Final Journalism Thoughts

Journalism is writing. The scope of journalism is so big, that anyone who writes can be a journalist. The Elements of Journalism by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosensthiel records “Anyone can be a journalist, not everyone is” (page 120). My interpretation of this saying is that in order to be a responsible journalist, certain principles must be adhered to. Anyone who writes down events that are occurring is a journalist, but the kind of journalists Kovach and Rosensthiel are referring to adhere to a code of ethics. Many newsrooms have their own code of ethics in addition to the code of ethics published by the Society of Professional Journalists. Individual journalists should also have their own code of ethics they should adhere to above all else.

To me, journalism means caring. Journalism is caring enough about other people to write about them and hoping to influence change. Journalism gives a voice to the voiceless and starts grassroots movements and informs the public. Being a good journalist means caring about people whether their sources, victims, or the audience. Journalists can care for sources by being fair and honest with them. Sources should know who they are speaking with so they are not harmed as a result of the story. Additionally, journalists should stand behind their sources and not let them be harmed by information they gave. Journalists can care for victims by being sensitive, but not claiming to understand what they are going through. The principles of journalism are even more important when dealing with victims and their families. Journalists should care enough about the victims to verify facts multiple times in order to ensure that no one is embarrassed by the story. Journalists care for the audience by reporting the truth. The job of a journalist is to inform the public and educate them on how to be good citizens.

Furthermore, journalists care about ethics and principles. Oftentimes the principles of journalism seem lofty and unattainable and many of them conflict in different situations. However, when journalists strive to keep their stories balanced and adhere to as many principles as possible, the public benefits. Some of the principles that stood out to me the most throughout the semester are objectivity, verification, independence, and loyalty. Responsible journalists should keep a list of the most important principles and ensure that with every story, these principles are being adhered to.

A code of ethics is important to journalism because oftentimes journalists are faced with difficult situations and they have to use their code of ethics in order ensure accuracy and fair reporting. The Society of Professional Journalists has a Code of Ethics that has four standards. First, seek the truth and report it. The Elements of Journalism says “The primary purpose of journalism is to provide citizens with the information they need to be free and self governing” (page 12). Journalists need to be actively looking for the truth in their stories in order to provide citizens correct information so that they can become self-governing. Once journalists obtain the truth, they need to report it in order to perform their function as a whistleblower. Journalists must monitor the power of individuals, corporations, and most importantly the government. In order to have a completely free democracy, a free press must be maintained so the media can report on the government.

Secondly, journalists must minimize harm. Often journalists are faced with the difficult decision of whether or not to publish a story. The test for this is that if the benefits outweigh the harm journalists should publish, but if the harm outweighs the benefits, the story should not be published. However, if the benefits and the harm appear to be equal, the test says to publish the story. I want to ensure that in my writing, I am sensitive towards sources and their families, while still being fair to the audience and tell them the truth. Third, journalists should act independently. With mass media declining and new media expanding, it is more important than ever to act independently. Journalists need to ensure that they are free from the business side of the media. Additionally, journalists must be independent from politics and other beliefs. It is never possible for journalists to be completely unbiased, but journalists should approach stories as objectively as possible, meaning they check their beliefs about politics and religion at the door of a story. Every journalist is different in regards to what beliefs they completely abandon in the pursuit of objectivity. I plan to keep my religion foremost in my life as a journalist, but I can write stories without involving my religion in them. Additionally, I think that voting is an important civic duty for everyone regardless of occupation so I still plan to vote, but not participate in political activism and not let my political beliefs become known in my stories.

