!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> Streamline Training & Documentation: 21st-Century Journalism XVII: The Five I's

Saturday, January 13, 2007

21st-Century Journalism XVII: The Five I's

Among the various avenues newspapers and TV broadcasters can explore to try to bolster their long-term prospects, one that I think needs more attention is substantially improving their reporting. I was heartened to find an article in the January/February issue of the Columbia Journalism Review that addresses this point.

Mitchell Stephens, a professor of journalism at New York University, argues:
In a day when information pours out of digital spigots, stories that package painstakingly gathered facts on current events — what happened, who said what, when — have lost much of their value. News now not only arrives astoundingly fast trom an astounding number of directions, it arrives free of charge. Selling what is elsewhere available free is difficult, even if it isn't nineteen hours stale.
Stephens strongly recommends that news organizations leave routine newsgathering — collecting and organizing the facts of a story — to the wire services and online news sites.

Stephens acknowledges that exclusives and investigative reports will remain viable — because they add value to the compilation of raw facts. As in any business, adding value is the key.

Stephens argues that the main way for the traditional media to add value in the Internet age is to perform analysis that helps people understand the significance of events. This would require training journalists to replace an approach based on presenting "just the facts," with an approach that includes drawing rational conclusions from the facts — not to be confused with finding sources who can be quoted drawing various conclusions, none of which is identified as the objectively correct conclusion.

Stephens offers The Independent in Great Britain as an example of what he has in mind. The Independent routinely publishes a mix of:
  • reporting a news event

  • placing it in wider context

  • adopting a coherent point of view on its significance
Stephens notes:
It is not that shocking, by European standards, that The Independent has been saying what it thinks; what is fresh and vital is the magazine-like boldness and focus (think The Economist) with which it is saying it.
Stephens goes on to describe the deepened reporting that presenting credible analysis and conclusions requires:
Getting the meaning of events will demand looking beyond press conferences, escaping the pack, tracking down more knowledgeable sources, spending more time with those who have been affected ...
Stephens notes that newspapers may be able to hire capable analysts from think tanks and universities, but he believes that "daily news-analysis organizations must also develop their own career path for analysts." This would commonly include a combination of on-the-ground experience and formal training.

The goal is to have reporters who go beyond Who, What, When and Where — now covered by the wire services and Internet news sources — to focus on finding out and explaining Why. Which brings us to the five I's. Such reporters, Stephens suggests, will produce stories that are Informed, Intelligent, Interesting, Industrious, and Insightful. And the newspapers and TV broadcasters who deliver such reporting will have a compelling raison d'ĂȘtre for the indefinite future.

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