Can The Media Be Fixed?

Having spent my adult life in media, it pains me to think that in today’s world, we are faced with a media that is incredibly divided…even worse than the country. What’s even worse is that our Founding Fathers realized how important the media was to act as a watchdog on the government. That’s why you have the First Amendment giving us “Freedom of the Press”. But something has gone horribly wrong over the past 20 years. Today, we’ve got media channels on TV and radio that are slanted to one side of the political spectrum or the other.

I would contend that you really can’t go anywhere these days and find an unbiased, “just the facts, Ma’am” type of news source. Newspapers, Cable channels, Broadcast channels, Radio stations are all set to one side or the other. Objectivity, which had long been a pillar of media, extending all the way back to the beginning of this country, has become a joke. And it doesn’t matter what side of the political spectrum you’re on. Pick up a liberal paper or watch CNN or MSNBC and you’re going to hear how guilty Trump is, and how Bidenomics is working, we just aren’t smart enough to realize it. Go to talk radio or watch Fox News or Newsmax and you’re going to hear just how much of a bumbling idiot our current president is, and how he can’t possibly make it another four years without seriously damaging our country.

So, the question is, how in the world do you fix it? I guess the more basic question is, IS it fixable? My short answer is yes, but it’s going to get messy.

The basic problem that we have in journalism these days is that the J-schools around the country (I’m looking at you, Syracuse, Northwestern, and Missouri!) have become breeding grounds for liberalist pablum. Back when I went to Ohio University (also liberal now, by the way), we were taught objectivity. We were taught how to properly put newscasts together and how to deliver them without our own opinions creeping in. Not so much any more. So, we first need to go to the source and blow it up. Fire all of the liberal journalist professors out there spewing socialism and wanting to get rid of our Constitution. They need to start teaching truth in journalism, not opinion-oriented blather.

Next, we need to do something to let the media (both sides) know that if you aren’t going to be objective, you’re going to be reclassified as an opinion site and that you won’t be considered media any longer, which means you aren’t under the auspices of the First Amendment. It’s one thing to be giving the news. It’s quite another to make your opinion the news. And it shouldn’t be tolerated on either side.

Now, that’s going to end up going to the Supreme Court of course. Liberals and conservatives will say that they have the “right” to free speech, which is true. It just isn’t true when you’re giving a newscast. And you shouldn’t be able to mix the two on the same channel, without making very clear that what you’re doing is editorializing, not giving news. It’s not the same thing by any stretch of the imagination.

When these “news outlets” learn that they are going to lose their media passes to the White House, or Congress, or anywhere else, trust me, they’ll sue first, and when they lose, they’ll start a second channel that is more op-ed than unbiased news. That’s all I’m asking for.

After all, aren’t we smart enough as Americans to decide the editorial parts for ourselves? Do we really need to be spoon-fed not just the story, but the meaning behind it, and the spin behind that? Something to think about!

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!

But Do You Believe? Do You REALLY Believe?

I have to admit, I missed this one when it came out as I was traveling. MSNBC Anchor Katy Tur admitted to the world that she feels she could be “doing more harm than good” in the way she anchors her newscasts. There’s a simple reason for that. Americans have lost faith in TV anchors. Oh, not just the Katy Tur’s of the world. They’ve lost it with ALL newscasts.

Only 11% of Americans have a great deal or a lot of confidence in television news according to a Gallup poll taken back in June. Newspapers didn’t fare much better hitting an all time low of just 16%, the first time ever that medium was below 20%. 46% of Americans have little or no confidence in newspapers. Only 5% of Republicans and 12% of independents have confidence. Democrats fare much better as 35% say they have confidence in what they read.

For television it was even worse. The confidence level fell below 20% for the fourth consecutive year. A majority at 53% of us said we had very little to no confidence in TV news. 8% of Republicans, 8% of independents and 20% of Democrats have any confidence in what they see on TV.

The whole reason for the distrust is simple. Newspapers and TV News have been making up stories. We left the “spin” in the dust eons ago. Now these media are just plain out making things up. They editorialize in the middle of newscasts or on the news sections of a newspaper. Things that belong as editorials are absolute rant sessions.

And what is really disturbing to me about all of this is that our Founding Fathers looked to the press (at the time only newspapers) to be the guardians of truth for our new nation. That’s what Freedom of the Press was all about. It was the press that was supposed to shine a light of truth and honesty into the dens of iniquity that would occur from time to time in our government. No one would have believed back then that the press in that day (which wasn’t very honest or unbiased either….ever hear of “yellow journalism”?) would be untrustworthy.

The media, and I’m talking ALL media needs to get back the credibility that they’ve lost. What’s the first thing you do if you’re taking over a country? You take over the media. Once you control the TV, radio, and newspapers in a country, you control the reporting of what’s going on. And you can say whatever you want. That’s what’s happened in this day and age in America. It’s sad, and it’s sickening. And it’s a good thing that at least one journalist that is doing it, admits that she’s troubled by it. There should be scads more!