Finally, journalists must be accountable for the stories that they publish. This has become easier as new media has expanded and the news has moved online. The audience can ask questions directly following stories and create a public forum for discussion. Additionally, journalists should always disclose their sources and let the audience know where information was obtained. If there are any mistakes in the stories, journalists should acknowledge the mistakes and correct them. In reading the New York Times this semester I was always impressed with the corrections always being in the same place, on the second page. The Times held themselves accountable for their mistakes and took efforts to correct any mistakes that were made. Additionally, journalists try to adhere to lofty principles and if I expect that all journalists should hold to these principles, then I must adhere to them as well.
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n addition to the Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics, I have other ethical codes that I expect myself to follow. First, I want to keep my priorities in line and not sacrifice things like religion and family in pursuit of a story. No story is worth giving up the most important things in life. Additionally, I need to maintain my integrity and not compromise my standards in order to get a story. I need to be honest with myself and my audience in my reporting. I will not ever do something that makes me feel dishonest whether it is using someone else’s work without citing it properly or lying to a source in order to get a quote for a story. I need to let my audience know that my information was obtained honestly so that my work can be trusted. Excellence in journalism is always getting the best story while adhering to the principles of journalism and maintaining integrity. Excellence means making a difference through the stories that I write and letting people know the truth so that they can in turn make a difference.

Many of the principles of journalism are essential to the press. Independence keeps reporters honest to their audience and keeps their writing clean. If the writing of a journalist has been tainted by an outside faction the audience cannot trust the story. Additionally, verification is important in order to ensure that stories are accurate so the audience can trust the work of the journalist. Verification helps minimize harm. If journalists verify their work and check with sources to ensure information is accurate the sources are protected. Many newsrooms have verification checklists. The Elements of Journalism provides a checklist of five things journalists can do to verify stories (page 89). First, never add anything that was not there. Often the temptation of journalism is to add information in order to make a story more convincing towards a certain point. However, if information is added, the entire story is tainted and the journalist is less believable in other stories. Second, never deceive the audience. The journalists first loyalty is to the audience and if journalists are deceiving the audience, they are not fully adhering to principles of truth and loyalty. Third, be as transparent as possible about your methods and motives. Journalists should always let the audience know where information was obtained from and what the desired outcome of the story is. Fourth, rely in your own original reporting. Journalists should always make sure they do their own reporting rather than use someone else’s work in order to make stories more interesting. Finally, exercise humility. Journalists need to be humble enough to correct mistakes and ensure accuracy in the future.

My view of journalism has changed over the past semester as I came to realize that there are so many factors and principles that influence journalism. Journalism is simply writing down events, but being a responsible journalist means adhering to principles and ethics to ensure that the public is informed about all aspects of public life. The media is so important to democracy and to citizens and journalists need to recognize this responsibility and write the best stories possible while adhering to these principles.

Engagement and Relevance

Engagement is an important function of journalism because journalists need to work to engage the readers in their stories. In order to keep the audience engaged, journalists must know the audience and understand that their first loyalty is to the citizens. Communication is important in the engagement process and journalists must communicate with their audience, not merely talk at them. Journalists need to write stories that are interesting and informative that will communicate important information to their audience.

One of the ways to engage audiences is to tell stories, not merely report incidents. Storytelling helps keeps the readers interest when they understand sources as characters and events as a plot. Jeff Jarvis, a writer on Buzz Machine wrote about how storytelling in journalism is declining due to new media. Journalism can now be a status update on facebook, a post on twitter, or a photo rather than stories about individuals. However, Jarvis concludes that if journalists focus only on telling stories, other forms of media are ignored, which can be sources of valuable information to the audience.

Additionally, news must be relevant to the audience in order to keep them engaged. The audience should be able to see themselves sand their community in stories. Often the trend in journalism is to report sensational stories that are interesting, but not necessarily relevant to the audience. The interactive media lab at the University of Florida wrote about sensationalism and the effect sensationalism has on audiences. Although viewers enjoy seeing sensational stories, they are often irrelevant to the audience meaning citizens were not being informed about their communities. The lab suggests that the reason sensationalism is so popular among audiences is because it is easier to understand a love affair or scandal than it is to understand a war or a difficult piece of legislation.

