Troubled Newspapers Flounder

Below are my prepared comments made last Thursday at a panel arranged at the City Club by Steve Fitzgerald, founder of http://www.LakewoodBuzz.com, in conjunction with the Cleveland branch of the Society of Professional Journalists.

You will notice I led off with comments about Doug Clifton, editor of the Plain Dealer. However, earlier that day he announced he’d retire soon.

I was asked during the discussion what I thought about Clifton leaving. I said, “I’m sorry to see him go.” I thought that Clifton did well early on but seemed to tire. I also credited him with strong attention to public information issues and placing an aggressive team at city hall, likely part of the reason Mayor Michael White didn’t run for re-election in 2001.

You will also notice that I didn’t comment on television news or the alternative newspapers. On TV, it’s difficult to get through most of the first few minutes of a local newscast. It’s that bad. The alternatives – Free Times and Scene – aren’t investing much time or effort in local news coverage and they aren’t alternative enough, at least in essential community news.

Here’s what I had prepared as some remarks on the Future of News Media:

I had a really good laugh recently when I read Erick Trickery’s Cleveland Magazine story about the Plain Dealer.

It reported that at a PD lunch editor Doug Clifton said that there was too much coverage of poverty by the PD.

It went on to say, Clifton “dislikes a saying dear to some journalists that their job is to ‘comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.’”

It then quoted columnist Regina Brett, “You could hear the room grow cold.”

Grow cold? They should have broken out in a laugh.

Clifton’s worried about the Pee Dee afflicting the comfortable?

I’d say that the comfortable are pretty comfortable with the Pee Dee.

Please, c’mon Doug, the big boys/girls get away with plenty with few exceptions.

As just a couple of examples:

Republican boss Bob Bennett, one of the scummier politicians around for years – have we seen a real investigation here?

Has the Pee Dee covered George Voinovich with the same incredulity or scoffing as they do Dennis Kucinich?

Has the Pee Dee taken a serious look at Dick Jacobs and what loot he’s taken from the community – or what he’s doing with city land at Chagrin Highlands, compared to what we taxpayers have spent to subsidize his handsome profits for decades?

C’mon, we hear more criticism of school teachers than multi-millionaires do in the Plain Dealer.

Newspapers practice socialism for the rich – just check downtown developments in the past 30 or 40 years.

For a hard-line capitalist approach, just check the minimum wage stance. The PD could not support raising it.

Newspapers are in trouble in part because they are so irrelevant to so many people.

I’ve worked for too many newspapers and observed newspapers for too long a time to know who they are comforting and who they are afflicting most of the time.

And there’s no question in my mind that Doug Clifton lives in a fantasy world if he doesn’t know the difference.

Wherever you go and talk with reporters there’s a pall on the discussion.

Newspaper are being nibbled from every corner.

I could be sarcastic and say that maybe, as movie theaters did during the depression, newspaper should give away dishes or something of value weekly to keep people subscribing.

The content isn’t doing it.

However, I think newspapers should look at content. The first four letters of “newspaper” spell NEWS.

There’s scarcity of real news in newspapers.

People, I believe, want to know more about their community and particularly about those who are making important decisions. (I was happy to see on the front page of the PD this Sunday (and hope to see more) an article about developer/lawyer/port authority head John Carney and his conflicts of interest.)

Newspapers are not giving it. Articles don’t have the meat they used to have.

I’m not arguing that there’s nothing in the PD. There’s a lot but still not enough.

I’ll give as an example of a trend I see as bad. I call it blip journalism.

For example, the year-end assessment of Mayor Frank Jackson.

It covered six full columns of the Sunday Forum front page.

The review itself had a magnificent total of 170 words, 17 measly lines.

That’s pretty skimpy stuff.

To be true there was with it one column with those bullet blip shorts.

All in all, very unsatisfying.

Newspapers are in a tough spot.

To be really relevant, they have to alienate. If they alienate they can lose readers. More important to them, they can lose advertisers.

Newspapers are in the same position as politicians – too many people to please, too afraid to displease.

So newspapers have to change to advance. They need to be more honest with readers, tell them what’s most important in the society, in the community.

Blogs, alternative web sites are stealing their thunder. It’s something they can’t allow, yet seemingly can’t afford to avoid in order to make the profit expected by owners.

Newspapers need some modern day P.T. Barnums, ready to excite people with brash newspapering.

From Cool Cleveland contributor Roldo Bartimole roldoATadelphia.net
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