SPEECH WE HATE

By Chris Daly

It was probably inevitable that Frank Rich would write a column insinuating that right-wing talk radio and television are responsible for the recent gun violence that killed an abortion doctor and a Holocaust museum guard. What I wish Rich had done is to really explore the issue, rather than tap it for temporary advantage. 

Here is a question that needs to be addressed by anyone who cares about free speech:

        What is the relationship between thought, speech, and action? 

I don't know the answer, but I am pretty sure that is question, and it has been addressed by philosophers, political thinkers, and law professors for many years. Rich could have tapped into that literature and opened up the issue for deeper thought. 

In my own case, here is something I am pretty sure of: I have had many thoughts that I have not spoken, and I have spoken many words that I did not act on.

Here is another question:

Is support for free speech a matter of principle (extending to all speech in all settings), or is it a matter of expediency (extending only to speech we agree with)?

Or is it more complicated?

MATH FOR JOURNALISTS (cont.)

By Chris Daly

As part of my continuing series on how journalists (and editors) manage to screw up even simple math stories, here is a cautionary tale: the flap over the leaked story of how many Gitmo detainees go on, after release, to rejoin the global jihad. (Assuming they were ever part of it and assuming that there even is such a thing is "global jihad.")

Here's a good intro by Greg Mitchell at E&P. 

What I would add is some perspective on the numbers. 

Is 1 in 7 (14%) high?

Is 1 in 20 (5%) high?

It's hard to say, without any comparative figures. So, I looked at the Justice Dept website, which includes the following information about recidivism in the United States. Turns out, more than two-thirds of common criminals are re-arrested within three years of release from prison. Almost half were re-convicted within three years. 

By contrast, the rate at which former Gitmo detainees (re)join some terror outfit seems to be pretty good. 

SAVE THE GLOBE?

FWIW...

There's a campaign forming to try to rescue The Boston Globe from the dustbin of history. 

Here is a site set up by the Boston Newspaper Guild, the union that represents the biggest bloc of Globe employees. You are invited to sign a petition to save the Globe.

May I add, before you "sign" the petition, be sure you have renewed your subscription!

WATCH YOUR LANGUAGE, MATEY!

By Chris Daly

I was watching the television news last evening and saw Captain Richard Phillips at his homecoming after being rescued from pirates. Phillips modestly denied being a hero and insisted that he was just a simple seaman doing his job.

That reminded me of something from long ago. In late 1976, I went to work in the Broadcast department at The Associated Press. Part of the apprenticeship for newcomers was training in the mysteries of writing for the spoken word. We were told all about alliteration, aspiration, sentence length and other technical matters. And I remember one of the old-timers adding this piece of advice. "Oh, yeah, kid, one more thing: watch out for those double-entendres," he said. "For instance, you never want to put something like this in a news script:

A MERCHANT VESSEL WAS ATTACKED TODAY BY PIRATES. AS THE PIRATES ATTEMPTED TO BOARD THE SHIP, THE CREW BEAT THEM OFF. IN THE COMMOTION, A HANDFUL OF SEAMEN WAS THROWN OVERBOARD."

I chuckled, but I remember thinkin: "Aw, c'mon. Pirates? Seamen? When is THAT ever going to happen?"

CONSERVATIVE MUSIC?

By Chris Daly

Here is a puzzle (at least to me) that I hope readers can help me with:

How do right-wing talk-show hosts get away with using music samples on their shows that would horrify the creators of that music?

I listen to a fair amount of conservative talk radio. (Don't ask why.) I regularly listen to Rush, Laura Ingrham and Michael Savage among the nationally syndicated shows. Locally here in Boston, I listen to Howie Carr, Michael Graham and Jay Severin. 

Like many radio programs, these shows all use "bumper music" to ease the transition into and out of commercial segments or any other break in programming. That I can understand. What I don't get is where they get off using some of my favorite music from some of my favorite musicians who I am DEAD sure would oppose it if they only knew. I hear snippets from Jimi Hendrix, the Dead, you name it. 

The ultimate case came a few days ago, listening to Laura Ingraham. As usual, she was comforting the comfortable and afflicting the afflicted. Then, on the way to a commercial break, she had the nerve to play Bob Dylan (Dylan!) singing "Baby, Let Me Follow You Down."

I am groping for a category beyond "cognitive dissonance" for the effect this had on my head.

Can anyone explain this?

HEARD RECENTLY

By Chris Daly

During a recent retreat by the communications-related faculties at BU, we were discussing (what else?) the "creative destruction" occurring now in nearly all mass media as they seek sustainable business models. 

Panelist Jonathan Zittrain of the Berkman Center on the Internet and Society at Harvard asked this question:

"What was the business model for the pyramids?"

CROWD-SOURCING IN SCIENCE?

By Chris Daly

I heard a great story this morning on the BBC about a project organized at Oxford University to use crowd-sourcing to help solve a huge problem in astronomy. It seems that there are high-quality telescopes all over the Earth that have taken more than 1 million photos of different galaxies. Now, the challenge is to categorize them according to their shapes. 

Turns out, people are good at recognizing patterns -- usually better than computers. So, the Oxford people are inviting regular people to participate directly in basic science by looking at the photos and deciding which pattern each image fits best. 

Here's the link to the project, Galaxy Zoo. 

AN IDEA WORTH THINKING ABOUT....

... FROM SOMEONE WORTH LISTENING TO. 