Journalism celebrity is becoming a difficult dilemma for journalists. Often celebrity can get in the way of reporting a story because sources may not be willing to communicate with the celebrity or the journalist may not be able to get relevant information due to their celebrity status. Additionally, celebrity status may keep journalists from being entirely independent. After Anderson Cooper assisted a bleeding Haitian boy following the Haiti earthquake he was accused by other journalists of neglecting his journalism in order to show his celebrity. Jon Snow, a British reporter said of the incident, “I’d call it elongated nightly fundraising. We didn’t learn very much from it. To my mind he isn’t a celebrity reporter — he’s just a celebrity.”

Comprehensive Journalism

One of the challenges facing journalists is how to cover all the newsworthy events and make them seem proportional in their coverage. News needs to be both comprehensive and proportional. As journalists, we should ensure that citizens can see themselves and their community in the news. A temptation is to make news more sensational and spend disproportionate time on sensational stories. This isolates the public because they can no longer see themselves or their communities in the news. A story on science line analyzed data from newspapers dating to the 1700s to discover that sensational stories were almost always on the front page of newspapers. Additionally, another study indicated that although viewers and readers like hearing about sensational stories, they begin disliking stories once they become too emotionally charged.

Another challenge is how to address demographics while attempting not to isolate the community. Advertisers try to target certain demographics and newspapers often respond by targeting the demographics advertisers want. A story on The Online Journalism Review suggests that although media is suffering, many new technologies including targeting demographics online could yield help journalism in the long run. Although this advertising method may work for online news, newspapers must continue to reach for the masses in order to accomplish the first principle of journalism: truth.

Soft news is increasing in journalism because it is less expensive and more often easier than hard news. However, Online Journalism Blog published a study by Jackie Harrison who concluded that soft news increasing was detrimental to quality journalism and informing the public. Although soft news does include many principles of journalism, it often does not significantly inform the public as does a hard news story.

In order to find the news that people are interested in and still provide quality journalism, market research is a necessity. These studies help journalists understand the likes and dislikes of the audience, which can then be applied to covering news stories that people enjoy reading. Market Research can encompass surveys, but often these do not reflect correct data and can be expensive to produce. The best form of market research is a focus group where a small group meets and participates in a discussion about what they enjoy seeing in the news. Although these help journalists understand what people want to see in the news, the consensus of a focus group can be swayed by one member of the group, which can adversely affect the quality of journalism.

Religion and Journalism

Religion and Journalism often seem mutually exclusive because journalists are trained to find the truth and repot it, but religious truth differs depending on the subject of the story. Regardless of the differences, many consider the religion beat to be of upmost importance to the newspaper industry. An article Catherine Rolfsen she tells about a lecture given by Columbia professor Ari Goldman where he claimed that religion was the most important beat in the newspaper. “I think the best beat in journalism is religion,” Goldman said. Writing about religion allows reporters to delve in into the minds of their subjects and get past the news stories and understand the motivations of the sources.

Although journalists seek for objectivity, the view of Muslims in America is mostly negative due to poor press coverage of the Muslim faith. The media often reports only the extremes rather than the middle stance meaning that Americans hear about the radical Muslims, giving many people a negative view of Muslims. A handbook called Reporting on Religion: A Primer on Journalisms Best Beat, gives history of the religions and advice of how to cover them. It explains that America was founded on Judeo-Christian beliefs and Islam has now joined the pack as one of the more frequent religions in America.

Goldman explains that religion can compromise neutrality because religion is an important identity marker for individuals. An ethical dilemma religion reporters face is whether to disclose their own religion to their sources. Some do, but many decline by saying that although they won’t disclose their religion, they are sensitive to other religions. The Reporting on Religion handbook gives several options including being upfront, using general terms, using humor to avoid answering, or refuse to answer.

An Article by Christian Century says that religion reporting is declining amidst the economic troubles of newspapers. Although religion is very prominent in the world, there is little news about it. Often religion news is negative towards religions because they’re reporting a story in which a religion organization did something against societal norms. Gustav Niebuhr an associate professor at Syracuse University teaching both religion and journalism told journalists that covering religion was extremely important. “I cannot think of a time when your work is more important … You are going to challenge the dark times,” said Niebuhr.