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!

Media May Shutter Because Of Virus

Being a former member of the media, I have long argued that there were several areas of “media” that were irrevocably going to change. TV, radio, and most certainly print of all kinds are on the outs. The Coronavirus has just sped up that process by ten-fold.

The print media has furloughed, or laid off some 33,000 workers since the pandemic began. There really isn’t any area of the print media that’s doing well today, and companies from Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper chain (they own USA Today, among others), down to the Sacramento Bee have felt the sting.

Companies large and small that deal in magazines and newspapers have long been thought to have lost the battle to the internet. Those publications that have maintained and promoted an online presences have fared much better than the more traditional print-only publications. But even in this horrendous era of disease, online companies aren’t sure they can keep going.

Buzzfeed was going to turn a nice profit this year, but that’s turned to dust since COVID-19. Slate is reducing pay up to 25% with the highest paid taking the largest bite. Other online sources like The Hill, McClatchy, and Vice Media are announcing that their staffs are either facing huge cuts in pay or layoffs. Likewise, radio and television groups have announced they are issuing pay cuts to employees and laying off people left and right. IHeartMedia (formerly Clear Channel), the country’s largest radio group announced back in March huge furloughs and pay cuts. Cumulus, the second largest radio group is furloughing and cutting wages as well.

Overall, CNN has let over 10,000 people go over the past year because of sagging ratings, and terrible advertising revenues, the lifeblood of any medium.

Print has always been susceptible to layoffs, long before Coronavirus became a household word. In fact, for the past fifteen or twenty years, print in all forms, be it magazines, or newspapers have been declared dead. Younger adults choose to get their news on the internet, where they can customize the news they get, and the bias it represents. Older readers who grew up with newspapers in the 50’s, 60’s, and even early 1970’s are dying off, leaving an incredible void. In fact, there has been only one successful startup of a daily newspaper in this country since World War II. That is USA Today.

Overall, media, as I have long harped on, is going through a birth, life, death, re-birth cycle. Some are in their second or third iterations of that. And some are at the end of their lives. The internet will be taking over for all of it. Think of the changes. You no longer have to wait until Thursday at 8pm to watch your favorite comedy. You can get it anytime you want on the internet. Same with movies. Same with radio. You can listen to virtually any of the 15,330 commercial radio stations in the US, all on the internet. And companies like IHeartMedia have made that possible, at the cost of listenership at it’s local stations by promoting the fact you can listen anywhere to anything. Music lovers can listen to any type of genre in existence through Amazon Prime, or Spotify, or Pandora.

Don’t be surprised to see your favorite cable news channel close up shop in the future, or at the very least change up the way it does business. Same with local television, radio, and newspaper. They are all dinosaurs…and COVID-19 has just sped up the process.

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!

The Media “BOOM” Is Over…

It was called the “Trump Media Boom” because all of these leftist media types thought that it would be the savior of their newspapers and magazines. They’d keep bashing Donald Trump, because, I mean, who wouldn’t like to bash him, right? Except something strange happened…he called them out on the fake news, almost from day one. He’s proven that they are wrong and he was right, and all of a sudden, major newspapers all across the country are laying off tons of people. Smaller newspapers are closing their doors. And the only “boom” going on in newspaper news desks is the sound of the paper itself imploding.

Over the last 30 years, newspapers have failed to have one year that had more readership than the last year. Over the last 13 years, advertisers, who were drawn to newsprint like moths to a flame, have decided that enough was enough, and they’ve left for the internet. Do you realize that there has been just one successful daily newspaper start up since the end of World War II? It’s USA Today. Hundreds of newspapers, employing thousands of journalists have cashed it in. The latest is New York Magazine. They just canned 32 staffers, half of them full time. That represents 5% of their staff. And around American some 1,400 communities have lost at least one newspaper in the past 15 years. Newspaper and magazines have become dinosaurs. They suck up trees and ink, and provide little that can’t be replicated here on the pages of the internet.

And that’s the way of the world. All of these thousands of journalists who thought they were going to get at least four years of added employment bashing Donald Trump are now looking for work. And that’s not the saddest part.

I’ll fill you in on a little secret. Your favorite disk-jockey, your favorite local radio talk show host, your favorite television news team? They’re all next in line to be shown the door.

That’s because, just like newspaper and magazines, they’re dinosaurs. When you can listen to literally any radio station in the country on the internet (my wife and I listened to a basketball game last night from the station I used to broadcast on back in Ohio), and you can basically watch any television show that is out there just by streaming it (without subscribing to cable TV, or satellite TV), you know the times they are a changin’.

And so it goes. The internet will become the heart and soul of the “new American media”. And it will stay that way at least until something comes along to replace the internet…and don’t worry…it will. It always happens. The life-death-rebirth-final death circle of life is there as much for media as it is for The Lion King. And for those leftist journalists who are pouring out of places like Syracuse, and Northwestern, and Missouri and their vaunted “J Schools”, kids…you may as well have majored in philosophy. You’ve got as much chance finding a job when you get out!

