Looking at changes to journalism in the digital era. New tools, new methods, new thought-leadership. The intersection of storytelling, innovation, and entrepreneurship.
The "Second Screen" is one of those buzzwords in media circles. People in news say they want to own the second screen, but most of their effort is targeted to standalone websites and phone and tablet apps. The non-fiction world could learn a lesson in second screen appeal from our fictional cousins who make The Walking Dead.
Quiz
The "sync experience" for The Walking Dead is a website-based experienced timed to coincide with live airings of television episodes. The content includes quizes, polls, video clips, and (tv) screen grabs presented at key moments. After a gruesome walker kill, the website will ask you to rank it on a bloodiness scale. When a symbolic gesture or item appears on the screen, the website will remind you of the significance (helpful for late entries into the series.)
Ad on Second Screen During a Commercial Break
The sync experience even includes ads, timed to offer themselves to viewers at a time when AMC is running promos rather than paid commercials, wisely making revenue and not conflicting with those who pay (more) for a broadcast slot. Each (new) episode of The Walking Dead starts with a reminder to start the "sync experience."
Talking Dead
And the final innovation for the "second screen" effort is bringing it back to the first screen. After new episodes we get Talking Dead, an hour-long show hosted by nerd royalty Chris Hardwick interviewing two celebrity "super fans" and one actor or producer from the show. This show incorporates digital interaction with the audience by displaying pictures from the "Dead Yourself" app, twitter questions, and more.
So how can news learn from this? While it would be next to impossible to automate a "news synch" to a live newscast, you could certainly do a "live tweet" or even host a Google+ Chat, possibly run by a (not the line) producer with the anchors and reporters joining in. Depending on crew availability (and break times, and union rules, etc.) there could also be a "News Extra" that runs after a newscast ends, or before it starts.)
Check out this list of YouTube videos compiled by AR&D Consultant Bill Seitzler (my former boss at WHEC in Rochester, NY). It shows some examples of how stations have used internet content live on the air, or cross-promoted a station's digital products on the air.
In my job as Executive Producer at a TV station, part of my job was understanding "broadcast rights" and copyright/trademark issues. Sometimes, I felt like I was the only one who "got it." Many reporters and photographers wanted to put Google Maps/Google Earth images on the air. I had to explain that Google requires a broadcast license, and at the time, there was a hefty fee. (But Bing was free, so we used that.)
It now looks like Google is no longer charging a fee for broadcasters to use Google Maps/Earth images. However, there is an application process, and you can apply here.
Last month, USA Today Media columnist Rem Reider wrote a piece on On-Air Fact Checkers. He wrote the piece after watching an episode of CNN's Reliable Sources with guest Tony Kornheiser of ESPN's Pardon the Interruption. I've never watched the show, but apparently PTI includes an on-air fact-checker. Kornheiser challenged his hard news cousins to add the feature to their programs.
The one place I've seen an on-air fact-checker is on FNC's Red Eye, where host Greg Gutfeld talks to Andy Levy for segments they call "The Half-time Report" and "The Post-game Wrap-Up." (I have not seen these in a while, as Levy is now seated at the table with the rest of the panel.) Levy will offer correct information when Gutfeld or a guest makes a mistaken assertion. Just as often, Levy will "correct" the opinion of someone on the show. The whole show plays a little fast and loose with the fact/opinion distinction, and makes heavy use of sarcasm and jokes, so this is not fact-checking in a pure form.
I don't see any of the "opinion shows" on CNN (Crossfire), MSNBC (every show airing after 3pm on weekdays), or FNC (5am-9am Fox and Friends, 2pm The Real Story with Gretchen Carlson, and everything from 4pm-11pm: Cavuto, The Five, Special Report, Greta, O'Reilly, The Kelly File, Hannity). All of these shows are based on the theory that the host is "correct," so the only person offering any corrections will be the host.
As for "straight news" programs, I don't really see them setting aside time for corrections on a daily basis. First, they put a lot of effort into making sure mistakes do not sneak in. When mistakes do occur, they are most often the result of a spelling error, or a mistaken button punch by a technician. As a television producer, I can tell you that for the sake of job harmony, anchors should not point out those sorts of errors. It happens, and sometimes should happen, that a person who appears on the air will point out and explain an error ("The person whose picture we just showed you is our congressman, not the suspected murder I was just talking about."), but even in those cases, you are still going to irritate some, if not all of your production crew, so there is a HUGE incentive to avoid it.
