iPad generates new opportunities for media industry

Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs unveils the iPad at an official ceremony in January.

In a society where technology seems to be changing at a rate that is equivalent to the blink of an eye, one piece of technology that has caught the attention of the general public is Apple‘s infamous iPad, which was first introduced to the American public last April. Although the device received a lot of criticism from technology critics for being a costly expense and unnecessary device that could be easily supplemented with an iPhone, iPod, or laptop, American consumers have shrugged such assertions and have been on a iPad buying frenzy. In fact, according to a recently released report from JP Morgan Chase, Apple has sold nearly 7.33 million iPads during its first quarter last year and 4.7 million more during its second. What’s more, this increase in sales contributed to Apple’s recently reported quarterly net profit of $5.99 billion last year, marking the first time in two decades that Apple edged out more profits than its fiercest competitor, Macintosh.

Although many occupational fields have reaped the benefits of this new technology, journalism experts in particular see a promising future for the device that may help the struggling field reinvent itself during a time when print circulation profits are gradually decreasing and online hits are adversely increasing. The New York Times alone reported a 15 percent increase in digital advertisement sales last year, but a $4.3 million net loss in revenue due to declining print advertisement sales and an overall decrease in circulation. Moreover, a gradual movement into mobile media is further strengthened by studies that support the fact that consumers are increasingly turning to mobile media to get their news rather than relying on According to a study conducted by mobile application developer TigerSpike, whose clients include the The Telegraph, The Economist, The Australian, and Mail Online, the average engagement time that a person spends on mobile applications is 30 to 34 minutes, which is five times the average for publications throughout the world.

As a result of this high amount of mobile engagement among readers, many steps are being taken by publications to increase their presence online through the creation of mobile applications that would allow users to the access the same news Found online and in print on their smartphones, such as the one used by The New York Times. In addition, media entrepreneurs are also taking on more ambitious projects, such as the one that is currently being undertaken by the Northern Territory Mobile Journalists Project and the Australian government in which journalism professionals teach young Aboriginal students video journalism skills that they later use to make their own videos of every day life in remote tribal villages on special-tailored iPhones. These videos are then uploaded to Australian government website that is accessible for anyone to view who may be interested in an anthropological documentation of Aboriginal life.

Aboriginal video journalists (above) use specially tailored iPhones to document daily life activities in their villages. These videos are then uploaded to the Australian government website for the public to view.

Another ambitious project that is currently being undertaken by media mogul Rupert Murdock and Apple is the creation of The Daily, a news publication that is specially tailored for the iPad. However, some analysts suggest that interest in the five-month old mobile application may be dwindling due to a declining readership that has been reflected in how often people link stories to their social media accounts. Although the publication has been mum about its subscription rates, an analysis of PostRank data — a company that tracks how often content is shared through social networking websites — by Nieman Lab‘s Joshua Benton revealed that people were posting items from The Daily on their social media accounts gradually less over time, which may hint that interest for this relatively novel concept may be stagnating.

So, in a certain sense, does this gradual shift from print-based media to online media ultimately signify the death of the printed word, which has previously been the primary way in which readers received their news? According to University of Oregon adjunct journalism professor Ed Madison, the answer is: maybe not. Madison explained that the online component serves as a marriage between the two seemingly different worlds, since the printed word can oftentimes supplement videos or other types of multimedia pieces that can be found online. As the popularity of online media continues to increase among readers and news publications alike, Madison predicts that a large amount of printed material will be migrated online for the public to view.

Whether or not this is the foreseeable future of journalism is still not yet certain, but what is certain is that we, as journalists, need to begin to learn how to use these types of technologies in a rapidly changing world that is moving closer and closer to a digital one.

One man’s exploration into the heart of war

Photo courtesy of The Oregonian

In Jere Van Dyk‘s talk at the University of Oregon last week, he described his experiences in Iraq and even detailed the events leading up to his capture and his time spent in captivity. For many, it highlighted the real dangers that journalists face abroad when covering conflicts, especially in the wake of numerous kidnappings in Iraq, where a few have been killed. Although it can be easy to dismiss him as another American journalist who blindly went into the heart of a conflict to find a story, Van Dyk’s history with Iraq is a lot more extensive than that.

In fact, Van Dyk was very familiar with the country and had travelled through the country extensively, even before the Taliban became the poster-child of guerilla warfare and terrorism. For Van Dyk, Iraq became a second home for him, and always seemed to be calling him back after the first time that he visited Iraq while he was still in college. However, no matter how comfortable he felt in his surroundings, everything did not go the way he had expected it to.

Although he was aware of the customs, cultural practices, and some of the language, Van Dyk said that he felt nervous to be traveling into the rugged terrain where the Taliban were infamously known to control. In fact, Van Dyk said many of the people that he talked to refused to go with him, because they knew the dangers and risks associated with the journey. However, Van Dyk said he was well acquainted with some key Taliban members and knew that he would be taken care of while he was there.

