Words of wisdom from BU's Charlie Steiner

A couple interesting columns in the news this morning and they do tie into sports....

First - in the Sports Section - a story about Bradley alum and ESPN sports expert and commentator Charlie Steiner - who now is the radio voice of the LA Dodgers - spoke at the Summit on Communication and Sport in Peoria.

He really had some telling comments...I will simply quote him...

Steiner was the keynote speaker to launch the three-day event at the Embassy Suites, hosted by the Bradley University department of communication.

He said...

"In my opinion, journalism has gone to the dark side where immediacy has become more important than being factual,” Steiner said. “The editorial process has been corrupted by the need for speed and how many hits a website receives. The so-called social media has radically changed the way a story, a message is reported. The times, they are a-changin’. And I’m not sure for the better."

"Sports used to be little more than a sideshow on the stage of real life. Now it’s an industry. Sports have become the new show business."

"As we begin this conference, one thing that has never changed is our jobs are based on telling the truth,” he said."

http://www.pjstar.com/sports/x221024558/Sports-summit-has-social-sentiment



So - he concedes that the media nowadays has morphed from being careful and accurate and seeking primarily to be honest and tell the truth and the facts...
..to now just racing willy-nilly as fast as possible to beat the non-experts who seem to be getting every single bit of news and happenings - posted onto message boards and bloges before the newspapers do!
Accuracy and honesty be damned - we gotta get it out there first!!!
Getting the story is actually the story!! It's all about me!!

Bingo - Charlie is the first one of "them" who finally admits the truth about the reporting process in the 21st century!




The other column is one detailing some interesting numbers and media ratings...

http://www.pjstar.com/news/x140149574/On-the-Air-Breaking-down-those-website-numbers

The writer, Steve Tartar, cites one single source to proclaim that the PJ Star web site is by far the most popular but it's a service they pay and who admits on their own web site that they do their surveys by phone and the non-response rates are as high as 20%.
Everyone knows that how the questions are asked and who is selected to call are major factors that will bias the outcome and findings.
But oddly - if they include a 4-county area - then suddenly WMBD's web site wins - with WEEK roughly neck & neck with PJStar.
But there are numerous networks and ONLY ONE newspaper - should they NOT get more viewership on the web than any of the numerous network sites that specialize only in giving a few headlines?
The fact that they don't is quite remarkable!

Also - he doesn't mention that quite routinely the google-type news searches show hits for just about all pages of a newspaper's web site - but (and you can easily show this yourself) they rarely will show hits on anything except the front pages or title pages of certain other sites - and WMBD's is that way.

BUT -- even so -- does it surprise that the opnly newspaper in all of Central Illinois actually gets looked at by a bit over 20% of the people in the Tri-County area?

Like this is shocking? Over in Bloomington - the rates are over 30% for local people viewing the Pantagraph web site...so compared to other communities the boasted 27% popularity is not much to brag about.
Just note that if and when other newspapers brag of the popularity of their web sites, it kinda leaves anything in Central Illinois in the dust...

The Dallas Morning News has close to 2 million unique visitors, and they don't even rank inside the Top 10! The NY Times has 15 million.
A recent study in Rochester, NY showed...
".... in the Rochester, NY local market - The Rochester Democrat & Chronicle ...Together with its website, www.democratandchronicle.com, the publication reaches 81% of the Rochester market on a weekly basis."

81% !!!!!!!

BUT - the overall point is and is also conceded by Tartar...
"You can't turn the clock back. The corner newsstand has moved to a screen. The movie image of the kid crying, "Extra! Extra! Read all about it" has been replaced by TV and Internet video that flashes before our eyes in seconds."

But he throws in this...
"So long as our society treats the disappearance of newspapers as strictly a business matter - with no implications for the future health of our democracy - this problem will continue to worsen," he wrote."

...so like a lot of journalists with massive egos....he cites a guy who links writing stuff in newspapers with the lifeblood of our democracy.
They are sooooo important that we need them every day - we should be checking their web sites even more!!

I think it's the other way around -- our democracy assures a free press - and not the other way around...
And the growth of other viewpoints and other avenues of opinions such as forums and blogs as well as cable channels - has helped keep the newspapers accountable........

Anyone remember the Dan Rather debacle and scandal?
Had it not been for the cable channels and the bloggers, this pompous egotist Dan Rather would have succeeded in cramming a filthy lie of a libelous counterfeit report onto the unsuspecting public because they'd have been told to trust Dan and his sources.
Instead Rather and his sources were proved to be a fraud - but what followed was even more staggering.
Rather - instead of just admitting he was wrong or bought into bad data - has to this day STILL championed the accuracy of those reports and documents that have since been UNANIMOUSLY debunked as completely fraudulent!
Dan Rather is the prime example of how if you get your facts from just one source and naively assume they are honest - then you are going to get lied to a lot and you will never know!

An age-old adage to life by is that EVERYONE is biased - they just are biased in different directions - although some will lay claim to being unbiased. Those are indeed the most dishonest sources of all!
Those who do choose to promote lies - do so with an agenda and that agenda is now quite obvious.

So as always - and this holds true for all sources of info including this blog -- buyer beware....make your mind up for yourself.