If there is a fact error in a taped report (and it does happen, a lot) a producer will usually whisper into the ear of the anchor, and the anchor will offer a clarification right after the piece runs. Sometimes, you'll see an anchor make a correction after a commercial break. (When newscasters have to add a correction, they will have to take time away from something else, usually dropping a planned story or making the weather forecaster do their job in less time.) You most likely won't see a correction when someone makes a spelling mistake on a graphic (as long as the error does not change the meaning in a way that distorts the overall meaning of the story in a way that needs to be explained.) The one place television has already adopted the practice of the Internet is casual spelling.
Perhaps the most appropriate place for on-air fact checking for TV broadcasts is on the second screen. Imagine a twitter feed offering corrections and commentary on the broadcast. Another option would be a "web extra" video stream that continues online after the broadcast ends, offering both a chance to correct errors, expand on content, and offer other extra information.
"Arctic Journey: Unicorn of the Sea" is a story prepared for Nightline that won the 2013 National Emmy Award for "Outstanding Feature Story on a Regularly Scheduled Newscast."
Many in the digital media realm talk about the "second screen experience," or even the "mulit-screen experience," to talk about people who are using social media while watching a traditional broadcast or cable program. Some programs try to integrate social media into the first screen by placing hashtags on the screen as a second bug, running a crawl of tweets on the bottom of the screen, or by showing social media posts as part of the main program.
"SimulTV" has a single screen solution. SimulTV is a subscription fee website with multiple channels. Each channel offers traditional video content and social media on a single page. I saw some of the people behind SimulTV pitch their product at the SXSW V2V conference in Las Vegas in 2013, and I wasn't very impressed, for the simple reason that they don't seem to understand content generators and providers. Their system is based on users coming to a SimulTV channel. Content providers, like broadcast networks and cable channels, are used to, and expect, users to come to THEIR web page for content. Instead of trying to get end users to pay to subscribe to one of their channels, I think these entrepreneurs would be better off licensing their technology to content providers.
Both CNN and FNC have "media criticism" shows on the weekend. CNN's used to be hosted by Howard Kurtz, until he was hired by FNC. Fox's old show, Fox Media Watch, was a joke. In its final year, the sole liberal critic was in a different location than the rest of the panel -- he was literally all alone. Now that Kurtz is at FNC, CNN's "Reliable Sources" is using guest hosts.
Back on September 29th, Brian Stelter took aim at CNN's moving target policy on "talent" revealing financial links to guests. In this case, Crossfire commentator Newt Gingrich's PAC gave money to Sen. Rand Paul -- the heavily promoted guest on the very first edition of Crossfire.
Welcome to "Who to Follow Friday," where I offer my thoughts on who to follow on Twitter for thought-leadership on jourmalism/media/tech/etc. This isn't who out there is tweeting the best breaking news, this is my list of people who are tweeting info or links to some of the most interesting thoughts about news, as well as the technology newsies use.
@journtoolbox is a creation of the Society of Professional Journalists, and according its Twitter profile, was created by Mike Reilley, an instructor at DePaul University. The feed often links to journaliststoolbox.org, a helpful place for reporters, editors, and academics.
"The Longest Wait" by Steve Hartman, won the 2013 National Emmy Award for Best Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast. Hartman is a master, and we can all learn from him.
Ever since John King from CNN spent election night in front of his "magic wall," local broadcasters have been jealous. AccuWeather has a new product that promises to bring the "magic wall" to local broadcasters called "Storyteller." According to the promotional materials, it will let you incorporate live HD video into presentations, which can include user-created maps (presumably from data and templates supplied by AccuWeather). The demos also show how you can put social media on the air (wonder if there is a system to filter out profanity?), and shows how easy it is to put a Google map on the air (with no mention of the fact that Google requires a licensing fee from broadcasters to put maps over-the-air.)
