Gallup Poll: Journos Low on the Ethics Chain

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A  random Gallup poll earlier this month of more than 1,000 adults nationwide found only one in five considered journalists honest and ethical, according to posts by Fishbowl NY and Poynter.org.

The poll, "U.S. Views on Honesty and Ethical Standards in Professions," revealed only 21 percent of those queried said newspaper reporters boasted high honesty and ethical standards, the same percentage scored by attorneys.  Television journalists were close behind, with only 20 percent of those polled concluding they were honest and ethical.  In contrast, nurses received an 82 percent favorable rating.

One Poynter faculty ethicist suggested popular opinion was shaped somewhat by the portrayal of journalists in entertainment as smarmy and unethical. All told, over the past 40 years, roughly one-third of the public participating in the Gallup poll found journalists of high honesty and ethical character.

Math is not the strong suit of the pristine staff of "TUOL," but as a journalist and an attorney, will assume 42 percent  of the public holds us in high regard.

Journalism Watchdog Suffering from Distemper?

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Cyndi Stivers,  the one-time managing editor of  EW.com, has stepped down as Editor-in-Chief of Columbia Journalism Review, a post she held since November 2011, to become editor-in-chief of AOL.com, capitalnewyork.com reported last week.

Stivers' departure comes amid severe ax-wielding at CJR that includes the planned June layoffs of Executive Editor Mike Hoyt, who has served in that capacity for a decade, and Editor-at-Large Justin Peters, as well as an ultimatum to staffers Curtis Brainard and Dean Starkman to accept half-time employment or be laid off, according to the capitalnewyork.com article.

The newsroom shake-up at CJR, a bimonthly periodical that has covered the journalism industry since 1961, coincides with Steve Coll becoming Dean at Columbia Journalism School, replacing Nick Lemann. The school publishes CJR, which is funded through advertising, subscriptions, foundation funding and grants.

According to the capitalnewyork post, the industry-wide malaise in advertising revenue and circulation is attributed to CJR's anticipated shortfall in meeting its fund-raising goals. CJR reimburses the amount of its annual budget that is advanced by the journalism school. Neither CJR nor the school responded to the capitalnewyork.com piece.

Journalist Edges Out Lumberjack as Worst Job in U.S.

Image via CrunchBase

A survey released today of  200 occupations by career Web site Careercast.com found reporters have the dubious honor of holding the worst job in the United States, according to a post by a Wall St. Journal blog (Blogs.wsj.com).

Careercast.com, which is owned by Carlsbad, Calif.-based Adicio, Inc., uses data from government agencies, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and bases its rankings on five criteria:

• work environment
• physical demands
• stress
• income
• hiring outlook.

Given bleak job prospects, long work days and paltry pay, it's not too surprising that journalists would find themselves 200th among the survey of 200 careers. Reporters edged out enlisted military personnel and lumberjacks to capture the basement spot. At least lumberjacks get to wield an axe, though "TUOL" has seen newspaper newspapers lethally wield a blue pen.

At the top of the Careercast.com list are actuaries, followed by biomedical engineers and software engineers, all of whom any self-respecting journalist could drink under the table. "TUOL" found little solace in the survey, in that attorneys ranked a meager 117.

Actuaries assign a financial value to risk, so journalism students may want to consult with one before it's too late.

Anthony Lewis: 1st Amendment Loses Its Best Friend

Pulitzer-Prize winning columnist and author Anthony Lewis died yesterday at age 85 from renal and heart failure.

Lewis, a champion of the First Amendment, spent more than three decades as a columnist for the New York Times, penning his last Abroad at Home column December 15, 2001. He also is the author of several important law-related books, including Gideon's Trumpet, about the U.S. Supreme Court decision, Gideon v. Wainwright, that found the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments mandated states appoint counsel for indigent criminal defendants, Make No Law, concerning the New York Times v. Sullivan High Court ruling that elevated the burden of proof on public officials bringing defamation claims against media defendants, and Freedom for the Thought that We Hate:  A Biography of the First Amendment.

The humble staff of "TUOL" was honored to have spoken with Lewis many times over the years at functions at Suffolk University Law School, New England Law Boston and the Massachusetts Bar Association (his spouse, Margaret Marshall, is the former Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court) and to have shared a meorable lunch with him when he came to speak to the staff's journalism students at Boston University's College of Communication. Lewis was the personification of class--a soft-spoken, witty, opinionated but humble, charming man with an English accent yet!

