photo « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

photo

friends / journalism / photo / Samford — Comments Off
5
May 15

The last Tuesday of the year

We had the departmental picnic this afternoon. We hold it indoors now. Two years in a row we could have drowned students in the rain. Today was lovely and warm. The picnic is great fun. You get to see all of the seniors pick up all of these awards that go onto their resume. Top of the this, best of the that.

And there are awards for underclassmen, too. I gave out one to a freshman and he got a standing ovation. He deserved it.

I got to give out the SEJC awards the students won in February. I gave a special award to our editor, Sydney. I always give a very brief speech for that one. I’d been thinking about what to say, and I kept thinking about when she was in my class her freshman year and about the young woman she’s become during her four years with us. We always miss them after that. So I flubbed the speech because it got almost-dusty in the front of that room.

When the picnic was over and everything hauled away and put back in to some semblance of order we all returned to the routine. This was the last night of this year’s newspaper. This is the last time they’d be together like this. We’ll meet tomorrow, but it will be different. I should have been grading — because this stack of papers is finally getting manageable, I’ve been on a roll — but I just stayed in the newsroom with them for much of the night.

We’ll lose four of the editorial staff to graduation. Sydney will be editing for Starnes’ newspapers. She had an internship there and they were wise enough to be impressed by her and offered her a job at the beginning of her senior year, I think it was. And now she’s going to be an editor, working on five community papers, in her first newspaper job. Rachael, who ran features this year, will go to grad school. Halley will be a media buyer in town. Adam, who ran a solid opinion section this year, will be heading to Ireland in a few weeks on a Fulbright scholarship. One of our underclassmen is transferring. Two more will stay on, Emily as the new editor-in-chief and Samantha will return to rule her fiefdom as photo editor.

As a group they did us all proud. Good journalism, taking slings and arrows and commendations and never getting hung up on any one thing or another, always ready to turn out the next good product. They did what I asked of them, don’t repeat mistakes and get better each time out. And they did it all with cheer and fun. Though not all of them would admit it out loud, they had a great time.

I’m glad they were at the Crimson. I can’t wait to see what they all do next.

journalism / links / Monday / photo / things to read — Comments Off
4
May 15

Things to read

Once more, with pastiche.

Here’s the incredible weekly feature that is going to throw a lot of important information at you. Some of it we’ll try to elaborate on or hint about what it means. Other things will be placed next to key messages that should let the reader draw individual conclusions. But that will be within subgroups, of course. These are organized so that if the topic isn’t of a specific interest, you can skip around a bit. Today the groups are journalism and media in general.

All of this is important. All of it is contemporary. It is by no means exhaustive or authoritative, but simply things to read.

We’ll start today with the journalism stuff, because the latest read from Pew is always of interest.

State of the News Media 2015:

Call it a mobile majority. At the start of 2015, 39 of the top 50 digital news websites have more traffic to their sites and associated applications coming from mobile devices than from desktop computers, according to Pew Research Center’s analysis of comScore data.

That’s telling enough, but there is so much to unpack from the Pew report and you can do it all at that link. Or you could follow the following.

The thing about this data, and how it is being rolled out in various ways, is that it would be great if we could understand it in the whole, but failing that, remember that any one point is not the end-all-be-all. Take, for example, the above in the context of Newspapers: Fact Sheet:

After a year of slight gains, newspaper circulation fell again in 2014 (though tracking these data is becoming more complicated each year due to measurement changes). Revenue from circulation rose, but ad revenue continued to fall, with gains in digital ad revenue failing to make up for falls in print ad revenue. Despite widespread talk of a shift to digital, most newspaper readership continues to be in print. Online, more traffic to the top newspaper websites and associated apps comes from mobile than from desktop users, and the average visitor only stays on the site for three minutes per visit. And several larger media conglomerates spun off their newspaper divisions as separate companies in an attempt to prevent the newspaper industry’s woes from affecting the health of their broadcast divisions.

Here’s a slightly different read off the same report, The State of the News Media 2015: Newspapers ↓, smartphones ↑:

Newspaper print ad revenue dropped again in 2014 to $16.4 billion, a 4% drop from 2013, the report said. Though newspaper digital ad revenue increased last year slightly — to $3.5 billion from $3.4 billion — it hasn’t been anywhere near enough to make up for the loss in print revenue.

“For the past five years, newspaper ad revenue has maintained a consistent trajectory: Print ads have produced less revenue (down 5%), while digital ads have produced more revenue (up 3%) — but not enough to make up for the fall in print revenue,” the report said.

Print ads are going to digital, specifically mobile and, this part should be the scariest, elsewhere.

