Transparency is the New Objectivity

This phrase, attributable to David Cohn's blog post in Media Shift Idea Lab, strikes a chord in me. It labels a complex idea handily. When we were growing up, the media would report stories based on "high White House sources." It was okay that we had to take the information on faith, because the stories were "objective," meaning that they would be careful to say "Congressman Loser denies these charges." Readers could rest assured that every claim had at least two sources, principals would be reached for comment, and opposing views would be at least mentioned.

But that traditional journalistic contract has broken down in recent years, probably reflecting news media's dire economic straits more than anything. 24-hour news cycles and infotainment have turned the typical story into something of a farce.

After more than a few reporters were found to be making things up, media outlets began explaining why sources were anonymous--"because the investigation is ongoing, because she is not authorized to speak to the media." Baby steps toward transparency.

It is so ubiquitous it's hard to summon outrage, but isn't it infuriating when the TV news says President Obama spoke and shows us mute video of him speaking, but then has the gall to tell us what he said? I understand that one of the finest orators of our time needs to be summarized for a short news show, but the reporters are not only selective in their topics, they can and do add significant spin. "The president said he was confident health care reform would pass," can be given a range of nuance from sarcasm to derision.

Journalists were never objective, but the old forms made us all complicit in a charade that worked, more or less. But it's time for a better approach before all the eyeballs the media is aching to monetize are glazed over. Transparency means a link to the video of the full speech, or the PDF of the actual document. If the story is about a new website, give readers the link even though it means they might (gasp) click away from your site.

Where's Clay Shirky?

Clay Shirky, a professor at NYU, among other things, understands the coming news media better than anyone I know. He sees things clearly from the point of view of readers', communities', and civilization's needs, as opposed to most bloggers on this subject who keep trying to see how the web and the changes it brings will affect existing news media.

So, I enjoy Clay Shirky's blog (http://www.shirky.com/weblog/). But it hasn't had a post since May 31 (and the last from Mr. Shirky was April 15). I took the summer off, too, but I miss Shirky's insight.

Shirky, C. Why Micropayments Don't Work, Sept. 2003

______. Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable, Mar. 2009

Changes are coming

Google feels the newspaper industry's pain. Ten days ago, Google proposed a micro-payment system that would allow news publishing sites to charge their readers without burdening those readers with the need to set up payment accounts with each source they would like to read.

In a written response to the Newspaper Association of America, Google offered a single sign-on approach that would allow a reader to create an account and pay Google to visit paid news sites.

"We envision the typical scenario to be where a user pays a monthly fee for access to a wide-ranging package of premium content. One example of a "package" might be full access to the WSJ; another "package" might include the top 10 business publications. Google believes that there is real power and benefit to publishers in providing these sorts of broad, multi-publication access passes."

The same section of the document explains that Google doesn't think micro-payments would be norm for accessing content. Sure, people might pay a dime to read a specific one-off article, but more typically, people would subscribe to bundles like cable TV. My instinct says they're wrong--Everyone chafes under the cable TV industry's inflexibility--your package includes the Golf Channel whether you want it or not. I think micro-payment will skyrocket like Facebook as soon as a viable exchange is available.

Either way, this is a good development for hyper-local, community news. Your "package," if it's done right, might include the WSJ and some business sites, plus electives like your hobby and your community. You get access to premium content on TennisPro.com and the SantaMonicaObserver.com, while your neighbor's package includes CatFancy.com instead.

Google was very helpful to the Los Gatos Observer. I had to jump through some hoops (updating the sitemap for each posting, using four-digit identifiers for articles) and bug the Google News team by e-mail for a while, but once we got in the rotation, our stories were at the top or near it on any search for 'Los Gatos' and we were tied in with the Google Alerts feature. Scott Seaman, our police chief, told me his Google Alert on 'Los Gatos' had introduced him to our paper.

Google also announced AdExchange, a mechanism that elects Google as broker between ad buyers and news publishers. Again, good for publishers--it makes ad revenues easier to attract and track.

Andy Hertzfeld, one of the original Macintosh designers, is now "thinking about new ways to search for the news," according to Google Labs. Perhaps one of these ways is FastFlip, a clever use of page images (similar to Amazon's SearchInside) that allows readers to browse news articles by page. Made public this week, everyone is invited to check it out.

Also interesting is the NewsTimeline, a Google Labs project from last April. It shows a calendar-based view of a few articles. The week view only shows 3 articles per day, and the automated article tease doesn't work well. It's also slow. Click on Week (the default is Day) and it "thinks" for a long time. Automated front page layout is a known problem in this biz, and let's put it this way: If someone solves that difficult problem, NewsTimeline will benefit from that solution. Just stacking things by date is orthogonal to a satisfactory approach.

How Google Plans to Save Newspapers Niroj Chokshi, The Atlantic, 9/10/09