Journalism as a Public Forum

Journalism has always provided a public forum for comments and citizen journalism. However, with the burst of technology in the journalism world, the public forum has been expanded because everyone can contribute to journalism. In an article by Christine Chinlund, she talks about the public forum has expanded in all media outlets. In broadcast and radio news, talk shows have increased and with the advent of the argument culture, the talk shows are focused on the polarization. The opinions of the hosts and guests are almost always the extremes, which leaves out the majority of Americans whose ideology falls between the extremes.

Additionally, the internet has expanded the public forum, which makes it more difficult, but necessary to rely on good newsgathering techniques. “The new communication format … already has demonstrated that the urge to comment replaces the urge to verify.” This in turn leads to the rise of news commentators, who often lack experience in journalism and democracy, but are often called journalists.

Roy Peter Clark, the senior scholar at the Poynter Institute says that the media has become alienated from the public by becoming a professional class. However, the media needs to be more like the public in order to properly serve their audience, which sometimes requires crossing the line of journalistic independence and becoming involved in community organizations. However, if journalists become more like the public, they can form a more effective public forum where readers can comment and have a say in the news.

An Article in the Press Gazette talks about how one of the functions of the media is to provide a public forum. The most basic form of public forum through the media is the op-ed page where columnists can write their opinions, and the audience can write back. Because the responses are published, it opens up a dialogue between journalists and the public, which increases the capability of the media to understand and write about the public. Additionally, talk shows are becoming more popular with the book referring to over 175 hours of news every day. The article says that although this provides a public forum, it does not enhance the public discourse. However, the internet and citizen journalists have massively increased the public forum because the public can respond almost immediately after the story is published. Although this increases the public forum, it is not always quality information that has been verified and often are personal insults towards other commentators.

Ethics in Journalism

Frequently, journalists are faced with ethical dilemmas where they must use their own moral conscience to decide what information to publish and what to leave out of a publication. The society of professional journalists has laid out a set of ethics that journalists should adhere to when making difficult decisions. This includes four aspects that the society believes all journalists should adhere to.

1. Seek Truth and Report it. Journalists should be looking for the truth and reporting on things going on in society in order to inform the public. This includes verification of facts in order to make sure that the entire story is completely true and free of factual errors. Additionally, journalists should not use headlines or photo that misrepresents the story. Rather, readers should be able to read a story and trust that it is true.

2. Journalists should minimize harm. Journalists should not seek to embarrass people for wrongdoing, rather they should report the truth in a fair and accurate way so the public is informed and the sources of information and the center of the story are not harmed. This is especially true in covering court proceedings.

3. Journalists should act independently. This means that the business aspect of the news should not affect the stories that are being published. The journalists first obligation is to the public and they should seek to inform the public and act independently of any corporations that the news organization is affiliated with.

4. Journalists should be accountable for what they publish. They should be willing to back up their information and answer questions their audience has. The newsroom should be transparent and the audience should know how news is being gathered and reported.

Many news organizations have an additional code of ethics in addition to the society of professional journalists. Among these organizations is the New York Times who state the purpose of their company and then explain how they gather news and then explain their code of ethics in every department of the news room.

An example of ethics in the newsroom would be the Pentagon Papers. Although this information was considered top secret by the government, the New York Times and Washington Post believed that seeking truth and reporting it outweighed any government interest. This in turn resulted in one of the greatest steps forward for the First Amendment when the New York Times won the Supreme Court Case making prior restraint unconstitutional. An article by Ben Easaugh explained the ethical dilemmas that faced the reporters, publishers, and reporters as they debated whether to publish the information contained in the Pentagon Papers.

The Watchdog Principle

Part of the role of journalism is to be a watchdog on the government. This is one of the most important roles of journalism because unless the government watches the government, no one will keep the government in check. Along with being a watchdog, the media is expected to be a whistleblower when the government is doing something they should not be. Watchdog journalism is more of an activist role because journalists hold the government accountable for their actions.

