my 2 cents

Good News about News

 

News about news organizations has more often been bad rather good in recent years.  It's been dominated by newspaper closings and news staff layoffs.

So it's good to see some positive news about news.

The Associated Press announced an expansion of its investigative  reporting efforts, with the hiring of some experienced award-winning investigative reporters and the reassignment of others already on the AP staff to investigative units. There will be an increased focus on national news in the U.S. and a new focus on international investigative reporting.

Investigative reporting is, in my opinion, one of the most important functions of a free and independent press.

Reporting that's based on first-hand and eyewitness accounts, prepared news releases, staged news conferences and interviews tells us what's happening -- on the surface, at least.  But investigative newsgathering delves behind what we see, to tell us why it's happening, who's behind it, what are the implications for those involved or for the readers.  It's the news behind the news.

The news release about the move, on the AP website, gives several examples of how investigative journalism has exposed corruption, mismanagement or honest errors, and how it's brought about many significant changes in laws, corporate and government practices and other things both here in the U.S. and abroad.

The AP's commitment to more investigative journalism is good news.

News Drones -- Not Ready for Primetime

 

I'm usually right there siding with the media for First Ammendment rights, since I think a free press is vital to having an open and democratic society. 

But I'm afraid I'm at odds with the more than a dozen news organizations who are challending the FAA ban on use of drones by journalists.  I can see all sorts of problems resulting from unfettered use of news drones, ranging from safety issues to personal privacy.

First of all, there's the safety issue.  Although hobbyists have been able to fly unmanned model planes for decades -- as a teen, in fact, I built and flew one with a friend -- there are strict rules regarding how high they can fly and banning them from areas near airports.  And the technology many years ago limited the height and range of those model aircraft.  But as drones now have the ability to fly at high altitudes and miles from the controller, they can pose serious risks to commercial and private aviation, putting those in the air and those on the ground at risk.

I also am concerned about personal privacy issues involving news drones.  It's bad enough that some big celebrity weddings get stalked by news helicopters or small aircraft hired by paparazzi hoping to get that $100,000 shot.  But drones, which are far less costly, can also be used to stalk everyday people who some news organization may suspect of wrongdoing.  Or I can see some local stations who have "Help me Howard"-type news features using drones to stalk someone who a viewer feels has wronged him somehow.

Over-zealous news drone operators can also interfere with legitimate police and emergency operttions.  It's happened with news helicopters, where they get in the way of police aircraft surveying a crime or emergency scene.  Just imagine police trying to do their work while dodging dozens of small, hard-to-spot news drones buzzing around the scene.  It's a disaster waiting to happen.

I can envision so many abuses of privacy and safety if news organizations have the right to put dozens of drones up in the air.  Just imagine "news organizations" like TMZ having free access to drones.

One possible solution might be to grant a very limited number of licenses to legitimate news organizations to use drones for newsgathering purposes, but with very specific and clear limitations that protect privacy and safety.  And solid fines should be imposed, to set an example when news drones step beyond set limits.

I know I'm going against the thinking of news organizations I admire and respect, like The New York Times, Washington Post, Gannett, Advance, Hearst and others.  But until very strict rules are set, I think we should hold off on unleashing news drones into the air.

 

 

Newspapers see circ gains thanks to digital

 

Newspapers, long suffering at the hands of all the news content now available online, are seeing some welcome news for a change.  And they have digital to thank.

The nation's three biggest dailies enjoyed healthy circulation gains in the latest report from the Alliance for Audited Media. 

USA Today remains at the #1 spot in terms of total circulation, at 3,250,157.  That's up an incredible 94 percent, which is a bit misleading.  USA Today's parent Gannett recently began including a truncated edition of USA Today as a stand-alone insert in dozens of its local and regional daily papers.  That move has added more than 668,000 to USA Today's overall circulation, although that number doesn't represent added subscription revenue.  It does, potentially, mean Gannett could see added ad revenue, which is a good thing, as long as Gannett puts some of that money back into providing better local reporting -- something I have not seen so far in the local Gannett paper I read, The Journal News.

The Wall Street Journal remained the second-largest daily, with a circulation of 2,291,093.

