Digital communications: The evolution of the new news cycle Author ...

In the first panel of a four-part series sponsored by City Hall and AT&T, six panelists?Ben Smith of Politico, New York City Deputy Mayor Howard Wolfson, NY1 morning anchor Pat Kiernan, MWW Group CEO Michael Kempner, DNAinfo editor Nicole Bode and Nick Judd of the Personal Democracy Forum?s techPresident blog?weighed in on the opportunities and challenges facing media and government as they struggle to master the digital tools of the future.
What follows is an edited transcript.
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City Hall: Can anyone control a message any more?
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Ben Smith, reporter, Politico: The White House constantly gets derailed. It?s both the day in and day out. They?ve ended the practice of just trying to put out one message and stick to it. They?ve given in to the idea that there?s just endless incoming and you are just giving out files. A small thing can always get magnified into a big thing.
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CH: Given the new forms of instant media, how do public relations firms keep track of the various different news accounts that media outlets release all day and night?
Michael Kempner, CEO, MWW Group: So much of it is out of your control, but so much is in your control, as well. It has always been speed to market. It was always about the first 24 hours. Now it?s closer to the first 24 seconds. How do you communicate across all screens, pretty much at the same time, pretty much before someone else has the opportunity to set the debate? The control isn?t what it used to be, but more so than what people would assume.
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CH: Howard, did you make a conscious decision to turn your Twitter feed into a medium to confirm or refute the factual accuracy of stories?
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Howard Wolfson, deputy mayor for governmental relations and communications: It?s sort of a conscious decision. You have a different role and responsibility in government than you do on a campaign. Your voice on a campaign can be a little edgier, a little more confrontational. When you work in the government and you are paid by the taxpayer, you have a different sense of obligations and responsibilities.
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CH: Pat, how representative is a conversation on Twitter of the city?s general sentiments on current issues?
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Pat Kiernan, anchor, NY1: We can be fooled into thinking the conversation on Twitter is a proxy for the feelings of the electorate. This group that is actively engaged in this 24-second news cycle is not necessarily representative of the audience out there. Most of the feedback I get back from viewers is on social media. The sample is skewed.
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CH: Nicole, you work for an entirely online news organization, yet television and print publications have based their reports on your stories. How have you built that following, and what impact do you think your organization has on the news industry?
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Nicole Bode, senior editor, DNAinfo: If you influence the influencers, if you make information available to the people who make information available to the rest of the people, then you build your credibility through the credibility of other people who trust you enough to share your information. It?s almost like a mini newspaper, just on Twitter.
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CH: Do you think Twitter could have the same impact that community newspapers did 40 years ago?
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Bode: It?s so stunning how people have reached out and been so desperate and thirsty for news. People tell us we are the CNN of Washington Heights and Inwood. It?s just because there are particular kinds of street areas where they weren?t getting that sort of coverage before.
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CH: Nick, who is using this technology but aren?t considered insiders?
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Nick Judd, associate editor, Personal Democracy Forum?s techPresident blog: People of color are more likely to be on social media. You have the real-people conversations people are having on Twitter about things tangentially related to politics. They are talking about their paychecks; they are talking about rent; they are talking about where they are going out at night and chatting with their friends, but they aren?t necessarily part of the insiders? group.
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Smith: There?s a huge audience of people that know as much as the insiders. There are no real insiders. You could probably put anyone in this room on CNN or one of the morning shows, and they would know as much as any random commentator out there.
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CH: Pat, how do you decide what to air on television within the limited amount of broadcast time available?
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Kiernan: I have 15,000 followers on Twitter, and over the course of a weekday morning over one million people will tune in to me on NY1 at a given point. When you?ve got them for 15 or 30 minutes, you have to make the right decisions on what they need to get out the door. Twitter alerts you to stories. It?s an instant method of feedback in your balance of a particular story.
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CH: Michael, how do you reach out to a mass audience through the multiple forms of new media?
Kempner: It?s less about the tools of the moment, because they will change, than about how people use the tools. People like Ben; to those that follow him and read him, I would say he has a big role in influencing the influencers. Those who are credible sources to other people are magnified. For us it?s a combination of relevancy of trust and influencing the influencers.
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CH: Are bloggers the new filter of media? What forms of media do communications apparatuses worry about?
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Wolfson: You have to be beyond just the people who are reading the newspaper. There?s enough capacity to worry about anything. We don?t have a New York City version of Politico yet. With the exception of NY1, we don?t have a version of a 24/7 cable industry devoted to covering politics in New York in the way that MSNBC is doing on a national level. If this is what you do, and you love it, consider us lucky to be in the last city in America?probably forever?that has four daily newspapers covering us on a daily basis.
CH: Nicole, do you get higher-quality interviews from community-board meetings than from monitoring chat rooms?
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Bode: There is no news without the community-board meetings. I don?t think that has changed in politics. You have to be at a place with a person to get news. Once you have that foundation, then you can get into the instant forms of communications. Being on the ground matters.
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CH: Ben, how important is it to go past the group think among those engaged in the political conversation and stay rooted in basic reporting?
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Smith: Twitter isn?t a new conversation; it?s just taking place there. It shapes this consensus, and everyone is talking about the same thing. If you are outside of the conversation, it doesn?t fit. Introducing facts into an argument already so shaped by partisanship doesn?t tend to change people?s mind.
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CH: Does the conversation start with people who are influential in social media or traditional news outlets?
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Wolfson: If you are below the age of 40, you are much more likely to get your news online. You can bet that as those people age, they?re going to decide to become avid TV watchers like their parents, or you can bet that they?ll decide to stay online, and their nightly audience will shrink. I?ll take the bet that they?re going to stay online. People are getting their news elsewhere. There are other means and platforms that have risen in importance.
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CH: Ben, has a modern-day reporter?s news judgment changed?
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Smith: Some of the reporting is observational but isn?t interesting. You used to have to imagine your audience. It?s nice when you don?t have to imagine the audience because you know exactly who they are. You know a lot of them personally; you hear from them directly.
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CH: Michael, how hard was it to keep up with the changes in technology?
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Kempner: It seems like this is some massive revolution, but it?s really a fast evolution. I think some industries are better than others in trying to figure it out. I thought it was the dumbest thing in the world, and then I use it and still think it?s kind of dumb, but I use it because I need to, and then I learned why it?s not dumb.
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Audience member: How does a news organization?s budget impact how much news they are able to cover?
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Kiernan: This is the discussion of a lot of blogging. It is still often originating its content off of old media. In terms of the number of journalists working at those enterprises versus the traditional, it?s a fraction. I don?t think anybody has come up with a business model yet.
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Smith: Is The New York Times a business? Is NY1 a business? The media hasn?t always been the greatest business, but it?s always managed. I know local blogging is a great business.
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Bode: There are plenty of places that are happy to just get some kid out of school. In terms of the legacy of where this is going to end, I don?t think we?ll really know for another 5 or 10 years yet. I think time will tell.
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Audience member: How much energy do you spend focusing on Twitter while reporting or working for a public relations firm?
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Smith: My job as a reporter has changed. What was once a publisher?s job has become a big part of a reporter?s job. I email out my story; I put it on Twitter; I engage with people in various ways. This used to be a function carried out by guys lugging stacks of paper around.
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Wolfson: I can have that conversation with you publicly and say, ?Hey, you got this wrong.? That is an escalation of what was frequently a private conversation, but it is more and more the case that people who are written about have recourse in a public way.
-->Source: http://www.cityhallnews.com/2011/10/digital-communications/
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