To give the communities around USC’s campus an information source and an independent voice while providing entrepreneurial journalism training for its students, USC Annenberg has launched "Intersections: The South Los Angeles Reporting Project” with a gala on-campus event May 5.
The Intersections community news Web site, at www.intersectionssouthla.org, features multimedia reporting by journalism students, community residents and community leaders that focuses on education, economic development, housing and immigration in local communities.
Journalism professors and co-directors of the project Project Bill Celis (pictured, above) and Willa Seidenberg (pictured, right) said the site's objectives are three-fold: teaching students urban reporting, partnering with the community, and mentoring local high school students.
"Hyperlocal news sites like the Intersections fill a void by supplying meaningful coverage that mainstream media have been unable or unwilling to provide," Celis said. "We're hopeful that the site will, in time, become a widely used resource by the residents of South Los Angeles."
“South Los Angeles may not have the money and clout that other LA neighborhoods have, but it has a wealth of characters, stories and lessons to be learned,” Seidenberg said. “As the journalism industry moves from traditional forms of media to digital delivery systems, residents in low-income neighborhoods cannot be overlooked.
“The Intersections Web site and its experiments with mobile delivery of news pulls together all sectors of this dynamic and changing community to create a meaningful dialogue and a source of valuable news and information,” she added.
The Intersections Web site has multiple layers of community engagement, classroom instruction and different forms of news delivery. It encourages residents to tell their own stories and it imbues a new generation of journalists with a holistic view of their communities. The project is currently engaged in a successful mentoring program at Crenshaw High School, where USC Annenberg journalism students have been working with several classes to produce audio slideshows, radio commentaries and blogs.
The Web site integrates many media outlets and research projects at USC Annenberg, including Annenberg Radio News; the digital magazine “Watt Way;” the Metamorphosis Project, which examines communication patterns in and around urban communities; and VozMob (Mobile Voices), a new project allowing itinerant laborers to tell their stories through cell-phone-based community reporting.
In a year when newspaper cutbacks have made their own headlines, strong evidence of the changing nature of media use in America may be found in a single statistic: Internet users report a large increase in time spent reading online newspapers, according to the eighth annual "Surveying the Digital Future" projected conducted by USC Annenberg's Center for the Digital Future.
In questions about reading online and print newspapers — key elements of the eighth annual comprehensive study of the impact of online technology on America — the Digital Future Project found that Internet users read online newspapers for 53 minutes per week, the highest level thus far in the Digital Future studies.
In contrast, Internet users in 2007 reported 41 minutes per week reading online newspapers.
The project also found that 22 percent of users said they stopped their subscription to a printed newspaper or magazine because they could access the same content while online.
“The most significant trend about how Americans are changing their news reading habits may be found in comparing the use of online media by light users vs. heavy users,” Center for the Digital Future director and communication professor Jeffrey I. Cole (pictured) said. “Heavy Internet users spent 65 more minutes per week reading online newspapers than do light users. This raises the question: how will the media habits of the current generation of light users change as online content continues to expand? What ramifications will these changes have for the newspapers of America?
Opportunities for Newspapers
In spite of grim prospects, significant bright spots remain for newspapers, Cole said, including “the greatest opportunities in their existence.”
“For the first time in 60 years, newspapers are back in the breaking news business,” Cole said, “except now their delivery method is electronic and not paper. Since the beginning of radio, newspapers have not been able to compete with broadcasting for delivery of immediate news. But in a digital world, newspapers can compete at least as effectively for breaking news delivery with broadcast media. On the Web, newspapers are live, and they can supplement their coverage with audio, video, and the invaluable resources of their vast archives. And, they already have talented teams of reporters and editors who can deliver the news.
“The key to newspapers’ success,” he said, “will be making bold moves entirely into the digital realm, and building business models that allow them to thrive online.”
In addition, print newspapers still have strong brand identities and reader loyalty.
In fact, while the Digital Future Project found increased reading of media content online, the study also found that a large percentage of Internet users remain loyal to print versions of newspapers. When asked if they would miss the print edition of their newspaper if it were no longer available, 61 percent of those who read newspapers offline agreed — up from 56 percent in 2007.
The Center for the Digital Future: nine years of exploring the digital realm
The Center for the Digital Future at the USC Annenberg School for Communication created and organizes the World Internet Project, which includes the Digital Future Project and similar studies in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Oceania. Since 2000, the Digital Future Project has examined the influence of the Internet and online technology on Americans.
Center for the Digital Future
Surveying the Digital Future highlights
Seungyoon Lee, a 2008 Annenberg doctoral graduate, will receive the 2009 Charles W. Redding Dissertation of the Year award from the Organizational Communication Division of the International Communication Association (ICA). She will receive the award at the ICA conference in Chicago in May.