The First Amendment had no stauncher ally and the journalism field, sadly, has few today who measure up to his standards.

Rest in peace, Tony.

Daily Variety R.I.P.

 (Photo credit: Steve Woolf)

Unable to compete with the free-access Web sites of competitors The Hollywood Reporter and Dateline Hollywood, the last print edition of The Daily Variety--once deemed "Hollywood's Bible"--rolled out this week, ending a near 80-year run, The Los Angeles Times reported.

The "Dream Industry" hasn't seen the last of Variety, as a free-access, recently revamped Web site is available, and a spanking new version of the Weekly Variety, a 108-year-old weekly, premieres next week, according to the Times article.

Variety earned $6 million last year, compared to the more than $30 million it brought in in 2006. Auto parts magnate Jay Penske acquired the publication for $25 million from Reed Elsevier last year (see "TUOL" post 10/10/12). To borrow a phrase from the entertainment tabloid, advertising revenues and print circulation have hardly been "boffo" since.

Russian Minister of (Mis)Information Berates Journalism Students

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

At a Moscow State University-sponsored conference entitled, Journalism: Social Mission and Profession, Alexei Volin, Deputy Minister of Communications and Mass Media, delivered the antithesis of a "pep talk" to nascent journalists, the iMediaEthics.org Web site reported.

Emphasizing that journalism is a business and not a mission, Volin told students: "The task of a journalist is to make money for those who hired him, and this can only be done if you become interesting to listeners and readers." Continuing his unspirational speech, Volin added: "Journalists should always keep in mind that their task is not to make the world better or lead humanity along the right path."

No doubt, faculty squirmed when Volin told them that lecturers who didn't adhere to these precepts were committing a crime. During a Q. & A. following his address, Volin, asked how he believed the audience would react to his message, replied: "I don't care about your reaction." Doesn't sound like a guy who hung around for the reception.

Journalists who attended the lecture expressed concern to iMediaEthics that the Kremlin increasingly has been adopting a hard line toward Russian press freedom. Making a guy like Volin a Minister of Communication is like hiring Mel Gibson to be your company's Diversity Officer or putting  Dick Cheney in charge of Recycling.

Cause & Effect: 'Thinner' Newscasts + Newspapers=Fewer Readers & Viewers

 (Photo credit: eszter)

The annual State of the News Media report by the Pew Research Center Project for Excellence in Journalism reflects the consequences of pared down tv newscasts and shrinking newspapers--a disappearing audience.

According to an Associated Press account of the Pew study, which surveyed 2,000 consumers earlier this year, fewer and/or less complete news stories prepared by financially strapped media outlets prompted nearly a third of those questioned to abandon a news outlet as an information source. Local television newscasts took it on the chin in the Pew study, which found only 28 percent of adults under age 30 questioned regularly watch local news, compared to 42 percent in 2006. As for the newscasts themselves, Pew noted 40 percent of the content concerned weather, traffic and sports. Government coverage by local tv newsrooms has dropped by 50 percent since 2005.

The Pew survey hits keep on coming: newspaper newsroom employment shrank 30 percent from its peak in 2000 to fewer than 40,000, the lowest figure since 1978, the AP story noted.

Buzz Goes for a Spin

(Photo credit: matthetube)Spin, the 27-year-old alternative music magazine, has been acquired by music and celebrity Web site conglomerate Buzzmedia, the New York Times reports today.

Plagued like other periodicals by readers' changing habits and declining ad revenues, Spin has experienced over the past decade a drop in circulation from 530,000 to 460,000, based on Audit Bureau of Circulation figures cited in the Times article. The future of the print edition is uncertain, as Spin has bolstered its Web site and its Spin Play iPad app.

Buzzmedia operates music Web sites, including Sterogum and Idolator, as well as celebrity sites for the likes of Kim Kardashian, which may be reassuring to some.  Terms of the purchase were not disclosed.

