Results matching “editors looking to change”

The "local focus" mantra that has spread to so many U.S. and U.K. newspapers is also alive and well at Latin American newspapers, albeit with a different game plan for success.

In the view of Editor & Publisher's Mark Fitzgerald, who attended a recent seminar for senior editors of leading Latin American dailies, the reasons for going hyperlocal are essentially the same across the board: to combat the pressures of the internet.

In the U.S., local news is seen as "the one franchise that differentiates newspapers from any other media pretenders." In this conception, in order to survive the digital era, newspapers can create multi-media hyperlocal ventures, tying together a social networking model with what they do best, print, to encourage "constant refreshment of the web site."    

The American local model, however, does not whole-heartedly encourage a two-way dialogue between residents and newspaper. Dialogue is important, yes, but not in the same way as in Latin America. There, it is the foundation of what makes local news successful; newspapers view "their local efforts as ways to imitate the Web's interactivity and its encouragement of self-expression."

"People want to narrate their stories," El Tiempo Editor in Chief Ernesto Cortes Fierro said. "People want to resolve their own problems. It is two-way content, and in a way it is a mutual rediscovery of the newspaper and the citizens."

Readers are an integral part of the Latin American local news model; efforts have ranged from including neighbor hood residents on the board (El Tiempo) to equipping citizen journalists with cameras to get footage during protests against President Hugo Chavez (Venezuelan daily El Nacional).

Source: Editor & Publisher 

Jim Roberts, digital news editor at The New York Times, will speak of the newsroom integration process undergone by the paper of record at the upcoming World Editors Forum, to be held June 1-4 in Gothenburg, Sweden.

He'll describe the last 3 years at the Times, as "it has attempted to make what I consider to be a historic shift in its mission," towards a much more rounded and "almost platform-agnostic" approach.

Roberts isn't one of those online editors who have an instinctive aversion for print, to the contrary - he worked as a print journalist and editor, as well as a National news editor at the Times. Although he resists calling the Times 'print-centric', it's a fact that print still accounts for over 80% of the company's revenues, and that "our main mission still is putting out a print publication," he said.

One key factor in the NYT's integration process was the gradual approach adopted by the newspaper, instead of "a radical shakeup" - similar to the Guardian's approach in that respect.

"There was a change in newsroom culture and it had its rocky moments, I certainly can't minimize that," said Roberts.

But "We haven't ordered anyone to focus on digital journalism to the exclusion of everything else." Instead, "We've encouraged people to think of Web as one of an array of tools and outlets to report the news."

Here are some of the other factors that made the Times' integration approach successful, in Roberts' view:

- The creation of a Continuous News Desk, in 1999, first appealed to foreign correspondents. With the help of staff based in New York, the reporters could publish stories online that could instantly be read by their sources. This established the foundations for print reporters seeking the advantages of online.

- Not having evolved through edicts, but by engaging staff's brains: give the print reporters the necessary tools.

- Teaching journalists that the Web can mean more and better ways to tell stories.

- Two years ago, the Times 'planted' multimedia editors at each news desk. This led to increased print-online collaboration on stories and to successful enterprise-type projects, where the Web content complemented the print articles, and vice versa (see this multimedia project about prisoners that were exonerated by DNA evidence, which complemented ex-prisoner profiles in the print edition).

- Roberts' own print background, thus trusting relationship with the paper's reporters. "One of my chores has been to eliminate the fear aspect of it (writing for the Web)."

- Last but not least, tell reporters that if they don't report online, their competitors will: "If I could point to one thing that has really worked, it is appealing to reporters' competitive instincts."


Roberts will speak in the second session of the World Editors Forum, entitled "Are integrated newsrooms really working?" View other interviews in this preview series by clicking here.

Source: Jim Roberts, Digital News Editor, The New York Times

There has been a lot of coverage of the results of the Newsroom Barometer, including Reuters' own take on the findings.

