Author: Kathryn Jones Malone

The new Walter Isaacson bio of Steve Jobs is probably something every publisher and editor in community journalism should read. 

As Politico’s Playbook tip sheet pointed out this morning, the main message of the book is this:  Know how to cut to the essence.  Jobs was a master at focusing on a few things – the most important things.  It’s a lesson we must learn in community journalism.

For years, we’ve focused as much on the medium as the message.  I can still remember my mother’s reaction when I first told her I had decided to become a journalist, back in 1966.  Her small-town Arkansas experience was exclusively with community newspapers, and she looked at me and asked a question I’ll never forget:  “Does this mean you’ll have ink smudges on your hands for the rest of your life?”

She was serious.

For mom, what she knew of journalism was inextricably wrapped up in that ink-on-newsprint product. It never occurred to her that they could be separated.

That was 40 years ago, but that world could as well have been 200 years ago.  Then, we called even the news by the name of the medium on which it was printed—the news was “the paper.”

And that worked for then.  It started changing when news started arriving by radio, then by television, then on your computer, and now on your mobile devices.  Steve Jobs started out as a computer guy, but he was one of the first to realize he wasn’t in the computer business – he was in the business of delivering information and entertainment … literally of bringing the world to your fingertips.

One of the stories in Isaacson’s book, according to Politico, is the story of when Apple execs were brainstorming the product that ultimately became the iDVD:  Jobs “jumped up, grabbed a marker, and drew a simple rectangle on a whiteboard.  ‘Here’s the new application.  It’s just got one window.  You drag your video into the window.  Then you click the button that says “Burn.”  That’s it.  That’s what we are going to make.’”

Jobs knew what business he was in – and that computers were the means, not the end.

This ain’t our fathers’ community journalism.  We do indeed publish a paper, and probably will for some time.  But that’s not our business.  Our business is news and information and entertainment.  Our business is putting people in touch with their community, and doing it so well that we provide an excellent platform for advertisers to reach that audience of news and entertainment consumers.  Our job is to be the go-to place to connect readers and viewers not only with events and news, but also with each other.

Our flagship is the newspaper.  But that paper product must now work in tandem with our website and with our social media platform.  Gone are the days when we thought only of getting something into the newspaper the next time it published.  Have you seen the commercials where these guys are playing with their tablets at football tailgate and someone comes up with a late news flash, and they respond, “That’s so 27 seconds ago”?

That’s not our current reality in community journalism, but that mentality is soaking into our audience – especially our young audience, our future – every time they turn onto a TV set or look at Facebook on their iPhone.

We have to realize what Steve Jobs realized, what made him a visionary; we have to figure out what our real business is, and to be relentless about pursuing it.

It’s scary, but it’s our future.

And besides, our hands will be a lot cleaner.

The Texas Center for Community Journalism is happy to welcome two new consultants who will help to provide answers for the questions Texas community journalists ask. Joining the Center’s group of specialists are Max Heath of Shelbyville, Ky., and Michael Sherrod of Fort Worth.

Heath is one of the nation’s best-known specialists in postal issues and Sherrod is a pioneer in new media business models. They join TCCJ consultants with specialties in law, publication design, writing, advertising sales, freedom of information and innovative approaches to community journalism.

TCCJ consultants provide answers to questions sent in by community newspapers to the Ask an Expert feature of the Center’s website, www.tccj.tcu.edu. They also advise the staff of the Center.

Heath is a semi-retired postal consultant for Publishing Group of America (American Profile/Relish/Spry), and for Landmark Community Newspapers, Inc., a division of Landmark Communications. For 21 years he was executive editor and for 23 years corporate circulation director as well.

Heath writes a monthly Postal Tips column for Publisher’s Auxiliary. He was named to the Postal Service Mailer’s Technical Advisory Committee (MTAC) representing NNA in 1989 and is also on the national Periodical Operations Advisory Committee, and the rule-making Periodicals Advisory Group.

He received the National Newspaper Association’s President’s Award in 1989, 1997, and 2007, the Ambassador Award in 1992, and the Amos Award for service to NNA in 1994.The Postal Service presented him a Special Achievement Award in 1997.

Michael Sherrod has been a pioneer in the online world since 1985. At the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, he created and sold one of the world’s first electronic advertisements to AT&T through an innovative videotext news service he helped manage.

Sherrod founded or co-founded 10 companies, including DigitalCity.com. He served in senior management roles at AMR Information Services, AOL, Ancestry.com, and examiner.com where he was founding president & CEO.

He recently served as the first publisher of TexasTribune.org, a non-profit, non-partisan media site covering Texas government, politics and policy.

He is currently entrepreneur in residence at the Neeley School of Business at TCU.

An exhibit currently at the Texas State History Museum chronicles the impact of high school football on Texas. But if you’re a Texas journalist, you don’t need this exhibit to remind you that football is king in Texas, and the king holds court every Friday night.

And that’s why football gives community newspapers one of their best opportunities to establish themselves as the go-to source for the latest news in town. Since almost nothing is bigger than the week’s game, community papers should make sure that they are the definitive source of news and information on that game. Nobody should beat us. We should have more news, more pictures, more features, more stats … and have it quicker than anyone. If your readers can find photos of the game, and reactions to the game, on Facebook before they can find them on your site, you’re missing a great opportunity.

