Lecture 12: Page One: Inside the New York Times



With the Internet surpassing print as our main news source, and newspapers going bankrupt, ... Page One chronicles the media industry’s transformation and assesses the high stakes for democracy ... The film deftly makes a beeline for the eye of the storm or, depending on how you look at it, the inner sanctum of the media, gaining unprecedented access to the New York Times newsroom for a year. At the media desk, a dialectical play-within-a-play transpires as writers like salty David Carr track print journalism’s metamorphosis even as their own paper struggles to stay vital and solvent, publishing material from WikiLeaks and encouraging writers to connect more directly with their audience. Meanwhile, rigorous journalism—including vibrant cross-cubicle debate and collaboration, tenacious jockeying for on-record quotes, and skillful page-one pitching—is alive and well. The resources, intellectual capital, stamina, and self-awareness mobilized when it counts attest there are no shortcuts when analyzing and reporting complex truths.

Since the internet has developed dramatically, many newspaper organisations in US were bankrupt. Many people are worried New York Times and American journalism would come to an end very soon. In reality, the New York Times is badly affected by decreasing subscriptions and advertisement revenues. Nowadays, people can easily get plenty of free information and news from the internet. Internet can be seen as a threat to the newspaper organisations. However, at the same time, the New York Times also used internet as a new platform to report news. People can now read the news on the website of New York Times. If readers want to read all articles or get more news stories, they have to pay money. That means some newspaper organisations start charging the online readers for the purpose of surviving in the industry. Page One: Inside the New York Times is a good documentary to give a summary on how media works today and how media face challenges and difficulties in this internet era.

Lecture 11: Investigative Journalism

An investigative journalist is a man or woman whose profession it is to discover the truth and to identify lapses from it in whatever media may be available. The act of doing this generally is called investigative journalism and is distinct from apparently similar work done by police, lawyers, auditors and regulatory bodies.

INVESTIGATIVE-INTELLIGENT
                              -INFORMED
                              -INTUITIVE
                              -INSIDE
                              -INVEST

Deeper definitions & Purpose
1. Critical and thorough journalism
2. Custodians of conscience
3. To provide a voice for those without one and to hold the powerful to account
4. Fourth Estate / Fourth Branch of Govt/ Watchdog

It is not enough for journalists to see themselves as mere messengers without understanding the hidden agendas of the message and myths that surround it. Newspapers clearly have a function beyond mere reporting and recording –a function of probing behind the straight news, or interpreting and explaining and sometimes of exposing … The press lives by disclosure. The ABC cannot simply report; its legislation clearly implies that it should also work within the best traditions of investigative journalism … systematically to pursue issues of public concern through innovative and reliable journalism.

TYPES OF INVESTIGATION INTERACTION

• Interviews
• Observations
• Documents
• Briefings
• Leaks
• Trespass
• Theft

INVESTIGATION METHODS

1. Interviewing-Numerous interviews with on-the-record sources as well as, in some instances, interviews with anonymous sources eg. whistleblowers
2. Observing-Investigation of technical issues, scrutiny of government and business practices and their effects. Research into social and legal issues
3. Analysing documents-(law suits, legal docs, tax records, corporate financials, FOI (Freedom of Information) material)

PR: propaganda by truth –the selective use of ‘facts’ to present a persuasive case to the public

• resistance to EXPOSURE
• dodging QUESTIONS
• massaging ‘talent’
• cleaning up stories

Journalism: verifying the ‘facts’ in ‘the public interest’

• no INTERVENTION
• no SHOE LEATHER
• lack of DEPTH
• formulaic reporting

Lecture 10: News Values

News Values is the degree of prominence a media outlet gives to a story, and the attention that is paid by an audience.

1.IMPACT

2.AUDIENCE IDENTIFICATION-news is anything that's interesting, that relates to what's happening in  the world, what's happening in areas of the culture that would be of interest to your audience.

3.PRAGMATICS-ethics – facticity - practice / practical
                             -current affairs - everyday

4.SOURCE INFLUENCE-journalism has never needed public relations more, and PR has never done a better job for the media.


Are News Values the same across different news services?NO – they vary across different news services.
Are News Values the same across different countries / cultures?NO – they vary across different countries / cultures.