According to the Dewitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy, watchdog journalism is an essential part of a healthy democracy because someone is holding the government accountable for their actions. ”Citizens need to know how well their government is handling its responsibilities in order to engage in the political process in a meaningful way,” said an article published by the Dewitt Wallace Center.

The watchdog principle can be misunderstood by people who believe the media is only out to “afflict the comfortable.” In some ways, some investigative reporting can be handled less responsibly and makes the media seem as if they are searching for sensationalism. Even if some investigative journalism is sensational, there is also really good investigative journalism that holds the government accountable, such as the Watergate Scandal. A story about bridges collapsing published in the Investigative Reporters and Editors website shows that the media holds local governments accountable for their promises. After a major bridge collapsed, the local governments promised to work more on the bridges in the community. A year later a story was published showing what bridges were still unsafe thus holding the local government accountable for their promises.

Additionally, many news organizations now have investigative teams focused specifically on investigating things in the community and reporting on it. This holds large corporations accountable as well as the government. KSL in Utah has an investigative team that investigates many issues such as legislature transfer fees, abandoned meth houses, and healthcare billing practices. Many of the investigative teams will spend weeks on a story researching the story to make sure that it is the best that it can possibly be and all the information is accurate.

Ideology of Journalism

A main theme of the principles of journalism is whether objectivity is an obtainable goal and the conclusion that I have noticed is that no reporter can be completely objective. Journalists can be neutral, but it is impossible to leave cultural values at the door of a story. However, values enhance stories and make them more interesting. It is difficult to write about something that is not important to our values, but when writing about something that we care about, the story comes to life as newsgathering techniques are heightened and the writing quality is better.

Politics are a big source of news because one of the functions of the media is to be a watchdog for the government. This means that journalists are to report on politicians who are doing something wrong. However, as both the government and media have evolved the relationship has become more mutual. Politicians depend on journalists to get their names out during campaigns and journalists depend on politicians to get news stories. In a story by The Daily IIJ the mutual relationship is discussed. The ultimate conclusion is that neither journalism nor government is as strong without the other group. Several news groups are turning more towards a particular party, making modern day journalism reminiscent of early American journalism where every newspaper supported a particular political party.

A story by The American Enterprise Online says that political journalism can be good journalism. “Partisan reporting--never to be considered mutually exclusive with good reporting--is the norm in British and European mainstream media, and is nothing new in American media either.” Many American news networks are more partisan because there are so many facts that it is impossible to print or read them all. This means that difficult decisions must be made when determining what to publish and journalists use their values and ideology to determine what information to publish.

Another difficult decision faced by journalists valuing objectivity is whether to help in human tragedy. Often helping a group of people removes objectivity because the journalist appears to be taking a side. However, when dealing with natural disasters there is not an opposing side to the story. Journalists should put down the cameras and the notebooks in order to help suffering people. They first should report on the situation to inform people and encourage others to help, but after the reporting is done, they should help the situation. It would be nearly impossible to watch suffering happen without becoming emotionally attached to the suffering people.

Anderson Cooper traveled to Haiti to cover the earthquake and wrote on his blog “on a story like this you need to see it with your own eyes.” He also talked about different experiences in Haiti that he has had throughout the years and has been both criticized and praised for helping a bloody boy on camera. I believe it would be impossible to see the boy that had been struck by bricks and not try to help him regardless of whether you are a journalist or not. At some point, humanity trumps everything else and professionalism stops mattering in order to help suffering people.

The Discipline of Verification

Verification is key to modern day journalism because there is news everywhere and journalists need to sort through the news to determine which is verifiable and can be run. The book presents the opinion that if a story is not verifiable, it should not be published. Journalism of verification is making sure all the details of the story are correct before running the story. This can be difficult because the pushfor news outlets is to break the story first and the temptation to publish the story before verifying it is always present. This leads to journalism of assertion where not all of the details are verified. Twisting details of the story to make it more interesting is asserting unverifiable facts, which should be avoided.