I just read "Smell You Later, Nerds", a column by Jessica Roy at BetaBeat. It is her last column, as she is heading over to TIME to run their TimeNewsfeed. She has a list of things she hates about the tech beat, and here are my two favorite:
7. The communal obsessions with expensive, over-brewed coffee, Nike Fuelbands and auto-tweeting scales, all of which are basically just narcissism masquerading as enlightened futurism.8. The notion that being the slightest bit critical makes you a “hater,” and the idea that providing any kind of coverage that isn’t a big sloppy BJ shows a lack of “journalistic integrity.”
The last one, of course, is pretty much a concern in every journalistic field. She's also concerned about the rampant and often ignored sexism and classism in the tech community. I think her final column deserves your attention.
Welcome to "Who to Follow Friday," where I offer my thoughts on who to follow on Twitter for thought-leadership on jourmalism/media/tech/etc. This isn't who out there is tweeting the best breaking news, this is my list of people who are tweeting info or links to some of the most interesting thoughts about news, as well as the technology newsies use.
Let's start with @journchat. This Twitter feed is associated with #journchat, which helps facilitate a weekly online chat (Monday 8-9pm ET) involving journalists, bloggers, public relations folks, and others. I've been participating for a few months, both as an active participant and as a lurker. Most of the time the chat will be provocative and at least remind you of a few journalistic principals. Personally, I'm always amused by how clueless the PR people are. Most weeks, I did come away with at least one good link to check out, piece of advice, and often a new person to follow.
Online Comments are supposed to be a crucial way to increase interactivity between media producers and consumers, but they come with dangers.
The threat of Internet trolls and their hateful and vitriolic comments that can hijack a news story are well known. This week, Popular Science announced it was dropping user comments because it is bad for science. A study led by a researcher from the University of Wisconsin-Madison showed that not only do comments have an impact on, and sometimes reverse, the reader's opinion of the issues in a scientific story, rude comments have an even more powerful impact. (The authors wrote a piece for the New York Times that summarizes the research.)
On the same day, YouTube announced changes for user comments. The goal here is to increase the usefulness of comments, by displaying more "important" comments higher in the comment list, rather than the most recent comments first. For example, if the celebrity that is the subject of a video comments, that comment is given prominent display. "Important" people in general are given preference in comments. Comments from a video's creator are also preferred. The improvements will also allow users more moderation control over their own videos.
Then there are the grand-daddies of commenting, Facebook and Twitter. Many media websites require commenters to register, often through Facebook. Facebook as a medium seems built for comments, with each wall post offering an invitation to comment. Since you pick your Facebook friends, you've essentially pre-moderated the responses, and you can always block, edit, and drop wall posts if you get comments you don't like. Twitter is simply 140 character comments broadcast to the entire world, with pre-moderation in the form of who you chose to follow.
Perhaps ending this entry with an invitation to comment is gratuitous.
I promise this occasional trip through the way-back machine will become more helpful and interesting once this blog has a little more longevity. Until then, we can still look back on the short history of pieces.
The Race to Innovate in Digital Media was my very first blog post back on August 23rd. It started as my attempt to look at the direction of innovation as the combination of previous media forms with new technological innovations. It ended up being a rudimentary history of media, from the cave wall to the Facebook wall.
All News is Local, also posted on August 23rd, looks at how a national broadcaster (The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC) decided to cover an event in one small, rural county in a big way because it illuminated a national trend.
Setting a New Bar for Journalism (August 26) shows how the business/entrepreneurial lessons of the show "Bar Rescue" might be applied to the media business.
And All Journalists should operate like entrepreneurs (August 29) was my attempt to apply some of the "self-help" lessons offered to the "start-up set" at the SxSw V2V conference in Las Vegas to the journalism community.
The Washington Post unveiled a new "app" on its website called "Topicly." It is a visually-based menu for news consumers. While it will work on a browser, it appears to be targeted to the tablet and mobile platforms, where images are king. Here's a screen shot.
Look familiar to anyone? It's very similar to Flipboard's interface.
