Geneva Overholser on OJR

Specialized Journalism: A Program Designed for the Future

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:59:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: As the director of the USC Annenberg School of Journalism, I'd like to introduce OJR readers to our Master's Programs in Specialized Journalism.

These are not your typical journalism M.A. programs. (Though we also have an excellent one of those.) In this innovative nine-month program, we have a different aim: As journalism is reinventing itself, we are reinventing the journalism academy, here in this incomparable learning laboratory of the future, Los Angeles.

Consequently, your fellow students will be atypical, as well. The remarkably interesting group we assemble each year brings artists and arts journalists of every stripe together with journalists eager to go deep into science, demographics, education, religion and a feast of other disciplines. Their work has appeared in the legacy media as well as Neon Tommy, Huffington Post and other online sites.

You will design your own curriculum, ranging across the offerings of this vibrant and richly interdisciplinary University. Along the way, we throw in some key enhancements: The updates in digital skills and social networking, an entrepreneurial mindset and a sense of the emerging lay of the journalistic land that will equip you to be a leader in journalism's reinvention. As online journalists, you have a head start on this journey. Together, we'll proceed further.

We have hired some of the best minds in the new-media world and melded them with our distinguished journalism faculty. And all of this exists within the exciting environment of a full-service School of Communication and Journalism that values the creation of new knowledge about this age-old craft we call journalism, as well as the many different ways we can now serve the public's information needs. And, assuming you can carve out the time, you can participate in Annenberg's news outlets on every platform and take advantage of the unparalleled diversity of experiences that Southern California offers.

I surely hope you will consider joining us here at Annenberg, where journalism's future is looking brighter every day. Please visit our website for application guidelines.

USC Annenberg gets a new name - USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 09:52:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser:

Recognizing the critically important role journalism plays in a democratic society and USC's role as a leading institution for educating and training journalists, the University of Southern California Board of Trustees has voted to change the name of the USC Annenberg School for Communication to the USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism.

We have grown accustomed to daily reminders that journalism is in a period of great unsettlement. What we recognize here on this special day, by adding "journalism" to the Annenberg School's name, is that this is also � and primarily - a period of enormous promise. We have asserted, here together, that journalism is a subject worthy of the attention of a great University.

And surely it is, particularly at this moment. For, even as its traditional models collapse, journalism is being reinvented. It is being reborn in new and exciting ways every day. And with this name change, we make clear the vital roles that Annenberg has played, and WILL play, in that reinvention.

First of all, we are, in collaboration with our colleagues in the School of Communication and throughout the University, doing research and deep reporting to enrich the debate that will contribute to shaping tomorrow's journalism: Research about the new roles of the public, the policies of governments at all levels, the innovations occurring around the world, the emerging models of community and national and international news and the potential for new economic models to support information in the public interest.

Second, in our own J-school version of R and D � researching and DOING � we are increasingly serving the information needs of our communities. as legacy media's resources so rapidly shrink. In our news outlets -- Annenberg Television News, Annenberg Radio News, NeonTommy: the voice of Annenberg Digital News and our documentary program Impact, as well as Intersections: The South Los Angeles Report and Spot.us, a community-supported investigative journalism site that we are just rolling out in L.A. � in all of these, our students and faculty are putting into practice the journalistic excellence we teach.

And teaching, of course, is the heart of our promise of contribution to journalism's future. In our classrooms and learning laboratories, and in the fine work of our centers for health reporting, arts reporting and digital news, we are ensuring that the enduring values of journalism will find their way wherever the public attention goes, from old media to new, into the worlds of Twitter and Facebook and their successors, through multi-platform storytelling, with a spirit of invention and entrepreneurialism that will enable Annenberg graduates to succeed and to lead in this arena so essential to democracy and to a life well-lived.

Students will actually read it! High school newspapers go Web-only

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:50:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: Like their professional counterparts, high school news organizations are moving online and fretting over budgets, but they�re also fighting censorship. This according to advisors from Southern California high schools who brought their students (some 300 strong) to the USC Annenberg School of Journalism�s high school journalism gathering Friday for a day of panels and journalism shop talk.

Many of the 30 advisors who gathered this morning to commiserate and trade solutions said they were ditching the print edition to go online only. One advisor said she was seeking �more of a social engagement site. You can actually get them to read things if you go online.�

Part of what�s driving them there is of course money. One advisor said his entire budget (it had been only $497) had been eliminated, which �forces my students to be entrepreneurial.� Tales of entrepreneurialism around the table raised everything from driver-school and tuxedo-rental ad sales to covert candy sales. Some noted they had no budget to lose. A high school neighboring Annenberg�s central-city campus said her students go to Hollywood television tapings, serving as audience members at $15 a head (transportation provided) to fund their journalism.

