Beware of Cheap Coffee?

So despite loving Gimme Coffee (woo, go local!), I am on a Starbucks mailing list because occasionally they send out coupons for free coffee. And Starbucks coffee ain't cheap.

Funny that this is their new advertising move.

My favorite new reads: "Beware of a cheaper cup of coffee. It comes with a price."
Notice that Starbucks is not saying, "cheap cup" but rather "cheaper cup," as if any cup of coffee below their price is inferior. I find it strange that during a time of increased financial awareness, Starbucks not not only embraces but flaunts its image, performing an about-face on its $1 cup experiment in January 2008.

A close second: "This is what coffee tastes like when you pour your wallet heart into it."

Emerging Trends

The Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism has released the State of the News Media 2009 report. In it six "new emerging" trends were identified:

1. The growing public debate over how to finance the news industry may well be focusing on the wrong remedies while other ideas go largely unexplored.
2. Power is shifting to the individual journalist and away, by degrees, from journalistic institutions.
3. On the Web, news organizations are focusing somewhat less on bringing audiences in and more on pushing content out.
4. The concept of partnership, motivated in part by desperation, is becoming a major focus of news investment and it may offer prospects for the financial future of news.
5. Even if cable news does not keep the audience gains of 2008, its rise is accelerating another change—the elevation of the minute-by-minute judgment in political journalism.
6. In its campaign coverage, the press was more reactive and passive and less of an enterprising investigator of the candidates than it once was.

Two through five make perfect sense to me, and I am not enough of a political junky to argue six, but I do have a problem with one. Exploring new ideas? Sounds great! Let's see what the Pew Project came up with:

1. Adopt the cable model, in which a fee to news producers is built into monthly Internet access fees consumers already pay. News industry executives have not seriously tested this enough to know if it could work, but these fees provide half the revenue in cable.

Surely we'd hear the cries: "The ESPN model? But what if I don't watch ESPN!?" Then take tell me what a "news producer" is. Would theHuffington Post be considered? How about the Drudge Report? There will have to be some serious line drawing in some rapidly shifting sand.
And what about the day when Google provides us all with free Internet? (Please check out that link, even if you don't care about free Internet)

2. Build major online retail malls within news sites. This could both create a local search network for small businesses and link them directly with consumers to complete transactions, not just offer advertising—with the news operation getting a point-of-purchase fee.

So this is...Craigslist meets Amazon? Newspapers are trying to get back that lost revenue that came from connecting people to what they want through classifieds. Not a bad idea, but let's hope no big corporations are let in.

3. Develop subscription-based niche products for elite professional audiences. These are more than subject-specific micro-sites. They are deep, detailed, up-to-the-minute online resources aimed at professional interests, and they are a proven and highly profitable growth area in journalism.

How...elitist? Actually I like this idea because niche journalism definitely has the potential to sell. A plus: it's produced for those who find it useful, so it can be more technical and geared toward that audience.

More on the issue (an AFP piece in the Tehran Times) here.

Jennifer Government

Combine 1984, American Psycho, and The Matrix and you get Jennifer Government. In author Max Berry's corporate future there is no tax and the United States is simply the collection of companies that operate within its territories. Even the government has been privatized. It's as far as you can get from 1984's Big Brother or the minutemen's fear of a "New World Order." But the typologies of government eschatology (1984, Brave New World, Farenheit 451) still exist - they are simply reversed in a terrifying display of consumerism.

Two customer rewards programs bind American businesses into one of two factions: Team Advantage and US Alliance. That seems a bit silly, but it isn't too far of a leap from today's corporate model in which Disney and GE control large swaths of not only media but also technology.

I wish Barry had given a little more information as to the media. Apparently in the future there are still papers, but because the only functional independent company is the government, I wonder how they would survive. Probably all media would be partisan. Clearly, independent media would be really important, but would probably be inaccessible or at least censored, depending on who controls the wires.

An excerpt:

John Nike was reading a novel called The Space Merchants; it had been reissued and he'd seen a review in Fast Company. They called it "prescient and hilarious," which John was having a hard time agreeing with. All these old science-fiction books were the same: they thought the future would be dominated by some hard-ass, oppressive Government. Maybe that was plausible back in the 1950s, when the world looked as if it might turn Commie. It sure wasn't now.

In The Space Merchants, the world was dominated by two advertising companies, which was closer to the truth. But still, there were so many laws the companies had to follow! If these guys had all the money, John wondered, who could stop them doing whatever they wanted?

That's a chilling question, even today.

Love Song of A Blogger [Prufrock?]

Instructions: Take T.S. Eliot, the Huffington Post and a blogger. Dice. Stir until evenly distributed. Add salt to taste.