If you haven't taken a look at the main findings (namely editors' massive acceptation of the integrated newsroom model, as well as about half of them believing news will be free in the future and that online will be the most common platform for news), you can read more below:

Read Part 1: Presentation - main results, the integrated newsroom will be the norm
Read Part 2: Multimedia, multi-skilled and integrated
Read Part 3: The future of the press
Read Part 4: Who participated in the survey?
Read Part 5: Comments by John Zogby and WEF President George Brock
Read Part 6: Threats to newspapers, areas of investment, more results


But here are a few more results that may have gone under the radar.

If provided resources to invest in editorial quality, what would you do first within the newsroom?

Across all categories, the responses illustrated two clear concerns for editors, which superceded all others: their staff needs to be attuned to new media (36% of the respondents would first train their staff in new media), and they need more journalists to produce quality coverage (30%, up from 22% last year). As more newsrooms face layoffs and tight budgets, editors are increasingly seeking to safeguard one of the main conditions to quality journalism: a team of qualified journalists.

For editors from newspapers whose number of journalists had decreased, their main priority was to recruit more journalists, at 50%, while also recognizing the necessity of new media training, at 31%. Even among newspapers whose staff had increased, 26% of editors wished to recruit more journalists (36% new media training).

This clearly shows that, in the view of editors, cutting staff and journalistic resources is not a solution - to the contrary - to resolve financial concerns a newspaper may have.

Overall, what do you view as the two greatest threats to the future of your newspaper?

57% of respondents saw the biggest threat to the future of newspapers coming from declining readership among young people. One of the greatest challenges faced by newspapers today is structural, linked to a change in habits among readers, as they become consumers of alternative forms of media.
Tied to this, a good share of respondents (37%) saw the Internet and digital media as a threat. This was closely followed by lack of editorial innovation (36%) and lack of investment (29%), which are also inter-related.

The results showed a split between perception of threats as being external, due to contextual evolutions of the market (young readership decline, digital media) and internal, due to lack of newspaper innovation - or the financial means to innovate.

Now looking specifically to your newspaper's editorial independence in the future, what do you view as the principal threat?

Perceived threats to editorial independence ranged relatively closely from 13% who listed 'other' concerns, to 23% who thought the biggest pressure would come from advertisers, through 19% who listed political pressure and 20% shareholder pressure (20%). Still, a combined 42% perceived the main threat as being related to newspapers' financial dependence, whether on shareholders and advertisers.

Where newspapers were heavily capitalized in the stock market, such as in Western Europe and North America, shareholder pressure was strong, 35% and 23% respectively, but political pressure didn't pose any threat - 3% for both.

Inversely, in many other regions, financial pressures were less important, but lack of press freedom led many editors to fear political pressure.

Do you think that in the future opinion and analysis pages will:

The results were stable compared to 2006. Two thirds (67%) of the respondents believed opinion and analysis pages would increase: many foresaw the upcoming evolution of newspaper content, which will be less about factual news and more about analysis and commentary.

An astonishingly small number of respondents from North America (50%) believed analysis and opinion would increase, compared to 76% for Western Europe (and 78% Eastern). This large difference underlines a divergence in editors' perception of the function their newspapers will have in the future, whether these increasingly focus on constant breaking news or instead turn to more analytical, magazine-type content. These results also reflect worries by American editors about having the proper resources to increase their opinion and analytical content.


If you would like more information about the Newsroom Barometer, don't hesitate to contact us. And let's not forget that the bright revelation of Barometer, as was the case last year, was that 84% of newspaper editors are optimistic about their newspaper's future, despite frequent doom and gloom reports...

In this section, John Zogby, CEO of Zogby International, and George Brock, World Editors Forum President and editor of the Saturday Times in the UK, comment on the results of the 2008 Newsroom Barometer. Both agree that the results show editors have opened to the new necessities of the digital age, while remaining strongly conscious of the possible threats to their newspapers and journalism.

(View the main results to this year's survey here.)

According to Brock, this year's survey points to the fact that "editors remain confident about a mixed-media future and have quietly got on with the business of integrating their newsrooms," but this is "tempered by anxiety that newspapers are not investing enough in recruitment and training for the future."