Keys to verifying stories should be to seek multiple witnesses of an event to make sure all sides are represented fairly. Additionally, disclose as much as possible about the witnesses so the readers understand why those sources were used and why their opinions are valid. Additionally, if anonymous sources are necessary, journalists should let readers know why their opinions are valid and the reason for using an anonymous source. Journalistic bias is affected through verification because journalists need to be objective when gathering the news, not just presenting it. The book uses the phrase "objectivity is a method, not an aim" to show that the entire newsgathering process including verification needs to be objective. By showing objectivity the journalist is letting the audience know how they obtained their information and how it is fair.

When journalists reveal their methods to their audience they are becoming transparent. The public should know about the news gathering process and the journalist should tell the audience how they obtained their information. Transparency increases credibility. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel posted their verification process online in order to be more transparent. Often, the temptation is for journalists to be omniscient. Vague stories often lead the audience to believe the journalist knows more information than they do. This should be avoided, and journalists should inform the public of where they obtained their information and what interviews and sources they were unable to get. Richard Sambrook, the director of the BBC Global News Division says "Transparency about the newsgathering and selection process is as important as the journalism itself in retaining that trust." He said that earning the trust of the audience was key to good journalism.

Intellectual humility corresponds with transparency, because it is important for journalists to be honest about what they know and be humble enough to not pretend to know more than they actually know. Humility means that journalists assume nothing and self-check to ensure all facts are verified. In a story by Bill Kovach reported in the Los Angeles Times, he asserted that humility was the key to the 2000 election. He said journalists covered the story rather than exploited it and showed intellectual humility producing transparent journalism.

The Profession

Journalism has often been referred to as the fourth estate of government. In many ways this is true becuase journalists act as gatekeepers and whistleblowers for the government. This high calling of the fourth estate can be likened to a professional priesthood where journalists job is to connect with the audience and inform them of what is going on in the world. I think that not all journalists are using their priesthood effectively however because media is become disengaged from their audiences. Many people are distrustful of the media, so they are not as willing to learn from the journalist priests. By verifying facts and writing well written, balanced stories, the media can re-gain the trust of their audience and form a more solid priesthood.

It has been suggested that with the decline of newspapers, journalists should use their priesthood power and influence from the fourth estate to begin a government sponsered newspaper. I believe this will decline the priesthood power because the audience will even less likely to trust a media that is dependent on the government for survival. An article by Dan Gilmor suggests that having a government sponsered media would not create a new priesthood, but further damage the already crumbling journalistic priesthood.

One of the biggest struggles for journalists is to decide when to get involved and where to draw the line. It can become difficult to simply stand and report on a story rather than getting involved and helping people that are in need of help. One of the best rules presented in class was that helping in a crisis is fine, as long as you put down the notebook first. The Society of Professional Journalists encourages reporters to stay distant from the stories they are covering. When journalists participate in the stories they are covering it often looks like they are trying to do good things just to boost their ratings. A story by Eric Deggans says that journalists should help as much as possible, and then never report on it. This discourages journalists from helping out because they would be taking time away from their job and it also does not allow for any thoughts of self interest because mass audiences will not know what they did.

Distance is an important part of gathering news. If reporters get too close to the story they lose objectivity and the story becomes a conflict of interest. However, if they stay too far away they will not understand the entire story. The line is different for every story and the sign of a good journalist is to find the line so that they can report accurately, but not get too close to the point the story becomes biased.

I think that journalists view the world in a slightly different way than other people because they are always looking for a story. Journalists, by nature, are curious and want to know more about what people are talking about and want to find a story in everything. However, the worldview of journalists is shrinking as journalism becomes more localized. An interview with Mark Danner says that news is becoming more local for two reasons. First, there is a perceived lack of interest among American audiences. Additionally, it is expensive to have foreign news and support bureaus around the world.