One of the beauties of The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock is that it works outward in, first dealing with the world before exploring how the poet fits into it. I didn't realize it until I was more than halfway done with this...work. I don't want to call it a parody. I'd rather think of it as a tribute. I will add links as I find more articles that apply.

Let us go then, you and me
As the search terms are spread out against the screen,
Endless winking code at our disposal;
Let us scroll, through certain near-collapsing rags,
Paltry papers, stagnant mags,
Time, the Times, all digitized; to print farewell!
these companies' profits have gone to hell.
Google guides you through a tedious argument
Of questionable intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"
Let us go and make our visit.

In the box the search terms come and go
Ads and stolen content glow.

The many blogs that pitch their work upon the Internet,
The many sites that host the content on the Internet
Spoke their silence into the black of cyberspace,
Wrangled their words through wires,
Let appear response from countless mouths and fingers,
Slipped around firewalls, made a sudden leap
And seeing the conversations they had stirred,
Continue spilling text as readers sleep.

And indeed there will come time
For the yellowed forlorn sheets that slide along the street
Smudging ink, crumpling, folded, torn;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a democracy where news is free;
There will be time for people to create
A new model, work of new brains and hands
That type and put their thoughts upon your screen:
Thoughts from you and thoughts from me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions, parenthetical revisions,
Before a new model we must meet.

In the box the search terms come and go
Our darkest thoughts, recorded, glow.

And indeed there will be Times
Editors wonder, "How'd I err?" and, "how'd I err?"
Time to look forward, instead of stare
At that dinosaur with disapproving glare.
[They will say: "How the revenue is growing thin!"]
Your mourning shroud, sackcloth strapped across your waste,
Do not despair; confront the problem you are faced-
[The will say: "But how the revenue is growing thin!"]
Do you dare
Disturb the blogosphere?
Internet allows the space
For decisions and revisions that in print could not appear.

For I have known them all already, known them all:-
Have known the evening paper, morning post
I have found the papers I like reading most.
I've heard the voices dying, heard them all
Beneath the print and paper's thin ghost.
So how should I presume?

And I cannot know them all together, not at all,
Two eyes that scan and interpret a phrase,
With so much information spread out on a page;
They pin the beautiful creature to the wall,
Then continue to engage
The text in so many different varied ways.
And how should I presume?

And I have seen the pens already, seen them fall-
Pens gripped by citizens on the trail
[But off the bus, what precious new details!]
But should they then confess
When for quotes they transgress?
Quotes that lie or are dishonest, quotes at all,
So who might I then trust?
And how do I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have surfed at midnight through the nets,
And watched debates flow through those tubes,
Those lonely men and women, running Windows?...

I should have been a pair of ragged hands
Scuttling across the desk on clicking keys.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, pass so peacefully!
All those clacking fingers,
Do they sleep ... tire ... does dread malinger
Stretching their brains, mad for you and me?
Should I, after writing countless words in essays
Have the strength to examine what the Huffington Post displays?
But though I have wept and groaned, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my words [grown slightly limp] on the web's uncaring platter
I am no prophet - and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And seen my blog stare back at me and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the words, the essays I have spat
Into the blogosphere, among some talk of this or that,
Would it have been all worth while,
To have bitten off perspective with a smile,
To have squeezed the day's news into a ball
To ask myself and you some overwhelming question,
To say, "I am legion, for we are many,
Come to inform you all, I shall tell you all"-
If one, reading this blog post or any,
Should say: "I do not understand at all.
Understand it not at all."

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the paper Times, the magazines, Gutenberg's dream,
After the novels, and all paper, after wearing suits to go to work-
And this, and so much more?-
It is impossible to say just where we'll be!
But as if a magic lantern threw our fears in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If the one paper left per city were to fall,
And turning to its readers say:
"We're sorry, that is all,
No more content, that is all."
. . . . .
No! These are not weak structures, nor were meant to be;
Are the fourth estate, one that will try
To swell a progress, keep a wary eye
On government; and not become a tool,
Independent, glad to be of use,
Truthful, relevant, and meticulous;
Full of pride and pity, ready to expose abuse;
All times, indeed, pushing progress-
Almost never the Fool.

They grow old ... They grow old ...
Their pants wear thin, and cyberspace is cold.

Shall they part with paperdom? Or practice what they preach?
For there are others out there who can analyze a speech.
I have heard the papers calling, each to each.

I think that they might search for me.

I have seen them riding westward on the plains
Combing through financial sheets of black gone red
When a cold wind chills and transfixes icy dread.

They have lingered while technology has changed
We hope they might find some way around:
That what human voice still lingers, will not drown.

Re: The LA Times Finds Out Product Placement Isn't the Magic Bullet?

Comment on Phil Bronstein's HuffPo post: "The LA Times Finds Out Product Placement Isn't the Magic Bullet?"