The path is clear for many editors: integrate the newsroom, think multimedia, train or hire a team of multi-skilled journalists. So are the threats: lack of investment, lack of training, lack of cultural change.

In the face of these deep changes for the newspaper industry and its organization, editors may often face managerial resistance to undergo these investments. But media companies must be bold. Their editors, for the most part, are ready to be. Said Brock: "I read the message of this year's Newsroom Barometer as an appeal from editors to their companies to be bold in the face of change and as a sign that they themselves intend to make the most of new opportunities."

For Zogby, who goes into more detail about the numeric results (see below), this year's results show that editors have adapted or are adapting to the current redefinition of the 4th Estate, the press, in light of the changes brought in part by the Internet.

"Perhaps the most important finding to emerge from the 2008 survey is that editors remain optimistic about the futures of their papers," as was the case for the previous edition of the Newsroom Barometer, wrote Zogby.

Yet this optimism shouldn't hide the urgency for newspapers to rethink their model. "For these editors the future is self-evident and our survey shows that they see the writing on the newsroom wall.  The evolution of the 4th Estate is no longer questions of if, when or how.  Editors now know the solution:  Innovate.  Integrate.  Or perish."

Read Brock and Zogby's full comments below.

Comments on the 2008 Newsroom Barometer by George Brock

Editors remain confident about a mixed-media future and have quietly got on with the business of integrating their newsrooms. The optimism is not universal and it is tempered by anxiety that newspapers are not investing enough in recruitment and training for the future.

Newspaper managements might reply that investment remains risky when it isn't yet clear where the income from digital publishing is supposed to come from. But newspaper businesses are made by content which creates and sustains demand. The first newspapers did not come about when someone assembled advertising platforms, distribution networks and hardware and afterwards looked for content to put into that system.

The sequence of events was the reverse. Somebody wants to tell as many people as possible something of interest or importance, discovers a sustained curiosity in that information or opinion and eventually a publishing operation grows up to supply the demand. The chain reaction is sparked by interest in the story, view, picture, interview, column, cartoon that's on offer. Without that first moment of ignition, nothing else happens.

You think this sounds a little basic? It is. But you would be surprised how often this simple reality is forgotten as today's media businesses struggle to adapt to a world in which digital technology is rewriting the economics of news publishing.

Online news and opinion has now been with us for long enough to see that no prediction about the future of news which is based on technology alone can tell us the future. Newspapers are not just ink marks on squashed trees: they are what people trust, they amuse people, in short they are a collection of ideas and information with which a reader forms a relationship. Where journalism - whether professional, citizen or any mixture of the two - creates that relationship, something lasting is born and can be sustained. You can see examples of success and failure both online and in print. As the first flush of online innovation and enthusiasm wears off, we can see more clearly that some of the online successes will grow very big indeed, but that only the best will prosper. Making information available - and the web makes it available as never before - does not make it wanted. Newspapers which innovate and adapt will also survive because their qualities are more important than the medium. Some of the failures in both online and print will be terminal.

I read the message of this year's Newsroom Barometer as an appeal from editors to their companies to be bold in the face of change and as a sign that they themselves intend to make the most of new opportunities. Most editors are clear that the essential qualities of good journalism can adapt to a new medium. They accept as a fact needing no further debate that their papers will now reach their constituency by several channels and not by one.

Redefining the 4th Estate: Opinions of the Editors by John Zogby

In the 550 years since the first pages of print rolled off the presses in the Bavarian town of Mainz, printed news evolved relatively unimpeded.  Even the invention and proliferation of radio and television failed to stymie the growth of newspapers, largely due to the ability of newspapers to provide more in-depth coverage.
    
The centuries-long hegemony of the ink and paper news model today faces its greatest threat--the advent of an independent and free Internet-based media.  This threat was evidenced at the height of the 2005 British elections with the publication of the 'Downing Street Memo' by The Sunday Times.  That short but potent document presented potentially damning evidence surrounding the planning in the run-up to the Iraq War, and while British papers seized the story, the leaked memo made only slight ripples in the American print media.  It did create, however, a surge within the rapidly developing blog community who used the lack of traditional media coverage as a call to arms.

