When I worked at the New York Daily News, I used to say that the place was ruled by its ghosts: ghosts of the past, whose haunting refrain was, “we do that because we’ve always it it that way,” or, “you can try that, but we tried it once — ’56, I think — and it didn’t work.” That was the authentic voice of many newsrooms.
Last night, Tim Porter linked — as did I — to Debbie Galant’s wonderful essay at Pressthink on what it’s like to be a hyperlocal journalist-blogger-entrepreneur-proprietor-gossip-gadfly. He said hers is an authentic voice of the newsroom and it is: The ghost of newsrooms future.
Tim also quoted from another authentic voice of the newsroom, the voice of newsrooms present: a heartfelt and frustrated — but, I’d argue, ultimately encouraging — email from David Hawkins of the Star-Ledger (I used to work with the paper; didn’t work with Hawkins). It’s an email filled with frustration about trying to get to the future and all the speedbumps, barriers, and bodies that lie in the way. But I find it encouraging because he cares so much and recognizes the need for change — that, alone, is a big deal in newsrooms. Responding to another essay of Tim’s about the mood of the newsroom, Hawkins writes: “But it seems like you are missing a significant group in the nattering nabobs you mention. Namely the 40-50 year-old mid-manager type who isn’t afraid of change, but doesn’t see it happening as a positive process where he works. The frustrated, soon-to-be-middle-aged people who feel powerless to help save their listing ships.” He’s saying that newspapers need to change and that he’s not alone in seeing that. Good news, I call that.
Hawkins complains about frustrations trying to get video content online and I should bear some responsibility for that, having been the online content exec. And if I try to foist off that blame by explaining about resources and staffing and revenue and politics and priorities, I’d only be proving his second complaint about “institutional and corporate mentality” and “fighting over who gets the credit or will be in charge.” I can’t argue, so I won’t.
As I’ve said before, I left my full-time job at a news organization because I am addicted to change and I believe news must change, but I am not confident it can happen from within. So I went out. But that’s me.
My fear is that if Hawkins and his fellow nabobs leave out of frustration or fatal intertia, then the news business will be in trouble. And it is a risk. He wrote to Tim:
I would love to embrace the future if someone would come up with a good plan at my place…..
So I complain after a fashion. I tell the people in charge, when they will listen, and my colleagues, when they aren’t rolling their eyes, that we have to change now. I cite proofs and examples. I admit to not having a lot of answers, but offer up what I’ve got, often focusing on how they could be done with little money and no additional personnel.
I’m all for creative solutions. But I am beginning to think I will have to pursue them elsewhere. And I hate that thought.
I hate that thought, too. This is an authentic voice of the newsroom today, of a love for journalism, and of the need for change and that is incredibly valuable. The question is how we get the present and future to meet.