Her dissertation was entitled The Coevolution of Multimodal, Multiplex, and Multilevel Organizational Networks in development Communities. The members of her dissertation committee were Francois Bar, Peter Monge (Chair), and Tom Valente (Public Health). Seungyoon is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Purdue University.
Abigail Nocon (BA Communication '09) was named a USC Global Scholar, which recognizes undergraduates who have excelled in their studies both at home and abroad, and was one of five students to be awarded a $10,000 scholarship to be applied toward graduate study. Nocon was a student in Annenberg's London semester program last year, and will be attending the London School of Economics next year in one of their MSc programs.
In order to be recognized as a Global Scholar, students are required to maintain a 3.5 GPA and spend a minimum of ten weeks abroad as part of their undergraduate experience. Additionally, to be eligible for the $10,000 prize, students prepare projects according to their specific university requirements.
Fifteen digital journalists from 10 states have been selected for the inaugural class of the Knight Digital Media Center’s News Entrepreneur Boot Camp.
Through an intense week of training in audience development, market research, legal issues, entrepreneurial decision-making and business practices and management, the program will prepare journalists to develop and launch new and sustainable news and information services in the public’s interest.
The News Entrepreneur Boot Camp will be in Los Angeles in May 2009 and is presented in partnership with the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at USC’s Marshall School of Business, USC Annenberg's Center on Communication Leadership and Policy and KDMC's Online Journalism Review.
“This boot camp is part of the Knight Digital Media Center’s commitment to ensuring that good journalism and good journalists survive in this critical period of downsizing and changing information models,” KDMC director Vikki Porter said. “With the partnership of the Greif Center’s Tom O’Malia, we are focused on bringing entrepreneurial skills to journalists who have great ideas for developing online news projects but who don’t know much about starting a business.”
Tom O'Malia, director of the Greif Center, said, "In today’s digital economy, positions that were once inside a 'company' are rapidly disappearing. Journalists today need to assume the responsibility for being the presidents of 'You, Inc.,' which requires both good journalism and good business practices.
“This is the new frontier and it is ripe with opportunity for those with a vision and the business skill sets to drive their vision,” he continued. “The Greif Center at USC is excited by what will evolve as a result of this camp."
The inaugural class of News Entrepreneur fellows includes:
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Ericka Boston, Takoma Park, Md. Senior editor, Sister 2 Sister magazine.
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Chad Capellman, Quincy, Mass. Independent web producer and former editor and producer, America Online and washingtonpost.com.
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Tim Collie, Boca Raton, Fla. Former senior writer, South Florida Sun Sentinel.
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Celeste Fraser Delgado, Miami, Fla. Editor, performancejournalism.com and former staff writer and music editor, Miami New Times.
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Rita Hibbard, Edmonds, Wash. Assistant managing editor, Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
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Jeremy Iggers, Minneapolis, Minn. Executive director, Twin Cities Media Alliance and former staff writer, Detroit Free Press.
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Adam Klawonn, Phoenix, Ariz. Managing editor, PHOENIX magazine and editor/publisher ZonieReport.com. Former reporter, San Diego Union-Tribune and Arizona Republic.
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Martin Langeveld, Vernon, Vt. Independent blogger and former publisher, North Adams (Mass.) Transcript and Brattleboro (Vt.) Reformer.
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Michael McCarthy, Seattle, Wash. Editor, LocalHealthGuideOnline.com and former North American Editor, The Lancet.
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Pamela Moreland, San Jose, Calif. Former assistant managing editor, San Jose Mercury News.
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Wendy Norris, Denver, Colo. Managing editor/reporter, ColoradoIndependent.com
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Julia Scott, Santa Monica, Calif. Chief blogger and CEO, bargainbabe.com and former reporter, Los Angeles Daily News and Newark Star-Ledger.
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Nancy Shute, Bethesda, Md. Contributing editor, US News & World Report.
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Arian Smedley, New York, N.Y. Editor, Associated Press Mobile News Network.
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Lynn Walford, Pasadena, Calif. Executive editor, Wireless and Mobile News. Former technology feature writer, Investor’s Business Daily.
Porter will direct the News Entrepreneur Boot Camp program faculty, which includes Robert Niles, editor of the KDMC’s OJR Blog; Tom O’Malia, holder of the Orfalea Director's Chair in Entrepreneurship and Professor of Clinical Entrepreneurship at the USC Marshall School of Business; Geneva Overholser, director of USC Annenberg’s School of Journalism; Mary Lou Fulton, vice president for audience development at the Bakersfield Californian and KDMC board member; Ken Doctor, media consultant and digital pioneer; Susan Mernit, CEO of Peoples Software Co., consultant and former Yahoo! executive; Dan Gillmor, director, Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship; and Vin Crosbie, adjunct professor and senior consultant on new media at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.