Loyalty

One of the most important and controversial elements of journalists is their loyalty to citizens. Although ideally it is easy to say that journalists first loyalty is to citizens, it is much difficult in the real world where advertising runs the newspaper business. Newspapers and broadcasts are dependent on companies purchasing ad space in order to make money. In situations depicted in both "Goodnight and Good Luck" and "The Insider" journalists question where their first loyalty is.

Journalists are becoming more and more disengaged from their audiences. Because fewer journalists are from the communities they serve, they are often unaware of nuances of their audience. However, they are less biased because they are more disengaged from their audience. I think that a more engaged journalist population is better because the audience is more likely to trust a journalist that they can relate to and if a journalist is from the community they are reporting on, the audience will be more likely to listen to the journalist and trust the information they are receiving.

Additionally, the wall between journalism and advertising is both dangerous and necessary. By separating parts of a business it becomes difficult to keep the business running smoothly. However, without the wall journalism would become entangled with advertising and it would be difficult to write an unbiased story that is not influenced directly by the advertisers. However, even with the wall, journalists can still be influenced by advertisers and the business side of journalism as was the case with the LA Times and the Staples Center sports arena.

In this situation, the LA Times had a deal with the Staples Center Sports Arena and published a a magazine about the facility splitting revenues with the stadium. The reporters were not aware of the business deal and were considerably upset when the scandal was reported. The following link shows an interview showing how upset the reporters were when the news of the scandal came loose.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec99/la_times_12-16.html

One of the most important things newspapers can do is to ensure the public knows that they are the first priority of the newspaper. The number one job of journalists is to tell the truth to the audience to make an informed public. By becoming transparent and aware of communities the public will begin to trust journalists again and be more willing to talk with them about issues affecting individuals. Some corporations such as the New York Times and Washington Post have set up standards, however, the pubic is often not aware of these standards because they are not easy to get to. The audience has to search for the standards rather than the journalists making them easily available.

The New York Times standards are linked here: http://www.nytco.com/press/ethics.html
The Washingtin Post's standards are linked here: http://www.washpost.com/gen_info/principles/index.shtml

Truth

The number one objective of a journalist is to tell the truth. However, the truth can be subjective as journalists decide what stories to cover and what their angle should be. Of course there is no possible way for every story to cover every angle and be completely unbiased, but journalists should give equal weight to both sides and let the audience decide the truth for themselves.

The function of journalism is not to tell what the audience to think, the function is to tell the audience what to think about. By providing factual information the audience can think about what is written and decide what they want to believe.

I do not believe that it is ever possible to be completely unbiased. Journalists enter a story with their background and their way of thinking about an issue. However, the job of journalists should be to minimize bias. This means that if a journalist is assigned a story that they know they can not cover without significant bias, they should remove themselves from the story and write about something else. However, if journalists work to write without letting their bias come through, stories can still be balanced and honest.

Journalism bias affects both journalists and the companies they work for. The presentation on truth made me think about the movie "The Insider." In this movie Russell Crowe stars as Jeffrey Wigand who has evidence that the big tobacco companies perjured themselves. He agreed to talk on 60 minutes with Mike Wallace, but in the end 60 minutes did not air to full coverage because they were worried about retaliation by the tobacco companies. This is a real life example of the ethical dilemma's facing journalists. The producer Lowell Bergman, played by Al Pacino, wanted to tell the truth to his audience, however his plan was thwarted by the business side of journalism and fear of lost advertisements. I think this shows the difficult choices made by news agencies every day. Although they are not always this drastic, the truth is sometimes difficult to get out and it can be hard to tell the full truth in the best way, especially if the truth is about media sponsors.

Bias is prevalent in the media, however, if journalists are able to put their bias behind them, they can tell the truth more effectively and fulfil the function of the media.

New Media

Wow! Class today was a little frightening. I was glad that we went over all sorts of new media coming out, but it is slightly overwhelming to grasp it all. I was just entering the blogging world and now there is so much other new media that I need to become part of.