"A sense of news values" is the first quality of editors – they are the "human sieves of the torrent of news", even more important even than an ability to write or a command of language. "Journalists rely on instinct rather than logic" when it comes to the defining a sense of news values.

The additivity hypothesis that the more factors an event satisfies, the higher the probability that it becomes news.
The complementarity hypothesis that the factors will tend to exclude each other.
The exclusion hypothesis that events that satisfy none or very few factors will not become news.

Newsworthiness: Reviewing Galtung & Ruge
1. THE POWER ELITE. Stories concerning powerful individuals, organisations or institutions.
2. CELEBRITY. Stories concerning people who are famous.
3. ENTERTAINMENT. Stories concerning sex, showbusiness, human interest, animals, an unfolding drama, or offering opportunities for humorous treatment, entertaining photographs or witty headlines.
4. SURPRISE. Stories that have an element of surprise and / or contrast.
5. BAD NEWS. Stories with particularly negative overtones, such as conflict or tragedy.
6. GOOD NEWS. Stories with particularly positive overtones such as rescues and cures.
7. MAGNITUDE. Stories that are perceived as sufficiently significant either in the numbers of people involved or in potential impact.
8. RELEVANCE. Stories about issues, groups and nations perceived to be relevant to the audience.
9. FOLLOW-UP. Stories about subjects already in the news.
10. NEWSPAPER AGENDA. Stories that set or represent the news organisation‘s own agenda.

Lecture 9: Agenda Setting

An individual's conception of reality is socially constructed through a process of communication using shared language. Reality exists, but the way we come to know it, talk about it, understand it, is mediated through social life. The media play a large role in "constructing" or "mediating" the social world as we understand it.

The four agendas

1. PUBLIC AGENDA -the set of topis that members of the public perceive as important.
2. POLICY AGENDA -issues that decision makers think are salient. (i.e. legislators)
3. CORPORATE AGENDA -issues that big business & corporations consider important.
4. MEDIA AGENDA -issues discussed in the media.

These four agendas are interrelated.


Agenda setting is the process of the mass media presenting certain issues frequently and prominentlywith the result that large segments of the public come to perceive those issues as more important than others. Simply put, the more coverage an issue receives, the more important it is to people.

The Mass media do not merely reflect and report reality, they filter and shape it. Media concentration on a few issues and subjects leads the public to perceive those issues as more important than other issues.

Two main types of Agenda Setting Theory

First Level Agenda Setting Theory: This is for the most part studied by researchers and emphasizes the major issues and "the transfer of the salience of those issues." At this level the media suggest what the public should focus on through coverage.

Second Level Agenda Setting Theory: This is essentially, how the media focuses on the attributes of the issues. The media suggests how people should think about an issue.

Strengths of the Agenda Setting Theory

1. It has explanatory power because it explains why most people prioritize the same issues as important.
2. It has predictive power because it predicts that if people are exposed to the same media, they will feel the same issues are important.
3. It can be proven false. If people aren’t exposed to the same media, they won’t feel the same issues are important.
4. Its meta-theoretical assumptions are balanced on the scientific side.
5. It lays groundwork for further research.
6. It has organising power because it helps organiseexisting knowledge of media effects.

Weakness of the Agenda Setting Theory

1. Media users may not be as ideal as the theory assumes. People may not be well-informed, deeply engaged in public affairs, thoughtful and skeptical. Instead, they pay casual and intermittent attention to public affairs, often ignorant of the details.
2. For people who have made up their minds, the effect is weakened.
3. News cannot create and conceal problems. The effect can merely alter the awareness, priorities and salience people attach to a set of problems.
4. NEW MEDIA is a whole new ballgame in terms of Agenda setting

Nokia says Lumia is 'first real Windows phone'

NOKIA has launched its long-awaited first Windows 7 smartphones, hoping to claw back market share it has lost in the smartphone race to chief rivals, Apple, Samsung and Google.

But some analysts say it may be too little, too late, for the world's top mobile phone maker.

With price tags of $560 and $360, the Lumia 800 and 710 are based on Microsoft's operating system and come eight months after Nokia and the computing giant said they were hitching up.

"Lumia is reasonably good ... but it's not an iPhone killer or a Samsung killer," Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics said.