The Jockey is a multimedia presentation by New York Times writer Barry Bearack and photographer Chang W. Lee. A total of 14 people are credited for the piece, which tells the story of Russell Baze, the jockey with the most races in American history. The photography and the videos that accompany the piece are brilliant, but there are not enough. Or, there is too much text. For a "multimedia" piece, they forgot the "multi" part. The video plays seamlessly within the story: you scroll down and the words from the text smoothly transform into the video part of the presentation. There is an interesting video portion detailing Baze's multiple career injuries. On the whole, though, this looks like a traditional long-read text piece with the video added on top. Notably, there are no video interviews, or "sound bites" of any of the piece's subjects within the piece. A good attempt, much better than "Snowfall" in my opinion, but still not quite reaching the pinnacle of what a multimedia piece should be.
TV People: looking for a simple way to highlight specific tweets and put them on the air? In most places, you order up a graphic or plug it into your CG program to get your way... but there's an alternative on the way. TVInteract is an app that even the most "hired for their looks" haircut can operate. The iOS app lets you look at your stream, pick a tweet, and it is ready for display, as long as your tablet is either connected via HDMI cable or AirPlay. Social media maven Jenni Hogan is attached to the company, which is pitching to TV stations and video outlets of all sizes.
Imagine NowThisNews on your television and you've got TouchVision. Both are putting an on-the-go, less-is-more approach to video news.
Both outfits are young, hip, visual, and willing to break out of the old-school television box, by adding animations, music, and a little bit of attitude. Both are time-conscious, presenting stories in bite-sized presentations of about a minute or less. TouchVision even does it without traditional "reporters" on the screen, preferring to use nameless, faceless narrators instead. TouchVision calls its presentation "news movies," and they are a bit more cinematic than traditional tv news fare.
NowThisNews's website looks a bit like Buzzfeed. The operation launched with a focus on mobile. They are now a leader in presenting news on Vine and Instagram.
TouchVision wants to position itself as the "network" for local broadcasters, and is offering its video content for both online and over-the-air use. Like traditional broadcast networks, local affiliates are offered a portion of time per hour to position local news, and a portion for locally-sold advertising.
I think the "snack size news" trend is interesting, especially when viewed against the counter trend of "longread" on the web and CNN's decision to add more hour-length documentary programming.
Cable Nets and local broadcasters churn out hours of content on mundane days, but Breaking News is when they get the big ratings. Any journalist knows that the information you get from sources, even the best sources, early in a major incident will not match exactly to the information you get hours or even days later. In the modern media age, most tend to report the information as soon as they get it, and then clarify or correct as "new information" comes in. Jon Stewart says we should put on the brakes and stop what he calls the "Wrongnado."
I usually agree with Stewart, but this time he's only half-right. He's right that we need to use the brakes a little more, but I don't think we can or even should put the newsmobile into park. You can never wait long enough for "all the facts" to come out -- historians who are uncovering new facts and new interpretations years, decades, even centuries after the events they write about can tell you that. Media is supposed to be the first draft of history, but Stewart is right that the rush to write that "first, first draft" leads to errors.
I've been watching a few shows online lately. I'm a late adopter to what looks to many like the future of video. My twice-daily viewings of a classic tv sci-fi show are interrupted every few minutes by commercials. Just like on the tv, when a commercial pops up on my computer, I turn to a magazine or amble over to the kitchen... but I've also actually watched a few.
Turns out, I'm typical. A study by online ad firm YuMe shows that traditional "spots" during an online video presentation are more effective that inline or banner ads that may appear around the viewing window. So, it looks like when it comes to online video, unless you want to pay for commercial-free viewing, it looks like we'll be living with commercials for a while longer.
Who would have thought a twerking video could have such serious implications. The video of the Twerking woman who caught on fire ("Worst Twerk Fail ever" was part of the title) was posted on Youtube on September 3, 2013. In days, the video was all over the place, and that includes major broadcasters, cable outlets, and websites of every flavor. (On the YouTube page, the poster bragged that she would "be on Jimmy Kimmel tonight" which, in retrospect, could have been a hint.)
Then, on his late night show on September 9, Jimmy Kimmel revealed that it was all a prank, and the media fell for it.
Funny right? Sure. Serious implications for journalism? Damn right.
Listen again to Kimmel's revelation with a critical ear. He says they received interview requests, but did not respond to a single one. If Kimmel is telling the truth, doesn't that mean that every single outlet that ran the video did so without confirming even who shot it, who was in the video... and never had the chance to ask "is it real?"