Now, as the Internet struggles to define itself in the shadow of the Fourth Estate, the question remains: will these two mediums continue to battle for supremacy or will they find stability in an integrated symbiotic relationship? To help bring clarity to this question, Zogby International was commissioned by the World Editors Forum and Reuters to survey 704 newspaper editors worldwide for the second in a series of annual 'Newsroom Barometer Surveys.'

    Perhaps the most important finding to emerge from the 2008 survey is that editors remain optimistic about the futures of their papers.  As in the 2006 Newsroom Barometer, nearly all editors (84%) are optimistic about the future of their paper.  The editors surveyed are as aware of what the future may hold for their industry as they are unified in their recognition of the underlying threats and potential solutions.

The Future

    The majority of editors (56%) now believe that most news (print and online) will be free in the future--up from 48% in 2006.  Nearly two-in-three editors (63%) believe that within a decade the most common form of  news consumption will be some form of electronic media--whether online (44%), mobile (12%) or through newer electronic media like e-papers and tablets (7%).  Less than a third (31%) believe print will remain the most common form of consumption.

    The perception of editors with respect to the future is not limited to the news product itself.  The overwhelming majority (83%) agree that within 5 years their nation's journalist workforce will be expected to know how to produce content for all platforms (e.g., print, video, audio and web).  Still, perception of the future is but one dimension of the story -- the remainder is defined by the threats to the industry and  how editors address those threats. 

The Threats

    By-and-large editors agree on the nature of the threats posed to their industry.  The decline in youth readership (58%), the rise in Internet and digital media (38%) and the lack of editorial innovation (36%) all speak to the consensus that change is imminent.  These editors tell us their chief sources of pressure are from advertisers (22%), shareholders (20%) and political forces (19%).  All pressure, no doubt,  to confront the changing reality through innovation and integration. 

    On one issue editors paint a mixed picture--the current state of their newsroom.  For some (39%) circulation in the past year is up; for others (29%) it is down.  One-third of editors (33%) have added journalists, a quarter have lost journalists (24%) and for the rest (42%) the number of journalists on their staff remains unchanged from a year ago. 


The Solutions

    When a majority of editors (54%) report that they have an integrated newsroom, they may make such statements not necessarily based on the reality, but also out of necessity.  Regardless of whether integration has or has not occurred, nearly all (86%) agree that it will be the norm in the near future.  Editors also agree on the steps needed to address other threats.  Asked what investments they would make in their newsroom given the opportunity, the top two investments cited--training journalists in new media (36%) and recruitment of new journalists (31%)--demonstrate that editors are looking to make a commitment to the future.  And with the recognition that editorial innovation is needed, 69% of editors agree that opinion and analysis pages will play an increasingly larger role in the future. 


Yes, editors are optimistic about the future of their papers, but they are also aware of the potential danger on the horizon.  Less than half (45%) believe the quality of journalism will improve over the next year.  More than a quarter (28%) believe the quality will worsen; a finding reflected in the high level of importance editors place on the need for investment in training and recruitment. 

For these editors the future is self-evident and our survey shows that they see the writing on the newsroom wall.  The evolution of the 4th Estate is no longer questions of if, when or how.  Editors now know the solution:  Innovate.  Integrate.  Or perish.


Read Part 1: Presentation - main results, the integrated newsroom will be the norm
Read Part 2: Multimedia, multi-skilled and integrated
Read Part 3: The future of the press
Read Part 4: Who participated in the survey?
Read Part 5: Comments by John Zogby and WEF President George Brock
Read Part 6: Threats to newspapers, areas of investment, more results

As newspapers worldwide weigh the decision to integrate their print and online newsrooms and grapple with whether their journalists should be fully multimedia capable or instead keep some specializations, the 2008 Newsroom Barometer asked a series of questions to gauge the current attitudes towards these issues.

