Toronto Star's Latest Venture Holds Hope For The Future

About 19 months ago, in August, 2013, the Toronto Star erected a paywall to improve its bottom line and allow it to improve services. At the same time Montreal’s La Presse launched an iPad app after having invested $40 million over two years. As a result La Presse has attracted a highly engaged younger audience who use the app for an average of 45 minutes a day and up to an hour on Saturdays. This is according to an article in the Huffington Post last November  http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/11/05/toronto-star-paywall-gone_n_6106122.html

Toronto Star publisher John Cruickshank was quoted as saying, “These are numbers we haven’t seen in the digital world at all to date.”

The Huffington Post also reported that the Torstar had signed a deal with LaPresse to develop a new tablet product for the Star at a cost of up to $14 million.

Like most papers, the Star has seen revenue for print advertising decline. On a year over year basis ad revenues have declined 20.5%, which is quite a lot.

On March 7^th the Toronto Star announced in a “Note To Readers” that it was removing its paywall as of April 1^st http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/03/07/note-to-readers-star-to-end-paid-digital-subscriptions-on-april-1.html#  It made the move after “extensive input from our readers and our advertisers.” Translated it means the paywall wasn’t working as well as they had hoped. (Ironically while looking at the note a message came up saying that I had 7 free articles left, out of 10, to view before I had to buy a subscription.)

The newspaper business reminds me too much of such failed companies as Baldwin Locomotives and Eastman Kodak. Baldwin was famous in its field as a builder of railway engines. Despite having pioneered in building railway diesel engines, it continued to focus on steam long after other builders had moved on. Kodak was the same in photography. It continued to concentrate on film, despite having pioneered in digital photography, and went bankrupt. Today it is just holding on.

The newspaper business is too much like these businesses. Newspapers pioneered in the use of the Internet and yet have failed to capitalize on it. Hopefully the Toronto Star’s new venture will succeed. We need the Toronto Star and we need newspapers.

Handling Rejections

Rejections. They come with the turf as a journalist, especially if you freelance, but there’s no way to avoid them, unless of course you are the boss. Even then your brilliant ideas might be rejected by your audience.

One way to handle a rejection is to take an AK47 or some other gun and shoot the bastard who rejected you. A good way if you don’t mind spending the rest of your life in jail or being executed and having a lot of people hate you. Or you could write a nasty letter or email to the bitch telling the person how brainless they are for rejecting you and your brilliant idea. That’s like blowing up both ends of a bridge with you in the middle. Another way is to just walk away from it all and never pitch an idea again. Yes that’s really showing them how not talented you are.

Rejections could and sometimes did ruin my day, especially if it was an idea that I had high hopes on and that I knew was a good idea. I’d often spend a day or two or three moping about and feeling sorry for myself. I would often fantasize about being a multi-millionaire and firing the editor or demoting them to a menial job. However, it was a good way to waste time and not accomplish anything.

Gradually I learned far better coping skills. I’d take an hour or two break and do something totally different, like play a computer game (My favorite was and is Railroad Tycoon.) or read or file. Sometimes, if a rejection hit particularly hard I’d take the rest of the day off and do something different, which might include a walk or a bicycle ride.

I also learned to try not to take rejections so personally. I learned to realize that it was an idea that was being rejected and not necessary me. Sometimes the editor themself might not know why they were rejecting the idea or reject it as they had reached information overload and were just wanting to get home. Sometimes the rejection might be that they have two people proposing the same idea, one they knew and one they didn’t know. They would go with the one they knew, which is natural. An idea might be rejected as you didn’t do your homework and they had just covered it or were about to cover it.

And let’s face it not all ideas are good and some are pitched at the wrong time to the wrong place or are good, but not pitched well. You then need to pause and rethink, which can be a very good response to a rejection.

Finally the very best response to a rejection is to just move on. Send out the query to a new publication or, if, upon reflection you feel it may not be so brilliant after all, send out a new query.

On Showing Respect To Various Faiths

With great freedom comes great responsibility. In the aftermath of the attack on Charlie Hebdo too many people seem to believe that because we have the right to do something they should.