The original version of this video went viral because it is amusing. But then, one media outlet let down its journalism guard. Then another. Then another. Soon, the loss of journalistic integrity is what spread virally. There's a lesson there.
America is a start-up nation. Look for the bleeding edge of advancement in just about any endeavor, and you will find a bunch of people operating on no sleep, hunched over computers or their phones, banging out code, copy, or a business plan, living in a distinct lack of luxury, confident that they will someday see the fruits of their labor... and loving it. Sounds a whole lot like the life of a journalist, no?
I recently attended the SXSW V2V conference in Las Vegas. It is an event focusing on startups, full of the energy and flavor of the well knowns SXSW Interactive/Film/Music festivals in Austin, TX. (I'm a fan, and hopefully a future attender, of both events.) I picked up one consistent message during the panels I attended: people in a startup need to do more for themselves, and not put EVERYTHING into the startup. Here is some of the specific advice I heard.
Get enough sleep. Obviously.
Be selfish. Do something for yourself every day.One entrepreneur said after he wakes up and eats breakfast, he spends 30 minutes doing something for himself that has nothing to do with his company.
Exercise. As in, don't sacrifice your body for your business.
Be passionate about what you do. Otherwise, why do it?
Constantly seek advice. Find a pal you can talk to about your stuff. Find a mentor.
Focus on the achievable. Instead of looking at one huge insurmountable goal, cut it up into smaller, achievable goals.
Bars and journalism have a stronger link than the obvious one. That's the lesson from watching a marathon of "Bar Rescue" on SpikeTV on Sunday.
For those who don't know, "Bar Rescue" is a program where bar industry expert Jon Taffer visits a troubled bar and over five days "rescues" the place. Most of the issues that the bars face are similar to issues that many newsrooms face (and I'll dare say, most workplaces in general face.)
Don't ignore the customer. Every episode of "Bar Rescue" starts with covert surveillance from Jon's SUV in the bar parking lot, where Taffer and his experts observe the bar through hidden cameras. Inevitably, the customer service is poor, the drinks are mixed badly, and the food is not properly prepared. No mater the medium, journalism needs to be presented in the form that the consumer wants. More and more, consumers want a form depending on their needs at that time: on the go, they want a Twitter update on that breaking story; when they're back home, they'll take out the tablet for the long-read on that topic, and maybe turn on the television to catch a better look at that compelling video.
Fix the signs. The evaluation of the bar starts with the parking lot, and issues like lighting, signage, and ambiance. People will not see the inside of a bar that is not appealing from the outside. The lessons for journalism are obvious: television needs appealing people, on bright and well-designed sets. Newspapers and websites need eye-catching design.
Serve the customers, not for yourself. On "Bar Rescue," I saw a disturbing number of owners or managers who would consumer alcohol to the point of intoxication, or give away drinks, or hit on customers. All are examples of putting yourself ahead of the customer experience (and, ahead of the business.) In television journalism, this sort of behavior happens in idle banter, especially in the form of "station insider" or "industry insider" jokes that the viewers don't get.
Fun is not your priority. Is a strong cousin. When an owner, manager, or employee is focused on having fun, they cannot focus on their duties, to the detriment of the rest of the operation.
Meet the new boss. After scoping the place out, Taffer reveals himself to the owner and the employees, and notifies them that "things will be changing" because he is, in effect, the new boss for the next five days. Before he even knows what all of the problems are, Taffer tells everyone that expectations will be raised, and those who cannot keep up will be out of work. This may seem harsh, but it is part of a pathway to success: tell the employees what is expected of them, train them to reach those expectations, measure their work to see if they meed those expectations, and then hold them accountable if they don't measure up.
Check the taps, check the traps. Before he can figure out what to fix, Taffer has to figure out what's broken. He tours the entire establishment, paying close attention to the two money centers: the bar and the kitchen. Taffer's inspection starts with cleanliness, which always comes up short. There's always filth in the beer taps, and years of caked on grease in the grease traps.
Fix the managers. Employee training starts with making sure the managers know it is their fault the employees are not measuring up. Managing starts with setting expectations. Many of the owners or managers have lost their passion, often due to a personal tragedy. Taffer helps them work through it. Lesson: manager, manage yourself first.
