PJNet

Geneva Overholser, now of the Missouri School of Journalism’s Washington bureau and formerly editor of the Des Moines Register, wants institutional journalism change and provides some possibilities. First the call for change:

we will most assuredly have to get it through our heads (and hearts) just how exciting and full of possibility for journalism’s future are today’s new venues — all those new digital platforms that so many have simply wished would go away. What could be worse than having journalism on iPods? How about NOT having it there? Take a cruise through some of the Web sites that, say, give ethnic news a well-deserved wider hearing. Or that enable people to search crime news by type, time and location. Or that pay the sort of loving attention to what’s going on in a particular neighborhood that only an old-fashioned weekly once knew how to do. How wondrously they put us to shame, all of us with our endless reasons why we can’t possibly fit something in our newspaper or newscast.

Here are some possible areas for change:

Board members could demand that the health of their companies’ journalism be audited as avidly as its fiscal health — and that their executives be rewarded as richly for the one as for the other. Shareholders could band together to exert pressure for corporate responsibility among media companies, much as they have pressed for corporate environmental responsibility.

Elected representatives could pass tax legislation to make it easier for news companies to be organized as nonprofit, tax-exempt corporations. Colleges could make civics and news literacy classes part of their entrance requirements. The journalism academy could turn its massive research capability toward questions of practical import for journalists: How can the concept of objectivity best be formulated to serve journalism today? How can journalism’s enduring values be translated even more richly online? Journalism organizations could recognize excellence in ways that strengthen the craft: Master copy editors, say, anointed by the American Copy Editors Society, would have responsibilities to nurture the craft back in their newsrooms. The opportunities go on and on. Some are easy to ponder, others immediately discomforting: Should the government provide tax breaks for under-heard voices? Should an independent council be established to track, promote and define the news function in the

United States

?

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This entry was posted on Friday, October 13th, 2006 at 9:28 am and is filed under Media, Restoring the Trust. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.