You guys are awesome.
Not that I nor Sally had any doubt.
Once again I am gobsmacked by the work and thought you have invested in your project.
Sally is teaching today and I will be teaching tonight. We haven't communicated except for terse emails regarding our schedules. And so, on my own and speaking only for myself I am going to offer some thoughts and an on-going challenge.
In a headline: Love what you've done but now go further.
You have created shows which are sober and thoughtful and offer a penetrating look into each subject. However, that "style" already exists. One of the most famous examples is a show called the National and the Journal which aired nightly on the CBC from 1982-1992. Here is their last program. I don't expect you'll spend too much time watching but nonetheless, it's masterwork television news http://www.cbc.ca/archives/categories/arts-entertainment/television/television-general/farewell-journal-hello-prime-time-news.html. We should all have been so lucky and privileged to produce such programming. Local shows in this country have tried the "deep dive" into specific subjects too (tho not often as an entire show) with special segments. I produced shows like this at KRON (NBC) in San Francisco umpteen years ago.
Here's my critique. You have produced a rundown for a show which reflects contemporary models -- certainly as thoughtful, certainly as do-able in many markets.
But I am left wondering:
Is this a show you'd want to watch nightly?
Can it be produced and sustained nightly?
We can't (and don't presume) to change the definition of news -- the who what when where why and how of our contemporary world -- what happened at city hall, the school board, the local business, the national story brought to a local venue, etc.
Or should we? Should we tweak it? And if so, how? How much? Can we break it? So what if we do? This is only college - not brain surgery. Remember that! That's really why you're here... kick some tires, take some chances... see what happens. Push the red button. And ask yourself how many mixed metaphors can I write into a single paragraph?
WOUB's programs are as traditional as any first-rate shows produced nationally. So too are the news programs in Columbus, Cincinnati and Charleston which can be seen on cable in the Athens market. But is this forever etched in stone? Are you fated to produce programs the same way I did - and remember I was there when Moses came down from the mountain top. And he was thirty minutes late, I thought for sure we were going to miss the first feed of the news that night!
Seriously... ok, well with tongue in cheek, do you want to produce shows into the mid-21st century along the same structure as we do today --- knowing what we already know that those contemporary shows are shedding audiences as fast as a snake molts?
But WTF? I know that's exactly what you are muttering under your breath as you read this post. Extemporaneous as I may be. "What (the hell) is he asking for?"
I don't know!
OK, there you have it. I don't know. I am hoping (pleadingly) that you have better answers than ALL the other experts existent today. TV executives - dinosaurs waiting to take their last gasps in an atmosphere where the oxygen is already at a premium - surely don't have the answers, or else they'd be producing new shows already.
May I be honest? Will you hear my confession? I am SO TIRED of bosses who have said in the past, "We're going to produce shows differently!" And when asked what that means they have shrugged and said, "Well we'll know it when we see it."
What unadulterated crap! First of all, it is a piss poor way to exercise being a boss. Second they are plagiarizing the words of a great SCOTUS judge named Mr. Justice Potter Stewart who in a landmark pornography case from Cleveland (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobellis_v._Ohio) said he couldn't define pornography but would know it when I (he) saw it. He came to rue that comment as it became something of an epitaph for him.
Ok, and I am guilty too... I can't tell you what I am looking for because admittedly it feels somewhat ephemeral. I have seen glimpses of it --- on great news shows, or even other programs ranging from SNL to Jon Stewart too, but I don't think I am any better at defining it than Mr. Justice Stewart.
On Thursday I want you to be able to answer these questions - could you produce your shows nightly? Would they serve your audiences? Would they provide for your community the kind of news coverage you feel your audiences needed to know (there you are thinking as editors) and the kind of content those audiences want to watch (there you are thinking as commercial providers of content selling soap products in your commercial pods).
Is what you've done the model for news programs into the mid-century? Would you watch... would your parents (or other ancients of the community) watch too?
Ah the contradictions of real life... did any one watch Sorkin's The Newsroom this past summer?
Ladies and gentlemen. You've done good work. (Notice I didn't use that tepid word 'fine'). I am really pleased. But I am not satisfied. Sorry. Nope. Not me. Uh-uh.
