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What happens on the Internet (usually) stays on the Internet

September 21, 2010 in Advising, College Media, ethics, Websites

It’s a new school year, and that means a new crop of requests to student newspaper advisers and student editors to remove content from web archives. The Daily Eastern News received a request (which we honored), and I’ve talked to someone who is trying to get something taken off of another student newspaper web site.

Perhaps it’s time to revisit some thoughts I wrote about the matter previously.

I first wrote about this phenomenon for Keeping Free Presses Free back in 2007 (here’s a link to the entire article).

From my anecdotal observations so far, the requests for removal of information from college media web sites usually come in two flavors: embarrassment and privacy concerns.

1. Youthful Indiscretions: By far, this is at the center of most requests. A student is arrested for a minor in possession charge, or something more serious. The arrest shows up in the student newspaper’s police blotter, and then on the web site. Five years later, the (now former) student is trying to clean up the search engines while trying to find work.

2. The learning curve is steep: The second factor is what I might call embarrassment about youthful expression. Several advisers have had requests from former newspaper staffers who are now ashamed of the quality of their writing or arguments.

3.  privacy or personal security: Some people have requested material be taken down from the Internet because, were it to fall into the hands of the wrong individual, there would be the potential for harm.

There are probably other concerns that people voice in hopes of getting material taken out of a web archive, but those are the ones I’ve heard of most often.

I don’t have any easy answers to number 3. Sometimes discretion is the better part of valor, as the saying goes. But it can be difficult to predict how such situations will play out, or whether the situation is as dangerous as presented.

Number 2 is the easiest of the three to deal with. You wrote an article and submitted it to the student newspaper/media outlet for publication. Own your work. If you are a journalist and you wrote some grammatically-challenged copy in college, welcome to the club. If you wrote an opinion piece expressing an opinion you now regret, welcome to life. Many people change their minds over time about issues and events. It reflects growth (mostly). Taking down an article from an archive because you’re embarrassed by its quality is extremely hard to justify, especially for a journalist.

Number 1 is the most delicate of the three because there is a tremendous potential for future harmful repercussions if incorrect or incomplete information is available online. And, quite frankly, news media do a horrible job of following up on most of the mundane (to us) items that appear in a police blotter. A former editor at the Pitt News had an interesting approach to this: printing the police blotter with names in the newspaper, but not placing names online. Might be something to consider.

If someone was arrested, but never prosecuted, or was found innocent, where is the follow-up that would display that information on the web? Frequently, there is none.

This is my take: Err on the side of the facts. Add to them when they are available (but be sure to verify – don’t just take someone’s word that they were cleared of charges). There’s no need to antagonize a former student if the facts are on their side. That doesn’t mean take the article down, but you should add a note to the original article with additional information.

Above all, as I mentioned earlier, you should develop a policy (in consultation with student editors) so there is some kind of map to follow in handling these situations, which are bound to come up more and more.

There are very few instances where I’d counsel someone to remove an online article or archived item. Better to shine more sunlight on the situation.

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College Media Review available for download

July 20, 2010 in Advising, College Media

10CMR47_3-4College Media Review, a publication of College Media Advisers, Inc., is a great resource for college media advisers and journalism faculty. It’s also available for free online. The latest edition includes an article by Jeff Halliday about mobile reporting. You can download the PDF (5.5 MB) here.

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CMA panel on blogging for advisers

October 31, 2008 in Advising, blogging

I’m sitting in front of an audience of advisers wishing the hotel internet access worked better.

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CMA upgrades web site

September 27, 2008 in Advising, College Media

cma For those with an interest in college media advising, the College Media Advisers web site has been upgraded. The new site is run on Drupal, upgraded from Joomla, which I helped transition the site from a College Publisher site in 2005. Click below for the new features. Many of these features were discussed when we moved off CP, but we didn’t have the resources to add them until CMA hired Bill Neville part-time to do web site development. (via Neville to the CMA listserv)

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NextGen journalism profs and advisers

April 28, 2008 in Academics, Advising, industry news

Paul Conley wrote something the other day that spurred this post, a late addition to the Carnival of Journalism (April edition).

Conley notes an Editor & Publisher article about newly displaced print editors looking for work as journalism instructors. Conley is succinct, as usual, in his assessment:

it’s not in the interest of journalism students for schools to hire people who either can’t or won’t adjust to the changes in media. Heck, journalism schools are already filled with people who don’t understand modern journalism. And there’s little doubt that those teachers have been producing graduates who are ill-prepared for the workforce.