Maybe there was a time when people would wait until next week when your paper came out for game news. No longer. But the same digital media that make everyone a publisher also give us some great opportunities to take the lead in covering high school football.

Here are some resources that will help you re-think what you’re doing to cover games:

Take time to read Steve Buttry’s great piece on Tweeting and liveblogging high school football. And even if Twitter isn’t that big in your town, you can use your game coverage to build your Twitter audience – and then use Twitter to promote everything from your website to your upcoming editions. Run house ads to say you’ll be Tweeting the game, and remind anyone with a computer that Twitter is free and starting an account takes only minutes. And as Steve shares in this blog, you’re not just Tweeting the game yourself – you will “curate” the Tweets of others by establishing a hashtag where everyone in the stands with a smartphone can comment on what’s going on in the game itself. Check out Steve’s blogpost – it’ll get you started. And if you already have a “Twitter presence” at your high school games, or if you’re liveblogging them, let us know at the Center by emailing [email protected]. We’d like to share your story.

Looking to improve your photos of the games? The Center is publishing a series on sports photography by Texas photojournalist Jason Fochtman. Check out his first blog on photography in poorly lit stadiums – if you haven’t seen it already – and watch for Jason’s future pieces.

And take time to re-evaluate your coverage in general to make sure you’re getting everything possible out of the games, and attracting as many readers – and advertisers – as you can. A good way to do that is by looking at Andrew Chavez’ blog post on football coverage that ran earlier on the TCCJ website.

You won’t want to do everything in this grab-bag of ideas – but if you find only one or two that will work at your paper, you’ll be attracting more high school football fans to your website and your newspaper.

One of our most dangerous temptations in community journalism is to emphasize the “community” part of our name and not the “journalism.”

We’re not metros (thank God). But neither should we think that we are somehow insulated from their pressures and problems, or that the issues they face will be a long time in coming to us – if ever.  The old “that’s a city problem, not our problem” idea died when mass communications and then social media knit the nation into one 311-million-person village.

Case in point:  the news of Bin Laden’s death.  Now what could be further from the news coverage issues we face in Texas community journalism?

But we’ve got to pay attention to what we learned in that coverage.  Like the fact that Twitter dictated the news, not the White House.  The president may be able to order the execution of the leader of Al Qaeda, but he can’t determine how news will break.

One site, analyzing the coverage, included this important observation, one we should all consider: 

“As notions, ‘edition’ and deadline are dead.A newspaper editor’s worst nightmare is breaking news landing on a Sunday night at closing time. Such conjunction of content and timing carries a high risk of irrelevancy — if missed, or of good-faith false information hitting the streets the next day — if inaccurate. We all have memories of too-close-to-call elections, rumors of a personality’s death, etc.

“Newspapers took time to make their mind up on the question of deadlines and editions (and many have yet to cross that Rubicon). But the leaders of the pack took the straightforward option: dump everything on the internet, as fast as you can and without regard for closing deadlines.

“For the Bin Laden story, most big news organizations produced vast amounts of articles as their physical papers were being re-edited. By the time the updated edition hit the street, its content had been posted on the net, but every story had also been continuously updated and augmented.  Did it affect newsstand sales? Early data show this isn’t the case. Sales always rise, no matter how more up-to-date the publication website is. With high impact news, analyzing reader reactions shows people still enjoy the physical paper’s broad view — and, for those special occasions, there is the ‘collector’s item’ feeling.”

Note the first sentence – “edition” and “deadline” are dead.  That’s the idea that the production of the news (reporting, writing, editing, design, production, distribution) somehow determine when the news is ready for consumption by readers.  That’s a concept straight out of the 20^th century.  And the 19^th, 18^th, 17^th, and so forth.

Right now, we see that playing out in major international and national news stories – the death of Bin Laden, the William and Kate wedding, the death of Michael Jackson.  But social media especially are making significant inroads in all our communities.  And we saw in the recent Texas fires that many people in the state were turning to Facebook and websites because they wanted to know right then – not when the paper came out later – what the news was.

Read also what the quote above said about what happened when the print editions of the newspapers came out.  Did the fact that people heard about it on Twitter and discussed it on Facebook and saw it on the news stop them from buying newspapers?  Not at all.  The next day’s papers were selling out because people want to read more about high-interest items.  After all, do people who watched Friday night’s football game and talked about it in church Sunday avoid the coverage in your newspaper because they already know so much, or are they eager to read more and see the photos and stats you publish?

We are part of a revolution in how people get their information.  It hit the West and East coasts first, then the cities, then the suburbs … and now we’re all affected. 

And what does it mean for community papers? Mainly that we’re not community papers any more.  We are community news sources that publish a paper, in addition to the other ways we disseminate the news.  The paper is our centerpiece, our flagship, our most important product – but more and more, breaking news will be found on Twitter and Facebook and our websites.

It may not be the way we thought we would be practicing journalism, but remember that journalism isn’t newspapers – newspapers contain journalism.  Journalism is what our readers want to know, and we’ve got to be about the business of giving it to them.