Public broadcasters face grave risks of losing credibility and trust through increasing commercialism of their work, says David Fanning, founding executive producer of the award-winning series Frontline. It is "shameful" he says about the ways some public stations use pledge drives to market products for local sponsors. "This is our deepest embarrassment as public broadcasters…we spend more of our energy and promotional time pushing programs that have nothing to do with our mission." Fanning delivered remarks at the annual James L. Loper Lecture in Public Service Broadcasting in November before an audience of public broadcasting leaders, community leaders, scholars and……
Year: 2009
Everything Old Is New Again – and Again and Again
For last year's elections, major newspaper web sites introduced such innovations as issues tracking and geotagged election watches, evidently unaware that these very tools had been introduced by Evans Witt and others back in 1996 on the first newspaper election web sites, when new media were really new. Some sites even had audio and video clips in 1996. OK, video over dialup was pretty jerky, but it was there, 13 years ago, the dog walking on its hind legs.Now we see print editors gearing up for tablet computers, as reported this week by the New York Times. The Times even……
2009: A year for philanthropy-driven news
This article appeared as an op-ed in the Sunday, Dec. 13, edition of Newsday.Will news nonprofits bankrolled by foundations and philanthropists be pillars of the future media ecology? To judge by the fast decline of mainstream media’s business model, and the fast rise in philanthropy-funded journalism, it’s starting to look that way.This has been an extraordinary year for the creation of new-media organizations and Web sites, and a big reason is the money that foundations and wealthy individuals are investing. Thousands of community news sites have been launched, and most of the prominent ones are nonprofits. Just in the last……
Entrepreneurship and the Community Web: Motherlode of ideas
One of them is fueled by a $2 million investment and embarked on a plan to establish community news network in 50 American cities. Another is a south Los Angeles site serving a neighborhood just 1 square mile in geography. One has been in the community news business for six years; another is just now starting to monetize his site.These were among the news sites represented at Friday’s “Entrepreneurship and the Community Web” conference at the University of Southern California. To my knowledge, anyway, it was the first time a large group of community news sites had ever gotten together……
Bloggers and the First Amendment: Shield Law Test
(Note: This is the second in a series of posts about this topic by Kelsey Browne & Ariel Fox) Finally, on its 17th try, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to send the proposed Federal Shield Law to the floor. This is promising, particularly because the Senate bill's definition of who would be eligible for Shield Law protection – as it currently stands – is pretty good for bloggers, and better than the House bill's definition. As we discussed previously, the House's version restricts coverage to those who receive a substantial portion of their livelihood or substantial financial gain from their……
Public Diplomacy and the USA
At a time when issues of soft/smart power are central to US foreign policy and the emerging strategy in Afghanistan, the history of American public diplomacy has an unprecedented significance. The USC Center on Public Diplomacy, in association with the USC Master of Diplomacy Program, USC Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership & Policy, and the Public Diplomacy Council present a reception featuring USC professor and author Nick Cull and Syracuse professor Mike Schneider. This event, held at the USC offices in Washington, DC, marks the launch of Nick's new book, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency: American……
Presented at FTC: New players help strengthen news scene
Remarks prepared for delivery Dec. 1 at Federal Trade Commission workshop on "How Will Journalism Survive the Internet Age?" Today, anyone can aspire to be a news provider, and increasingly, people and organizations are deciding that's exactly what they want to be. It's this process — many voices instead of few — that is fundamentally transforming our news ecology. The new players come in all sizes and forms, including the traditional for-profit model. I'll focus here on nonprofits and also on non-news organizations that are quickly emerging as news producers. These newcomers are not making up for all the resources……
Cowan & Westphal: Reality check. Shrinking government support contributes to news media economic decline
A mythology about the relationship between American government and the news business is again making the rounds, and it needs a corrective jolt. The myth is that the commercial press in this country stands wholly independent of governmental sustenance. Here's the jolt: There's never been a time in U.S. history when government dollars weren't propping up the news business. This year, federal, state and local governments will spend well over $1 billion to support commercial news publishers through tax breaks, postal subsidies and the printing of public notices…….
Entrepreneurship and the Community Web
In partnership with USC Annenberg’s School of Journalism, Center on Communication Leadership & Policy Senior Fellow and USC Annenberg executive in residence David Westphal convenes a meeting of top producers of web based community news and information to discuss best practices, building audiences, and serving the information needs of local communities. The program also includes presentations by Jarl Mohn, media investor, philanthropist and USC Annenberg board chairman and Jonathan Weber, founder and editor of NewWest.net. This program is part of Dean Ernest Wilson’s Entrepreneurship and Economic Literacy Initiative (ELE). There is no charge to attend, but advance registration is requested…….
Why does anyone really want to buy NBC?
WASHINGTON – Any day now, if published reports are accurate, cable giant Comcast will celebrate Thanksgiving not by dining on turkey but by feasting on peacock: Comcast is set to acquire NBC from General Electric. However, reports in the past few weeks touching on the financial performance and prospects of NBC Television raise an interesting question: Why does anyone really want to buy NBC? And why does Comcast, in particular, really want to buy NBC?……