The New York Times is very close behind The Journal and, in fact, beats it on Sundays.  Its daily circ jumped an amazing 94 percent to 2,199,012 and Sunday circ went up 8 percent to 2,517,307.  The big increase in daily circulation is partly thanks to the fact that the AAM now includes digital circulation in its calculations.

The change to include digital has boosted the numbers for many other papers throughout the country, which could help beleagured publishers improve their bottom lines with added ad revenues.

 

 

 

Telemarketing Turnaround

 

Unless you happen to be a telemarketer, you’ll probably agree with me on this … I hate telemarketing calls.  I must get several a week at the office, selling printing, electric power, copier service, moving services – you name it.

What really bugs me is when the caller realizes he or she isn’t going to make a  sale, and click, they just hang up.  No parting words like, “ok, thanks” or “sorry we can’t help you now, but please keep us in mind” or even a simple “Thanks for your time, Goodbye.”   Just Click!  Like their time is more valuable than mine and they’re onto the next call rather than an extra two seconds to say “Ok, thank you.”

It burns me up.

So just imagine how furious I was the other day.  I had received a call from a woman from an office supply company, saying she had good prices on toner.  I told her I didn’t buy much, but if she wanted to send an email with her prices on the cartridges I use, I’d consider it.  She thanked me so much, saying she’d had a tough day and my willingness to consider her offer made her afternoon.

Sure enough, I got an email from her, but the prices were just about the same as what I pay at the Staples down the street.  And with Staples, I get points toward money-back coupons.  So I deleted the email.

A few days later, Eleni (that’s her name) called to follow-up.  She was very nice on the phone until I told her that her prices were no better than Staples’ prices.  Then, with no further words from her, the phone went dead -- Click.

I can’t begin to tell you how mad I was.  I went down the hall to tell my co-worker Jeanne, who writes a blog about customer service, and as I told the story I got more and more pissed off.  This was someone who I had spoken with for a few minutes, and then we had further interaction when she sent her prices.  But as soon as she saw I was not going to buy, she hung up.  How dare she!  I even looked for her email to send a nasty note, but I had already deleted it.

Grrr.

About ten minutes later the phone rang.  I recognized the voice.  It was Eleni.  Before I could rip into her, she began to apologize, saying she didn’t know what happened, but the phone had gone dead. She was calling to tell me she had not rudely hung up on me, and that even if I didn’t buy now, she hoped I’d keep her info on hand for the future.  But mainly, she said, she wanted to apologize for hanging up on me, even though it had been an accident.

I was so stunned and pleasantly surprised that I placed an order with Eleni for a couple of ink cartridges.  And I sat there at my desk, slowly shook my head and smiled.

    .  .  .  .

 

P.S.  If you're looking for office supplies and furnishings, Eleni can help and get you a good price.  She's at 718-392-0615 or by email at elenikatos@sunsetofficesupply.com.  She promises she won't hang up on you.

 

News from across the River

 

New Jersey seems to have more than its fair share of discouraging news lately.

The "bridgegate" scandal surrounding the closing of some George Washington Bridge lanes just refuses to go away, as politicians still are calling for "independent" investigations into possible abuse of power by Gov. Christie and his minions.

And now, it looks like New Jersey residents will have a tougher time keeping up with local politics and finding out the real scoop on local issues.  The Star-Ledger, the Garden State's biggest paper with circulation throughout the state, recently announced major layoffs including more than a quarter of its newsroom staff.  

The layoffs, according to the publisher, are part of a plan to consolidate operations among several papers in New Jersey and Pennsylvania that are owned by the Star-Ledger's parent, Advance Publications. 

It sounds just like what Gannett did several years ago in Westchester and Rockland Counties, just north of New York City.  Gannett consolidated about a dozen smaller, local dailies and put them under the combined banner of The Journal News.  Despite their "We are local" slogan, the paper has done a pathetic job of covering local government and politics, and local school districts. 

It's not the fault of the reporters.  It's simply that there aren't enough of them left anymore to cover local news. So now, with little newspaper oversight, politicians and school boards are often free to operate in the dark and do things that an uninformed public learns when it's too late.

I'm afraid that may be the fate of our neighbors across the Hudson, as the layoffs and consolidations hurt the papers' ability to report and be local watchdogs.

And if that's not bad enough, New Jersey recently was cited as the worst state in the nation for business, inheriting that dubious honor from New York.  