Paywall Construction on the Rise

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)Newspaper digital subscription programs continue to grow, as roughly 186 newspapers across the nation have erected paywalls, according to the Web site Newsandtech.com

Gannett Co.'s U.S. Community Publishing division last week unveiled digital subscriber plans for The Des Moines Register, The Tennessean and The Courier-Journal, raising to 28, the number of its newspapers requiring online visitors to pay for access to content. (See "TUOL" post 2/23/12.)

A dozen major newspaper publishers have erected paywalls for digital versions of their publications, according to Poynter.org.  Holdouts still remain, however, including Hearst Newspapers, LLC, which doesn't charge for online viewing.

UPDATE: Sun-Times Owner Set to Acquire Weekly Chicago Reader

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)Crain's Chicago Business (Chicagobusiness.com) reports that Wrapports, LLC, owner of the daily Chicago Sun-Times tabloid, expects to complete its acquisition of the free weekly Chicago Reader  for roughly $3 million next week.

According to Crain's, Wrapports, which forked up $23 million last December to buy Sun-Times Media, publisher of The Chicago Sun-Times, along with seven suburban dailies and 30 suburban weekly newspapers, is close to tying up the deal to land the Reader. As previously reported here (see "TUOL" post 3/13/12), Texas-based Bulkey Capital LP was retained to oversee the unloading of the Reader, which presently is owned by New York investment banker Atalaya Capital Management L.P.

The Atalaya hedge fund came into the Reader in 2009 when it purchased it out of bankruptcy, along with The Washington City Weekly and Creative Loafing Atlanta, from an insolvent Florida company, Creative Loafing, Inc., for $5 million. The Reader, which distributes about 90,000 copies weekly through newspaper boxes, restaurants, bars and retail shops, is expected to compete against the Chicago Tribune-published RedEye for Chicago's younger audience.

Salt Lake Tribune Jettisons Nine Newsroom Staffers

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)Utah's largest daily, The Salt Lake Tribune, has announced layoffs of nine editorial employees, a 7.5 percent reduction in newsroom personnel, leaving an editorial staff of 119.

The Trib, owned by Denver-based MediaNews Group, blamed sagging circulation and declining ad pages for the staff reduction, which largely affected the copy desk.

More's the pity to the pink-slipped journalists who are unable to drown their sorrows at the pub past 1 a.m. in Salt Lake City.

New York Times Slashes 50 Positions; Newsroom Spared

Assistant General Counsel George Freeman, a 31-year New York Times veteran, was among those pink-slipped as The Times last week eliminated 50 positions.

In a story broken by media watchdog Jim Romanesko (JimRomanesko.com) and reported by Capitalnewyork.com and elsewhere, the job reductions spared the newsroom but affected personnel in the finance, legal and human resources departments. The Times is in the throes of difficult contract negotiations with the union that represents more than 1,000 Times staffers.

Gannett Quarterly Profits Off a Quarter

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)Restructuring costs and plunging newspaper advertising revenue are to blame for the 25 percent decrease in First Quarter profits for McLean, Va.-based media conglomerate Gannett Co. compared to a year ago.

According to an Associated Press report, Gannett, whose stable includes USA Today among its 82 newspapers, along with 23 television stations, saw a 2.6 percent decline in First Quarter revenues compared to the same period in 2011. Digital ad revenues, however, jumped 6.8 percent.

Adults Love Local News

(Photo credit: Knight Foundation)A phone survey of more than 2,200 adults last January found 72 percent of the adults polled relied on local newspapers to satisfy their craving for local information.

The study by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism and Internet & American Life Project, backed by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which has a 2 percent margin of error, gauged how respondents obtained information about 16 topics, ranging from crime news and school information to weather reports.

The results, reported on www.PewInternet.org, found 32 percent of adults conceding the absence of their local paper would have a major impact on their lives, a number that jumped to 35 percent among adult respondents age 40 and older. The survey was conducted both on cell phones and landlines.

'Lighthouse' Columnist No Beacon of Integrity

Blueprint of Split Rock Lighthouse. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)Anchor Weekly editor Steve Jeffrey has resigned, the Calgary Herald reports, the day after a humor writer allegedly uncovered at least 42 instances in which Jeffrey purportedly committed plagiarism in his local political column, "Lighthouse".

Jeffrey, who initially denied plagiarizing others works while conceding he used other writers for "inspiration," stepped down one day after humorist George Waters claimed Jeffrey merely altered minor details of others' writings in his own column, according to the Herald story.

