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Amy Goodman

Amy Goodman is an award-winning investigative journalist and syndicated columnist, author and the host of Democracy Now! airing on more than 800 public television/radio stations worldwide. Goodman is the first journalist to receive the Right Livelihood Award, widely known as the ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’ for “developing an innovative model of truly independent grassroots political journalism that brings to millions of people the alternative voices that are often excluded by the mainstream media.” The Independent of London named Amy Goodman and Democracy Now! “an inspiration”; pulsemedia.org placed Goodman at the top of their 20 Top Global Media Figures.

Goodman is the author of four New York Times bestsellers. Her latest book is Breaking the Sound Barrier; she co-authored the first three bestsellers, Standing Up to the Madness, Static, and The Exception to the Rulers, with her brother, journalist David Goodman.

Breaking the Sound Barrier

Award-winning investigative journalist Amy Goodman breaks through corporate media lies, sound-bites and silence with passionate reporting as host of Democracy Now! Her latest bestseller, Breaking the Sound Barrier, proves the power of independent journalism in the struggle for a better world. From community organizers in New Orleans, to the victims of torture and police violence, to those struggling to survive in Haiti, we are given the extraordinary opportunity to hear ordinary people standing up and speaking out.

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The series is sponsored by the Liberty Tree Initiative, McCormick Foundation, and the First Amendment Center.

The Information Society Project (ISP) at Yale Law School is an intellectual center studying the impact of the Internet and new information technologies on law and society. The Knight Law and Media Program examines the intersection of First Amendment law, media, and journalism.

Ellen Goodman – Rutgers University Law School
Public Media, from Broadcast to Broadband

What is the purpose of public broadcasting?
Original vision of 1967 Public Broadcasting Act – very contemporary, ahead of its time – universal service in every community and citizen engagement in every community

Public Broadcasting Act of 1967
“that constitute a source of alternative sources for all . . .”

ACCESS to information and networks
OUTREACH to underserved communities
SERVICE public with information

What should public media become given:
technological convergence; information abundance; new publics; participatory capabilities

The media no longer can just reach out but others also have to (and can) reach in

The case for public media:
Market Failures
Non-Market Objectives
$10 billion plus investment

Create where the market fails to create
- not just creation from scratch but also curation (aggregate at large) and then connect

Can public media SAVE journalism?
Digital networks make it more likely but the original 1967 public broadcasting act makes it difficult. Most of the federal support goes to public broadcasting

Many of the most exciting public media projects involve connections with community groups. This echoes the comments by Paul Bass on the previous panel in which he discussed that the citizen journalist is not king – still need the professional journalist – but the citizen (journalist) has a bigger role to play.

Josh Silver – Executive Director of Free Press (organization has been around for 7 years)

Involve the public in very important public policy debates – commercial media is abysmal
The reliance on coveted advertisers can skew the content and get them to shy away from some very important topics.

Reference to Vanity Fair article that Reality programming has cheapened the networks. There is a constant quest for ever-cheaper content.

When we look at this public media question, there is a really simple question
If you look at the divorce of news content and advertising, which has many factors on top of the digital revolution, the question is whether there is sufficient revenue sources (including advertising) to support meaningful national and international newsgathering? Absolutely not!

No matter what, you will lose the majority of professional journalists in this country? Thus we have to look at the public sector as a necessary evil. He uses this term because people generally don’t like the idea of government money funding media. It is sort of like trying to get your kid to eat asparagus. It may not be the desired source but it is the necessary one.

Over the past couple of months, there have been two really good reports that have come out, especially the Knight Commission Report headed by Peter Shane.

In general, across the board, we have to broaden the debate. We need a real movement across this country that really understands how vital journalism is – likens it to the women’s suffrage and Civil Rights movements.

Friendly: “If Public Broadcasting is reliant on an annual appropriation from Congress, it will be a disaster.” And in fact, it has been a disaster.

We have one of the lowest per capita funding of public broadcasting in the developing world.

It is 1/30th or even less of what AIG got in its bailout. A real populist.

If we are going to do this, it has to be non-ideological – conservatives and liberals who can work together in support of an emboldened public media.

Yet there is no explanation of how to make that happen – especially how to get conservatives on board!

