AP News, March 12th, 2007
With television news losing audience, newspapers struggling to stay afloat and growth even slowing on Internet sites, it seems like a desolate time for the news industry.
Yet there are signs of hope, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism, which issued its annual report on the state of journalism on Sunday.
People haven't lost interest in news, said Tom Rosenstiel, the project's director. But all facets of the industry are hurting simply because there are so many more ways to get information _ on broadcast and cable television, big-city newspapers and local handouts, Web sites, blogs, cell phones and PDAs.
"The problem is more about capturing an audience that you can convert into money to subsidize the gathering of news," he said.
Some newspapers have reacted to the diminished capacity by closing foreign bureaus or trying to play up local news. But these approaches may make these newspapers increasingly irrelevant in the eyes of readers, he said.
Times like these are when renegades and free thinkers can flourish, people like Ted Turner when he started CNN, Rosenstiel said.
There are new ideas bubbling up.
Rosenstiel said there have been many improvements in media-owned Web sites. Blogs are also starting to get more journalistic, counter to the image of someone sitting in their pajamas and writing what comes to them. He cited the L.A. Observed Web site and Global Voices, which culls news from various sources around the world and subjects it to tight editing.
"Where we need to have bolder leadership is on the business side," he said.
The project's report noted how the "argument culture" of cable television news is now being replaced by the "answer culture." Instead of presenting "Crossfire"-style debates, there's a greater trend toward shows that simply present the world through an ideological prism, with hosts like Bill O'Reilly, Keith Olbermann and Lou Dobbs.
The report also discussed how public ownership of media organizations may be giving way to more private ownership, and whether that will ultimately benefit or detract from newsgathering.
Ethnic press is the only media sector that is still growing, the report said.
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On the Net:
http://www.stateofthemedia.org