Among the main findings:
- 86% believe integrated print and online newsrooms will become the norm in the short term - five years.
- 83% believe journalists will be expected to be able to produce content for all media within five years.
- 83% think newsroom design is an important factor in helping print and online collaboration.
- 53% claim to have an integrated newsroom.
- Among those who don't have an integrated newsroom, more than two thirds (69%) expect to have one within five years.

Do you agree or disagree that the "integrated newsroom" or "multimedia newsroom" will be the norm for newspapers in your country in 5 years?

An overwhelming majority of respondents, 86%, agreed that the integrated newsroom would be the norm for newspapers in the future. Moreover, nearly half "strongly agreed" that that would be the case. Less than 3% "strongly disagreed." Firstly, this shows that the model of the integrated newsroom, in which journalists are platform-agnostic, is deemed to be the most adapted to the current transition of newspapers. Secondly, it means editors believe these changes will occur very swiftly, if the integrated newsroom is to be "the norm" within five years.

The biggest proponents of the integrated newsroom came from North America, where 95% believe in the integrated newsroom. For other respondents, irrespective of their geographic location, the results were on par with average, although slightly lesser in Africa and Asia, at 74%.

Do you believe that within 5 years journalists in your country will be expected to know how to produce content for all platforms (print, video, audio, Web, mobile, etc.)?

As for the previous question - since the integrated newsroom and platform-agnostic journalism are tied together - an overwhelming majority of respondents, 83%, believes in the advent of multimedia journalists. Only 15% disagreed, an impressively low figure considering that most newspapers around the world still have single-platform journalists.
Again, North American respondents were the biggest believers in multimedia journalism, at 91% (62% 'strongly' and 29% 'somewhat'). This contrasts with respondents from Asia and Africa, who were less likely to think journalists would be platform-agnostic (70% and 73.5% respectively). Again, this is presumably because many of these newspapers are still more strongly focusing on their print product.

In your opinion, how important is the physical layout / design of your newsroom in determining how print and online journalists collaborate?

Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of respondents (83%) believed that newsroom design was at least 'somewhat' (39%) or 'very' (42%) important in determining collaboration among print and online journalists. At a time when some steps of the news process can be achieved with no need for physical proximity, editors still value the importance of a newsroom layout that favors staff interaction and helps make the editorial process more efficient. This also means that editors believe cultural change, through human interaction, is necessary to promote collaboration between print and online.

When do you expect your newspaper to have an integrated newsroom?

Newsroom integration, though not the norm yet, is among short-term priorities for newspapers and their editors. Of the 319 respondents who said they're newsroom wasn't integrated, a combined 69% expects to integrate within the next five years (39% within the next two, 30% within five). However, one in five respondents still isn't sure when - or perhaps whether - his or her newsroom will be integrated.

There is a correlation between the perceived urgency of newsroom integration and the state of a newspaper's print circulation. For newspapers whose circulation had decreased last year, a combined 80% of respondents expected to integrate within the next five years - including 48% in the next two. This starkly contrasts with newspapers whose circulation increased: 70% expected to integrate newsrooms in the next five years, including 41% in the next two. Editors consider newsroom integration to be more than a simple change in print-online collaboration. Newsroom integration can potentially be an editorial solution to struggles faced by newspapers in print.

Read Part 1: Presentation - main results, the integrated newsroom will be the norm
Read Part 2: Multimedia, multi-skilled and integrated
Read Part 3: The future of the press
Read Part 4: Who participated in the survey?
Read Part 5: Comments by John Zogby and WEF President George Brock
Read Part 6: Threats to newspapers, areas of investment, more results

Marcus Brauchli, top editor of the Wall Street Journal is stepping down after less than five months since Rupert Murdoch took control of the paper.

Brauchli had been in the job for a year, Last month, he said in an interview that Murdoch was "very engaged" but "set broad objectives" to maintain the paper's independence.

Part of the agreement that allowed Murdoch to buy the WSJ stated that Murdoch could not remove three top-ranking editors, including Brauchli. With Brauchli's resignation, Murdoch can now choose a successor, but a special committee must approve of that person first, according to the agreement.

