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Open Letter to Newspaper Photographers
Corey Perrine, Photographer
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Augusta | GA | USA | Posted: 11:14 AM on 12.01.10 |
->> For those seeking inspiration in the storm...
The great Melissa Lyttle speaks. Listen. Learn.
http://thelifeofm.com/?p=432 |
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Matthew Hinton, Photographer, Assistant
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New Orleans | LA | USA | Posted: 4:24 AM on 12.03.10 |
->> In following Niemeir's link to the Ted Koppel article it's worth noting that Ted Koppel's conversations with Eisner about budget cuts probably happened when Disney bought ABC in 1996. Google was founded in 1998 and much of the internet did not exist and was not a factor at the time of the budget cuts.
David Simon a former Baltimore Sun reporter and creator of The Wire, Homicide, and Treme stated in testimony before congress.
"Anyone listening carefully may have noted that I was brought out of my reporting position in 1995. That’s well before the internet began to threaten the industry, before Craigslist and department store consolidation gutted the ad base, before any of the current economic conditions applied. In fact, when newspaper chains began cutting personnel and content, the industry was one of the most profitable yet discovered by Wall Street. We know now, because bankruptcy has opened the books, that the Baltimore Sun was eliminating its afternoon edition and trimming nearly a hundred reporters and editors in an era when the paper was achieving 37 percent profits. "
Much of the turmoil facing news is self-inflicted by budget cutting to increase profits. But by reducing the amount of money on reporting, news outlets have help reduced circulation and ratings, which leads to more budget cuts, and a vicious cycle.
I agree with Lyttle that we should always strive to be better journalists, whether the storm, and that we have great responsibility to our communities. But I think it's naive to say "Do not let the current state of the industry define us; it’s time for us to define and shape it."
I don't think it something we can control at all especially when news companies today give away content for free on the internet. And putting more content online for free with tweets or blogs isn't really changing the shape of the industry but reinforcing a bad trend.
Again the downfall is very much self-inflicted because of the amount of content news organizations put on the web for free. Japanese newspapers have the highest circulation in the world because they have made an effort to put a minimal amount of news on the internet. So even in a more tech savvy nation they have better old school circulation.
The printed newspaper though old is light years ahead of the internet because it allows a company to hold on the exclusivity of news content for at least a little while. If content is not online it's hard for a blogger to copy and paste it off of a news website.
The new storm of "free news" on the horizon that we must whether is well described by Mr. Simon again during other testimony about the future of news:
"High-end journalism is dying in America and unless a new economic model is achieved, it will not be reborn on the web or anywhere else. The internet is a marvelous tool and clearly it is the informational delivery system of our future, but thus far it does not deliver much first-generation reporting. Instead, it leeches that reporting from mainstream news publications, whereupon aggregating websites and bloggers contribute little more than repetition, commentary and froth. Meanwhile, readers acquire news from the aggregators and abandon its point of origin - namely the newspapers themselves.
In short, the parasite is slowly killing the host.
It is nice to get stuff for free, of course. . .
. . .high-end journalism - that which acquires essential information about our government and society in the first place -- is a profession; it requires daily, full-time commitment by trained men and women who return to the same beats day in and day out until the best of them know everything with which a given institution is contending. . . . I am offended to think that anyone, anywhere believes American institutions as insulated, self-preserving and self-justifying as police departments, school systems, legislatures and chief executives can be held to gathered facts by amateurs pursuing the task without compensation, training or for that matter, sufficient standing to make public officials even care to whom it is they are lying or from whom they are withholding information.
The idea of this is absurd, yet to read the claims that some new media voices are already making, you would think they need only bulldoze the carcasses of moribund newspapers aside and begin typing. They don't know what they don't know - which is a dangerous state for any class of folk - and to those of us who do understand how subtle and complex good reporting can be, their ignorance is as embarrassing as it is seemingly sincere. . . A neighbor who is a good listener and cares about people is a good neighbor; he is not in any sense a citizen social worker. Just as a neighbor with a garden hose and good intentions is not a citizen firefighter. To say so is a heedless insult to trained social workers and firefighters." |
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T.J. Hamilton, Photographer
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Grand Rapids | MI | USA | Posted: 9:56 AM on 12.07.10 |
| ->> Thanks Corey for sharing this...I am grateful I still am shooting for a daily newspaper, despite the layoffs of our own staff.... 10 out of 15 shooters in the last 2 years... This helps put it in perspective. |
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Mike Simons, Photographer
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Tulsa | Ok | | Posted: 4:02 PM on 03.28.11 |
->> An open thank you letter to Melissa Lyttle:
After reading this blog, I picked up my phone and started making calls for a project that I have been "planning" on working on for years. The blog got me fired up to actually start working on it.
The resulting photo essay is called "driven" and the first story ran today and the site launched today. The published page is on my member page. And the web site is here- www.tulsaworld.com/driven
Thanks Melissa! Great blog. |
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Jeremy Harmon, Photo Editor, Photographer
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Salt Lake City | UT | USA | Posted: 9:10 PM on 03.28.11 |
| ->> Thanks for the link Corey. |
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Chuck Liddy, Photographer
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Durham | NC | USA | Posted: 1:24 AM on 03.29.11 |
| ->> I have to say...I can't jump on this bandwagon. Yes, many things Melissa says are true, but she is somewhat "whistling through the graveyard". The fact of the matter is it really doesn't matter how good you are, or what kind of great work you are doing...IF the axe falls it falls where it wants, or excuse me, where management deems it should fall. Here in NC I've seen FIVE North Carolina Press Photographers of the Year (POY) laid off. These folks folks continued to do great work day in and day out until the day they got laid off. This Pollyana attitude (in the friggin Blogosphere no less) is one of the worse things happening nowadays. It's almost as bad as contests themselves. One of the reasons I don't write a blog...they are somewhat like pablum now....ANYONE can type ANYTHING, no matter what relevance they might have. shots in the dark, voices in the wilderness, inspiration in the storm? I think not. that said, if melissa's words and advice make you feel safe, heed them. but don't be surprised if some upper management goon deems you are unimportant and sends you packing. welcome to the REAL world. |
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Brett Clark, Photographer
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Chuck Liddy, Photographer
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Durham | NC | USA | Posted: 11:03 AM on 03.29.11 |
->> brett, that's somewhat the point I was trying to get across...ypu gotta love the "pay" part of your post
"You are paid based on how often you write, how much traffic you generate and how much our advertisers value your content. Our writers (Examiners) are independent contractors and are paid monthly through PayPal."
all that and not a single word as to the AMOUNT. for all anyone knows you might be getting $10/column or story. |
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Mike Simons, Photographer
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Tulsa | Ok | | Posted: 3:14 PM on 03.29.11 |
->> Chuck-
All I got from that blog was that if your are lucky enough to still be a newspaper photographer then use that opportunity to do the kind of work you love doing. None of us know how long we can keep doing this job, but while we still get to we should enjoy every minute. |
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