I think you've chosen 'safe' based on what you know, what you have seen, what exists in the world of today. But remember at the beginning I personally asked you to dream, to dare to dream. I am sending you back to dream some more.
I like many ideas - including those regarding style and format in the first presentation... but what I am looking for there are specifics - story idea and how you'd deploy the tactic, the techniques that you list. Great ideas in the sense of using new methadologies to tell stories better.... give some thought too into the story selection process. How you'd use each tool - or in combination - where and how. Will each story be told using one of those techniques? Should they all be? Will the tactics lost their value if overused? Are they do-able for each story... or maybe not needed?
Don't be disheartened. Skype me - CHALLENGE ME - most of you have been either disinterested or too scared to come to the belly of the beast! C'mon.... I'm here to annoy you - to challenge you - to take you on this journey and when we get to the end of the known world... we'll take the last leap together!
You haven't shown me something new - you haven't shown me something so wacky, so wild, so untenable that it can't be done... or shouldn't be done. Or maybe it should be? Or maybe, partially?
What and how do you think the news should be covered every night... what constitutes news for your age-sex cohort. Is it the stuff of the links I offered last week? Is it something better? Different? And how?
DO NOT BE DISCOURAGED. In fact, though I am writing entirely off the cuff and have promised myself not to go back and edit or temper my rant, I am pleased by the work you've done. You have worked to please your teachers. But this isn't high school. As Dorothy said, "Toto we're not in Kansas any more."
You did good. Now do better. Surprise us... dream... dare us... come up with an approach to stories and content and delivery that pushes boundaries.
It won't be easy -- and hell, networks and stations have already invested millions of dollars in research and focus groups to little avail. I know you're young - you're innocents... and that is precisely why I think so highly of you. You haven't been polluted by the excuse of, "Well that's the way we've always done it."
OK, so if you wondered, that's what I think. I can't be any more transparent than this... the JFresh program demands this of all of us -- that's what makes it (and you) so kick-ass wonderful!
Would you please, not for me, not for Sally, nor from Prof. Stewart or Prof. Hodson alone, but among your working groups - for you - please think some more?
One final challenge - get your collective juices going on this. The first year the JFresh coined the name PShap for me. They had heard the folk at Court TV used to call me Shap-Daddy. Some reporters at the AP used the handle Shap-a-dap.
I need a new name... I challenge you to do better on that too.
Peter Shaplen
Marin, California
I think that, while this post is a little overwhelming, it is also motivational. I want to change it. I want to get journalism back to a respectful occupation and field. It should be, what we do is hard work! But it seems that regardless of the minor changes made to the media, media is still seen as biased, boring, depressing, and out to serve its own agenda. If nothing else, I want to change this. I want to change the stigma. Our generation doesn't watch the news because of this stigma, because we get it from our parents. Enough is enough, we need to fix it. I'll have more on the how and less on the why later. That's my rant!
ReplyDeleteRe-reading our meeting notes, I can definitely see why you were disappointed - or rather, not satisfied - with our results, Professor Shaplen. Although we tried to think subversively and came up with a few good story ideas, the truth of the matter is that we didn't delve deep into the idea of actually changing journalism with our work. And that's a shame - you said it yourself, WOUB and the other student broadcast organizations here are obligated to stay "safe." As a part of the JFreshman Newsroom, we have a truly unique opportunity to tangibly change the frontier of journalism, and we shouldn't pass it up.
ReplyDeleteI can vouch that, during our group meeting on Sunday, we came up with some unique ideas on how to actively change the workings of the medium of journalism. But for whatever reason - perhaps because we're not entirely decided on them, perhaps because we didn't want the other group to find out - they didn't make it into our meeting notes. But I can verify that we discussed some really unique, clever ways to bridge the gap between reporter and audience, and I think we ought to go through with them. Journalism as a medium is in need of a major change, and we're in the perfect position to supply it.