A tough place to do business?  Ask The Star-Ledger. 

Other Voices: "We're all in the crossfire"

We open this space from time to time to others, to hear thoughts and opinions by other voices.  My friend, mentor and former business partner Alan Hirsch sent this around to his friends by email this morning, and I thought it was worth sharing with other readers here.  It's especially significant during this holy week for both Christians and Jews.

 

-  -  -  -

The April 14th New York Times op-ed piece contained some fresh thoughts about hate crimes, specifically covering the shootings in Kansas over the past weekend.

 

Last Sunday, the killer nut drove to a Jewish community center in Overland Park, Kansas, and opened fire.  Then he went to a Jewish retirement home nearby and did the same.  Three people were killed.

 

This killer nut is so stupid that none of the three victims was Jewish. They were all Christians.  A point made by the Times writer, Frank Bruni, is that "When hatred is loosed, we're all in the crossfire."

 

FBI statistics (the latest from 2012) show that there were 6,573 hate crimes reported to the bureau.

 

Of the religion-prompted hate crimes reported,  65 percent were aimed at Jews, the same number as 10 years earlier, and 11 percent were aimed at Muslims.

 

Following 9/11,  since 100 percent of the 20 terrorists in the planes attacking the U.S. were Muslims, "there was enormous concern that all Muslims would be stereotyped and scapegoated, and this heightened sensitivity lingers," the article pointed out.

 

Anti-Semitism is alive and well in America.  Many U.S. colleges promote or accept anti-Israel discussions and the general public too often just sits by, not bothered by the open bias against Jewish people.  Non-Jews in America, and that totals 97 percent of the population, or more than 320 million people, appear not to be aware of the  point that "When hatred is loosed, we're all in the crossfire."

Passover

 

It's as much a rite of spring as seeing the first robin or going to the Auto Show.

Passover is when Jews stop to recall the days of slavery under the Pharoah in Egypt, and the seder, done at home followed by a meal, retells the story.

We can't eat bread for a week, but matzoh's not bad.  And matzoh is used in lots of traditional eastern European Jewish cooking, like chicken soup with matzoh balls and matzoh brei -- essentially a matzoh version of French toast.

So many of us will be at a seder tonight and, for some, tomorrow nightas well. We won't be eating bread and many other foods, but we'll be chowing down on lots of other yummy "kosher for Passover" goodies.

A zissen Pesach... a sweet Passover.

Are we smart with our smartphones?

 

Fifty-six percent of us now have smartphones. That number keeps growing every year.

MediaLife recently reported on a survey taken earlier this year on how we use our smartphones.  The study looked at how much time we spend doing various tasks on our phones.                                               Photo: New York Times

On average, we spend 2 hours and 42 minutes using our smartphones every day.  That number seems to have plateaued, rising by only four minutes after much bigger gains over the previous five years.  

The biggest percentage of time on smartphones is used on Facebook -- 17 percent.  All other social media sites, combined, account for 9.5 percent of smartphone time. 

YouTube takes up 4 percent, and Twitter is at 1.5 percent.

Gaming takes up 32 percent, via downloaded games and apps. 

The study didn't measure how much time we spend emailing, texting, taking pictures and videos on our phones.  Oh, and also, making and taking calls on the phone.

 

 

 

Oh, no!

 

A year from now, what will we do at 11:35 p.m.?

 

They keep coming...

New York City continues to grow as more people come here to settle.

The Big Apple's population went over the 8 million mark with the last census in 2010, and it's gained nearly 3% since that last official headcount.  There are now more than 8.4 million of us New Yorkers -- the biggest number ever.

Every borough showed a population gain, led by Brooklyn and then Queens. 

The city still loses thousands every year who head south for warmth and sun (especially after this brutal winter) or out west to find themselves.  But between immigrants -- 73,000 coming from abroad last year alone -- and a high birth rate, our numbers continue to rise.  New New Yorkers joining us from Asia and the sub-continent, eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America continue to enrich our city with diversity that makes this place great.

Growth will be a challenge, as it means more people to absorb with education, housing and jobs.  But it also creates new opportunities, since the things needed to accomodate our new neighbors will lead to more revenues and added income for retailers and others who will serve the new New Yorkers.

As always, the city welcomes them with open arms and an open heart.