitting most from online and mobile advertising.

We identified this as a new type of digital divide with news organizations becoming increasingly reliant on the Googles, Apples, Twitters and Facebooks of the world.

Writing at the Online Journalism Review, Robert Niles inverts the concern and believes that this economic and power shift liberates the journalists who actually report the news:

I’ve never believed that newspaper companies are the originators of journalism. To me, the true originators of journalism are reporters and sources. Newspapers were yesterday’s middlemen, bringing together reporters, an audience, and the advertisers who were willing to pay to reach the audience that journalists’ reports would attract. Sure, newspaper companies played a vital role, but calling them the originators of content is akin to giving credit to an talent agent for an actor’s performance.

Today, tech companies have disrupted these arrangements. As a journalist, I can use Google’s Blogger to create my own publication and Google’s AdSense will pay me for the advertising revenue that my work attracts. And let’s not forget those downloads from Amazon and Apple, either, which provide an even more direct route for today’s writers to earn income from an audience. I don’t need a job with a newspaper a make living as a journalist now. Tech companies have become the new middlemen, through which sources and writers can reach an audience and customers, instead of having to rely on newspaper and broadcast companies to make that match, as they did so often in the past.

In this view, Pew’s report is not a depiction of a news industry losing control of its revenue future to the tech industry. It is instead a map of how tech companies are disrupting publishing monopolies, creating new avenues for journalists to travel in their careers.

Some of these new avenues are yet uncharted. Others won’t lead to any reasonable income. Others still will turn out to offer immense profit. All my work writing over the past few years on OJR about entrepreneurial journalism has been to help you find the best new avenue for you. But just because newspaper companies are getting squeezed doesn’t mean that you have to lose your future in the journalism business.

While I wouldn’t recommend anyone quit their day job for potential AdSense riches, I think Niles’ overall point is important to remember. Yes, I’d like to see legacy organizations with their histories and infrastructure for supporting great journalism survive. But more important I want to see great journalism itself survive.

I’m not convinced that the two are necessarily related.

Robert Niles, OJR. Turn news industry disruptions to your advantage.

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This could be seminal to the news industry, especially the newspapers, who are desperately seeking to understand profitable adoption of the internet, in particular the large networking websites. 

The Poynter article mentions Tanya Cordrey (Director of digital development, Guardian News & Media) say that the frictionless sharing on Facebook (through The Guardian app) is actually returning profits to the company and has generated 'enough ad revenue to cover the development cost.' 

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If I were starting over in the top job at the Sun, knowing what I know now, my new mantra for the newsroom would be: We are a digital news operation with a print component. We are not a print newsroom with a digital component. That is the organizing principle that guides all of our decisions, I would tell my staff. -- Timothy Franklin, former editor of The Baltimore Sun; currently at Bloomberg

http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/03/new-in-nieman-reports-what-former-top-newspaper-editors-would-have-done-differently/

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the printing press, the computer, and television are not therefore simply machines which convey information. They are metaphors through which we conceptualize reality in one way or another. They will classify the world for us, sequence it, frame it, enlarge it, reduce it, argue a case for what it is like. Through these media metaphors, we do not see the world as it is. We see it as our coding systems are. Such is the power of the form of information -- Neil Postman

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In India, the issue of internet censorship and the extent of permissible freedom of speech on social networking websites have come to forefront due to the recent comments from the Indian Minister of Communication and Information Technology, Kapil Sibal. He suggested 'Google & Facebook must submit their content for screening against "objectionable" content'.

In one of my earlier post, I have highlighted how the government of India was keen to understand and explore the online social world of information and opinions. However, they surely seem to have misinterpreted this virtual space or may have miscommunicated their intentions. Whatever it be, it has put the government in a tight spot once again, with having to justify and answer too many questions about people's right to freedom of speech and expression, its (government) willingness to allow public expression of dissent and outlook towards progress and reforms in the country. 

It is in this context that the above hyperlinked article, highlighting the history of internet censorship in India is significant. 

