Holiday joy must be tinged with renewed survivors’ guilt at the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Some good people survived the latest cull of experienced reporters, photographers and editors and new bylines are appearing. I wish them well. It won’t be easy.
Enquirer credibility is being undermined by editor Carolyn Washburn’s decision to scrap the historic — if imperfect — wall of separation between news and advertising. Now, it will be up to journalists to make sure their stories benefit advertisers as well as readers whom they must help “monetize.”
In the past, solid, accurate and trustworthy reporting was sufficient to attract readers to the Enquirer. In turn, advertisers drew validation from the integrity of Enquirer news columns; trust one, trust the other.
Not now. Whether younger consumers know or care is uncertain, given their eclectic consumption of news on smart phones, laptops, iPads, tablets, etc.
Lest you think I’m making this up, here’s part of an exchange between Washburn and online news media aggregator Jim Romenesko. It began with an Enquirer ad for an investigative reporter. Asked about the undisguised link between news judgment and advertising ambitions, Washburn replied in part:
“We’ve already seen some results that didn’t hurt the newsroom or readers at all and benefited a business in our community and our advertising team. Of course, we will and must say no. When an advertiser or sponsor wants to put my Reds beat writer in a suit at his monthly live show, I say absolutely not. When an advertiser wants us to do a story just because they’re an advertiser, we say no. We’ve told the staff that as we go forward and begin to build these relationships, that the most important thing is to raise questions if they are ever uncomfortable or uncertain. We’ll talk things through as things come up to be sure we do the right thing.”
Advertisers aren’t stupid.
They’ll draw the obvious inference and find new opportunities to promote self-serving features of which there already are too many.
They’ll also see new ways to urge a reporter to drop a troublesome idea or story.
In such an environment, no reporter should be surprised to hear, “Do you really want to pursue this? It won’t do either of us any good.”
And good luck to any Enquirer journalist who candidly expresses discomfort and uncertainty. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what the “right thing” will be in Gannett’s highly-disciplined drive for increased profits.
I’m not hostile to profits. They provided me a fair wage here and abroad for decades. Profits support my Enquirer retirement. In addition to dividends to stockholders, profits can support better journalism.
However, the Enquirer always has been friendly to local businesses and deferential to corporate/banking leaders. Some stories are barely distinguishable from press releases. That’s not new nor is it admirable. But “that’s just the Enquirer..."
Meanwhile, the Enquirer lovingly tells us about real estate development and new bars and restaurants despite the paper's lack of experienced police, medical, environment or education reporters.
Now, with Washburn’s assurance, I’ll read the paper knowing that savvy reporters, photographers and editors are looking over their shoulders, wondering if an advertiser or ad rep will complain about a story, an image or a headline. Here’s the Enquirer help-wanted ad that led to the Romenesko-Washburn exchange:
Romenesko wondered about the investigative reporter’s relationship with the advertising partner and how the journalist will “monetize” his or her audience. Here’s Washburn’s fuller response: “I included this expectation - for the reporter to work with the ad side — in all beat job descriptions, though it’s less likely to be relevant in some than others. It’s less likely to be relevant for investigative than the health reporter, for example.
“But the idea is that our adv (sic) sales rep and our reporter are very often talking to the same people in an organization. So we want that sales rep and that reporter to know each other. They can share insights they are learning about the industry and that organization.
“An advertiser often has questions about news content and our content strategies. The sales rep doesn’t have to be the one to answer all that. We can sometimes make introductions for each other in the organization that may be helpful. They can go on ‘get to know you’ or ‘what’s new’ visits with each other. I’ve done some of these myself. The sales rep, in listening to me talk to one of our arts organizations, learns more about our coverage. And later that is helpful to him as he is trying to describe our coverage focus to an advertiser.