Not the first time rough Waters brought down a Lighthouse.

API: R.I.P

Newspaper Association of America (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

After 66 years, the Reston, Va.-based American Press Institute ("API") has terminated its staff and will merge with the Newspaper Association of America ("NAA"), The Washington Post reported.

Founded in 1946 by Providence Journal editor Sevllon Brown and initially headquartered at Columbia University, the nonprofit API ran programs that attracted journalists nationwide. With the print journalism industry in the doldrums, contributions from news organizations have declined and program attendees dwindled, necessitating API eliminating its eight full-time staffers, and one part-time employee.

According to the Post article, API and NAA will merge their endowments.

Alternative Weekly Chicago Reader on the Block

Image via WikipediaThe Chicago Reader, the alternative weekly launched in 1971 by Carleton College grads and retrieved from the bankruptcy heap for $5 million in 2009 by the Atalaya Capital Management, L.P. New York hedge fund, is for sale.

Stories in Crain's Chicago Business and The Chicago Tribune report that Texas-based Bulkey Capital L.P. is advising Atalaya regarding the unloading of the Reader, which distributes about 90,000 copies weekly through bars, restaurants, retail outlets and newspaper boxes. Potential buyers include the Phoenix-based Village Voice Media Holdings LLC and The Chicago Sun Times, which itself emerged from bankruptcy in 2009 and was bought this year by Wrapports LLC (see "TUOL" post 12/21/11).

Atalaya also owns the Washington City Paper and Creative Loafing Atlanta weeklies, by virtue of the hedge fund acquirinq the bankrupt Florida company Creative Loafing Inc in 2009. Bulkey contends the Reader is operating in the black nowadays, though distribution of the 41-year-old weekly is down 40,000 copies from four years ago.

Syria Conflict Claims Lives of Two Western Journalists

Image via WikipediaSunday Times foreign correspondent Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik were killed by a mortar blast in Homs, Syria, The Washington Post reports.

The American-born Colvin, twice a recipient of the British Press Awards' Foreign Correspondent of the Year, lost an eye to a shrapnel wound in 2001 while covering a story in Sri Lanka. The Syrian government has a lockdown on information, making difficult to independently verify the circumstances of the journalists' deaths, the Post account stated.

Not including Colvin and Ochlik, eleven journalists have been killed in 2012, a half-dozen of whom were confirmed to have died in the performance of their duties, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

No Brotherly Love for Philly Journos as Layoffs Loom

Image via WikipediaThe Philadelphia Media Network ("PMN"), owner of The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News and philly.com will resort to layoffs if a voluntary buyout program available to employees through the end of the month doesn't yield three dozen fewer workers, Poynter.org reports.

Newspaper Guild leaders received the grim news yesterday that PMN needs to slash its workforce by 37 positions that may come from across-the-board and include reporters, cartoonists, photographers, editorial writers and copy editors, among other classifications. The number of staffers who opt for the buyout will dictate how many layoffs occur, according to Poynter.org.

The respective newsrooms of the Inquirer, Daily News and philly.com will merge when they relocate, which is scheduled for June. PMN is looking to unload the media properties via auction (see "TUOL" post 1/31/12).

Whither Philly Dailies?

Image via WikipediaHow solid or shaky the ground on which Philadelphia Media Network ("PMN")-owned dailies, the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News, stand is open to debate on news that one of PMN's key stakeholders is sitting on his hands as the papers are put on the auction block.

The New York Post yesterday reported that Alden Global Capital principal Randall Smith, owner of roughly 30 percent of the Inquirer & News properties, has remained quiet amid PMN's auction that is expected to reap about $100 million. PMN acquired the dailies out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from Philadelphia Media Holdings (see "TUOL" post 7/11/11).

Romanesko's media blog reported that PMN CEO Greg Osberg discounted the Post story, assuring PMN employees in a memo that shareholders routinely boost or reduce their ownership levels in properties and that a minority owner may only sell his percentage of ownership in the dailies, not the dailies themselves.

Alden Capital and other hedge funds doled out $139 million for their Philly stake (sorry), the Post reported, but it seems that Smith, a major shareholder in a variety of media entities, including Gannett, Freedom Communications and Journal Register Co., may be losing his taste for media empire building.