The Carnegie Commission had a “we can” and “must do” attitude. History is repeating itself and we must work together to replicate that success.

Laura Walker – General Manager – WNYC, New York

Wins the prize with the first reference to the Kindle.

Describing her subway ride in NYC where only five people were reading a paper newspaper, and three of those were the free am newspapers.

Public Media must aim to preserve local democracy.

3 Specific Areas of focus in the journalistic world
1. Local Coverage
2. Deep Coverage

Investigative Journalism (doesn’t pay and we need to make sure someone is asking those questions)

3. Represent the diverse voices in this country

Forget nostalgia. The New York Times newsroom in 1961 wasn’t all that great. You wouldn’t even know there was an African American person in this country – and the only women were on the Society Pages.

We are no longer just telling a story but we are also initiating and facilitating a conversation.
- This is a major theme that is emerging. Journalism is more of a conversation. But it is not a free flowing conversation with no restraints but rather one led and moderated by the professional journalists – especially those funded by public institutions.

But there are limits. We need to make sure that as we evolve, we maintain very high standards for journalism.

Fort Hood Example – there was a lot of WRONG information coming out from a 30-year-old Twitterer female soldier. She said that the shooter was dead and that there was a second shooter. How do the “journalists” do the fact checking necessary to ensure accuracy?

As the role of the journalist changes, so do the pay models. The pay walls are coming. And in the not-for-profit world, it is key that we come up with sustainable business models. It will help protect against funders with an agenda.

Although there is somewhat of a contradiction here in that arguing for public funding and yet recognizing that can influence the content. The key is mixed partnerships that is not all one or the other.

We have an opportunity and the responsibility to fill the void of local journalism.

We need more public funding – not just for infrastructure – but most importantly, for the CONTENT.

This movement is not going to resonate like suffrage but that doesn’t mean that we can’t talk to Congress and increase our funding.

The recipe for change – thinking big – add 500 reporters in communities across this country. We need to challenge others to come up with plans to really cover their local areas.

Lawrence Grossman – Digital Promise Project

Creative Destruction – following up on Paul Bass’s presentation from the last panel

We have heard about the trouble that the news industry is in, the fact of the matter is that we are living through the creative destruction of a $50 billion industry.

The Web is killing off the news media of the 20th industry. Every single monopoly newspapers is in serious financial trouble – not to mention the major news magazine and network television news.

Even the normally wealthy Forbes, Fortune, and Business Week are suffering.

This is evidence of capitalism’s propensity for creative destruction.

Presidential Election, Michael Jackson’s Death, and Shooting spree in Fort Hood. Once the videos are seen, the viewers do not go back to the old media forms.

Six grandchildren from ages 18-28 and never seen any of them read a newspaper in print, let alone purchase a newspaper in print.

Perhaps the most intriguing statistic of the day – for the first time, the annual survey from the Society for the Protection of Journalists – demonstrated that the largest single group of imprisoned journalists was Internet journalists.

We should stop trying to save “old” media. It is dead and it isn’t coming back. So how do we ensure that the new journalism will flourish?

And regardless, we are not looking for a return to the days of party-controlled journalism or Father Coughlin-style radio reporting (think Lou Dobbs but rabid anti-semitism that made Dobb’s xenophobia look like niceties)

Reconstruction of American Journalism Report – focus on local news coverage will require a big increase in funding from Congress. But this is neither a practical or realistic solution. The lack of funding is pathetic and not even close and the high budget deficits make it next to impossible to imagine additional funding for public broadcasting.

Although weak, there are interesting entittes, like the New Haven Independent and the Chicago News Cooperative. But perhaps the pooling of resources that so many papers are engaging in will provide a model for the future.

But the biggest impetus for expansion will come from the new digital technologies themselves.

Q&A

Silver responding to Larry Grossman’s skepticism – other countries have made Internet access accessible. We just need to copy other successful political movements to make this happen.

I cannot help but agree with with Larry Grossman. Ellen Goodman believes that the case just has to be made. But the reality is that the massive federal deficits will handcuff policymaking for years to come. Goodman wants people to focus on how public broadcasting impacts their lives? How can we do that?