In addition, the boot camp will feature case studies presented by entrepreneurial journalists and others who are branding themselves in the new news ecology.
More than 120 applications for the fellowship were received from journalists from around the country and from a variety of media backgrounds.
The KDMC is a partnership of USC Annenberg and the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism and is funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
Knight Digital Media Center
News Entrepreneur Boot Camp
USC Annenberg's ReportingonHealth.org, a new Web 2.0 community for journalists covering health funded by The California Endowment, recently posted new resources on covering the unfolding swine flu outbreak.
This guide provides a general overview of swine flu and the best Web sites for statistics, public health updates, scientific and policy information and blogs about the disease. ReportingonHealth bloggers Barbara Feder Ostrov, former medical writer for the San Jose Mercury News, and Bill Heisel, investigative reporter for the Los Angeles Times, offer fresh angles for covering the story here and here.
ReportingOnHealth.org is a community of journalists committed to improving their craft by sharing ideas and resources. The California Endowment Health Journalism Fellowships offer journalists a chance to step away from the newsroom to hone their health reporting skills. In workshops, field trips and discussions, fellows learn from nationally renowned health experts, policy analysts and community health leaders, from top journalists in the field, and from each other. Participants "graduate" with a multitude of story ideas and sources, plus a thorough grounding in the principles and practice of good health journalism.
ReportingonHealth.org
The California Endowment
Swine flu resources
NBC Sports won a Peabody Award for its coverage of the Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony, which was produced by Annenberg alumnus David Neal (B.A. Journalism '79).
The Peabody organization called the broadcast "an exponential magnification of what was once known in television as a 'spectacular.'" The Beijing Opening Ceremony was crafted and choreographed by creative director Zhang Yimou, executive produced for NBC by Dick Ebersol and directed by Bucky Gunts.
This marks the first Peabody Award ever won by NBC Sports and the first for an Olympics broadcast in 33 years. Previously, the 1972 Summer Games and the 1976 Summer and Winter Games had been honored.
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished achievement and meritorious public service by TV and radio stations, networks, producing organizations, individuals and the World Wide Web. The awards program, established in 1940 and administered by the University of Georgia's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, is the oldest, most prestigious honor in electronic media, according to the Web site.
The USC Annenberg School for Communication is pleased to host Beyond Broadcast 2009, an annual conference on the impact of new technologies on public service media. The conference takes place June 3-6 at USC Annenberg, with attendees from around the world sharing their experiences through plenary sessions, panel discussions and skills workshops.
Since 2006, the annual Beyond Broadcast conference has explored the evolution of participatory digital public media. This year's conference, titled "Public Service Media from Local to Global," brings this ongoing conversation to the world stage, examining these issues from a global perspective.
You can learn more about the conference here: www.beyondbroadcast.net. USC Annenberg students, faculty & staff can register at no cost at annenberg.usc.edu/rsvp; all others can register
here. For questions about the conference, email beyond.broadcast@usc.edu.
The Annenberg Student Communication Association held its annual Favorite Professor, TA and Staff Person Awards Banquet on April 23 in the Annenberg West Wing Lobby. Nearly 300 undergraduate Communication students voted for this year's favorites.
This year's Favorite Professor was Stacy Smith. Ken Sereno and Josh Kun were Favorite Professor Finalists. Favorite TA honors went to Richard Lawrence. Finalists were Robby Ratan and D. Travers Scott. Favorite Staff Person was Maryann Wu. Finalists were Annie Mateen and Sarah Holdren.
El Cholo donated food for the event. The funds ASCA gathered from donations, along with the money that would have paid for the Mexican delicacies from El Cholo, was donated to Troy Camp-- a student run philanthropy that holds a summer camp and mentorship program for underprivileged children in the LA community. The event raised almost $650.
Small Screen, Big Picture: Television and Lived Religion , an edited collection by journalism professor Diane Winston about how religious ideas and issues are woven into television narratives, was released today by Baylor University Press today.
"In fifteen rich, compelling, and often amusing essays, this book describes the remarkable flowering of religious themes in the high-quality television melodramas of the new century," said Robert Thompson, professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University. "It discusses with both sanity and intelligence two subjects that are often discussed with neither."