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Speaking in context of the Washington Post Facebook App, he says that the successful news site of the future will have a social component for sure. 

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#CNNIBNlies raises important questions about ethics in journalism

I woke up this morning to a very disturbing hashtag on Twitter - #CNNIBNlies and was shocked to know what it was about. Will get to it in a bit. Let me give you a brief background of the media house in the spotlight - CNN IBN.

CNN IBN is a 24-hours English new channel based in New Delhi and is headed by Rajdeep Sardesai (Twitter handle - @sardesairajdeep) and is considered to be one of the credible news channels on the Indian television. In my opinion, it is one of the news channels widely followed by the English speaking Indian audiences. Face The Nation is the channel's prime time, 10:00pm news debate show hosted by Sagarika Ghose (Twitter handle - @sagarikaghose), the channel's Deputy Editor and wife of Sardesai. 

So, when I first read the hashtag, I immediately clicked on it to know what was it about. I saw a stream of tweets, many abusive, some surprised, some agonized and a few consoling. Happened to be that in one of her recent previous news debate, Ghose had apparently integrated a recorded interview into a live debate and projected it falsely as being live as well. 

I then visited Ghose's twitter account and found these:

In her tweets, Ghose has been asking people to "google and look up to 'look live' for broadcast journalism" and sim-sat. In addition to this, in her defense, she has tweeted saying recorded interviews are a routine in newsrooms. I agree with her. They are but how often are the audiences misled into believing that a recorded interview is a live reaction. For me, it is an ethical violation and cannot be pardoned even if some/all the newsrooms resort it. After all, a hundred wrongs don't make a right, do they? It is simply wrong. 

However, some of the tweets have been extremely abusive and downright cheap, in my opinion. Here is one example: 

I dont say we need to let this go but instead of reacting in such inappropriate words, we need to discuss media practices, ethics and whether we as audiences want our news channels to indulge into this sort of a behaviour. In a rather balanced reaction to this in his latest blog post, Vir Sanghvi says:

I pass no value judgements about the sim-sat phenomenon. As far as I know, every single television channel does it. It is part of the everyday routine of news television. In some cases, I am pretty sure that the anchors phrase their questions much more aggressively when they repeat them live to make themselves look good. That, too, is par for the course. My experience of international TV is limited but I doubt if the BBC would do this. Nor do I think that sim-sats are common on American television. So, why do we do it in India? Is there no alternative? And shouldn’t there be a debate about the practice?

There is a lot we, as commoners, don't understand about the media and when episodes like this give us an opportunity to know more, discuss and clearly state acceptable behaviour from news providers, we not should lose this opportunity in attacking just a personality or a news organization. 

Also, had it not been for social media, the reactions of the people would have probably never reached the journalists in the magnitude as being expressed. It is high time we understand that the word of the media can never be taken as the Gospel truth. 

In conclusion, for me, in this episode the journalist and the news program team has definitely been at fault for falsely projecting a recorded interview as a live reaction. And even if this has become a standard practice in newsrooms, responsible journalism requires the news anchor/presenter to honestly convey the elements of news content and program (as in this case) to the audiences. I believe a better way to conduct this debate would have been to clearly indicate that the interview was recorded earlier, play responses from the interviewee and then conduct a debate with live participants around it. Not that tough really, is it?

What are your reactions and thoughts on this?

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TEDx Talk: Crowdsourcing the news by Paul Lewis, The Guardian

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Honestly, the first time I read it, it struck me as funny, especially nullifying the mention in the bio (of journalists on Twitter) regarding retweets not being endorsements. What more can one do? Moreover, I think people on Twitter and other platforms are smart enough to distinguish an opinion from factual reporting. Imagine how tedious it would be to always add a /word line or two about the link/statement being RT'ed. And lets not forget the character constraint. 

