Web Politics

According to the article “Political Candidates Stick to Traditional Media” published in MediaWeek, political candidates from both parties are demonstrating a stubborn devotion to traditional media, along with a cautious streak that is holding them back from truly embracing the Web as an outlet for political ad dollars. Even though Americans’ media habits are rapidly changing a group of panelists that spoke during the Mixx Conference predict that most spending will remain on TV and other tried and true outlets. Richard Kosinsi, vp of political advertising estimated that most candidates were planning to spend around one percent of their total media budgets online, versus the seven percent that most mainstream brands typically spend on the medium:

When it comes to paid media, candidates are about seven years behind. While many candidates have embraced social media platforms such as MySpace, Facebook and YouTube to state their case to the online audience, (where they often don’t have to spend a dime) when it comes to true advertising they are not quite there yet.

According to Rob Shepardson, founding partner of the agency SS+K, who helped advise Senator Barack Obama’s campaign:

Most candidates consider the Web an excellent place to fundraise and to engage activists, but aren’t convinced about its effectiveness in persuading voters. That’s still where the question is. It’s about getting people out on a cold night in Iowa...that’s the biggest challenge.

According to the article, those holding the decision power for candidates’ media campaigns too often rely on what they’ve done in the past, whether it worked or not:

What we are seeing in this election...is the dominance of political game by the same consultant. This is the only profession where you lose again and again and get rehired.

On a positive note, the article offers a flicker of hope for those looking for political spending on the Web:

We’re still early in the race. Right now, candidates are still in raise and save mode. That could change as the fields thin out and TV inventory potentially gets tighter next year.

I sure hope that political candidates turn to the Web. While I would hate to get political SPAM on Facebook I would have to question candidates that don’t use it as an avenue to reach voters. Especially when trying to reach a younger, technologically savvy generation. Web advertising is advertising for the new generation and by ignoring such an avenue it sends the message that political candidates don’t care about the new generation and don’t want to waist their monetary funds on them, which is a big mistake.

Readers in Control

How would you like to see in the news? Ever wish that sometimes you could pick what made front-page headlines or what didn’t for that matter? Now, thanks to the Internet, you can because social network news websites are making it possible by allowing users to vote on what they consider news. The article “Who Controls the News? On the Web, You Can” published in the Christian Science Monitor this week reported that:

The Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ) decided to find out what the difference between what editors of The New York Times considered a top story as opposed to the readers...

The readers PEJ decided to pole were from three user-driven sites: Del.icio.us, Digg and Reddit as well as Yahoo News’s Most Recommended, Most Viewed, and Most E-mailed. The PEJ report mentions that:

In a week when the mainstream press was focused on Iraq and the debate over immigration, the three leading user-news sites were more focused on stories like the release of Apple’s new iPone and that Nintendo had surpassed Sony in net worth.

According to the article while this may generally be seen as more proof that the Internet is corrupting the news and that people aren’t paying attention to the stories that really count, journalist should not go on the ledge over the PEJ report. The main reason is due to the one glaring flaw in the voting which is that it doesn’t account for the age of the visitors to each site. Usually their users are much younger than online readers of tradition media and when you are 25 and single what you consider important is very different from if you were 35 with three kids and a mortgage.

The article still notes that the PEJ study does show that when Web users are given the opportunity, they do make different news choices than professional journalist do and they get their news from very different sources. One example given of the changing face of journalism is DailySource where Web users suggest what stories should appear on it. Along with traditional news sources, it also features video from sites like YouTube and material from blogs.

The site allows users to submit an article and editors take them into consideration when selecting the top stories. The creator of DailySource, Peter Dunn, a journalist and former media coach and consultant said that:

Instead of relying on the stretch resources of one paper people could get high-quality articles and information from over a thousand publications including daily papers, television network site, newsmagazine, journals, blogs and others. But it’s more than just news. I would love to see these local daily sources become a place where people could find resources and share stories about their communities and share ideas about how to solfe problems...

These types of hybrid news sites as well as social networking sites illustrate the decentralizing power of the Internet where people are no longer content to be told what the “news is”. Today readers have their own minds and their own ideas and they want to share them. Those we are smart will listen and jump on the Web 2.0 bandwagon. Readers want to become part of what they are reading. They want to be involved and given the opportunity to interact with everything, including their news.

A Wall Street Magazine?

“A Wall Street Journal Magazine” the headline alone was enough to catch my attention in this week’s news. The article by The New York Times reported that next year Pursuits, a glossy monthly magazine about the lifestyles of the rich, will be created by The Wall Street Journal in hopes of drawing more ads for expensive consumer goods. Robert Frank, a columnist, blogger and author about wealthy America is the leading candidate to become editor of Pursuits.