Start with a clean glass. You'd be amazed at the number of bars using dirty glasses. You'd also be amazed at the filthy condition of most newsrooms. I worked at a place where the owner forbade eating at your desk, to the the point of threatening and actually firing people for it. Many people thought it was goofy, most (even the senior management) broke the rule, but I thought it was a good rule. No one likes working in filth, so don't let it get filthy in the first place if you can avoid it.
You can't mix drinks until you can pour. Employee training on "Bar Rescue" usually starts with teaching bartenders how to pour properly. It is so basic, and so often ignored. All the fancy "Snowfall"-style multi-media on your website or live-shot-o-rama in your holographic projector filled "Disaster Monitor Room" broadcast center don't make a lick of difference if you don't verify your quotes, ask good questions, and spell everything correctly.
Small mistakes add up to big dollars. At some point, Taffer will put out the BevIntel report. By weighing all the bottles in the bar, then weighing them after last call, and comparing to the receipts, Taffer can figure out just how many drinks the bartenders are giving away, either through straight free drinks or "over-pouring." The figures are staggering: thousands of dollars in a night. Journalists think of it this way: breaking the basic rules of journalism costs money. If journalists mess up their "pours," you can make mistakes, which damage your credibility, and can lead to lawsuits.
Don't forget the kitchen. A few of the bars did not have a kitchen, or did not pay it much mind. Taffer says it is a crucial revenue center. People who eat will order more drinks, stay longer, pay more money. The lesson for journalism: look for secondary revenue streams.
Have unique drinks and dishes. Taffer's experts devise new drinks and dishes for the bars, usually tied to the bar's theme or brand. The lesson for journalism is to know the brand and execute. An investigative station probably shouldn't spend too much (any) time on Miley Cyrus twerking at the VMAs, no matter how many eyeballs that may attract short-term. A community newspaper should focus on what the local members of congress are doing, but probably not spend a lot of time on every political machination going on in Washington, DC.
Focus on the profit. Smart bars don't spend a lot of time making drinks and dishes with small profit margins. They maybe even cut them from the menu. I saw one episode about a bar with a drag show. When the drag show started, drink sales stopped. So, the drag show had to change.
You find out a lot during the stress test. Taffer puts each bar through a "stress test," pulling in a bigger-than-usual crowd to put the pressure on everyone. And they usually can't handle the stress. Drinks are made poorly. Food gets to customers slowly. This really highlights the weak points, which are really opportunities for improvement. While most journalism outfits can not (would not) create a "stress test" situation, they happen on their own when either one really big story breaks, or many significant stories break at the same time. After things start to calm, take the time to figure out where your "opportunities for improvement" are.
Renovate. After the stress test, Tapper kicks everyone out for three days to redesign the bar, inside and out. Most journalism outfits are not going to do a top to bottom renovation all that often, but there are ongoing tweaks. Television stations will update the set or the graphics (or the anchors.) Newspapers might tweak the masthead, or try a few new layout techniques. Websites will have periodic redesigns. The lesson is not to be afraid of the change.
Celebrate the change. There's a scene in every episode of "Bar Rescue" where Taffer reveals the brand new look to the bar, and the employees' reaction. Usually, they're excited. Sometimes, they are upset about the change. When a bar's history is truly important, it will either survive the change, or will at least be celebrated in the redesign. The employees that embrace the change are the ones who are shown succeeding when the renovated bar receives the first patrons. The lessons for journalists are obvious. Too much is changing in the industry for you to wish for the way things used to be, but we also cannot abandon it entirely.
"All News is Local" is one of those cliches that just happens to be true. On Thursday, August 22nd, Rachel Maddow took her show to Elizabeth City, North Carolina. For a few days now, Maddow has been showing how the local election board there is just one cog in the North Carolina Republican campaign to restrict access to voting. In her typical way, she shows just how wrong-headed this is, from a common sense perspective, from a government policy/spending perspective, and from the perspective of anyone who believes in democracy. The HuffPo did a nice write-up here.