Silver admits that it could take 30 years before we see a real renaissance in public funding for public broadcasting. But that is dependent on constant advocacy and vigilance – and it should not deter us from making the effort.

Dimensions of the Challenge

Paul Starr, Princeton University: Changes in the newsmedia today give us both reason to worry and to be excited. Local foundations of American democracy have been decaying for a while — the crisis of the press will only accelerate this if we don’t do something about this. A strong press at local, state, and federal levels have upheld the underpinning of democracy. Tocqueville’s argument, for example, was that local associations and newspapers allowed Americans to overcome the perils of individualism. This mobilized the people to solve common problems. Toqueville didn’t recognize that the federal government played a significant part in promoting this structure. Because of the federal system, there was an incentive to create broad, chapter-based associations and communities — but this changed this past century. Campaigns began to emphasize fundraising instead of engagement, hollowing out participation at the local level. Apparently, American cities are becoming more homogenous, correlating with political belief. This translates to less diversity with regard to political contestation in geographic areas. There has already been a vitality at the base of American democracy, and the decline of the metropolitan newspaper will deepen this. Three factors affect this:

Financing of journalism: Newspapers provided much of the original newsgathering at the local and state level. Resources are sapped, and without prospect for rapid replacement. At the national level, the potential market is enough to sustain dynamic newsmaking at a sustainable level — this is not the case at the local level. State coverage has dropped by 30% in recent years.

Assembling of a public for the news: Free, niche sites online fill demand, but do not allow for “incidental learning.”

Political accountability: newspapers had the ability stand up to government actors, but internet outlets might not have the resources to do so. This is not necessarily because of investigative journalism, but just constant monitoring.

Some argue that all that has ever mattered is a small segment of the population. But what of the “secession of the affluent”? These individuals are cosmopolitans, not locals. Who will then take a stake in the public? Let’s take New Jersey, for example — a state without a public. Its two biggest cities lie outside of its boundaries: New York and Philadelphia. Where is the coverage of New Jersey? People in New Jersey thus know less about their state than in other states. State newspapers used to compensate, but they are now in free-fall. Papers are shells of what they once were. Investigative reporters, many whom covered important scandals, are among those who have lost their jobs. Income and education are high and correlated with civic engagement, but without media attached to the state, New Jerseyians do not have their own state public. Thus campaigns hinge almost entirely on television programming. The state exemplifies some of the worst pathologies of media and politics. This problem may become the problem of many more states. How can we expect people to spring into action? We will have a shaky basis for popular government.

We must bolster public accountability and an attentive public. This is an unbelievably hard program. There is rot at the bottom of American democracy and we’ve hardly begun to confront it.

Steven Wildman, Michigan State University: Here to present empirical research on coverage of local government by local media. The scope includes TV, radio, cable, newspaper, both daily and weekly, and online coverage of local government institutions for the central city and a suburban city for 120 randomly selected metropolitan statistical areas. The content analysis is based on 9 sample days from early 2009. Identifies news items and editorials relating to eight categories of local news coverage.

Notable patterns in the sample data: newspapers and TV stations dominate in local news coverage while cable TV and citizen journalism sites contribute very little. Weekly papers are huge in suburbs. Many suburbs, though, don’t have their own newspapers. Broadcast media and newspapers emphasize different types of local news. In markets with lots of stations, most broadcast outlets don’t offer news, and even fewer are unique voices. Also, offering news does not equate to offering local news.

The effect of MSA size most pronounced for suburban newspapers. All 120 central cities had daily newspapers and all but one had at least one weekly. Of 119 suburbs in sample, 40% didn’t have a daily paper, and 29% didn’t have a daily or weekly. Number of news radio stations does not increase in proportion to number of stations.

[Stay tuned for electronic versions of the powerpoints -- we'll get 'em if we can!]

Lisa George, Hunter College: What does economics as a discipline have to say about the market for newspapers? How do economists think about the good and the bad, what is better, and what is the problem today?

Economics of newspaper markets includes the high fixed cost of producing content, high variable cost of distribution, vertically integrated content production, advertiser finance, and two sided markets and information externalities.