Remember on February 17, 2009 when Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz posted "Staying Real in an Instant," an advertorial about introducing instant coffee to Starbucks' lineup?

I do. It was above the fold, first article in the left-hand column. Right where this one, a legitimate news story, is. Perhaps Starbucks didn't pay for the ad, but there were more legitimate items to put there.

Newspapers aren't the only ones who sell out.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Ethical Blogging

Bittergate journalist Mayhill Fowler made big news last June, reporting the angry comments Bill Clinton made toward Vanity Fair editor Todd Purdham. There were just a couple problems: she did not identify herself as a reporter and the tirade came after she called the piece a "hatchet job." As an Off The Bus citizen journalist, was what she did ethical?

For citizen journalists, there is no code of ethics, so journalists must act as they see fit. If you're Matt Drudge, this means there is minimal fact-checking, honesty and balance. Not so much of a problem if you know Drudge leans right, but still it would be nice to know he is following some code he makes available to people reading his work (this goes for all bloggers who do original reporting).

The Society of Professional Journalists has its own code that news organizations and their reporters are supposed to follow. Everyone knows this does not always happen. So I'll take this from a different approach, assuming all reporting is biased in some way, if not in the content of the writing, then in the overall message of the organization. Good reporting, even if it has a point of view, is not propaganda, but represents many sides of the issue.

CyberJournalist.net offers its own blogging code of ethics based on the Society of Professional Journalists' code. It changes "Seek Truth and Report It" to "Be Honest and Fair" and leaves out the SPJ's "Act Independently."

While I like the code, I disagree somewhat with the code in that bloggers should seek the truth in every article analyzed and every piece of information received from readers. Being honest and fair is not quite enough. Truth should still play a large role in blogging, even advocacy blogging.

I especially like that the code drops "Act Independently" because of all the great reporting Off The Bus did. These "citizen journalists" were mostly Obama supporters and yet they held him accountable for his words and actions. I believe that truthful and meaningful reporting is possible even when a journalist is associated with an organization. How many journalists do not have a point of view on politics, abortion, war?

Some people seemed to miss the point, like this commenter:

Just another attemot to kill the concept of Blogging. Dont fuck around with individuality. If you are outta content or blogburnt take a break to avoid such worthless attempts at making Bloggers into a mindless herd of sheep.

What I write/rave/rant in my blog is my personal thot process and I'm no way gonna alter it cos some reader got offended and thinks differently.

A code of ethics does not attempt to control bloggers, but rather to ensure that their readers are receiving the information they think they are. What it really comes down to as a blogger is being honest and disclosing as much about your reporting as possible.

Maybe I should develop a code of ethics myself...

...But you already knew this.

[Click for larger version on Penny-Arcade.com]

Insightful. The hat could really represent any job at a newspaper - journalist especially. The metaphor has particular poignancy today, as the New York Times Co. has threatened to shut down The Boston Globe. Journalists across the country are chained to newspapers and their parent companies and advertisers, waiting to sink in the global economic downturn. But according to the Wall Street Journal, they may be able to recover:

The [Boston Globe] ultimatum doesn't necessarily ensure that the 137-year-old daily will close. In recent months, other publishers have achieved significant cost savings by issuing similar threats to unprofitable dailies such as the Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., and the San Francisco Chronicle.

But even if that does not destroy them, the Internet's glacial reign is nigh. Content distribution models are changing. But that's okay, because it's the dinosaurs that are going down (just a few will probably adapt and survive), and it's the choice of journalists as to whether they want to go down with them.

Blogging the Izzys

Salon.com blogger Glenn Greenwald and Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman were honored at the inaugural Izzy Awards last night at the State Theater in Ithaca, N.Y.

Organized by the Park Center for Independent Media, the event recognized the two journalists for their "special achievement in independent media," following the legacy of legendary journalist I.F. Stone.


Check out the video introduction for Greenwald I made for the presentation:


Press Release

Greenwald
Greewald began by distinguishing himself from "establishment" journalists, calling himself an independent blogger. In his opinion, Goodman is "the living and breathing embodiment of what journalism should be." He is instead a blogger, and for him there is a distinction between these, establishment journalists and independent journalists. Establishment journalists crank out journalism, even when they are "blogging" for their establishment media organization. Bloggers react to establishment journalism. Independent journalists think in a way contrary to establishment journalists. To demonstrate what an establishment journalist is, Greenwald cited an article by Newsweek's Evan Thomas, in which he reveals:

If you are of the establishment persuasion (and I am), reading Krugman makes you uneasy...By definition, establishments believe in propping up the existing order. Members of the ruling class have a vested interest in keeping things pretty much the way they are. Safeguarding the status quo, protecting traditional institutions, can be healthy and useful, stabilizing and reassuring.