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!

Your Media Is About To Change…

You come home from a hard day of work and you plop down, maybe have a favorite beverage before or after dinner. You watch TV and enjoy some mindless sitcom. Then you go to bed. The next day you wake up to the radio/alarm clock. You get dressed, listen to you favorite local station in the car on the way to work, and begin the next day.

And it’s all about to change.

Look, I spent my life working in the media. I know this topic backward and forward. And I can tell you as sure as I’m sitting here that the way you use media is about to change forever. And change in a big way. Gone is your favorite radio station. Gone is your local TV station. Gone is your local newspaper. Forget those things. They are all history.

So is your cable company. So are the satellite giants like DishNetwork and DirecTV. They’re toast too. Why? You are currently on the internet. It’s the only way you can read this blog. And it also delivers the rest of the information and entertainment that you will need to make it through your day.

When it comes to newspapers, they’re dinosaurs. The New York Times keeps laying off staff and charging its readers more money. They can’t get the readers, they lose advertisers, it’s a terrible spiral.

Radio stations have already gone national. You can now listen to any station in the country on things like IHeartRadio, including the stations I used to work at some 2,000 miles away. Forget about signal strength. And with places like Pandora, Amazon Music, and ITunes, you never, EVER need to listen to music on the radio anymore. You can create your own playlists and listen only to what you like. Same goes for talk radio.

And for television, cable, satellite, and even local TV is already dead. My wife and I cut the cord and dropped DirecTV two years ago and haven’t looked back, and haven’t missed a step. Hulu, Amazon Prime, and CBS All Access have replaced DirecTV and have done so at about 20% of the cost. I love it when the DirecTV guy at Costco comes up to me and says he can save me money. I just laugh in his face. I told him last month if he could save me money over what I’m paying now, I’d give him $100 on the spot. But if he couldn’t he’d give me free DirecTV for life. He didn’t take me up on the offer.

Look, the internet will one day be replaced with something, just like all of the other things that are currently dying out there. I don’t know what it will be, but the history of media is it’s got a life, a death, and a rebirth, and a final death. You need to accept that because change is coming on how you get your information, and your entertainment. That’s why companies like I Heart Media are going bankrupt. They can’t afford the business model anymore. And local TV stations, and DirecTV (now part of AT&T), and DishNet are all going to follow the same slippery path.

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!

The Death Of Traditional Media

I’ve talked about this from time to time. There is a life cycle to everything we experience. Think about it for a minute. What things did you use and couldn’t get along without when you were a kid? Are those things still around? Are they still that important? Probably not.

Everything out there has a birth, a life, a death, and sometimes, as in the case of media, a rebirth. As society moves forward, and technology continues to improve, old, tired media find a way to die off. Of course, they always are fighting to stay alive. I guess that’s the humaness in us all…even media.

Let me refresh if you haven’t heard the life/death/rebirth story before. When Guttenberg invented the movable type printing press, newspapers became all the rage. That was where people got their news…and it stayed that way for almost 500 years. Then radio came along, and the immediacy of radio overtook newspapers. No longer could you have a kid on the street corner shouting “Extra, Extra! Read all about it!” Radio had already covered it.

So, newspapers had to “reborn” themselves, and they did by going more in depth. Radio dealt in time, not pages, so newspapers could go much farther in depth with a story than radio could. And radio flourished as the entertainment medium until the 1940’s when TV came into the picture. At that point, radio had to give up the entertainment side… at least as far as the soap operas and spoken word shows were concerned. But radio was reborn into a music medium. In the 1980’s AM radio was reborn into a talk medium.

TV ran into trouble when cable television came along in the 1970’s. And the news on TV in the form of the network newscasts started fading out. No longer were Walter Cronkite and Huntley/Brinkley standard fare. In the 1990’s with the first Gulf War, CNN showed the world what cable could do better than broadcast TV.

It’s happening again with all of those media in form of the internet. It’s where we get informed, it’s where we get entertained. It’s a part of our lives. And it’s killing off newspapers once and for all.

The Denver Post has cut it’s reporting staff to the bones, while offering it’s readers much less news. And, it’s raised rates to the moon. That’s a recipe for disaster in anybody’s book. Now comes word the Salt Lake City Tribune has laid off a third of it’s reporters. It’s just too expensive to continue. So has the New York Times, and other big newspapers. In fact, there has been one daily start up of newspapers since World War II. It’s called USA Today. Other than that, every single daily start up has failed. Newspaper and magazines are dying their last breath. They will be consumed by the internet. And it will happen sooner rather than later, get used to it.

The internet is also killing TV with things like Netflix and Hulu. And local radio is already a thing of the past. IHeartRadio (which is owned by a company that owns radio stations) is basically accelerating the death by allowing listeners to listen online anywhere to anything.

Somewhere up the road, the internet will die. I have no idea what it will be replaced with, but it will be something awesome. It’s been the media giant slayer ever since it’s inception!

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!