Discussion questions for the December 2007 / January 2008 issue, along with suggestions for further readings on Web advertising, the explosion of video on news Web sites and the AP's burgeoning foreign bureaus.

Story 1: "Online Salvation?" |  Story 2: "Video Explosion"  |  Story 3: "Covering the World " |  Story 4:"Declaring War on Errors"

Randy Bennett, vice president of audience and business development for the Newspaper Association of America / Courtesy of the Naa
The Newspaper Association of America's Randy Bennett says newspapers have staked out a solid position on the Internet. (Photo courtesy the NAA)
STORY 1: "Online Salvation: The embattled newspaper business is betting heavily on Web advertising revenue to secure its survival. But that wager is hardly a sure thing." By Paul Farhi  

MORE INFO FROM THE STORY:  Farhi asks: Can online ad revenue grow fast enough to replace the dollars that are being lost by the old media? At the moment, he reports, the Internet has a long way to go. "...even if the newspaper industry continued to lose about 8 percent of its print ad revenue a year and online revenue continued to grow at 20 percent a year--the pace of the first half of 2007--it would take more than a decade for online revenue to catch up to print." Some suggest more Web-only news features might help attract more visitors, and more ad dollars. Meanwhile, some traditional news organizations are joining forces with Internet giants like Yahoo! and Google to pair news content with the search engines' technology.

CLASS DISCUSSION AND RESEARCH ASSIGNMENT:  

  • Invite in a panel of publishers, editors or advertising managers from area professional news Web sites. Ask them if their Web sites are operating in the black; if they expect their Web sites to eventually replace the ad revenue from their traditional publications; and, if so, when that might happen and how. What will the sites' strategies be for increasing revenues? Students should come to class armed with additional questions about the sites' business strategies and editorial goals. If the guests can't make it physically to class, consider chatting via a videoconference on Skype.
  • Ask students to write research papers detailing business strategies for some of the top news Web sites in the country. The papers could draw on a mix of new interviews conducted by the students and previously published interviews in newspapers, magazines and trade journals (such as AJR and Columbia Journalism Review). Papers should include citations and end notes or foot notes.


    • RELATED COLUMNS, STORIES AND WEB LINKS:


    STORY 2: "The Video Explosion: News organizations are embracing video on their Web sites in a big way. The quality ranges from bad to basic to superb. And for some journalists, the advent of video is a terrific new career opportunity." By Charles Layton  

    MORE INFO FROM THE STORY:  With the advent of fast computer connections in homes and inexpensive digital camera equipment, newsrooms are finding little excuses not to jump in. Some are training both reporters and photographers to shoot video. An additional incentive? "Video consumers skew younger than the population as a whole and have higher incomes and more education," Layton reports.

    CLASS DISCUSSION AND SURFING ASSIGNMENT:

  • How difficult is it for still photographers to shoot video while on assignment -- or for news reporters to shoot moving images? How common is it for photographers to shoot only with high-definition video cameras, finding still images for publication in frame grabs? Invite in three or four photographers and/or reporters from news organizations experimenting more and more with this multi-tasking. What are the benefits to the reader of the journalists' juggle? What are the downsides -- for readers and journalists? (Are newsrooms sacrificing quality of images?) If journalists aren't available locally, consider a conference call or a videoconference to journalists at The Washington Post or the Detroit Free Press.
  • Ask students to create a list of 10 strong examples of videography on news Web sites, and 10 weak examples. (Stories and projects cited in Layton's report are off limits.) Ask students to detail in an analysis paper what elements --in storytelling or technique -- separate the good from the bad. Students should also be required to interview a reporter or videographer involved with one of the good examples. They should detail in their paper some of the findings from this interview, including how long the piece took from start to finish and what special skills and software were needed to execute it.