But, even that did not prevent his capture, which was thrown into the limelight for the next several months following his kidnapping. However, Van Dyk seemed to paint a different picture of Al Qaeda that is different than the ones that are typically portrayed through the media — an image of an incensed group of people who will engage an aggressive form of warfare to eliminate the enemy at all costs. Apart from this image, Van Dyk explained that his cultural background in Iraq allowed him to interact with them on an equal basis to the point at which they would try to protect him and view him as a guest rather than an enemy.

Thus, audiences here are left with this interesting, yet unlikely dichotomous relationship of Al Qaeda members being brutal to their enemies, yet kind to those who respectful to those enemies as well. For example, if you compare Van Dyk’s case with that of former Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, who was tortured and brutally murdered, the outcomes are very different even though the circumstances are similar, to a certain extent. Even Van Dyk does not completely understand why he was chosen to live instead of facing the same fate as Pearl; however, he did credit Pearl for saving the lives of future journalists, since most terrorists are unwilling to kill their hostages.

From what many journalists know now, much of the Middle East is a scary, unpredictable place, where the dangers are extremely high and the terrorist groups are relentless, but beyond that exterior, perhaps there is a certain part of humanity in it all that may be lost in the translation of war. And, perhaps what motivates journalists to take risks and place themselves in dangerous situations is not only the opportunity to advance their career, but a love for a place that may seem undesirable to others.

Award provides lessons in independent ethical reporting

Today, I attended the UO School of Journalism’s Payne Awards luncheon, where about 50 guests and I were introduced to the distinguished award winners, who were recognized for their commitment to ethics in the field, even when facing insurmountable economic, psychological, financial and some times legal challenges.

Concordia Sentinel editor Stanley Nelson (above) worked tirelessly to provide justice for the family of Frank Morris, a shoe store owner who was killed by the Ku Klux Klan when his store was set on fire. Photo courtesy of the Shreveport Times.

The first winner, Stanley Nelson, was lauded by the Payne Awards committee for his excellent reporting skills in helping police solve the cold case death of Frank Morris, who was killed when the shoe store that he owned was torched and burned to the ground by Ku Klux Klan Members. During the course of his three year investigation, Nelson and his employer, The Concordia Sentinel, successfully overcame a significant amount of obstacles in the pursuit of the truth and justice for the victim’s family, including death threats, break-ins, and cancelled newspaper subscriptions. Among one of the biggest challenges that Nelson faced was the opposition raised by his community where KKK violence was rampant during the 1950s and 1960s and in an era where memories of such incidents had been put on the back shelf in hopes of being forgotten.

Photo courtesy of Andrew Cusack (AndrewCusack.com)

The second place recognition went to the staff of the Yale Daily News at Yale University for their coverage of a high-profile public suicide that took place in New York City. At the time, news of the suicide dominated the headlines in throughout the Northeast, especially in New York City. While other news organizations focused on the teen’s suicide itself and often times provided gruesome details of the suicide itself, the Yale Daily News consulted with the Center for Disease Control’s recommendations on how to handle a suicide and focused more on the types services that the university provides for students who are in similar situations and the changes that would be occurring to these programs as a result of the teen’s suicide.

In particular, the predicament that the Yale Daily News faced is one that I can personally relate to. Several days ago, I was assigned a story to report on, which on the surface seemed simple enough — a summary of the University’s Suicide Awareness Week events that officially kicked off on Monday. Unfortunately for me, I question whether I had made the soundest judgment when I decided to correlate the university’s events to a tragedy last week in which a teen’s death attracted national attention to the town of Bend. Retrospectively, I would have certainly took a look at the CDC’s recommendations on reporting suicides in hope of preventing “suicide contagion” or “copy cat” suicides, which may result from the reportage of certain parts of a suicide. Although I was not even aware that such a manual on reporting suicides existed until the luncheon today, ignorance certainly should not have certainly clouded my judgment, which I believe was a tough one to have made at the time.

On one hand, I was trying to bring attention to the effectiveness of the school’s prevention program and methods by highlighting a case in the community, but on the other, I was aware that suicides are rarely ever covered in newspapers, unless it is the death of a well-known person or, in this case, a public suicide. Most of the details in the story could have been found and verified on multiple news sites; however, was it right for me to have done what everyone else was doing and reporting what everyone else had already reported? Maybe not.

For the Yale Daily News, the editorial board made a decision for the publication’s coverage of the tragedy to be vastly different than that of many major news organizations. Instead of focusing in on the tragedy itself, the Yale Daily News went out and highlighted solutions to the problem while maintaining a distance from details of the story in order to protect potentially vulnerable readers. In this sense, I think there is something very significant that I took away from the luncheon — as the well-known maxim reads, “Sometimes the right thing isn’t always the most popular.” Although it is true that journalists have an obligation to report the news and find the truth behind the issue, journalists also have an innate obligation to be sensitive to their readers as well. Some times it is easy to overlook this concept in the pursuit of the truth, but sometimes in order to find the most productive and helpful truth, one must look elsewhere in order to protect the interests of the people that we — as journalists — serve.