Over the past 7 years as an adviser and instructor, I’ve watched the tide slowly shifting as professors and college media advisers have faced the challenges that impact their industry. Anecdotes are all I can offer, but I’ve seen some journalism professors who’ve been around for more than 20 years who face the future with a keen interest, and others who are still mired in the past. Ditto with advisers.

My sense of things now is that even if someone is entirely dismissive of new media (online media, multimedia, whatever you want to call it), they are not as prone to display their contempt as they were, say, three years ago.

I would add to Paul’s comments by saying that people leaving the industry shouldn’t look to academia as a place to hide. Right now, academic journalism is pushing forward to keep pace with the industry, even as the industry’s pace of change ramps up further. In our department, we’re trying to figure out ways to get students engaged with online/multimedia tools early in the sequence so that they are skilled when they leave. If a retiring editor doesn’t like using blogs in the workplace, I can’t imagine they’ll like using blogs for class assignments (which I see more and more of, btw).

For most of the past five years, I’ve followed the academic journalism job market pretty closely, partly out of my own employment concerns, and partly because I ran the job board for College Media Advisers, Inc. The trends during that time showed a lot more desire for people who could understand, teach, or research in the area of multimedia or convergence. There were lots of positions open for Public Relations/Advertising, a good number of broadcast TV/radio positions, and multimedia positions. Print positions were not as well-represented, and the competition in those areas is already fierce.

In the advising sphere, it’s not much better.

College media outlets are scrambling to replace declining ad revenues just like their “professional” media counterparts. They have the challenge of training students for the skills they’ll need in the future while maintaining their traditional media imprints – no small feat with a mostly volunteer staff.

And a final word of caution for an editor hoping to make the jump from industry to academia (especially in an advising role), there’s an old saying: You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. In most student media settings, advising is mostly a post hoc enterprise. The adviser doesn’t “tell” the students what to put in the paper, how to write the stories, where to go for coverage – unless the adviser is asked.

That could be a heavy transition for a newspaper editor to make.

With all of that said, I’m keen to see the day when some of the multimedia whiz kids return to colleges to do some advising, teaching and research. But I suspect that won’t be for a while. The industry needs that young blood and is willing to pay more for those skilled practitioners right now.

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CP – the good and the bad

April 23, 2008 in Advising, College Publisher, online software, Websites

Most of you know I have been testing the new 5.0 or polopoly version for College Publisher going on 4 months. I have been getting many emails and questions at the conventions about what it is like but by far the biggest question that gets put to me is in the vien of “we are thinking of switching but want to know what the new 5.0 system has to offer before we jump ship.” Note, this isn’t a direct quote from any one just a general wording.

I think since the problems of the “j run errors” many advisors and students are frustrated with CP and that is why many are looking at other options. Additionally, we all have probably attended or followed sessions on “new media” and our students now want to try some of these great things we have all learned about. Things which may not be easy to do, if possible at all under the current 4.0 system.

At the core however, I feel many advisors are over looking some key points. I quickly broke down what I see as positives and negatives for the CP system. This is a short list and by no means complete. Feel free to add your thoughts in the comments section.

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Discouraging words

October 10, 2007 in Advising, hope for the future

I have the business sense of a squirrel, but even I can see a disturbing financial trend for our student media here. We’ve been looking at our quarterly income statements today, wondering how to stop the bleeding. Ad revenue looks to be down 20 to 25 percent from last year at this time. We had hoped that the problem was local – that we were doing something wrong and could find a way to fix it. But after hearing from business advisers from around the country, it looks as though nearly everyone’s in the same boat. National advertising appears to be the primary culprit, but local has been tough, too.

We’re finding areas to make cuts, but really, personnel is the only place to make a significant dent. So we either hire fewer reporters, photographers, designers, etc., and ask more of our already-overworked editors, or we reduce all staff and start printing smaller papers with less local content and – gasp – maybe even less frequently. And in the process, we sacrifice part of our educational mission.

So my question for Innovation in College Media is this: Are college media nearing a point where we need to invent new business models to sustain ourselves? Of course new media is part of that mix, but it’s still not a major source of revenue (at least not here). The print product still pays almost all of the bills. Meanwhile, fewer people read newspapers.