After all, Moses was only late in the first place because Aaron and the other Israelites had built the golden calf. He was so incensed to see them straying from the law of the Lord that he broke the original stone tablets in half and had to climb back up Mt. Sinai to get a second pair. Likewise, we're producing journalism in a world where most of the existing journalists are simply doing it wrong. And on our part as news makers, it's going to take a lot more than a little subversive thinking to right their wrongs. What we need to do is melt down the calf, break the tablets, and create our own Ten Commandments - we need to completely redefine the medium that is news. We already have some great ideas as to how, and I'm confident in our group's ability to follow through.
Hey Peter, what's Shappenin'? Best I could do on the spot...
ReplyDeleteI agree 100% with Jaelynn in the respect that while this post may be a lot to take in, I think it gives us a boost to do better. I also agree with Branden that our notes were very vague, and there was a lot more going on in our discussions. Though after reading this, I feel like we could have talked about more.
I feel like one of our biggest focuses was on the interaction between reporter and audience. We talked about many different anchor styles to try rather than the typical "sitting behind a desk" approach to keep viewers interested and feeling involved. One huge thing that journalism must accomodate is that we live in such an individualistic society where everyone's voice must be heard. While that is extremely important (please don't hear me wrong!), that is why we must constantly take audience opinion into consideration, whether it is through snail-mail (like anyone takes the time to do that anymore, right?!) or Twitter.
But then (again) there's the issue that people criticize the news for being too depressing and boring. When certain news organizations try to spice things up (Ex: the Buzz 60 video we watched), they're viewed as biased, or only there for humor. Is there any way to please people?! Ugh...that's what I rant about. Everything is either "too this" or "too that" so we just have to keep playing with things. My group touched on a balance between serious and light-hearted stories in the styles that we liked. Now out next step is developing those ideas further (along with other ones). Peter was right that many organizations, particularly ones associated with a school (Ex: WOUB), play it safe with their stories, broadcast styles, etc. I think step number one is to think of ourselves not as college students, but as professionals already. We can't restrict ourselves because we're college freshman; instead, we should give ourselves more opportunities because we're Scripps freshman. We're in JFresh--we're pros at this now. So let's start to overcome the shyness that we have and make a "kick-ass wonderful" newscast."
Sometimes my thoughts are a little jumbled, so if you don't understand something I said, find me on Facebook (Kelly Fisher), Twitter (k_fish93) or Skype (k.fish93) and ask!
Thanks for the motivational blog, Shap, our good ol' Chap!
Peter... You're making me nervous...
ReplyDeleteEverything I've done--through all K-12 school years, at OU, and even in my personal writings--has been very structured. And now that you've unarmed me of my skeletal structure I'm getting worried. This is uncharted territory for me, but I'm really eager to plot a map. I just need to find where to begin. I think every one of us just needs to step outside our schema of news and really think about what we love and what we're passionate about(and that's going to be really hard because what I love is certainly not going to be what you love) and apply it to the news. I think maybe we're just afraid (as I am, at least) that I'm going to build a rocket to the moon and you're going to tell me that we don't have enough uranium to travel to Gloucester OH.
Basically, what I'm trying to say in too many metaphors is that I'm afraid to begin because I'm afraid I'm going to crash and burn and everyone will point and laugh. But you need to keep scaring me, Peter, because I know that with the creativity (and significant advance in broadcast experience) around me, we'll all end up with a variation of our dream rocket ship (wow I'm cheesy).
P.S. Peter, how do you feel about Shapman? Shapster? Shappidy-doo-da?
Your rant really helped me remember why I wanted to join JFresh in the first place. So many things about broadcast news annoy me and bore me and I really want to do something to change that.
ReplyDeleteBut like you said, it is hard to think outside of the box and even more so to actually step out of it. It is really simple to be scared into dismissing new ideas and just go along with what is "acceptable".
I hope that through JFresh we are actually able to achieve a working model of a news broadcast that people would watch over shows like "Jersey Shore". I hope to be a part of that achievement and I will take your words to heart and really try to think and contribute to my group so we can achieve this.
P.S. (your initial's are the same as "post script" but I don't think you'd like to be called that) How do you feel about:
"Shaphat" (hebrew for "judge, governor") or Shapdog (like sheepdog for all of us sheep ^^), "C Shap" (like the programming language)or.....
"Gangsta Shap": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzLtmdm_0TQ >:P I hope you're not sorry you asked us for a new nickname lol