February 28, 2011
FCC’s Waldman: Philanthropy must play a key role in reviving local investigative journalism
Steve Waldman gave a preview of his much anticipated FCC Future of the Media report Monday at a convening of about 300 community foundation leaders in Miami to discuss how their organizations can help meet community news and information needs. After describing in horrifying detail the scale of the decline of beat reporting by traditional newspaper and broadcast sources, Waldman focused on what he said is in crisis and unlikely to recover through market forces: Local, full-time professional accountability journalism.
“The Future of Media and the Information Needs of Communities in a Digital Age” is still being written and reviewed within the FCC, and Waldman, senior advisor to the FCC, opened with a big caveat: “These are my personal opinions. I reserve the right to completely renounce my opinions and change my mind on everything I say.”
Still, it seems unlikely that two major elements that Waldman outlined will change:
1. No government funding. “Government is not going to step in to fund this,” Waldman said, noting that public media are currently facing funding cutbacks.
2. Philanthropy as a critical source of funding for journalism. Since the problem is local, Waldman said, “The community foundations really need to play a key role. If the community foundations do not, I’m not sure who will. The community foundations are that central to this problem.”
Waldman was upbeat about many aspects of the digital revolution and its impact on news and information flows.
“A lot of the media landscape is fantastic, parts of the media landscape are more vibrant then they have ever been,” Waldman said. For example, many neighborhoods have more news than ever before and debate is more open and “meritocratic than the old opinion pages.”
But for all its benefits, the Internet has not filled the gap of accountability journalism. Despite increases in outlets, voices, and distribution channels, Waldman said, the amount of journalism is decreasing.
“You can have more news and less journalism.”
Waldman challenged the viewpoint that the problem will sort it self out after a period of transition because there is no revenue model in sight that will pay for having reporters on watch at city halls and statehouses and other centers of power every day.
Waldman spoke at the Knight Foundation’s annual Media Learning Seminar in Miami. The event is designed to engage community foundations in a new frontier in their grant making. (Disclosure: It’s a gathering I attend as a consultant to Knight’s Community Information Challenge, which provides matching grants to local foundations that support news and information efforts.)
UPDATE: Here is a video of Waldman’s speech.
Waldman emphasized to the foundation leaders the link between news and information and the work their foundations do in fostering community improvement.
Information “is not the goal in itself. It is the lubricant that enables you to do other things.”
He sees a bigger role for non-profit media, broadly defined to include not just public broadcasting but media centers, public access channels, low power FM radio stations and schools running local news operations.
“The nonprofit sector is going to have to rise up.”
He reminded the audience of the importance of accountability journalism that we are losing. The pieces that are missing “just happens to be the parts that the founding fathers had in mind when they talked about the Fourth Estate being as important to democracy as the others.”
Waldman believes there is a potential do more than just “avert disaster.” Instead, foundations can join an effort to create something better than what we’ve lost. “It has the potential to be something fantastic,” he said. “You’re at the center of a very important, exciting task.”
The News Leadership 3.0 blog is made possible by a grant to USC Annenberg from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
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I listened to his remarks via the Vimeo clip on a site for the event ... was somewhat disappointed, glad he had some warm words for what folks like us are doing, but I think he is giving us way short shrift re: assuming that local grassroots neighborhood news is all civic “labor of love” (not his phrase) and NOT serious, fulltime journalism. We do the latter too. And we are far, far, far from alone. However, foundations don’t seem to be terribly interested in folks like us, instead wanting to bolster or even bankroll the creation of standalone “nonprofit” sites (some of which, I must say, are spending money like water, with six-digit CEOs, and you know who I mean). They’ve asked for our opinions, which is great, but if they want to spend money to help amp up MORE fulltime accountability journalism - how about a chance for those of us who are already doing it, bootstrapped, whether commercial or not, to amplify our efforts, rather than ignoring us and throwing the cash at new efforts which haven’t proven themselves at ANYTHING? Offer me a chance to apply for a grant to pay for a veteran fulltime investigative journalist for a year. That would maybe be about $80,000 or so (or, you put in $60K, I’ll put in $20K). We could rock the world a lot harder than we’re rocking it now.
/soapbox
By TR @ WSB, 03/02/11 at 10:10 am
Good points, Tracy. FYI, The Chicago Community Trust and other big foundations in Chicago are funding bootstraps - some to create additional content (Gaper’s Block) and others to improve their technology so they can grow their traffic (Windy Citizen). I think it’s a promising approach. Knight Foundation is contributing matching funds for this effort.
By Michele McLellan, 03/02/11 at 10:28 am
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