I don't have a ton of free time to devote to new media so my problem now is deciding what sorts of media is worthwhile of my time. For example, Twitter might not be so bad, but I just don't want to spend tons of time following people on Twitter and seeing what they're up to. Also, there are few things that I dislike as much as reading electronic books. I would so much rather just have a hard copy of a book of newspaper in front of me, so I think the Amazon Kindle is definitely not necessary.

I would love to get an iPhone, but my concern there is that I would spend so much time on my phone and on the Internet that I would forget the real world around me. I think the future of media is slightly dangerous because people may be so tuned into media and all the different media outlets that they forget there is a real world going on around them. My time is too precious to spend massive amounts of time online doing things that are not necessarily worthwhile. I guess that as time progresses and I get more involved in the communications major I may figure out exactly what kind of media is beneficial and worth my time.

I Love Blogging!

Since starting this course I have discovered I like blogging. Check that - I Love blogging. Seriously, it's one of my new favorite things. I went to Jerusalem last semester and didn't have a blog, but when we got home there was a group blog that we can all contribute too and I loved checking on it to see what my friends were up to. Then I started this semester and had to set up this blog, and then I was having so much fun I set up a personal blog for myself.

I was reading in the New York Times this morning about Mark McGwire and his steroid confession. I am an avid baseball fan and while I was reading that I was thinking so much about what I thought about the steroid issue and I just wanted to write about it. I went to class and we were talking about blogging and right then and there I set up a a new blog completely devoted to baseball, especially the New York Yankees. I think the steroid issue is so important to baseball and it really is destroying the integrity of the record books. I was proud to see McGwire finally come clean after ten years of denial. I wish that Barry Bonds and Roger Clemmons would also come clean, but I am not holding my breath for those two.

In other news, I am getting so excited about technology and the future of communications. I love reading the New York times and hearing about all the new technology coming out that is going to change mass communication. I am thrilled about skyping on television and the new Google phone. It really does make me so excited to become a reporter.

I am a little upset that NBC is moving Leno back to his previous spot and I think that it was a good decision of O'Brien to leave the network. I prefer O'Brien to Leno and I think it is completely unfair that they would give O'Brien the prime time slot and then give it back to Leno. Reading newspapers is so much fun! I just love being informed and learing about what's going on in the world.

Here's the link to my new baseball blog!

http://alisonlovestheyankees.blogspot.com/

What should I do with journalism

Although class today was awesome and very informative, it was slightly disheartening as well. Brother Cressman said that we probably wouldn't have a whole carreer in television journalism and that the journalism business was changing rapidly. I think that it's great that we have this information, but it is slightly stressful as I'm trying to figure out what I want to do for the rest of my life! I wish I had a crystal ball and could look into it and figure out what the future has in store for me. In my head I know how I want it to go, but there are just so many things that could happen. I want a stable carreer first and foremost. I think the most terrible situation would be struggling to live paycheck to paycheck. I need stability first.

My dream job with broadcasting would be to work for the Yankees Entertainment Sports network in New York. I would love reporting on games and following the Yankees as a job! With the changes in journalism though anything could happen. I'm glad that we discussed this matter in class today though because I feel more prepared for the future. I really just hope that things work out and I end up finding a job that I really love. I hope I'm not being too ideal about my dreams and goals because I don't want to set myself up for disappointment. Journalism is changing quickly and there are no longer any absolutes in regards to journalism. I just hope that I can keep up with all the changes and be prepared for what happens next!

What is Journalism?

I don't know if Journalism was ever easy to define, but I think that with the explosion of technology, the term journalism has gotten harder to define. My interpretation of journalism is published information. It can be published either through the written or spoken word because either media spreads information. Anyone can be a journalist if they spread information to someone else. Lay citizens can become journalists through blogging because they are spreading ideas and information through their blog. Additionally, with new technology such as smart phones, anyone can take video and edit it and post it on their blog or youtube to spread information. More and more, people are turning towards blogs and the other websites to obtain information making internet one of the largest media outlets of information. Journalism will continue to increase with the spread of technology and become even harder to define as people turn to different forms of media to obtain information.