As for censorship, an advisor who said she is already under prior review added that she has trouble pleading her case with her principal, who sneers, �whaddya gonna do, plead �freedom of speech?�� when she defends her students� work. (�At least he�s heard of the First Amendment,� a colleague responded wryly.) Said another: �I�m the only teacher on campus who, if I do my job, will be in trouble.�

One advisor said she was having so much trouble with the principal that she found herself breaking into tears for a week. �I thought that I�d LOVE to get rid of journalism,� she said, but knew it wasn�t true: �It�s so important that the kids have a voice.�

The day opened with recognition of former high school journalism advisor Jan Ewell, who was instrumental in winning passing of a bill signed into law in late September that will prevent school administrators from punishing teachers for their students� exercise of First Amendment rights. At the panel discussion, which followed that ceremony, teachers of Ewell�s long experience joined novices to tell of newspapers that had been shut down but now were returning to life, some of them paid for by the advisors themselves. They shared stories of ASNE�s high school journalism advisors� workshop, counsel from the the Student Press Law Center, and online chat rooms that feel like faculty lounges peopled only by journalism advisors.

Amid the travails, the work, it seems, is still worth it. �It�s addicting,� one man said of journalism advising. �Once you start start doing it��

Annenberg�s twice-yearly High School Journalism Day gatherings are funded by the Los Angeles Times, and organized by Diane Guthman.

The journalism 'priesthood' destroyed?

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 12:49:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: It was Nieman reunion time last weekend, and the honored veterans of journalism were gathered in the very shadow of Harvard. Our panel was called: �Voices from the New World of Journalism.�

�I think we�re fooling ourselves a little bit in how much change is needed,� Michael Skoler of American Public Media said. The needed transformation lies well beyond the use of new tools. �People expect to share information.� But that goes against our ethos � getting the scoop, keeping it exclusive. Nor does allowing people to participate in � not just respond to -- our work come naturally. �Deep in our souls we feel like that�s dumbing down our journalism. I would argue that it�s smartening it up.�

Mara Schiavocampo, NBC�s digital correspondent, agreed. When the crowd�s complaints about the low quality of public contributions confirmed Skoler�s dumbing-down assumption, Schiavocampo stressed, �More voices is a good thing for all of us. We just need to make sure we all operate by the same rules. It�s a journalism of partnership.�

What drove Schiavocampo to her current ultra-multi-media whirlwind professional life was a desire to �produce media the way I consumed media.� For others attempting this, she warns, authenticity is extremely important. Too often, �Big media are the parents pulling on ripped jeans and going to rock concerts in order to be cool.�

Joshua Benton, director of the new Nieman Journalism Lab, urged the crowd toward an awareness of just how many folks are putting useful information out there. Of the 600 RSS feeds a day that he reads, fewer than 10 percent are by journalists.

We need to be asking, �What can we do to connect with those people?� True, he noted, �It�s a difficult thing to create a healthy online community.� We need to set guidelines, make them clear, and follow them. And the journalists have to be involved in the comments. �It�s easy to lash out at someone who isn�t human to you.� Given the relationship we�ve trained people to expect of us, �we have to rehumanize ourselves.�

And then this last comment, which must have gripped me so much amid this crowd of worthies that I somehow failed to note its author: �The future just happened. It destroyed the priesthoods.�

Did journalism's business model distort journalism's social mission?

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 18:36:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: I realized today to my amazement that I may long have been a secret disciple of Milton Friedman.

The famed laissez-faire economist held that business and mission don�t go together, according to Adlai Wertman, of USC�s Marshall School of Business. �And I�m not sure I disagree with him,� Wertman told students and faculty at this week�s USC Annenberg Director�s Forum. �I�m not sure I trust business with anything else.�

This throws a complex light on the collapse of the conventional economic model for journalism � which has consisted of trusting business with this mission so dear to our (and, we hope, the nation�s) hearts. That collapse feels no less catastrophic to those who are losing their jobs, nor to faithful news consumers who see shrinking newspapers and dumbed-down newscasts. And it�s still deeply worrisome when you think about who will have the power, guts and access to go up against big government and big business, so as to keep us informed about the nation and the world.

Still, it is fitting to be reminded of the ways in which the economic model has distorted the mission.

Consider the view of Wertman, who spent 18 years as an investment banker and another seven devoted to helping the homeless (�The first two or three �From Wall Street to Skid Row� headlines were clever, but the 18th or 19th??!!�) before coming to the academy. Confronted with the nation�s inability to resolve the many ills confronting it, Wertman told the Journalism School: �I think it�s all your fault. In my view, the political world follows journalism.� And journalism has led down the wrong paths in our failure to give attention to poverty, homelessness and other weighty and complex issues.

The profit model may be responsible for much of the problem: �There is a major difference between a mission-driven business and a business,� he said. Profit-seeking companies �quickly go from no social mission to no social responsibility.� The result has been, in Wertman�s opinion, a distorted notion of �what the public wants� when it comes to journalism, and a terribly inadequate news diet for a self-governing people.

So what�s to be done?

�If you are asking, �Can I create new models that are mission-driven in journalism, and make a living?� Absolutely!� said Wertman. Start with the focus, he advised. The new models that seem to do well are very targeted.

�Donors want to know, �What are you going to effect?� That�s the hardest part. Once you figure out your mission, you can do anything. And I teach, the narrower the mission, the better.�

For some of us, then, the problem may actually be that what we are worried about is saving journalism. Wrong focus.

