Today’s meeting with Tom Rosenstiel, Director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism at the Pew Research Center, was, in my opinion, by far the best two hour site visit we have had in D.C. (CBS comes in a close second). At lunch, we pleaded with Dr. K to ask Bob Schieffer if he could possibly set up another meeting so we can pick Rosenstiel’s brain just a little more. Additionally, I would pay good money to be a fly on the wall during any conversation that Bob Schieffer and Tom Rosenstiel would have – it would be the meeting of unique insights, opinions and predictions by men who have spent their life working to make journalism and public communication better.
Pew Research Center (Pew) is an independent, non-biased public opinion research organization that specializes in research about the public’s attitude towards politics, the press and public policy. The Pew is funded by The Pew Charitable Trust, not the organizations that use the collected data, which means all information is made public and remains accurate and non-partisan. Pew’s research and data analysis does have some media effect by keeping track of how, why and when people do what they do in relation to news and politics.
One of the most interesting statements Rosenstiel made today was: “Old media doesn’t have an audience problem, it has a revenue problem.” Every class I have taken in college has put a lot more emphasis on audience fragmentation and less on advertising dollars being down. But the decrease in revenue is why newspapers are suffering and in contrast the newspaper audience is indeed growing. However, more and more advertising dollars are pushed to the Internet and newer forms of technology (i.e. mobile and iPad). Additionally, the biggest change has been that companies and advertisers don’t need to use news media (newspapers and even TV) to reach their intended audience anymore. Everything has moved to the “free world” – for example classified ads made up the biggest portion of a newspaper’s ad revenue but now, 70% of those ads have moved to the internet on sites like Craigslist – leaving newspapers with nothing to fill the void.
But not all is lost. News media (both print newspapers and traditional news TV) have a place in our world and they are necessary. Rosenstiel has a new book coming out in November of this year called “Blur: How to Know What's True in the Age of Information Overload” and he talks about 8 different functions that journalism and public communication will continue to have. He made a point of talking about how news and information consumption is becoming more and more consumer driven – we can no longer “get away with” slipping messages and information in to broadcasts or ads. Instead, as future professionals, we need to more creative, more innovative and more aware of what consumers want and be able to provide it maybe even before consumers know they want it (Hard to do – yes. Impossible. No.)The essential elements of journalism and communication will continue to be important to the public – there is hope.
Another interesting statement he made was about what the future holds and how current media and news organizations can become the visionary and leader of a this necessary evolution. Rosenstiel said that companies will need to become part news/journalism and part engineering – it is a mind-set and a way of thinking that allows for creative possibilities to see the light of day. We have heard about decreasing viewership, fragmentation, the need for revolution and leadership…now we have heard about the possible solutions. I felt smarter after this meeting. I felt excited for my future career after this meeting. I felt motivated after this meeting. This man was extremely intelligent and was able to break down complex issues into simple terms that we could understand, appreciate and interpret. I was disappointed when our time was up, even though we kept him for an extra hour, and I hope we will have the opportunity to talk with him again. I would love to ask if he sees the newspaper industry becoming more fragmented like TV and if he thinks that 3D television will have any impact before everything moves to the computer and – I could just go on for days. A truly inspirational experience – I’m ready to begin.
Check out this website (www.tbd.com), a completely online newspaper sponsored by Politico in Washington D.C. that is supposed to be direct competition for the number one print newspaper, The Washington Post. It will be interesting to see how successful this experiment is and could possibly determine the future of newspapers.
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