"But where Nokia does stand out is on their price - it looks like they are going to be very competitive."

Lumia 800, with Carl Zeiss optics and 16GB of internal memory, will be available in selected European countries in November, including France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and Britain.

It will be sold in Hong Kong, India, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan before the year-end.

Lumia 710, with a 1.4 GHz processor, navigational applications and Nokia Music - a free, mobile music-streaming app - will first be available in Hong Kong, India, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan toward the end of the year.

The company's share price jumped almost 3 per cent in an otherwise depressed market on the Helsinki Stock Exchange but settled, closing almost unchanged at ($6.68).

Nokia, which claims 1.3 billion daily users, has been the world's biggest handset maker since 1998, selling 432 million devices last year - more than its three closest rivals combined.

But after reaching its announced global goal of 40 per cent market share in 2008, it has struggled against rivals making cheaper handsets in Asia, and its share has shrunk to 24 percent earlier this year.

Worse still, Nokia's sales in the more lucrative smartphone market crashed 39 per cent in the third quarter as it continued to be squeezed in the low end by Asian manufacturers like ZTE and in the high end by the iPhone, Research in Motion's Blackberry, Korea's Samsung Electronics and Taiwan-based HTC Corp.

The iPhone has set the standard for smartphones among many design-conscious consumers and the Blackberry has been the favourite of the corporate set.

Google's Android software has emerged as the choice for phone makers that want to challenge the iPhone.

Samsung and HTC - snapping at Nokia's heels for third place in topend smartphones behind the iPhone and Samsung - are the biggest users of the Android platform.

Nokia is still operating Symbian software, older than Apple's software and considered clumsy by many, although it has been upgraded. Nokia also introduced the MeeGo platform in its flagship N9 model launched last month.

Mr Elop has said Windows software will become the main platform for Nokia smartphones but that it won't stop developing Symbian or MeeGo.

Mr Mawston says Nokia has been pushed into a corner as Symbian was unable to compete with other operating systems and MeeGo took too long to develop.

"It's a risk that they may be juggling too many balls at once," Mr Mawston said.

"They were pushed into a multi-platform strategy for at least the short-term, but given the competitive situation with Symbian and MeeGo they really had no choice but to develop a third (platform) and juggle all three at once."

Mr Elop described the Lumia phones as a "new dawn" for Nokia.

"Lumia is light ... Lumia is the first real Windows Phone," Mr Elop declared to the London audience.

He acknowledged that since he took over the Nokia leadership a year ago there had been "some difficult moments and some tough decisions to make," including more than 12,000 layoffs, but was upbeat about the future.

"Eight months ago, here in London we outlined a new direction for Nokia," Mr Elop said. "Since then we've gone through a significant transition and we are playing to win - no holding back, no hesitation, no second guessing."

Nokia, which according to Strategy Analytics, is the world's top seller of dual SIM card handsets, sold 18 million such devices in the third quarter.

"Dual SIM is really something Nokia should have been doing in 2007 and 2008 when the market really started rocketing quite aggressively," Mr Mawston said

"Like with smartphones really, they're two or three years behind and are gradually playing catch-up."

Brisbane Festival 2011 laser light show

Lecture 8: Public Media

The role of public media
Public media should have public value. According to the BBC that means:

1. Embedding a ‘public service ethos’
2. Value for licencefee money
3. 'Weighing public value against market impact'
4. Public consultation

In 1985 the Broadcasting Research Unit defined public service broadcasting as involving:

• Geographical universality
• Universality of appeal
• Special provision for minorities
• Special relationship to the sense of national identity and community
• Distanced from all vested interests
• Universality of payment
• Competition in good programming rather than competition for numbers
• Liberate rather than restrict

Public Media Functions:

• Nation Building
• National Heritage
• National Identity
• National Conversations



"The difference between commercial broadcasting and public broadcasting is the difference between consumers and citizens". Public media is a media whose mission is to serve or engage a public. Its purpose is to serve the public, rather than make profits. In Australia, ABC and SBS are the two largest public broadcasting corporations. Due to really tight budget, public media producer or journalist has to take up serveral job duties. Therefore, producing quality media work is never easy with little money. Public media really are facing challenges to continue its run in competition with commercial media. It is difficult to avoid commercialization when getting consumers' support.