The first issue will appear next September as an insert in the Journal’s Saturday edition and will go to about 800,000 Journal subscribers in the 18 metropolitan areas where the newspaper sells the most copies. Pursuits will also be available to all readers on The Journal’s Website.

In a Dow Jones news release Marcus W. Brauchli, The Journal's managing editor, said:

Pursuits will offer compelling journalism, vivid imagery and an unmatched guide to wealth, fashion, collecting and travel.

The news of Pursuits comes after Rupert Murdoch, chairman of News Corporation, mused publicly about turning the entire Saturday edition into a magazine.

While I must agree that the idea of Pursuits is an innovative idea and an excellent move towards attracting a younger generation of readers the thought of turning the entire Saturday edition into a magazine is quite disturbing. One of the reasons The Wall Street Journal is so successful is because it has such a high reputation among news readers. I’m afraid that Rupert Murdoch might take the success of Pursuits to far when it comes to the rest of The Wall Street Journal.

Where Did All the Ethics Go?

In response to one of my previous blog postings I came across the article "A Newspaper Defends Naming Jurors" published by The New York Times. It refers back to an article published by The Connecticut Post on September 9, 2007 that dealt with the jury selection process in a court case involving the death penalty. Accompanying the story was an illustration of 18 empty chairs with personal information about each juror including their name, hometown and occupation. After the article was released two of the jurors mentioned were excused from duty after expressing concern for their personal safety. I bogged on this issue and posed the question of just who exactly the newspaper was trying to inform and whether they were in the wrong for doing so.

In The New York Times article I learned that James H. Smith, editor of The Connecticut Post, was defending his decision to publish the story. His reasoning stemmed from the fact that there is no law prohibiting the publication of jurors' names, though sometimes judges will decide not to make the names public. Mr. Smith offers no apologies for the article and stated that:

The U.S. Constitution calls for a public trial with an impartial jury. How do you know if the jury is impartial if you don't know who they are and something about them?

I don't agree with Mr. Smith's reasoning and after hearing the facts of the case I am given a clear idea why the jurors feared retribution. The defendant, Russell Peeler Jr., was convicted of ordering his younger brother to kill Leroy Brown, 8, and his mother, Karen Clarke, in 1999. Mr. Peeler Jr. wanted Leroy Brown killed because he was scheduled to testify against him for killing his mother's boyfriend. The jury was to decide if Mr. Peeler Jr. should spend life in prison or die by lethal injection. With such high stakes one could easily understand why a juror would not particularly want the public, including friends of Mr. Peeler Jr., to know any information about them including where they were from.

A journalism ethics professor from the University of Maryland commented on the release of juror information by saying that:

It could also expose them to pressure from advocates on both sides of the death penalty. Newspapers need to balance the public's right to know with the potential risk of harm to jurors.

There were other alternatives to write about that would have given just as substantive details about the jurors without specifically naming them. You can still get a feel for a person and their impartiality by learning their background without specifically knowing their name. I very much stick to my originally response to hearing of the article in that journalistically and ethically a line was crossed and poor judgments were made. As a reporter it is your job to be objective and ethical towards all parties involved. By publishing such personal information about the 18 jurors the article was no longer simply informing the public.

Just Who Are We Trying to Inform Anyway?

I recently read an article entitled “Jurors excused, mistrial denied in Peeler case” published by The Connecticut Post that was commenting on an earlier publication by The Post. The article released the names, hometowns and personal information about 12 jurors and six alternates in the death penalty hearing for Russell Peeler Jr. on the front page of its Sunday edition. A Superior Court judge excused two jurors, fearful about their safety, from duty after the publication was released.

State’s Attorney Jonathan Benedict said:

This was an exercise of colossal misjudgment by the Connecticut Post.

One of the jurors excused told the judge she was shocked to see her name in Sunday’s newspaper stating, “I had no idea the Connecticut Post would do that, I am now concerned about my safety.” Another juror was excused because she was concerned about the safety of her children.

This incident is incredibly shocking to me especially after hearing that the jurors were “...told not to tell people [they] were on the jury.”

