The New Paradigm for News

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science

Volumn 546, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 141-153

  Hume, Ellen ^a  

^a Public Broadcasting Service   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0041117355     PISSN: 00027162     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0002716296546001013     Document Type: Article

References (25)

1. The Yankelovich Monitor found in 1994 that the number of people expressing “a great deal of confidence” in news reports on television had dropped to 29 percent from 55 percent in 1988. Those with “a great deal of confidence” in newspapers dropped to 24 percent from 51 percent during the same period, and in magazines, to 14 percent from 38 percent. While confidence in other institutions also has fallen, the decrease for journalism is among the most dramatic.
2. New digital technologies and tools include voice-activated computers linked to the Internet, smart cellular phones, interactive cable television, video on demand, handwriting-to-text, CD-ROM, direct-broadcast television and radio, and expanded bandwidth.
3. To be sure, some of the Limbaugh audience and Internet users may also be consumers of traditional news. But most journalists believe that some of the decline in their audiences is due, in part, to the increased number of media competitors offering information and entertainment. In publishing their consumer survey on 6 Apr. 1995, the Times Mirror Center for the People and the Press suggested that some of the falloff in news audiences might have been due to the popularity of the O. J. Simpson trial, which was offered live on Court TV and CNN.
4. See Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, The One to One Future (New York: Doubleday, 1993).
5. To be sure, Chung is no longer anchor of the CBS Evening News, and Dateline NBC has struggled to improve its journalistic standards. There was a huge outcry against the New York Times’ quoting the Enquirer, and it is less likely to do so again in that manner. These news organizations may be responding to the critics-and getting smarter about what best serves their brand-name future.
6. From an interview with John Ellis, conducted by the author, 15 Mar. 1995. Ellis has worked as a consultant for Roger Ailes, former president of CNBC and former media consultant to President George Bush, and for General Electric, NBC, and other media companies.
7. There is no definitive research about which news organizations are tabloid and which are not the competitive landscape is highly volatile, and some tabloid stations may lead in some newscasts while their more serious competitors lead at different times during the day in the same communities. But the less sensationalized, more substantive news generally rises to the top, attracting the most viewers over time in most markets, according to such experts as John Ellis and David Bartlett, who is president of the Radio and Television News Directors Association. Bartlett observed that, even in Miami, the television station that has set the style nationally for Miami-style tabloid news, WSVN, is not at the top of its market; the least tabloid news, on WPLG, gets higher ratings. Interview with the author, 20 June 1995. The tabloid format usually is employed by stations fighting for second or third place in a highly competitive market, according to WCVB-TV News Director Candy Altman. Interview with the author, 15 Mar. 1995.
8. Interview with the author, 15 Mar. 1995.
9. Interview with the author, 15 Mar. 1995.
10. Interview with the author, 15 Mar. 1995.
11. John Lansing, “The News Is News, Right? Wrong!” Poynter Report (Poynter Institute, 1995).
12. While WCCO remains in first place in Minneapolis, other stations that have tried “family-sensitive” programming have not won the ratings boosts they had hoped for. One reason is that some are missing the point. Violence should not be swept under the rug any more than it should be gratuitous. It should be covered in a way that provides meaning and context for viewers.
13. Beverly Kees and Bill Phillips, Nothing Sacred (Nashville: Vanderbilt University, Freedom Forum First Amendment Center, 1994), p. 82.
14. See, for example, Thomas Patterson, Out of Order (New York: Knopf, 1995); Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Dirty Politics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).
15. Three critiques that have stirred much debate within journalism circles are James Fallows, Breaking the News, Paul Starobin, “A Generation of Vipers,” Columbia Journalism Review (Mar.-Apr. 1995); and Adam Gopnik, “Read All About It,” New Yorker, 12 Dec. 1994.
16. See Larry Sabato, Feeding Frenzy (New York: Free Press, 1991); Suzanne Garment, Scandal (New York: Times Books, 1991).
17. See E. J. Dionne, Jr., Why Americans Hate Politics (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991).
18. See Michael McKeon, “Fragmenting of News,” Washington Post, 11 May 1994.
19. See David Mathews, “America's Secret Political Life II” (Speech, Kettering Foundation, Feb. 1995); Millennium Communications, “Communications as Engagement” (Monograph, Common Enterprise Initiative, Rockefeller Foundation, 1995).
20. Ed Fouhy, “The Dawn of Public Journalism,” National Civic Review, p. 263 (Summer-Fall 1994).
21. Cole Campbell, “Reporting on Public Life at the Virginian-Pilot” (Paper, Project on Public Life and the Press, American Press Institute, Reston, VA, 10-12 Nov. 1994).
22. Rosen made his comments during an interview on CNN's Reliable Sources, 19 Mar. 1995.
23. Turner's remarks were part of the Annenberg Washington Program's “Changing the News” conference, Washington, DC, 9 Feb. 1995.
24. Fouhy, “Dawn of Public Journalism,” p. 262.
25. Discussions of how civic-journalism projects affect news audiences can be found in Edward D. Miller, “The Charlotte Project: Helping Citizens Take Back Democracy,” Poynter Papers (Poynter Institute for Media Studies), no. 4 (1994); Jay Rosen, Public Life and the Press: A Research Report (New York University: Project on Public Life and the Press, 1994); Edward D. Miller, “Election ‘92: The Charlotte Project” (St. Petersburg, FL: Poynter Institute for Media Studies, 1993); Michael Hoyt, “The Wichita Experiment: What Happens When a Newspaper Tries to Connect Readership and Citizenship?” Columbia Journalism Review (July-Aug. 1992).