Monthly Archives: February 2008

From the Newsroom

Gaps in Bay Area coverage

Though the Public Press team is looking to construct a local news organization that’s innovative in its business model, production, design, financing, management, technology and distribution, the raison detre of this exercise is to cover stories that traditionally have been ignored in the press. This is the fun part: pushing the boundaries of what professional journalists have considered “news.” What topics are left by the wayside? They include stories that lack a special appeal to so-called quality readers — the wealthy elite sought by high-end advertisers. (Your suggestions are more than welcome; please leave some ideas in the “comments” section at the bottom of this post.) Some initial thoughts on what would be important for the rest of us to read more of:

Poverty and segregation Diversity and immigration Science Education (primary, secondary and higher) Business from an average consumer’s point of view Labor Media criticism Public transportation The rental housing market Public health Political substance (as opposed to the electoral horserace) Criminal justice and prisons (as opposed to individual crimes) Grassroots arts and culture production State politics and public policy This last point was the subject of an insightful report last fall from the California Media Project (since renamed the California Media Collaborative) by its founder, Louis Freedberg. The report, “ Covering California: Perspectives on Media Coverage of California,” surveyed nearly 70 community and civic leaders, revealing a deep dissatisfaction with the quality and quantity of news available to the public about statewide public-policy concerns.

From the Newsroom

Seeking solutions to the media meltdown

Even as vital Bay Area journalistic institutions seemed to crumble before their eyes, a panel of media reformers at the journalism school at the University of California, Berkeley, sounded almost optimistic Wednesday night. Just a day after the Bay Area News Group, which gobbled up the San Jose Mercury News a year and a half ago, announced that it was heading for another round of staff reductions because of a bad advertising season, there was Luther Jackson, the San Jose Newspaper Guild executive officer, talking about helping the company realize its workers were dedicated to helping the newspapers find innovative ways to market themselves.“I think what we need more than anything in our newsrooms is a culture of innovation,” he said, explaining that the new Guild was eager to work with management to reposition the paper as a responsive multimedia news organization.Chris O’Brien, the Mercury News business reporter and mastermind of the Next Newsroom project at Duke University’s school paper (as well as Public Press co-conspirator), likewise noted that the Merc’s staff has been eager to engage in newsroom reforms like those proposed by the paper’s “rethinking” committee. At the moment, though, no one can think of those ideas when it’s unclear how many reporters and editors will be standing a month from now.Louis Freedberg, director of the California Media Collaborative, announced he is pursuing a venture he’s calling Cal Express — a statewide “strike force” of journalists that could swoop in to cover important public policy stories that fall between the cracks. It’s an exciting idea if it can ever get funded. Freedberg and I talked afterward about setting up a hypothetical collaboration with the Public Press.