Media Transparency in an Online Universe

When I decided to write a piece about the growing need for media transparency in today's news universe, little did I know the story would wind up serving as its own little experiment in news distribution and disclosure.

My end of the transparency experiment starts here, with the disclosure that this column is my first story to be published on the Mothership Web site with no concrete plans for publication in the newspaper's print edition.

The backstory is relatively simple: I pulled together a piece looking at why leading newspapers seem to be doing some of their best work these days, while absorbing some of their harshest criticism. The answer: a growing demand for the story behind big stories that is harder to ignore in a world of blogs and instantaneous criticism.

Because the story was long, we have lots of competition for the front page and the subject might seem like inside baseball to readers, my bosses decided to try something new and publish it on the web Monday night as a bit of an experiment. Hopefully, those of you who care about the subject will find it easily; and as always, you can leave your thoughts about this strategy here.

I'm hopeful this will get the story to folks who care quickly as possible -- even if the result is even more demand for the stories on how we all get our big stories.

A few links you might also find interesting: Cyberjournalist.net, Jay Rosen's PressThink, the Huffington Post and David Berlind's media transparency experiment. And, of course, one of the biggest sites to help spread the word when journalists write about media is Jim Romenesko's Media News blog on the Web site of the Poynter Institute (which also owns the St. Petersburg Times), linked in the right-hand column.

Comments

[Josh Hallett]

Eric:I had no problem finding the story, the link in your blog post helped :-)Transparency can be a slippery slope. In Florida we benefit from a very broad public records law. As such, when people from other areas claim 'transparency' I claim BS. My rule is that when somebody says they are transparent they aren't. Sort of like, 'trust me.' I know plenty of PIOs that have local reporters review their e-mail on a regular basis. How many journalists allow that? I'm not singling out just journalists though. Corporations, PR professionals and others are now claiming 'transparency' thru blogging. To those who wish to be transparent, show me your bank account, your phone records. That's transparency. I think news organizations that are blogging their news meetings are taking the right steps. Let the people know why some things are being covered and why other things aren't.There will always be those like Dan Gillmor and Jeff Jarvis that push the envelope for open lines of communication. Jeff is a bit more pointed though. Others like Stephen Baker of BusinessWeek have recently been struggling with the issue of how open they should be, especially when dealing with feature stories or scoops.When I deal with those in the media and PR one of the things I reference is a recent PEW study:http://pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Teens_Content_Creation.pdfSome 57% of online teens create content for the internet. That amounts to half of all teens ages 12-17, or about 12 million youth. These Content Creators report having done one or more of the following activities: create a blog; create or work on a personal webpage; create or work on a webpage for school, a friend, or an organization; share original content such as artwork, photos, stories, or videos online; or remix content found online into a new creation. One of the new terms is prosumer, this generation produces and consumes. They expect to be part of the process. I don't want to get too Cluetrain-y, but news is no longer a lecture, it's a conversation.

[Eric Deggans]

True dat.I've been writing such things for a while now as media critic, and i have a story running thursday on the concept of a media diet which takes this concept further.Regarding your email comment, you must bear in mind that cops, government bureaucrats and elected officials are conducting the public's business and paid by public money. So one could argue that they are required to show the most transparency possible.Because we must safeguard sources, reporters could never offer that level of transparency. Even blogging news meetings would be tough for us, because our competition could just dial up the blog and know every story we're working on for tomorrow's newspaper.But we must be more transparent, and news organizations are slowly being forced to realize this fact...

[Anonymous]

before i read the article, let me say if this isn't the future of journalism, it should be.with papers shrinking and shrinking by day (thanks to costs) and editors always concerned about space, this is a way to publish a story, an in-depth piece, and not be worried about having it chopped to pieces.

[Eric Deggans]

You hit on a major reason why we published it the way we did. To run it on the front page today would have required cutting it in half. So this was a better compromise....

[Anonymous]

herein lies both the future, and possible death, of newsprinted newspapers. anyone reading your story online did so for free, skipped paying the quarter, and didnt have to look at any of the display or classified ads that pay for the paper. clearly, there are many advantages to web-based journalism, including immediacy and no length limits, ability to link to relevant info, attach video/audio clips etc. still, im glad im not a newspaper publisher/owner. id feel like a typewriter/vinyl records/photo film salesman all at the same time.

[Anonymous]

herein lies both the future, and possible death, of newsprinted newspapers. anyone reading your story online did so for free, skipped paying the quarter, and didnt have to look at any of the display or classified ads that pay for the paper.very key. larger websites have been able to draw a lot more ad dollars in recent months, but seemingly, not the smaller ones.being able to generate ad revenue on the net will be critical.but on the positive side, one reason for many layoffs and cutbacks at papers is the rapidly rising costs of ink and paper, skyrocketing costs.with news on the net, those costs are eliminated.

[Khan of the Wastelands]

Anyone who reads the NY Times editorial page knows that the future of online news is a monthly fee for users.I'm sure the St. Pete Times will eventually go that route when they come up with a plan to make it profitable.

[Ken]

Eric:Transparency was key in our controversial reporting on the mayor of Spokane's sexual activities and alleged misuse of office.As editor of the web site, I pushed for every conceivable document to be posted in raw form online. That included interview transcripts, transcripts from the mayor's online chats and email exchanges, and much more.Spokesman-Review editor Steve Smith outlines our quite extensive "Transparent Newsroom" project in a guest post at Jay Rosen's Press Think a few weeks back.http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2005/11/23/spk_ss.htmlKen SandsOnline Publisher

[Eric Deggans]

Ken -- Your URL was cut off by blogger. If you'd like to email me the link, i'll put it up inside the blog item.digdog@aol.comAnother cool thing about working online -- you can change stories anytime...

[Mr. Gator]

Mr. Deggans,Uhh, I think you make a good point. Uhh