Usually, the networks and cable-nets send their anchors out for the big, splashy disaster, trial, or crime story that will evolve over days. This is the first time I've seen one deploy for what is, essentially, a process story about a process that is "over." The vote already took place; Maddow played the YouTube video of the meeting.
The other interesting thing here is that Maddow heaped praise on the newspaper industry. It is no new thing for television people to interview newspaper people about stories: in some sad way, that substitutes when television doesn't bother to assign one of its own journalists to a story. Maddow not only interviewed that local newspaper journalist in North Carolina, but she asked, pleaded her viewers to support "local journalism" by subscribing to newspapers and paying to access internet paywalls. (You can bet you won't see the anchors on the broadcast networks pitching local newspapers over the air supplied by local television stations with local newsrooms.)
Move, or get left behind. That seems to be the message, and the fear, in the digital media age. The race is on to own "mobile," even though no one has figured out how to own "social" or "online" before it, much less how to make a profit off of any of these disruptive technologies. So, I thought I might do a thought experiment, and track the various "disruptive" events in journalism (fact-based storytelling) through time.
1. Gestural Language
Probably the first form of communication. It also confirms to one human that there is an existence beyond their own brain. Gestures depend on a set of objects in the immediate vicinity ("I want that thing I'm pointing at") or a set of actions that correspond to known and accepted activities (You know I want food, because I'm pinching my fingers together and putting them in my mouth, the "I want food" sign.) Storytelling was usually simple and factual; fictional storytelling was restricted to lying. This was usually used between individuals: there was not much point in gesturing a crowd of hundreds that you want the piece of meat, when you just want Og to pass it over.
2. Spoken/Sung Language
Perhaps the biggest disruption for humanity was when we stopped relying on simple gestures to communicate, and learned to communicate through spoken language and song. This also opened up the potential topics for communication. Spoken language is a disruptive technology that allowed us to communicate about concepts, not just objects. Applies to both factual and fictional storytelling. This was more appropriate for communication from one person to a large group.
3.) Drawings/Images - Storage
Starting with cave drawings, humanity was no longer dependent on that "set of objects in the immediate vicinity"to communicate (See Spoken Language). Drawings also disrupted time: the messages were "sent" at a specific time, but would last as long as the drawing lasted. Again, both factual (historical) and fictional (mythological) storytelling was possible. Communication from one or many to one or many.
With those three in place, the first "multimedia" presentation would look something like the storytelling scene from "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome," which itself looks a bit like primitive theatre.
So, with those three innovations, humanity learned to communicate through visual and aural methods. Both methods are adaptable to both fact and fiction, and are suitable for messages from one or many, to one or many. In most cases, the "user filter" is simply to listen/observe or chose not to listen/observe. In the computer era (and later), you have more control over the types of content you chose to expose yourself to. In the mobile era, you can chose to only expose yourself to content that is or is about places nearby.
(We have also learned to communicate through the other five "traditional" senses: for example, many chefs think of a meal, or even a single dish, as a story told through taste and smell. Anyone who has experienced traditional (mostly non-Western) music knows it as much an experience in feeling the percussive beats as it is about the sound; same with an arena concert. For the most part, though, we will focus the rest of this article on communication through visual and auditory means.)
I believe that all subsequent innovations in storytelling were either improvements to efficency, storage, profit-making, or a combination of previous storytelling methods.
4. Text (Written Language) - Storage
On a very basic level, written language is a symbolic representation of gestures, spoken words, or drawings. At every step there is something "lost in translation," as there is something intrinsic about each of the three "base means" of communication that are lost when they are converted to written language. Written language in some eastern/Asian locations is a broad, but finite, set of symbols. In Western locations (and some Eastern) locations, written language consists of a small (relative to Western pictographic languages) number of units (letters) combined into a theoretically infinite number of larger units (words) which are then combined into larger units of meaning (sentences.)
5. Letters & Records
Written language led to written records, and to letters. I think of records as "thoughts to be used later," and letters as "thoughts to be used by someone else, at a different time and place." One-to-one communication.
6. Signs
One-to-many communication through text. Will lead to billboards, handbills, etc.
7. Monks/Painters Apprentices
Hand duplication of the Bible spread the word, and was the start of a long record of The Bible as the most "published" set of information in all time. Hand-crafted bibles included intricate artwork that was, in some sense, multimedia. Painters Apprentices often duplicated paintings, accomplishing a primitive "mass production."