    RELATED COLUMNS AND LINKS:


    STORY 3: "Covering the World: As U.S. news organizations have backed away from foreign news coverage, the Associated Press' international report has become increasingly vital." By Sherrie Ricchiardi

    MORE INFO FROM THE STORY: Ricchiardi reports: "While others are pulling out of foreign locales, the wire service has made worldwide expansion part of a master plan for future growth. To lead that effort, a new division, AP International, was established in 2003." AP has 243 bureaus in 97 countries, serving news operations that potentially reach 1 billion people a day. The flagship of the overseas bureaus is in Baghdad, where some 200 staffers and stringers are roaming the country, Ricchiardi writes.

    CLASS RESEARCH AND DISCUSSION:
  • Ask students to spend five days monitoring Associated Press reports from its foreign bureaus (assuming your college has free access to the wire), along with foreign reports published in one of the nation's top newspapers: The New York Times, The Washington Post or the Los Angeles Times. Students will use their analyses to write a paper that describes similarities and differences in the coverage. How often did the newspaper rely on AP dispatches to report on foreign happenings? How often did it rely on its own staffers to file? How different were the dispatches? (For instance, did both the news publication and the wire offer breaking stories as well as enterprise and investigative pieces? Were the stories' focus and topics similar, or different?) Can any early conclusions be drawn from this brief study? Students should type up their findings, including attribution and informal sources, and be prepared to discuss them in class.
  • What's it like to be a foreign correspondent? Invite in reporters from area professional news outlets to talk about their overseas assignments, including how they cultivated sources on the beat, how often they had to rely on translators, drivers or security help, and how they worked to safeguard themselves in potentially dangerous assignments. How did they prepare themselves for the assignments before they went overseas? (Did they have to learn a new language?) What advice would they offer a young reporter hoping to one day land such a beat? If reporters in your community can't be found to chat to your class, try a video or phone conference with a reporter in another town.
  • One argument that some news editors give for pulling back on foreign bureaus is that they need to focus on the local franchise, with local news reports being given a priority. But many publications successfully report foreign stories with a local angle -- showing audiences why they should care about news events outside their home town. (For instance, a regional paper covering the Iraq war might report on soldiers deployed from the local community.) Ask the class to identify a published foreign story that could have been reported differently -- with a local angle included. The original story should be turned in, along with a paragraph summary from the student on how the story could have been reported and written differently.

    RELATED STORIES, COLUMNS AND REPORTS:


    STORY 4: "    Declaring War on Errors" Book reviews by Carl Sessions Stepp

    MORE INFO FROM STEPP: "Regret the Error" by Craig Silverman compiles published media corrections, but also lays out a plan for reform, starting with a "systems approach" to accuracy. Rather than blaming an individual, this approach considers how newsroom processes and cultures contribute to published errors. Silverman recommends, among other ideas, better training in interviewing and note-taking and a 10-minute fact-checking period before reporters turn in copy. "Letters from the Editor," by William Woo, a former editor at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, compiles letters he wrote to students while teaching at Stanford. He counseled students to look for the human side of stories.

    CLASS DISCUSSION / ANALYSIS:

  • Stepp notes that studies show that errors occur in up to 61 percent of all stories. Yet many mistakes could have been prevented had the reporter taken some time before turning in copy to double-check the facts. For this assignment, ask students to choose a story from a campus publication or a local newspaper or Web site for post-publication fact-checking. Students should use a yellow highlighter to note every checkable fact: Spellings of proper names of people, places, companies; titles of people; and other checkable tidbits, including facts contained in quotes. Students should then consult reputable documents and resources to verify the information. Primary documents are preferred for fact-checking. Any discrepancies should be noted in a typed summary, which will be turned in with the story for a class grade.
  • After completing the above assignment, students should be prepared to discuss their findings with the class--including any surprises. How might they cut down on their own mistakes in reporting and writing?

    RELATED STORIES AND WEB SITES:

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    Teachers' guide written and produced by Chris Harvey, online bureau director at the University of Maryland Philip Merrill College of Journalism and a former managing editor of AJR. First item for this issue published Dec. 10, 2007; second item added Dec. 18; third item added Jan. 1, 2008; last item added Jan. 2, 2008.

    Copyright © 2007 Philip Merrill College of Journalism. Permission is granted to freely print, for classroom use, up to 100 copies of the most up-to-date version of this document, as long as the document is not modified.