While I’m sure the case was an extremely high profile one and the identities of the jury members speculated about during the time leading up to the trial I see no reason for having not only their names but also their hometowns and personal information published in a newspaper. After learning that the jurors themselves were told to keep their identity a secret it makes me wonder how the media even learned of their names. Then there is the fact that background work had to be done on each of the eighteen members to even have something to write about. Maybe it’s just me but I basically see a big “Here they are, come and get them” headline and it makes me wonder just what news should actually be news. I’m sure that the public is much more interested in what’s going on with the actually case; at least I know I would be. What difference does it make to me as a reader that I now know who the jurors are, where to find their parents, and little bits of personal information about them? Does it mean that if I don’t like the outcome I’m suppose to pay them a person visit, since after reading I’d be able to?

It leaves me wondering what we as readers really want in the news and questioning where our ethics have gone. Should someone really have the right to make others fear for their safety and the safety of their families just to try and entertain readers?

High School Denies Freedom of the Press

What ever happened to freedom of the press? This is the question I was left with after reading the article “School Apologizes After Banning Reporter from Game” originally published by the Winchester Sun. According the newspaper a Kentucky school was apologizing to its local newspaper after banning one of its reporters at the Homecoming game as a form of punishment. The Principal at George Roger’s Clark High School refused to allow a reporter into the press box because he didn’t like an article the newspaper ran earlier that day.

The article in question was about four white students from George Roger’s Clark who gave a fellow black student a racially charged note. According to the mother of the student who received the note it depicted racially violent pictures and statements like “the south will rise again.” After learning of the incident a story was published by the local newspaper. The banned journalist commented, “Reporting the news is their job and the action Principal Gordon Parido took was shocking.”

The banned journalist recalled how he:

...got a phone call saying, you’re banned from the press box tonight and I said you’re kidding right? He said no, Mr. Parido doesn’t want you to be in the press box.

When he questioned the reasoning behind the action he was told that it was because the principal didn’t like the story he published in the paper very well. Since the banning of the reporter Principal Parido has called and apologized to him and while relations seem to be smooth between the school and the newspaper it is still disheartening to hear of such a response by a school district.

It seems to me that such an incident at a school would demand action from the media and not publishing the story would be punished. If my child attended George Roger’s Clark High School I would definitely want to know of such an occurrence and I would be outraged if it were to simply be swept under the rug. I remember in my hometown when a “Hit List” was discovered at the middle school that physically threatened the lives of specific students and it made the front page of many newspapers. While it does present some ethical dilemmas, like publishing the names of those on the hit list, it shouldn’t in anyway be questioned on whether or not to make the issue public.

The most shocking part about this article to me was not only the fact that the principal banned the reporter to punish the paper for reporting on the incident but that the principal had the authority to do so in the first place. News is news and everyone has the right to know about it, especially when it happens on school grounds that are funded by tax payer’s money. Reporters should not have to second guess every word they right to prevent offending or upsetting someone that could later retaliate against them.

Facebook's NewsFriends

I can’t live without my Facebook! I’m sure that most of you have either said or thought these exact words at some point over the last few years. Making it hard to remember what life was like before Facebook in a world where one had to call up friends and actually talk to them to keep in touch and find out what was going on in their lives. Today you can do almost anything on Facebook without actually doing it. From stalking...I mean...learning about your friend’s day-to-day lives to catching up on the latest movies and books just by checking out what your friends have to say about them.

For some, is seems like a big waist of time indulging in such trivial matters but for all of you out there that thought Facebook was for entertainment value alone prepare to be shocked. Facebook is now the latest one-stop-shop for, you guessed it, the news. While sifting through the hits on my RSS feeds I came across a story from News Gator Daily entitled, “Hello Facebook? Say Hello to Your NewsFriends.” The article discussed Facebook’s newly added free application called NewsFriends. Which allows users to easily find, read and share blogs, news, videos and podcasts with their “friends.” It’s simple to use and along with your own chosen feeds it automatically allows you to get the same news that your friends are getting.

As stated in the article by Richard MacManus of ReadWriteWeb:

“NewsFriends is not designed to be the main news reader for power users of products like FeedDemon or NetNewsWire, but it’s a great complement to those products when those users are spending time on Facebook.”

NewsFriends is provided by NewsGator Technologies and is a great way for Facebook-junkies who aren’t currently using a dedicated RSS reader to get all the benefits within a familiar environment. Where you can “post” your favorite articles and comments on a profile page or check out which of your friends was the first to subscribe to a Web site.

I think that in a world where younger generations aren’t spending half as much time skimming news pages as they are their friend’s pages, myself included, that bringing the news directly to them is a great development. Facebook is on their level; they know Facebook and are not intimidated by it. By placing news outlets in a very familiar place it not only allows younger generations easy access to them but also just might create an environment where the free flow of news content become like second nature.

To add the free NewsFriends application to your Facebook account click here.