8. Printing Press - Advertising
Mechanical reproduction replaces monks and painters apprentices. (Not immediately, but eventually.) This leads to commerce: books in the one-to-many communication area, newspapers in the many-to-many area. Note that newspapers eventually developed "in-line advertising," reducing the cost of the product to the consumer and replacing it with a charge to the ad-placer. In general, advertising penetrates the many-to-many side quite easily, and penetrates the one-to-many in more subtle ways.
9. Photography/Film - Storage
Now you don't have to have any artistic skill to capture an image, or to tell a story with an image. Photography lead to film, which is a transformative storytelling technology. Both are reproducible, one-to-many storytelling media. When pictures and films are sold, they are not normally mixed with advertising (there is no ad in the middle of your photo, and the film doesn't stop for an advertisement in the middle (we had to wait for television for that innovation.))
10. Telegraph
After text was converted to Morse Code's dashes and dots, allowed the transmission of text over long distances. In many ways, the spiritual ancestor of telephony and the internet. One-to-one or one-to-many, not ad supported.
11. Audio Recording
Storage of spoken/sung storytelling. One-to-one or one-to-many, not ad supported.
12. Radio
The long-distance transmission of spoken/sung storytelling. One-to-many, generally ad supported. (U.S. law forbids "pay to play," so radio broadcasters make money by selling advertising. Satellite radio is subscription based, and generally has no advertising, and uses that fact as a selling point.)
13. Telephone
Spoken/Sung storytelling over long distances. One-to-one (generally), not ad supported.
14. Television
Visual and spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. One-to-many communication. Ad supported.
15. Computer
Visual, spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. Communication was generally one-to-many (the program/presentation writer/coder communicates a story to many. Think about the video game author communicating with the players. The coder to the people experiencing the program.) Not ad supported.
16. Internet
Visual, spoken/sung storytelling over great distances. Includes one-to-one, one-to-many, and many-to-many communication. In addition to subscriptions and advertising, internet content providers have figured out how to make money selling data about their users. Varying degrees of ad support depending on the specific method of communication. Let's break them down:
Email: one-to-one or one-to-many text-based communication. (While you can now attach or embed a picture or audio file in an email, I contend these are not intrinsic to email). At origin, email was free or paid for by subscribers to connect to an internet service provider. (What about Gmail and its ads? I contend the ads are there so Google doesn't charge you for the interface that makes Gmail work: the skeleton email protocol is still free/subscription based.
Bulletin Boards: many-to-many text-based communication. Supported by a combination of subscription fees and in-line advertising.
Websites/HTML/CSS: one-to-many and many-to-many text, visual, audio storytelling. While some are free, most are supported by ads. A small but growing number are supported by subscription fees.
17. Portable Computing - Smart Phones/Tablets
This era marks an interesting reversal in trends. Innovation in the "computer" era was based on reduction in size and an increase in computing power. Each generation of computer is smaller than the previous one, but come with more memory and more computing power. Computer programs are able to accomplish more and more different tasks with each version. Smart phones started as computers that were able to run one program at a time, with a small screen. As smart phones evolve, they are actually becoming bigger, evolving into tablets. While each generation of smart phone/tablet does have more memory and more processing power, the apps they run are often slimmed-down versions of analogous programs for desktop computers, with inputs and outputs that are smaller. For example:
Texting/SMS: not just stripped down email, this is a personal telegraph.
Location based apps: building on the power of GPS, with location as a filter.
Sensor-based apps: personal movement, temperature, direction, environment as input.
Phone: at first, the apps were an add-on to the phone. After evolution, tablets no longer have a phone capability.
Video/Photo: visual input in a way that is clumsy with a desktop machine.
Distance has been overcome for data transmission, and now a device that can handle any story-telling paradigm is portable. The latest area for innovation appears to be interaction based on the environment of the user, both the physical location (relative to other physical locations) and the current environmental conditions (temperature, barometric pressure, geographic orientation (what direction are you pointing?), ambient sound, etc.) Innovators will figure out new ways to combine old storytelling paradigms with environmental sensor inputs.