Do we look for revenue aside from advertising? What might that look like? Do we publish a printed newspaper less frequently, and attempt to drive readers to an innovative Web site in hopes that they won’t give up on us altogether? Will advertisers support that? Do we create niche publications?

And, can we get good advice from professional news media, other than “Welcome to the real world?”

I don’t know any of these answers. I’m hoping some of you might.

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Simpson College consulting

September 29, 2007 in Academics, Advising, CICM shop talk

Murley at Simpson College

This Friday, I spent most of the day with faculty and students at Simpson College in Iowa, as a visiting outside consultant. Simpson’s Communication department is looking at ways to revamp their curriculum for the future. While there, I got to meet with the editors of The Simpsonian, the nation’s oldest continuously published student newspaper, and talk about college media in general and how they can better use their web presence.

Thanks to Brian Steffen for the invitation and the hospitality.

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Cranking up the critiques

August 28, 2007 in Advising

The first week of publication each fall means, for me, getting back into the routine of doing a daily critique. The critique is my most important, day-to-day teaching tool. Every adviser does it a little differently, but for me it consists of a marked-up newspaper, a written sheet or two stapled on top, and then the same written material placed online so students can access it from anywhere. I try to view the paper and Web site as a typical reader, raising questions and comments the public might have. 

A thorough critique takes time – particularly when done over the course of a typically busy newsroom day. I try to make myself start early and be mostly done by noon, before the newsroom fills with students and everyone’s occupied with tomorrow’s paper instead of today’s. 

If the critique isn’t done and placed in the newsroom by early afternoon, students start asking about it. They read it religiously; I always tell them it’s one person’s take on that day’s product and that they shouldn’t put too much stock in it. But they do. Creative people – writers, photographers, designers – crave feedback on their work. I’ve realized over the years that the daily critique is often the only constructive feedback our students get.  

I’ve also realized that, once they graduate, it may be a long time before they get thorough feedback on their work. At small dailies and weeklies, only the best editors find time for regular critiques. The rest starve their staffers, who end up leaving because they aren’t growing. 

My process has become more complicated over the years, as more and more students have wanted feedback. Our Web site has lots of unique material, so I need to comment on a few items there each day. Our online radio station produces daily podcasts; those need attention, too. Most days, there just isn’t time to focus on everything. So I’ll direct most of the comments to the most prominent issue that day. Most often, I focus on good reporting and writing. Sometimes it’s grammar and style problems. Sometimes it’s photo composition, or good design. But I do try to include at least one daily comment on each major aspect of the paper: reporting, writing, editing, design, photo, online. The critique needs to relevant to every student every day. 

I’d be interested to see comments from other advisers / students / alumni about different forms critiques can take. What works for you?

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Training and trusting

August 15, 2007 in Advising

These are the last few days of quiet. A student media office is a creepy place when no students are around. The fun of this job is the energy level found in a newsroom full of motivated students. This week, though, I need the quiet as I plan for our newsroom training week.

 

We’ll pack a whole lot of information into next week – how-to sessions in all departments and, in particular, legal and ethical issues our students will need to understand. We’ve found that before classes start is the only time we have their undivided attention.

 

Here’s the hard lesson about training, though: Its ultimate success does not depend on my teaching skills, or those of Maria, our business adviser. We’ve taught the same material to different staffs over the years with widely varying results.

 

My teaching, enthusiasm and overall credibility as adviser all play some role with the whole staff. But what matters more is helping to shape the attitudes of the top editors. The staff takes its cues from them – not me – on just about every issue: the level of professionalism in their journalism and general office atmosphere … the spirit of fun that either pervades this place or doesn’t … the focus or lack of focus on tangible goals … and the amount of grumbling about low pay. 

Which is why we spend the first couple of training days with just the managers and editors. Sure, we go over newsroom basics. But it’s more about setting a tone. What we’re really doing is formally putting the Northern Star into their hands. The year’s success level rests with them. We can give them tools and support, but the ship is theirs.

 

Early in my career as an adviser, that was one of the toughest adjustments. I spent 10 years as a daily newspaper reporter and editor. Everything about those jobs was hands-on. The quality of each day’s paper depended a lot on me. Whereas, an adviser’s role is – to quote an old article by Ron Johnson – “train ’em and trust ’em.”

 

In that order. That’s why next week is so important.

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