Newsrooms may change, but will never disappear

Newsrooms may change, but will never disappear

By: Rachel Bunn
Edited by: Becky Taylor

The newsroom is changing with the addition of new practices, and most believe although the newsroom will never be obsolete journalists will have to develop more skills.


Most newspapers are now using new technology, Web sites and social media, such as Twitter and Facebook, to break news.

Traditional print media is being thrust into the 21st century, and the newsroom is changing the way it operates, one small step at a time.

“People are so impatient. They want the news and they want it right now, or 10 seconds ago,” said Al Summers, news editor at the Times-Courier, a weekly paper in Ellijay, Ga.

Summers said the integration of computers in the newsroom allows writers to generate more and better stories because they have access to more resources.

Writers now only have to type a single word into Google or another search engine to produce hundreds of Web sites containing millions of facts.

Pete McCommons, editor and publisher at Flagpole Magazine in Athens, Ga., disagrees with Summers.

He says computers are important and have aided in the general production of the paper, but do not have a significant impact on the development of news.

“Speed and ease of publication have increased. You still have to develop the idea,” said McCommons.

Computers are changing the types of jobs in newsrooms.

Emily Baldwin, former writer and editor for The Citizen Newspaper in Fayetteville, Ga., became the first web editor when The Citizen launched its Web site, www.thecitizennews.com, in 2005.

Although some jobs are being created, many traditional jobs are being let go. Baldwin was given the responsibilities of editor for the Life and Style section as well as being Web editor of The Citizen.

A recent Los Angeles Times article pointed to job reductions as the only way many papers are staying afloat.

As journalism students prepare to graduate in this changing environment, what lies ahead?

Marc McAfee, columnist for The Red and Black at the University of Georgia, believes students will no longer be defined to roles such as reporter, photographer or editor—journalists will have to be able to do everything.

“Everything is going into one narrow channel,” said McAfee.

Summers agrees that the more you are able to do, the better chance you have at getting a job.

“The more skills you have coming in, the more marketable you are,” he said.

With the rise of new media and “jack-of-all-trade” journalists, what will happen to newsrooms?

Baldwin believes that the community and the knowledge of peers is too valuable to abandon the newsroom. McCommons has a different take.

“It is entirely possible that publications will resort to the model of using mostly freelance writers, as Flagpole does now, but with those writers submitting their copy to an editor before it is published online,” said McCommons.

Summers and McAfee agree that publications need a cohesiveness that cannot be found without editors and newsrooms’ existence.

“Editors are still important,” said Summers.

The future of newspapers is less clear. Will they disappear in the physical form? Summers does not think so.

Summers believes that for local news, people will always want something they can hold or display.

Baldwin does not agree that physical papers will continue into the future, but believes that change will come gradually.

“It’s a slow evolution for papers.”

She says the baby boom generation still desire to have a physical newspaper, but dependence and love of the Internet by the younger generation will eventually drive papers out of print.

“You have to try to capture the next generation of people, what they want. At the end of the day, it’s a business.”

Blogs as Hard News

JT Alexander, 21, checks a blog on Blogspot.com for class


By: Anne Connaughton

Although industry professionals consider blogs a credible source for daily news, readers have not embraced the trend.

The concept of a blog can be difficult to grasp. Anyone can write one. There are blogs on virtually any topic. Blog hosting web site, Blogspot.com, does not even have a comprehensive top 10 list. Instead, they post recent top ten lists on a variety of subjects. Some featured this week are Top 10 TV Blogs, Top 10 Librarian Blogs, and 10 Blogs Every Lawyer Should Read.

Recently, blogs have even been used to cover breaking news stories. With the wealth of technology on hand for the average person, citizen journalism is a common phenomenon. Someone can conceivably take a picture of a local disaster on their camera phone, upload it to their blog with a quick description in much less time than a traditional newspaper would take to be alerted of the news and cover it.

The question is, does the public trust their news from just anyone?

Seth Bailey, 27, a graduate student, from Covington, Ga., worries about the motivations behind news-based blogs. He feels that a blogger only caters to their own interests, while a traditional news sources is conscious of a wider audience.

“You’re only getting one side, not all the news,” he said.

Although he stays clear of blogs, Bailey does go online twice a day to read his news from online formats of his favorite papers. The Internet is easier for his lifestyle than a traditional newspaper, he said, because he spends a lot of time on the computer and often the exact story he is searching for pops up quickly.

“I’m more often in front of a computer screen than a newsstand,” Bailey said.

Hannah Wilson, 20, an art education major from Commerce, Ga., agrees that blogs are too opinionated for hard news. She commonly reads four newspapers a week, and only ventures online for celebrity gossip and the type of news she would not be likely to find in a daily, local publication.

“I like the idea of a team putting out my paper,” Wilson said, “Not just one person. That gives the paper different opinions, there’s protagonist and antagonists and positive and negatives in stories that are developed in newsrooms.”

Ashlee Berryhill, 20, a business administration/management major from Cochran, Ga., has the opposite opinion. Berryhill reads The Red and Black daily, and her hometown newspaper, The Cochran Journal, on weekends when she goes home.

Berryhill rarely turns to the online version of stories for her news, preferring a tangible newspaper because she can carry it with her all day long and read it when she likes.
However, she would consider a blog as a primary source of news. Berryhill likes the ability to comment on news stories, and likes more information than only what was presented that these posts offer.

Newspapers are rushing to compete with the upswing in blogging, and are hiring professional bloggers to their sites. Maybe this trend will make for a people’s wider acceptance of a blog as a credible news source.

Many recent graduates are entering the blogging industry, and Sara Idacavage, 22, an editorial intern for Dailycandy.com, is one such individual. Dailycandy.com is a site devoted to the entertainment, culture, and lifestyle of various major cities. According to Idacavage, 99 percent of her job is fact checking, looking up anything in a blog that isn’t an opinion.

Before her current position, Idacavage was a student at the University of Georgia and co-founder of a blog, Thepopcouture.com, a blog that ties pop culture references to what’s happening in the fashion industry. She started this blog because she saw a need for a different kind of fashion blog.

“So many blogs are just runway shows or selling some $700 dress,” she said, “I’m just not a blog person—I wanted something I would read.”

According to Idacavage, Dailycandy.com is a professional blog because of the effort spent fact checking and making sure the stories stay fair and accurate. Thepopcouture.com is more fun and personal, though she does feel that people take her more seriously with a blog on her business card.

Because of her experience at her current position, Idacavage believes a blog can definitely be a source for credible hard news.

“I mean, even CNN has a twitter,” she said, “So I wouldn’t rule it out.”

Edited by: Robert Burns