“Many of those organizations are both advertisers and sources. And many of those organizations are trying to grow their reach among 25-45 year olds in the community just as we are. So we can actually can learn things from each other as we have these conversations. Over time, that will help us grow . . . “
About the same time Romenesko and Washburn were exchanging emails, I found the inadvertently funny exchange on the jimromenesko.com blog. It captures the spirit of journalists appalled by the Gannett cost-cutting and newsroom realignments that create vacancies at the Enquirer and other dailies. The exchange begins with an email from Antje Spethmann, Gannett Corporate Talent Acquisition, to Richard C. Arthur:
“Dear Rick,
Good afternoon, I found your profile on LinkedIn while searching for an editor to fill one of our Content Strategist roles. We have openings for a newsroom leader — essentially managing editor — at The Asbury Park Press, The Cincinnati Enquirer, The Des Moines Register, The Springfield News-Leader and The Salem Statesman-Journal.
“As part of our ‘Newsroom of the Future,’ we have organized ourselves to keep pace with news consumption, become a digital-first news institution, and let our reporters own and drive their coverage.
“As such, leadership positions are more coaching and strategy oriented.
“In Salem, Asbury Park and Cincinnati, we are looking for investigative/watchdog/accountability coaches to guide reporters during and after the creation of content. Needless to say, this person has to live the Fourth Estate.
“In Des Moines and Springfield, we’re hiring a more general content coach, who guides reporters and photographers in planning for digital-first with the best storytelling approach for target audiences. He or she must be able inspire staff to experiment, learn and grow to meet rapidly evolving consumer needs.
“We all have personal and professional networks of journalists and I figured you might know someone who is looking, or just ready to take the next step in his or her career. If so, please feel free to pass this along. I look forward to seeing who might be interested.
“Thanks for much for passing this along. I do appreciate it.”
(Her email included links to formal job descriptions and information about Gannett’s “Newsroom of the Future.”)
Here is Rick Arthur’s response:
“Dear Antje,
I would never refer anyone to Gannett, an organization that has such disdain for copy editors and that treats its employees so shabbily, and whose executives, publishers and editors wilfully (sic) deny that there are problems while creating — for the second time in a decade — the laughably Orwellian ‘Newsroom of the Future.’
“All the best,
Rick"
CURMUDGEON NOTES:
• I worked Christmas at the Cincinnati Enquirer for decades so someone who celebrated could have the day off. Most of the time that meant editing the local pages. Reduced holiday staffs struggled to fill before we produced and cached “evergreen” stories and photos for predictably slow Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s days. We probably used a shot of a polar bear playing with a beer keg in its pond at the zoo and maybe, depending on the weather, ice skating in Eden Park. There usually was a house fire and a late story about northbound traffic backups on I-75 on Death Hill. My favorite Christmas story involved people who had a crappy day. This went beyond working Christmas; it had to be truly bad.
One person our reporter interviewed was Faye Tucker. I don’t remember why she had a bad day, but it was a doozy. The story went to the top of the local page. Ms. Tucker’s family name was in boldface caps at the top of a column...misspelled. The alliteration of her first and misspelled last name was perfect. I caught it when a copy boy brought me a page proof. I walked downstairs to the shop and showed the typo to the foreman. He stared at the page proof as if he could will the misspelled Tucker to correct itself. After all, catching and correcting errors were printers’ responsibilities. Then he moved quickly and professionally. He stopped the press; that’s rarely done because the roll-fed newsprint could rip and require costly time to thread it through the press again. Then he walked into the block-long press and damaged the offending F with his pocket knife. Skill and luck prevailed. Printing resumed without the newsprint ripping and Tucker looked like it began with a damaged T rather than an F. Hundreds or thousands of early edition copies were printed and sent to carriers before I had seen the page proof but Ms. Tucker never saw the typo or didn’t care. We never heard a complaint.
• Speaking of times past, Mandy Rice-Davies’ death last week generated long and generally affectionate obits. She and roommate Christine Keeler were young working class party girls involved in a sex scandal that almost brought down the British government. Rice-Davies is equally famous for her saucy retort when party host Viscount Astor denied he’d had sex with her. “Well, he would, wouldn’t he?” That got her into the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. It was one of the livelier, more fascinating stories we covered when I was at UPI in London.
• Why did it take a Pulitzer-winning British daily to reveal the manipulative, brutal interrogation of Tasha Thomas after cops killed companion John Crawford III in Ohio’s Beavercreek Walmart? London’s Guardian obtained the police video of the 94-minute grilling from Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine’s office with a public records request. The video shows Beavercreek Detective Rodney Curd “accusing her of lying, threatening her with jail, and suggesting that she was high on drugs,” the London paper said.