This is not the person you want reporting, because the big questions will never be asked [and compared to the questions on torture and war that could be asked, the linked example seems utterly inconsequential]. If the press's role is not exposing lies, what is it?

Greenwald also tackled establishment journalism's secretive nature. Even while railing for governemnt transparency, journalists have a tendancy hide behind corporate facades. This is why all too often establishment news is not "fair and balanced" and why NBC does not do stories on GE.

To be credible, Greenwald stated, a medium must:

1. Keep a distance from the political structure's influence
2. Steer clear of corporate influence.

But, ah, 2 is so difficult. I.F. Stone's Weekly was free of advertisements. Salon is not. So here's the low-down, if you're looking for it. Salon.com uses both banner advertising and page intro ads (which don't appear with a premium membership). Salon is partially owned by Adobe. According to Yahoo Finance, "Adobe Systems founder and Salon Chairman John Warnock holds about 40% of the company's total voting securities." Salon does not present this fact when posting wire-style tech news from the gigaOM network.

Sometimes advertising is needed. When it is used, so too must transparency. Journalists and blogger who do have advertisers must not cater to them. This was perhaps the strongest point of Greenwald's presentation. Independent journalism is not a type of journalism. Journalism should be independent by nature:

If it's not independent, it's not journalism.

Goodman
A Pacifica veteran, Goodman was more at home with the leftist/aging hippie crowd. Most of the names she mentioned garnered applause, even at the most inappropriate moments.

Example (paraphrased):
"That day, April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis Tennessee."
[applause]

They were clapping, of course, for her enthusiasm, but it seemed cheap and misplaced. To everything there is a season. These people were applauding themselves for remembering rather than for agreeing with Goodman's many well-made points.

"We need a media that presents the full spectrum of perspectives," said Goodman. The sources of these perspectives should be identifiable. Mainstream media can be useful if:

• It is unbiased and asks the hard questions

-or-

• It is biased and can be analyzed as such in order to take down a corporation, goverment/official or "news" organization [Greenwald's specialty]

Mainstream media and their parent companies too often silence the majority, said Goodman. There is a "silenced majority" that opposes war and torture, but the mainstream media does not give them a voice, which it should.

Goodman championed Net Neutrality and open airwaves, the channels through which independent media flow. A violation of freedom of the press, she noted, is a violation of your right to know:

Democracy is a messy thing. It's our job to capture it all.

And that is exactly what Goodman and Greenwald are doing. It is important we follow them and that others emerge who will act with the same bravery and tenacity they do.

When Pages Aren't Made of 1s and 0s

This is a blog about independent media (mostly) and encyclopedias are media.

Christopher Dawson, anti-Microsoft blogger at ZDnet, recently published a post proclaiming, "Good riddance, Encarta!" Yes, Microsoft Encarta will be phased out this year. But is that necessarily a good thing?

While I love to see Microsoft (and any big corporation, for that matter) blasted, I can't help thinking that there can be benefits to the establishment media (more on this later today or tomorrow, in a post of the inaugural Izzy Awards). They can get some things right, and you can always look to see where their interests lie. Take a look at ZDnet itself. It reveals on the website that it's owned by CBS. Their bloggers disclose their affiliations. But just like Wikipedia, independent media can get things wrong or show bias.

Writes Dawson:

I’m not saying Encarta was a bad product. On the contrary, it did a fine job of making encyclopedic articles searchable and accessible on a computer. However, I’m thrilled to see it go because of what it represents. Kids will just go to Wikipedia or the first three hits on Google, now, right? While that remains too true, what it really represents is the absolute challenge to educators to teach kids real Web-based research skills.

Many people are lazy and will just go to Wikipedia and the first three hits on Google. But this isn't research. Wikipedia can be hacked. The first three hits on Google won't give you alternative viewpoints or extend your knowledge beyond the scope of what the Wikipedia article will tell you. You need to dig deeper and consult more sources. And what about books? If you want to compare perspectives on Martin Luther King, Jr., you have decades of research and original thought available at your local library.

(Exception to the "first three hits are the same" rule: The third hit for a Google search "Martin Luther King" is martinlutherking.org, a website run by the white supremacist group Stormfront. Check it out, and tell me if that's a source you want Little Johnny using for his paper.)

What is needed is the teaching of good research methods. For beginning research, a mainstream encyclopedia is as good a source as any. From there you dig in and analyze critically. I wouldn't expect Little Johnny to expose Microsoft cover-ups (indeed, the EU believes it doesn't even need a watchdog), but he should consult a variety of sources, some of which are infrequently cited among bloggers because they are accessed only through specialty retailers and libraries: books. There is still history in those, too.