Walter Isaacson, who knows about as much about the media as anyone, has a worthwhile piece in TIME about his plan to saving the news business. The idea is a micropayment system that operates constantly (and ideally, unobtrusively) gathering up pennies, nickels, and dimes from the audience for news. 

If it worked, the news business would not be totally dependent on advertising (as on-line news is now) and would be supported by the readers. 

I know (from experience) that all thinking in this area faces an uphill struggle. Every idea is criticized as stupid, and every person who tries to offer a solution is denounced as an idiot. So, I wish Walter luck, because he deserves it.

ENDOWMENT JOURNALISM

By Chris Daly

Today's Times carries a provocative op-ed piece in which the authors, two financial wizards from Yale, make the case for a new business model for journalism, which badly needs one. David Swensen and Michael Schmidt propose creating endowments, like those that support most of higher ed, to pay for the gathering and disseminating of news. 

Why not?

I can see some definite upsides. One is the hope that journalists would be able to operate more like professors. They would be paid pretty well to engage in free inquiry. I would urge that the equivalent of "academic freedom" be built into the new model, so that journalists are able to follow their reporting where it leads them (and not be forced to cover the opening of a Hyundai dealership that just happens to belong to the publisher's brother-in-law).

As it stands now, most large private universities operate on a "dual-revenue" model. They already have this in common with newspapers, which have operated on a dual-revenue model for more than a century. Newspapers depended on circulation as well as advertising (both "display" advertising with images and classified ads, which were just words). Newspapers are finding that both revenue streams are drying to a trickle, which is why they are all dying of thirst. 

Among universities, the dual-revenue stream consists of tuition and "income from endowment." (Actually, some have a pretty important third stream, consisting of grants. There's no reason that an endowed journalism of the future could not apply for -- and get -- grants, too.) Just now, universities are suffering from a sharp contraction in the funds they get from the endowment (thanks to the stock market implosion), but that is presumably temporary. The basic model is based on this idea: the current users (students) pay something, in the form of tuition. In addition, other people (alumni, do-gooders) who recognize the value of education have voluntary decided to contribute to the good cause. 

In theory, there's no reason why this could not work in journalism as well. There is no absolute necessity that journalism be operated by for-profit private corporations supported largely by advertising. There have always been some alternative models (and for more, see my book, elsewhere on this site). The profit-seeking corporation was merely the dominant force in the field, but there is no particular reason that it should be perpetual, and there is growing evidence that it is in fact doomed. 

So, there will be a next business model. In previous posts, I have suggested a few, including one I would still like to see: the readers of a paper like the Times could pony up and buy the paper. Then it would operate like a cooperative bank or a mutual insurance company: the owners and the customers are the same people.

Alternatively, the endowment model has a certain appeal. For one thing, it allows the size of the endowment to grow over time. Just as with a university, the size of the endowment would be a reflection of the value people place in the institution, and this could accumulate over generations. (Indeed, if you took all the money the Times ever made -- before the recent lean years -- that it paid out in dividends and diverted all that money instead into an endowment, and if you had invested that growing pile of dough at a reasonable return,  the paper would be mighty well-endowed by now.)

One key step: the paper would have to convert to non-profit status. Some would object that this would amount to a government subsidy of the news business. Yes, it would. But, so what? Do we not agree that having a news industry is worth it? Do we not recognize that government has subsidized the news business in half a dozen ways ever since the founding of the United States? (Again, see my book. Look at the postal subsidy, printing contracts, venture capital for the telegraph, etc.)

I think the most serious objection would probably be practical. Would enough people really step up and contribute? That is a great unknown. They have never been asked. 

Of course, if this idea catches on, it could lead to some novel situations. Suppose, for example, that George Steinbrenner wanted to endow a "named chair" in sports reporting. Would he feel entitled to meddle with the copy? Or, imagine the Donald Trump chair in real estate reporting. Would the poor bastard in that position have to cover every Trump opening, wedding, and comb-over? What about a Halliburton chair in defense journalism? 

I don't know.... 

But if they are ever handing money out, I say TAKE IT. 

News Linking

By Chris Daly

In today's Boston Globe, the newspaper has the awkward task of writing about itself. Not only that, but the paper has to write about itself as a defendant in a lawsuit (something papers are loathe to do). And not only that, but the paper has to write about itself in a lawsuit in which it is probably in the wrong. (Pity Robert Weisman, who got stuck with this assignment.)

The short version: the Globe has recently been linking (extensively) from its local news website to stories that were actually written by reporters for newspapers owned by a rival company, often under the heading "Wicked Local." (A term that I believe was coined by Courtney Hollands, a BU alum and former student of mine who thought it up a few years ago while covering the town of Plymouth for the Patriot Ledger newspaper.) The lawsuit pits the owner of the local papers, the newspaper chain GateHouse Media, against the owner of the Globe, which is the New York Times company.

The Globe has defended its practice by saying that on-line, a link is a link, and all links are good in that they serve readers and stimulate traffic. But... what the newspaper has not said is that there was a day, not too long ago, when the Globe so dominated local and regional news coverage that it would never have even deigned to acknowledge a rival. The Globe would have matched the good stories with work by its own staffers and ignored the rest. 

[Speaking of links... the Globe article today includes links to most of the nouns mentioned in the piece except for one. You guessed it: GateHouse. Here's the link if you need it.)