Fixed costs include high first copy costs that limit the number of papers that can survive in any market. Large cities have larger papers with higher readership. Notably, groups with minority tastes may be poorly served. Technology and transformation lowers the cost of producing content, and also opens the market for supply of content. More competition for journalists and newspapers. Technology and welfare also reduces the advantage to large markets and can also provide content satisfying minority tastes. Niche tastes don’t have to rely on the mass market.

Distribution costs are particular to newspapers that take gas, labor, and paper to be transported. Digital information, by contrast, is free — marking a drastic change in the market. Zero distribution cost enlarges markets, leading to more viewpoint differentiation. This means more voices, but if readers become more selective, this leads to reading of better content. This means more potential for “superstar journalists”. When everyone can read everything, you only need what you find desirable or necessary. You choose the best, not the local. This means that there are direct connections between writers and readers, creting a market for superstars with high risk and high reward. Readers, not papers, will make the superstars. The content type determines vertical integration.

Advertisers value access to targeted consumers. Newspapers long earned monopoly rents from ads, and the incentives to produce content preferred by elites. Distortions caused by the advertising model benefited the elites as a result. Now, new entrants are good at bundling and targeting, driving down the price. Distinguishing bundling value from content value central to new business models. Consumer value of bundled content grows as sources proliferate, and thus so does advertiser value for targeted readers. Newspapers still have a geographic organization, not by topic bundles.

Information externalities, or how what you read affects what you do. Technology changes this. We see a shift from local to national media leading to a shift from local to national externalities. This is localism vs. globalism, and we’re seeing benefits in globalism. A shift to integrated markets reduces probability but raises consequences of corruption.

Possible Solutions

Peter Shane, Executive Director, Knight Commission on the News Needs of Communities: Questions to consider, stemming from an Aspen Institute meeting: what are the information needs of communities in democracy? Are they met in America today? If not, what can we do about it? Our democracy is organized geography: if there’s a breakdown between geography and media, the consequences can be severe. We must concentrate on the information needs, not just news needs, of a community. The media ecology of local communities makes available relevant, credible information necessary for governing in kind. Conversations about access: to broadband, to skills, to tools that allow them to be effective actors. How do we consider civic engagement? How do we get people to believe they’re implicated so they should act? The recommendations addressing these questions only narrowly deal with business models. Journalistic institutions do not need “saving” as much as they need “creating” — there are far more localities than local newspapers. Hundreds, if not thousands, of localities have scant or no news coverage. Many communities get no coverage at all. Potential buyers of news will underinvest because a lot of the product is late, or not of interest, or disturbing to what we believe. There are also potential free rider problems. We can’t only rely on those who are enthusiastic about it to fund it. There is also a cultural problem: antagonism towards intellectual authority, and that is part of the model of professional journalism. The idea of public interest is mocked as being incoherent and irrelevant to the political and media environment. Technology furthers this, allowing for an unbundling of services — we don’t pick up incidental learning in the way we would in newspapers. Let’s imagine a world in which local journalism is part of the DNA of University education at all levels.

Paul Bass, New Haven Independent: If news is dying, then why are so many people covering this? News is not dying. This is the most exciting time to be a reporter — you can tell stories unlike ever before, you can do more than ever before, and there’s a lot more monitoring to pressure you to be better. The only thing that’s dying is the bad media model that tries to decrease newsmaking while increasing profit. On blogs, you can see development of story in real-time with back and forth about real information. News should be like a utility you pay for, and maybe the pay model is just bad. Your readers were participants, not consumers. This isn’t so bad! With the internet, you have all sorts of participants — the students, the teachers, other visitors. You can have transparent dialogue or discussions on pertinent public events, like neighborhood perceptions or traffic safety. These discussions have raw but interesting insight into where to go next — and that’s journalism. Readers are cross-referencing sources, finding discrepancies, and developing thoughts and recommendations from that. This is why we have journalism. We get grants and funding to this. Competition is back. There is no one answer or one model, there’s a lot of creative construction at the moment. Part of the fun is how to figure out the revenue models and trying different answers. This includes collaborating on space, getting local funding, external grants, expanding the legal notices — the experiences are broad. What you see in the communities is that you’re seeing different forms of newsgathering, and they’re going to compete while reporting increases. Don’t fret!