USA Today on the Pew report, Mobile news on the rise as print decline continues:

Unless you’re big, digital revenue remains an elusive target for many publishers, even though the amount of money paid by advertisers to get their brand on video and display ads across all media grew 18% in 2014 to $50.7 billion, Pew said, citing research firm eMarketer. Five companies — Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL — captured 61% of domestic digital ad revenue in 2014, it said. Digital ads make up about a quarter of all media advertising spending.

While newspaper circulation is falling, the appeal of print still holds sway for many readers. More than half of readers — 56% — still read newspaper content in print only, the study said. Newspaper publishers have a reason to hold onto their ink barrels as well, with $16.4 billion still spent on print ads. But that’s down from $17.3 billion a year ago. Their digital ad revenue totaled $3.5 billion, flat from a year ago.

As revenue declines, so does the industry’s employment. Overall newspaper newsroom employment fell 3% in 2013 — the most recent year for which figures are available — to 36,700, the report said, citing the American Society of News Editors’ Newsroom Employment Census.

And, to bring the consumer trend on home, here’s this from Dadaviz, For The Top-10 Newspapers, Mobile Overtakes Desktop Traffic.

A few links into the news on Facebook plan:

Emily Bell in CJR: Google and Facebook are our frenemy. Beware.
Facebook banned us for writing about pot
The Guardian is trying to swing Google’s pendulum back to publishers

This is about data and the publishers are going to give it away. If Facebook builds out this network and they don’t share evenly with the content providers it is going to be a disaster for publishers. Facebook has pitched this all on the idea of “news, faster” and has applied that idea to the people already there. News outlets can’t seem to build faster and they can’t capitalize on the one place they should be the strongest — local networks — so they are giving this away. Maybe it will be a long term, brilliant win for news outlets. But one hopes they’ve realized they’ve given the keys, editorial and otherwise, away to an entity who has designs on being the biggest ad market, biggest search, biggest network and biggest video provider in the world.

Let’s think again about what news outlets should do: sell ads, help people find local things, tie communities together and tell compelling stories.

And just wait until someone decides they need to report on something happening over at ol’ Ma Facebook.

This is a nice collection:

The Baltimore photo on Time’s cover was by an amateur photographer
Seven Tips for Photographers Covering Protests
App from ACLU of California aims to preserve videos of police
Cops Shut Down CNN; Reporter: “Are We Under Martial Law?”

Let’s call this section news media trends:

Drop in Discover Traffic Poses Questions for Snapchat
NPR Clips Can Now Be Embedded on Other Websites
In Nepal, the BBC is using Viber to share information and safety tips
University of Florida explores geolocation news feeds
Adopting a digital-first mindset at the University Daily Kansan
It’s Time For Every Journalist To Learn Basic Data Skills
Reuters’ mobile strategy: ‘If it has a screen, it’s fair game’
Why The New York Times apps look different

About the first one in that list, I bet it comes down to novelty, the Discover channels still tinkering with best practices and the inability to share the cool stuff. Snapchat isn’t very good at this fundamental element of social media yet.

About that last one, I just had this conversation with our new web/mobile editor last week: what about microsites and apps? And then he and I brainstormed an app that, if he develops it, might let him retire young.

I’m angling for kickbacks.

And a few general media links of interest …

If done well, and given time to breathe, this may work in Space City: Houston’s KRIV Launches Web-Only Personal Take On News. I think, if done well and given time to breathe, it could work even better elsewhere. Like Birmingham, for example. Birmingham is a destination city in broadcast for most people. Small enough to be nice, big enough to let you be successful if you have the chops, and a little something for most everyone.

The state’s largest media market has an incredible stable set of anchors and plenty of long-term reporters. Sure, people pass through, but people really stick. They like it because they can do good work and because it can be impactful and because they are important here. The Yankee’s former boss at WBRC said this at the Emmy’s as he was presenting a 50-years-in-broadcasting award to one of his colleagues. He tried to explain the market by saying there aren’t huge stars or professional sports teams or a lot of other inane attractions. The city’s faces of news are the city’s celebrities. He was write. Put this plan, from Houston, in a personality-driven market like Birmingham, and you could do some really cool things with it.

Some TV entities are wisely trying to change up their distribution models. Here’s to their success: How 7News hopes to livestream video to reach new audiences.