�Take the mission away from journalism and think more about journalism as a tool: We care about poverty, and how could we use journalism as a tool to make a difference,� he said.

If that sounds like advocacy said Wertman, it needn�t be. You persuade your donors (and consumers) that a full, fair, balanced and proportional picture of the issue is the best way to get people interested and informed, and thus to bring about action.

Mission accomplished: A new model for effective journalism � albeit not one of interest to Wall Street. But maybe enough to keep you off Skid Row.

Las Vegas Sun tries innovative path toward online success

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 23:42:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: "A newspaper success story." That was the topic for Drex Heikes when he spoke to us here at Annenberg about his work at the Las Vegas Sun. But, really, he said, "What we have is a newspaper that's trying."

It's an interesting effort, for sure. Since 2005 the Sun has been a small daily inserted into the rival newspaper (operating under a JOA), plus a vibrantly innovative website. The print paper is innovative, too: Typically eight attractive, ad-free pages, it focuses on the interpretative, the entrepreneurial, the investigative. "We get to think the bigger thoughts," said Heikes, who at one point entertained the notion of coming to Los Angeles to do an all-Web paper to compete with the embattled Times.

Given the uniqueness of Vegas and the rarity of the JOA model, it's unclear how much of the Sun's experience is exportable. And, oh yes, it's all rather richly subsidized by a buoyantly happy billionaire publisher, Brian Greenspun, who exults, in a video: "My God, this is the future of journalism. It's here right now, and we did it!" He's hoping the lines will cross in favor of profitability by 2012, but in the meantime, says Heikes, Greenspun "is having fun. He's 62 years old, and he looks like he's 14."

Well, surely that part is exportable: Any other billionaires out there who'd like to try this?

Focus on 'what,' not 'where,' in planning your journalism career

Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:23:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: So you want to do journalism but are worried about all the change hitting the craft?

Do what digital pioneer and entrepreneur Elizabeth Osder has done: "I always tried to be about what I get to do rather than where I get to do it."

But the economic models just aren't working for newspapers online, lamented one student attending USC Annenberg School of Journalism Director's Forum.

Not true, said Osder, fresh off consulting work with Tina Brown's just-launched "The Daily Beast." Plenty of people are making plenty of money online. (As if in confirmation, David Westphal, Annenberg's executive in residence, noted that McClatchy right now makes more money online than it costs to pay all the editors and publishers in the company.)

Here's how to think about it, Osder told the group:

"Start with the impact you want to have. Figure out how what audience you need to assemble to have that impact. And what kind of content is needed to do that. Then price it out: How much money do you need to do it?"

"If I wanted to do that, I'd have gone to Marshall (USC's business school)," a student groaned in reply. Understandable, said Osder, but having to do this kind of thinking brings a needed discipline. "It forces you to be relevant and useful versus arrogant and entitled."

Hmmmm. This nostalgia we're feeling: Is it for The Wall, which guaranteed the purity of our journalism -- or for the folks on the other side of it, who had to worry about whether it was read and paid for?

Welcome back, to the 'new' OJR

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 09:29:00 MST

By Geneva Overholser: First, thanks to all of OJR's long-time readers for coming back. We are grateful for your loyalty, and we hope you will join us regularly in this new quest to help journalism find a sound footing in the digital age.

I am the new director of the Annenberg School of Journalism at the University of Southern California. My four decades in newspapering may have helped land me in this position, but it's my gusto for the future of information in the public interest that defines my work now. We hope � here at Annenberg, and here at OJR in its new Knight Digital Media Center home � to help figure out what it is about journalism that is most important to carry forward. And, we hope to do what we can to ensure that it does indeed GET carried forward.

Those are no small goals, and they will require the lively participation of new contributors to OJR, as well as the continued enthusiasm of old OJR hands.

This website will be different from the "old" OJR in a couple of ways: First, as you'll see, it is integrated with the Knight Digital Media Center. Also, we want to ensure that Annenberg faculty, friends and students play an important role in the conversation. What remains the same is that Robert Niles (called by The Guardian "one of America's top media academics," and we quite agree) will be around. We also will eagerly continue to accept comments and suggestions from readers. And the archives will remain in place.

We propose four main areas of discussion:

1. Reporting and writing in a conversational environment. How can, and should, we report the news when publications are now a two-way conversation, instead of a single-direction monologue?

2. Investigative reporting in the Internet era. How can news organizations, and individual journalists, harness the power of modern computing and networking (including crowdsourcing) to investigate public data?

3. Entrepreneurial journalism. The old business model for news is broken. How do we prepare journalists to develop new ones?

4. "Guerilla-marketing" the news. This builds from topics 1 and 3, and addresses how journalists ought to be thinking about making their content "viral," optimizing for search engines and using promotional techniques to draw audience to their content, at minimal financial expense.

We'll be publishing twice a week on the "new" OJR, on Wednesdays and on Fridays. But you will also find fresh posts on other topics other days of the week on the KDMC website, http://www.knightdigitalmediacenter.org/.

Robert will be writing the next piece, on Friday. See you after that.