Small Screen, Big Picture is described as a pioneering study at the intersection of religion and media. It treats television as a virtual meeting place where Americans across racial, ethnic, economic and religious lines find instructive and inspirational narratives. An interdisciplinary tour de force, this book describes how television converts social concerns, cultural conundrums and metaphysical questions into stories that explore and even shape who we are and would like to be — the building blocks of religious speculation.
"When I started teaching a Communication course on media, religion and Hollywood, I discovered there were almost no books that explored how religious and spiritual ideas were represented on television," Winston said. "So I decided to pull together an interdisciplinary collection that focuses on lived religion in post 9/11 television series. Small Screen, Big Picture looks at how the entertainment media — and specifically shows ranging from "Heroes" to "House" — deal with intersection of religion and race, gender, politics, morality and mortality."
Winston, who holds the Knight Chair in Media and Religion, is also the author of Faith in the Market: Religion and Urban Commercial Culture (2002), and Red-Hot and Righteous: The Urban Religion of the Salvation Army (1999).
Small Screen, Big Picture: Television and Lived Religion
More on Winston
Two Annenberg students -- Nien-Tsu Chen, a doctoral student in Communication, and Jin Huang, an M.A. student in Strategic Public Relations -- will present on the first phase of USC Annenberg's Alhambra project at Glasgow Caledonian University's Centres & Peripheries Conference in Glasgow.
The Alhambra project, which involves eight students from both Communication and Journalism, is headed by Journalism professor Michael Parks and is studying the Los Angeles suburb of Alhambra. Ultimately, the final goal is to develop a web-based newsletter to promote communication among Alhambra's ethnic communities.
Parks also will be joining the students in Glasgow. The Annenberg presentation is the lead-off paper at the two-day conference.
Nicholas Cull , CPD Faculty Fellow and Director of the USC Master of Public Diplomacy Program, participated in a US-China Economic and Security Review Commission hearing on April 30 about "China’s Propaganda and Influence Operations, Its Intelligence Activities that Target the United States, and the Resulting Impacts on U.S. National Security."
Said Cull in his testimony, "China is doing nothing wrong in its Public Diplomacy drive. It is wise policy from China’s point of view. What would be wrong would be for the west to ignore it. The appropriate response of the west should be to meet the overtures for exchange in the spirit in which they are intended and to accept opportunities to know China better and facilitate China’s knowing more of the west."
To read Cull's full testimony, click here.
Communication professor Andrea Hollingshead was invited to speak in the University of California at Santa Barbara Communication Department colloquium series on April 17.
The title of her presentation was: "The Benefits and Pitfalls of Transactive Memory Systems: From Dating Couples to Emergency Responders."
"Transactive memory is a group-level memory system that often develops in close relationships and work teams. It involves a division of responsibility among group members and a shared awareness about 'who knows what.' Most research has focused on the benefits of transactive memory," said Hollingshead. "This presentation ... explore[d] pitfalls and errors of transactive memory."
Norman Lear Center director and holder of the Norman Lear Chair in Entertainment, Media and Society Martin Kaplan wrote a April 20 column for The Jewish Journal about the reaction to revelations of CIA memos sanctioning torture.
"It will be the playwrights and screenwriters, not the journalists and historians, who will someday get the torture story right," Kaplan wrote. "It will be the poets and novelists, not the philosophers and clergy, who will take us to the heart of that darkness. It will be the artists and satirists, not the law and the lawyers, who will eventually haul this decade to the bar of justice."
Cinny Kennard, the Center on Communication Leadership and Policy's senior fellow, moderated a panel discussion on April 28 at the Milken Institute's Global Conference titled "Global Aid Workers: Heroes on the Front Lines."
The panelists discussed the down economy and its effect on the work of NGOs and aid workers. Stern noted the effect that the economy was having on the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, sharing that some big donors have disappeared, but individuals and families that give small donations remain consistent in their giving. She said, "The people that give us small, consistent donations tell us they have decisions they can make with their money, but the children UNICEF serves never had a choice to begin with." This continued support helps make it possible for NGOs and global aid workers to address some of the world’s most challenging problems.
Communication professor Josh Kun delivered a keynote lecture titled "Of Angels and Migrants: The Music of Mexico on the Move" at Ohio State University for a "Cultures in Flux" conference.
Also, Kun co-organized The Jews on Vinyl Revue, a live concert featuring Jewish-Latin fusionist Irving Fields and Korean- Jewish crooner Johnny Yune
celebrating the work presented in the Jews on Vinyl exhibition. The revue was on April 30 and was co-curated by Kun and inspired by the book he co-authored, And You Shall Know Us By The Trail Of Our Vinyl.
Journalism professor A. J. Langguth wrote a May 3 op-ed for the LA Times about the United States' 45 year history of torture. Previously, Languth wrote a book about the United States' role in the spread of military dictatorships throughout Latin America and reported from South Vietnam during the war. He described his findings from those experiences.