Meanwhile, the people trying to eat the industry’s lunch:

Yahoo Aims for Millennials With 18 New Shows, Says CEO

Report: Comcast plans YouTube-like online video service

Bloomberg’s New Publishing Platform Is ‘Like Tinder for Video’

One guess why all of that is important, Mobile Shopping: Smartphone Visits Increase 269%; Revenue Up 123%.

photo / weekend — Comments Off
3
May 15

Catching up

The weekly post with extra pics, the excuse to be thin on the weekend around here, is extra thin this week. I have been too busy to pull my phone out of my pocket and take extra snapshots for you, Internet! I don’t know what you’ll do, but I’m sure you’ll soldier on. We’ll go with what we have.

I found these at Publix on Greensprings and they are inherently creepy.

I’m not sure if it is the unfinished nature of the beasts or that the rest of the top is rather lazily the same color. I suppose if your kids asked questions about it — inside the containers were all the parts you’d need to make your own classic farm scene — they might be just about ready to advance out of this age-bracket.

Of course they were placed at the proper eye level.

“MOMMA! MOMMA! MOMMA! I WANT THE CREEPY COW THING!”

She’s helping me grade things.

She has the amazing ability to only be interested in the one I’m grading at the time. Not any other stack of fake papers I could put out as a deterrent. “This one, hooman.”

Friday / photo / Samford — Comments Off
1
May 15

Commercials and fried chicken

Grading, grading and classes. I graded at lunch today, reading over commercials that I’d had students write. Students really seem to dive into the idea of writing commercials. You see some incredible inventiveness and imagination leap off the page. As soon as they figure out how to channel that into non-fiction writing they’ll be on their way. And that’s why I like offering a commercial assignment.

I give them a 30-second spot to fill. You can have an unlimited budget to make your spot happen. The catches are that you have to advertise an existing product and the people that appear in your commercial have to be alive — no Moses or Marilyn Monroe, and they can’t work for the competition.

And in classes today we started the slog toward finals.

I saw this this afternoon.

It was pointing to a tree in the quad, upon which a great deal of random art had been displayed. I had to go to the building in the background to handle a small accounting matter. I met a lady there who summed up two of my Samford themes. Seems she’s counting the days until her second child’s graduation and wedding. She did not look like a woman old enough to be marrying off a second kid, let alone by the grandmother of three. And, yet, there she was. Being around college students keeps you young.

The other thing was the great happiness the lady possessed. I’m sure it was really about the fine weather or that her daughter will soon be married — outdoors, with kilts! — and that the bride and groom will be moving into the same neighborhood.

“I’m getting my baby back,” she said.

It probably had to do with some of those things. Or that it was almost quitting time on Friday. But here was an account who sits in a cube and crunches numbers and had a smile that would have pointed its own way to that tree in the quad.

Samford is pretty special that way. In all of my years here I’ve never met anyone who wasn’t pleased about the opportunity to be a part of it. How many of the jobs you’ve had in your career can offer you that as a perk?

And, now, meatballs and the rest of the NFL Draft.

Have a great weekend. Just remember, the next time you see a commercial, it started because a former student was inspired somewhere along the way. And if they turn Marilyn Monroe into a hologram for the spot, don’t tell my students.

photo / Samford / Thursday — Comments Off
30
Apr 15

They keep us young

They keep us young.

Last night the incoming editor-in-chief of The Samford Crimson poked her head into my office. I was just about ready to call it a night, but students will make you stick around.

Emily is this year’s news editor and she is, as they almost always are at the paper, one squared away individual. She asked me a question about this and we talked about that and then the next thing you know we’d spent an hour discussing journalism and what our newsroom can be. She left at 8 p.m.

Someone asked me a few years ago why it is I want to do this kind of work. And there’s the answer: It is important to the community, but even more so to the students I get to work with. When you have passionate college students doing work they care about, you’re surrounded by a special treat, indeed. Those people deserve as much passion as energy as you can give back. It only makes them better.

And to have the opportunity to work with enthusiastic young men and women so dedicated to learning their craft is simply invigorating.

They asked me that when I interviewed for the job here, too. I went through the importance part and the passion part and the influence my media adviser had when I was in school and then I said “Plus, maybe they’ll keep me young!”

The guy that asked me that just retired last year. He’d watched his second grandchild go through college. Now he goes out and runs four or five miles every day. He agreed with my answer during the interview, I remember it clearly. He knew about students keeping the rest of us young.

The shortest answer, as this year winds down, is that it is a treat, and worth it, and hardly seems like working. And weaved among all of that is a great value.

There’s only one more week with this year’s talented crew. Four of the nucleus I work with are graduating. I’ll break them all down next week after our last, and surely poignant meetings. But first there’s another paper to get through and the departmental picnic and then lost last gatherings.

They keep us young.

I have a small and growing mound of papers to grade. We can blame the silver hair on that.