This sort of a policy also snatches away the human character of journalists, turning them into mere reporting bots. No fun for me as a reader. In my experience, I have always enjoyed journalists on Twitter and Facebook, who value their opinions and indulge in debates on issues. Some of my favourites remains Nicholas Kristof and Piers Morgan. Latter is a real sport! When a journalist moves beyond facts into the realm of opinions, debates, comments or even sharing personal life moments, it makes me relate to them more as a human being and in the process, increases my loyalty towards them. Not that hard to understand, is it?

Again, AP gets it wrong in wanting to change the usage of RT. People on social networks are conditioned to certain, rather strict formats or codes of information sharing and even if someone wishes to alter, it has to be done gradually with the consent of all (lets not forget, it is a 'social' networking site), not in some haughty manner being conveyed in a top-down communication. 

And when AP's Standards Editor Tom Kent tweets that 'Some saying "RT" belongs after comment of the RT'er, not before. We're OK with either if meaning is clear' (mentioned in the article), I wish they had actually made the efforts to check on with the popular usage than creating their own. Social Media Policies are all about responsibilities after all, right?

And thus, I am really curious to understand with what knowledge (of social media) and goals (from social media) do news organizations create such policies. Worth it. What say?

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What I like about it is that it is:

- Easy. The user has to just type in the word or term or phrase (not the whole sentence) and @ reply to the handle. 

- Instant. I was amazed at the instant reply. It replies to you with a link, which contains a list of articles related to your query. Did not time it but it is definitely less than 20 seconds. 

- Innovative. Brilliant idea to generate website traffic and besides, it makes news search on Twitter really simple. I would definitely prefer this than scroll through page, sifting through tweets using a particular hashtag and then read the article. Exhausting!

Thoughts?

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Social change and social media in India

"Social media is not just a technique but an attitude . . . a strategy, and is part of a changing society"

When this statement is made by a 58-year old Indian cabinet minister, Salman Khursheed to the media confessing that the Indian government misread the power of social media, you know that the new media tsunami has finally hit the headhonchos and hereon, its popularity and power is only going to increase. 

In May this year, 74 year old social activist Anna Hazare along with few other prominent activists launched a mass movement, Indian Against Corruption. Team Anna, as they are popularly referred to as, have been persistent in their demands to pass the Janlok Pal Bill (or the Citizens' Ombudsman Bill), which they believe will check the corruption in the system and empower common people. They have resorted to various methods like public meetings, media interviews, hunger strikes to reach out to people and force on the government to pass their bill. Interestingly, they have build a very strong social media campaign with prominent Team Anna members like Kiran Bedi and Arvind Kejriwal interacting with people on Twitter and Hazare sending out a youtube video from a prison.

Hazare's hunger strike at the Ramlila Maidan in New Delhi saw thousands of people take to the streets demanding the adoption of the Janlok Pal bill. This unprecedented public outrage against corruption also was reflected on Facebook, Twitter and blogs as opinions for and against the movement flooded the Internet. A section of the Indian populace argues that the movement is anti-democratic and is tarnishing the parliament. 

While the bill still awaits to be passed by the Parliament, Anna Hazare has launched a blog to keep the movement alive, at least online. I believe it will not be very difficult for Team Anna to move this online campaign to offline and once again, summon the people on the streets. 

The Government on the other hand, as Salman Khursheed put it, "were slightly disadvantaged because we didn’t use social media as effectively as they [activists] did". Moreover, even in the view of India's big digital divide, he suggested that it was no longer wise to dismiss the public sentiments voiced via social media as limited to the big cities or the privileged classes... the government has had a “difficult year” and that “things have gone wrong.

He said that the government has began studying media messages and working on plans on how to send out its own. It would be interesting to watch how the government creates and strengthens its presence on the various social networking websites and more importantly, how it counters this movement. 

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After FB & Twitter programs for journalists, this study puts Linkedin on the first place on the utility factor for the news producers. 

Would be interesting to go through case studies for this. What features of this professional networking site are useful to them and how is it better than FB, Twitter.

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Monitors installed Boston Globe's newsroom to display tweets and the news website. 

Seminal.

http://beta.boston.com/2011/08/01/tweets-on-a-pole-an-information-radiator-for-the-newsroom/