"Our interference, which went on for decades, was not limited to one political party. The meddling in Brazil began in earnest during the early 1960s under a Democratic administration. At that time, Washington's alarm over Cuba was much like the more recent panic after 9/11," he wrote.
"The difference between American involvement in South American atrocities in 1964 and 'enhanced interrogation' now is that some modern-day officials appear proud of themselves," he concluded.
Journalism professor Judy Muller's book, Emus Loose in Egnar: Big Stories from Small Town Newspapers, will be published by the University of Nebraska Press. Publication date will be sometime in late spring 2010.
School of Journalism professor Richard Reeves wrote an April 25 New York Times op-ed about the first 100 days in presidential office for John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama, noting that modern history shows there is little relation between the small time period and the rest of the term.
Reeves argued that Obama's first 100 days were not nearly as tumultuous as those of Kennedy, who was faced with Russia's man-in-space triumph, a bungled Bay of Pigs invasion and the thought that the U.S.-backed Laos would turn Communist.
"We don’t know what — if any — explosions have taken place in Barack Obama’s Oval Office," he wrote. "
We do know, though, that he has not made the kind of mistakes in his first 100 days that Kennedy did. ... Most of all, we know from observing the modern presidency that there may be very little relation between a president’s first 100 days and the next 1,361. The presidency is essentially a reactive job; any president — be it John F. Kennedy or Barack Obama — inevitably becomes a creature of events unforeseen."
Reeves is the author of President Kennedy: Profile of Power, which was chosen by Time magazine as the best non-fiction book of 1993.
New York Times op-ed
More on Reeves
Journalism professor Roberto Suro will present two research papers at a meeting May 6-8 of the Transatlantic Council on Migration which will be held at the Rockefeller Foundation center in Bellagio, Italy. With support from the Bertelsmann Stiftung, the largest private foundation in Germany, the Council convenes policy makers, corporate leaders and scholars from Europe and the United States to discuss issues of immigration. The upcoming meeting will focus on the role of the news media in shaping the policy environment.
Suro will present “Promoting Stalemate: The Media and US Policy on Migration,” an updated version of a study published last September by the Brookings Institution and the Norman Lear Center. A similar methodology has been applied by researchers in the United Kingdom and Germany to explore how news coverage has influenced recent policy debates in those countries. Suro will also present “America’s Views of Immigration: The Evidence from Public Opinion Surveys” which explores attitudes over the past ten years.
Both papers were commissioned by the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, D.C. which convenes the Council’s meetings in partnership with the European Policy Center. Suro is affiliated with MPI as a non-resident scholar.
Journalism professor Diane Winston spoke to a meeting of the Ford Foundation Board of Trustees on April 21 in Washington DC about religion and the news media. Winston addressed the challenges and opportunities of presenting informed coverage on religion and public life in the new media environment.
Geoffrey Baum, managing director of the Center on Communication Leadership and Policy, delivered the keynote address at the annual meeting of the Industry Education Partnership in Pasadena on May 1. Baum, who serves on the California Community Colleges Board of Governors and Pasadena City College board of trustees, addressed the economic crisis and the importance of partnerships between education, the business community, and non-profit organizations. Baum also described plans for federal economic stimulus funding and reported on his work as a member of the Board of Governors.
"We are facing record levels of unemployment, home foreclosure, and business failure while the demand for services has never been greater," he said. "We are working closely with the Governor and the Legislature to underscore the role of community colleges as the state’s Economic Recovery Centers. As with any disaster, members of our community must have access to resources and support in order to recover from this current crisis and get our economy moving again."
For more information, click here.
Anawalt on MacArthur Fellows Program (Charleston City Paper)
Castells on megalopolises (Le Monde)
Le Monde cited Manuel Castells of the USC Annenberg School about megalopolises. These giant urban centers are the strategic hubs of globalization, facilitating the flow of information and money throughout the world, Castells wrote in 2001.
Kaplan on future of MPAA, U.S. pirate fascination and "The Rachel Maddow Show" (LA Times, Seattle PI, LA Times)
Saltzman on journalists in movies (Merced Sun Star)
Smith on the language of the recession (Columbia University)
Communication professor Chris Smith was interviewed by Dave Kansas' "Business and Economics Reporting" class at the Columbia University Journalism School. The topic under discussion was how the language of the recession has affected the way the story of the recession has been told and how much impact that has on public perception.
Annenberg TV News highlighted (Broadcast Engineering)
Annenberg's Strategic Communication and Public Relations Center cited (NY Times)