“After more than an hour and a half of questioning and statement-taking, Curd finally told Thomas that Crawford, 22, had died. ‘As a result of his actions, he is gone,’ said the detective, as she slumped in her chair and cried.”
Police said they thought Thomas helped Crawford bring a real gun into the store to kill Thomas’ former girlfriend. There was no real gun. They knew that. The ex wasn’t there. They knew that. Crawford was killed carrying an air rifle he picked out from a Walmart sales display.
• Another voice I grew up with is dead. Richard C. Hottelet was the youngest and last of “Murrow’s Boys” who covered World War II in Europe as CBS radio reporters. His NYTimes obit included a quote that should remain the motto of all reporters who respect our trade and audiences: “It was not our job to inspire people, to educate, to move them. It was our job to tell them what was going on.”
• Do you remember, “You know it’s going to be a shit day when you get to the office and 60 Minutes is waiting?" The update is “Don’t email anything you don’t want to read on Page 1 of the NYTimes.” Cue NYTimes columnist Maureen Dowd, whose gushing email exchange with Sony Pictures cochair Amy Pascal was leaked by hackers. Dowd apparently promised Pascal and Sony an upbeat column and Pascal’s husband, former Timesman Bernard Weinraub, a pre-publication peek at that column. Dowd and Weinraub say she never showed him the column in advance.
Dowd is famous for acerbic skewerings so her fawning emails are a delight. In NYT coverage of this air kiss tempest, the Times’ ombudsman revealed that the paper has no policy against showing stories/columns to subjects before publication and Dowd wasn’t the first to be caught doing so.
• Eric Holder apparently wants his last acts as attorney general to include magnanimity: dropping efforts to force NYTimes reporter James Risen to name sources for classified information he published in 2006.
Not likely. Obama/Holder are aggressively hostile to reporters and whistleblowers who unofficially leak classified information to them. However, Obama/Holder retribution is selective. CIA favors some reporters with leaks of classified materials, correctly confident the White House and DoJ wouldn’t seriously object.
Meanwhile, Pulitzer-winner and Cincinnati native Risen will be remembered for his unflinching promise of confidentiality. Until his source releases him, he’ll keep his word. So far, Risen has suggested where Holder should stuff his repeated subpoenas. It’s not clear what else prosecutors will ask if they get Risen into court this week or if he’ll refuse to testisfy and and continue to risk jail for contempt. The issues include Risen’s book, State of War, published a year after the NYTimes killed the same story at White House request. In his book and spiked story, Risen described a botched CIA plan to damage Iran’s nuclear program.
• Errors in translation cause mirth as well as misery. So it was with a smile that I read the rush to correct mistranslations and theological interpretations of Pope Francis’ recent statement, “Holy Scripture teaches us that the fulfillment of this wonderful design also affects everything around us.” Reporters interpreted that as suggesting animals could go to heaven and a tearful boy would see his recently deceased dog in heaven. It was a worldwide sensation. Ooops.
The NYTimes has one of the best corrections: “An earlier version of this article misstated the circumstances of Pope Francis’ remarks. He made them in a general audience at the Vatican, not in consoling a distraught boy whose dog had died. The article also misstated what Francis is known to have said. According to Vatican Radio, Francis said: ‘The Holy Scripture teaches us that the fulfillment of this wonderful design also affects everything around us,’ which was interpreted to mean he believes animals go to heaven. Francis is not known to have said: ‘One day, we will see our animals again in the eternity of Christ. Paradise is open to all of God’s creatures.’ Those remarks were once made by Pope Paul VI to a distraught child, and were cited in a Corriere della Sera article that concluded Francis believes animals go to heaven..."
• Should newspapers refuse display ads for realistic air guns like those carried by two recent victims of police shootings? Check any Sunday Enquirer display ads from sporting goods stores. They often show the kind of handgun that got Tamir Rice killed in Cleveland. His looked like the real thing because someone removed the orange muzzle fitting meant to distinguish it from a firearm. Drawing it from his waistband only heightened young Rice’s risk; that’s where young thugs often conceal pistols.