Some Journal staffers say that "Brauchli felt overshadowed by the paper's new publisher, Robert Thomson, a former editor of another Murdoch property, the Times of London."

Thomson said Murdoch is "clearly interested in challenging the journalistic establishment" by broadening the Journal's coverage. Washingtonpost.com's Howard Kurtz wonders if "the sense of anxiety [of Murdoch's political interference] could return if Murdoch names an editor, whether Thomson or someone else, from outside the Journal culture."

Source: WashingtonPost.com

UPDATE:
Brauchli wrote a memo to his staff that stated his reason as "now that the ownership transition has taken place, I have come to believe the new owners should have a managing editor of their choosing."

He acknowledges that "change was necessary" in the newspaper industry, but also when News Corp. bought Dow Jones, an editorial agreement was made to "block commercial or political interference in our journalism," read the memo.

Though Brauchli concedes that the new management has adhered to the agreement and that the "journalistic integrity remains intact," WSJ.com reports that Brauchli had difficulties being a mediator between the paper's traditions and News Corp's new vision. He had complained that "he wasn't always in the loop about new ideas" in the past few weeks, according to WSJ.com.

Reuters reports that the resignation could "reignite worries about editorial independence that were voiced during Murdoch's takeover bid when some staffers feared the Journal's reputation as the top U.S. business newspaper would be threatened if Murdoch became proprietor."

With Brauchli's resignation, current WSJ publisher Robert Thomson may take on a more active role in the newsroom, but isn't expected to be the interim managing editor, according to WSJ.com. There already is a search for the next managing editor. Brauchli, however, is likely to stay in the company, possibly as a consultant, says WSJ.com, guiding senior management, including "whether News Corp.'s Star-TV service in Asia should launch a business-news channel."

Murdoch said he believed Brauchli's experience "will be a great asset, especially in Asia -- a region where we see significant growth potential and where he has particular expertise."

Dean Starkman of CJR writes that "with Brauchli gone, the Journal newsroom loses not just a topflight editor and bureau chief, a great Asia hand, and someone who was a real, live reporter, [but also] loses a surprisingly savvy internal diplomat who, I thought, might just have been adroit enough to manage the inevitable tensions that would arise from the takeover, at least enough to preserve some of the Journal's great journalistic heritage."

Sources: Poynter Online, Wall Street Journal, Columbia Journalism Review, Reuters
through Poynter Romenesko

Last week, journalists Anne Stine Saether and Anders Sooth Knutsen from Norway's VG's online arm were awarded with the Skup-diploma, an investigative prize, for developing the newspaper's biggest multimedia project ever.

The idea for the online project about domestic killings in Norway was born in mid-2007 after a murder case that had been buried in the back pages of the paper. It took six months to complete, but on, Nov. 12 the front page of VG's print edition featured portraits of women killed by their men. The story was planned and executed on all platforms simultaneously, and included online blogs, articles, chats, and video interviews with some of the murderers, next of kin, psychologists, and others.

For the project, VG took on the task of extensively researching anonymous homicide statistics, using all the archives and registers they could access for the multi-media project.

"The idea for the project came as a result of my own anger and feeling of impotence half a year ago. Yet another woman had been murdered and the story was buried far back in the newspaper, I thought, dammit, this happens all the time, which lead to the idea to spray the front page with the faces of women who'd suffered such a fate," said Kjersti Sortland, the managing editor of the award-winning journalists.

The project took half-a-year to finish, but the completed coverage was "groundbreaking" and "led to a change in how murders are reported in Norway," according to Online Journalism Scandinavia's Kristine Lowe.

The Norwegian government plans to map domestic murders, and starting in 2007, the Norwegian police had began to register the relationship between the murderer and victim in their reports.

"In contrast to other countries, we did not know how many women were killed by their husbands, partners and boyfriends in Norway," said the jury who awarded the prize.

Source: Journalism.co.uk (photo)