The Choice of a New Generation

The reading this week in the Social Role of the Mass Media class has primarily focused on cybermedia from the journalist’s point of view: ethics, legalities, mobile reporting, effective use of social media, verification, and so on.

But who’s consuming all of this cybermedia?  Of course, we know from weeks past it’s all of those Millennials, a fact highlighted in this piece from the Associated Press.

Independence Examiner (April 13, 1945).  Harry S. Truman Presidential Museum & 
Library.  Independence, Missouri.  Photographed by Stephen Milligan (June 28, 2014).

To maintain credibility, transparency, and all of those other honest, forthright characteristics of a good journalism teacher, I must admit I didn’t some across this story after hours of in-depth research for this class.  No, while I was trying to grade my way out from under a pile of papers in time for this week’s third marking period report card deadline, this article appeared in my e-mail inbox from none other than John, the lawyer who doesn’t watch local news but instead gets his news from Google and phone alerts—he of student bus driving fame (see my Week 6 blog post).

The story even uses Tom Rosenstiel as a source—he of Blur and The Elements of Journalism fame (see just about every week of this class).

The piece details the results of a survey showing most Millennials get their news online, mostly from cybermedia like Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and YouTube.  The results also show this method of consumption is trickling up into older generations. And news consumers are using up to three or four cybermedia sites for their news.

Still, though, some of those who gather their news from social media have a use for newspapers and television, but they are growing tired of those talking heads spouting off opinions—bad news for those purveyors of journalism of affirmation.

Possibly another nail in affirmation journalism’s coffin: Well over half those who get their news via cybermedia say they subscribe to multiple viewpoints in their feeds.  If only everyone could or would be this open minded!

We can’t have our cybercake and eat it, too, though—most of those surveyed admit to receiving their news through passive consumption instead of actively seeking it out, attending to the stories that pop up in those feeds.  In teaching a new generation of students news literacy, journalism educators can stress the value of active consumption.

A little bit of icing on that cybercake is that even when respondents encountered news randomly on social media, some conducted further research into the topic of their own volition.  Healthy skepticism!  What better way to educate oneself and make an informed judgment?

And a big dollop of whipped cream on that cake: News consumption and cybermedia engagement are increasing in all age groups studied.  Surely this will lead to a more informed, engaged populace

Perhaps there is hope for this new generation—and for the generations ahead of it.

Palmetto Pride

How could I let this week pass without acknowledging—nay, basking in—the pride I and many other South Carolinians have in our former governor, Mark Sanford, who set the example for good health and outdoor tourism with his penchant for walking the Appalachian Trail?

And now, Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel have immortalized Sanford in their text Blur as a cautionary tale—oops, I mean…example…of how interview subjects are booked for television news programs.

South Carolina State House.  Columbia, South Carolina.  1855.  
Greek Revival style.  National Register of Historic Places 
(June 5, 1970).  National Historic Landmark (May 11, 1976).  
Photographed by Stephen Milligan (June 21, 2010). 

Just as Sanford had jetted off to Argentina for a week to court his mistress, upon returning to his job as leader of the Palmetto State, he was immediately courted by television news outlets to come onto their programs to tell his tale of tortured love—mostly on his own terms or with promises of sympathetic interviewers, according to the e-mail messages Charleston’s newspaper, The Post and Courier, snagged through the Freedom of Information Act.

Talk about adding insult to injury!  It’s bad enough the man cheated on his wife, abandoned his job for a week, abandoned his four sons the week of Father’s Day, and lied about the whole mess (there’s that Palmetto Pride showing again), but then he has media franchises clamoring to have him as a guest so he can explain away the whole thing (wait, Palmetto Pride is an organization dedicated to fight litter in South Carolina…how appropriate—I’ll leave that reference in).

I remember Gov. Sanford’s 2009 walk well—I was in Springfield, Illinois, at the time, participating in a fellowship to study Abraham Lincoln for a week.  With only one teacher from each state, as the lone South Carolinian, I was the center of attention the morning the story broke.  A day or two later, the lady from Ohio even accused Sanford of having Michael Jackson killed to deflect attention from his escapades. 

Even more embarrassment—now South Carolina will forever be linked in some minds to the death of the King of Pop!

As a journalism teacher, there is something here to truly be proud of—the investigative reporting (see how I worked that other topic of discussion from this week in) of Gina Smith, The State newspaper reporter who drove four hours to Atlanta in the middle of the night to greet Sanford as he stepped off the airplane at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport that morning—to avoid the Columbia airport, of course.  Smith had gotten a tip that something other than a stroll on the Appalachian Trail was afoot, so she pursued the investigation—did a little digging, did a little raking—and hit pay dirt.

Those are the tools of any good investigative reporter—a shovel and a rake to uncover and sort through the muck politicians like Mark Sanford so plentifully supply their constituents.  If it hadn’t been for Smith’s persistence, Sanford’s dishonesty might have taken longer to be uncovered—or even have been obscured in the glare of his golden boy image.

Stay Tuned—Your Local News Isn’t Next…or Is It?

In Chapter 5 of The Elements of Journalism, “Independence from Faction,” Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel make some predictions about the future of localism.

News consumption will move away from local topics.  National electronic news organizations will arise.  Internet news will further polarize society.  Small interest groups will spring up.  And it’s already happening!

Old Horry County Courthouse.  Conway, South Carolina.  1908.  Photographed 
by Stephen Milligan (April 3, 2011). 

Just when you thought localism might be an antidote to all the ill feelings people seem to have toward the national media…

According to the authors’ research, news consumers have more confidence in their local media than in the national media, but local media may go the way of the film camera if the these startling predictions come to pass.                         

At least the predictions were somewhat startling to me.  Through my rose-colored glasses, I thought people would always want to see their children’s names and photos in the paper or clip and save a beloved relative’s obituary.

What a quaint notion!  Why wait for a photo of a child to be published?  Children are already famous—what parent doesn’t whip out a ubiquitous cell phone, snap a photo of the child doing something allegedly cute, and upload it to a social media site, if not multiple social media sites?  Every moment of one’s existence is captured and published these days.

And why wait for that obituary to be published when it can be found instantly online?  You can even sign the online guestbook—no need to attend a visitation to sign a real guestbook, or rather print in it since no one is taught cursive writing anymore.

In the dark ages of my childhood, my hometown, little old Conway, South Carolina, had two newspapers, The Field and Herald (named for the town’s agricultural heritage) and The Horry Independent (pronounced OR-ee and named for the county, Horry, which developed a reputation for independence since it’s cut off from the rest of South Carolina by rivers; the county was named for local Revolutionary War hero Peter Horry).

Now, keep in mind both of these newspapers were weekly papers, so we had to wait an entire week to see the school honor roll or the latest tobacco crop yield report.

The Field and Herald has been long gone, but The Horry Independent is still thriving; in fact, it’s part of a larger publishing group, Waccamaw Publishers (named for the river that runs through the heart of the county; ultimately named for the local Native American tribe), that prints weekly newspapers for several of the smaller, rural towns and communities in the county (The Sun News is the county’s daily paper out of Myrtle Beach).

Maybe this publishing group is an anomaly, an anachronism, in today’s media world.

Or maybe localism is still alive…in your local newspaper, your local magazine, your local radio news show, your local television news program.

In another word—dare I say it?  Locally.