As a Canadian citizen I have the legal right to cheat on my wife as long as it is with another consenting adult, but that doesn’t mean I should, especially if I truly love and respect her, which I do. That doesn’t mean that I believe we should enact laws making adultery a crime either.

Here in the West we have the legal right as people in the media to poke fun at people, including Mohammed, but that doesn’t mean we should. Most Muslims are upset and angry over the mocking of their Prophet and their faith. As a devout Christian I can understand and sympathise with how Muslims feel as people mock and poke fun at my Savior all the time, including Charlie Hebdo, and worse, they use his name as a swear word. So as a writer I will not turn around and mock or otherwise show disrespect to Muslims and people of other faiths, including atheism, as I want them to respect my faith.

As for the argument that defiantly putting a cartoon of Mohammed on the cover with the caption “Je suis Charlie” is an act of defending freedom of speech and freedom of the press, I strongly disagree. It is an act of unnecessary disrespect and provocation.

However, as strongly as I may feel about someone mocking and showing what I consider to be disrespect to my faith, that does not give me the right to murder them or their families and friends or total strangers because I feel they might someone be associated with those who offend me. Nor does it give me the right to threaten them or destroy their property. I don’t think making such behavior illegal is the solution either. Education and changing attitudes is. Just look at say the term “nigger”, which was once commonly used. Blacks educated people about it and gradually the term disappeared from public use without the use of laws.

However, the biggest concern I have with a legal approach to this issue is where would it end? People of all faiths could probably agree on some basics, but beyond that there would likely be major disputes. We’d also start crossing the line between respecting the faith of others and imposing a particular faith’s values on everyone else and on suppressing freedom of the press.

Bottom line is the press needs to be very mindful of the ethical implications of what we do.

The Invasion Of Corporate Journalism

Over the past decade or more an invasion has been taking place, one that threatens not only ourselves, but the ones doing the invading as well. It’s the creeping invasion of corporate journalism into the regular media.

                  In the United States (I haven’t been able to find and comparable Canadian figures. What little I have found suggests data is similar.) the number of journalists has declined 17% between 2004 and 2013, while the number of public relations specialists has increased by 22%. (see http://www.mondaynote.com/2014/09/21/brace-for-the-corporate-journalism-wave/) The median income for journalists is $35,600, while the median income for public relations specialists is $54,940. (see http://contently.net/2014/09/02/stories/public-relations-salaries-increase-journalism-salaries-cant-even-keep-inflation/ ) It’s no wonder then that as more and more journalists get laid off as the result of downsizing or newspapers folding that they are migrating to corporate journalism. Even those who still have jobs within journalism have been leaving seeing no future for them.

                  In sort of a mirror image of them, public relations and communications agencies along with a growing number of companies have been setting up fully staffed newsrooms, which mimic those of regular media. These newsrooms seek tell favorable stories about themselves or their clients.

                  So what exactly is corporate journalism and how does it differ from regular journalism. Regular journalism seeks to report on events and examine/investigate issues independently of businesses and other organizations, including government. On the other hand corporate journalism seeks to report on events and examine issues in a way that is favorable to business. Corporate journalism will seek to restrict access to information and individuals, while regular journalism will seek to get around this. When a bad event happens, corporate journalism will seek to downplay or suppress it.

                  There has always been a struggle between journalism and advertising. If you’ve ever read 19^th century newspapers you see this readily. There are ads that mimic regular news and regular news that amounted to advertising. In the 1920s most financial journalists were on the take. They were paid to write favorable stories about certain stocks. However, standards were evolved to try to keep advertising and journalism separate.

                  Over the years various organizations such as government agencies, businesses (railroads, airlines, insurance companies, manufacturers), museums and clubs have produced their own magazines for public consumption. All had an obvious bias.

                  Today things have gone further. In Richmond, California the local newspaper has been replaced by an online paper financed and run by Chevron Oil. It’s slick and polished and slants news in favor of Chevron. According to Grist, “...it’s a Chevron propaganda rag that’s run and written by the company’s flacks.” (see http://grist.org/news/chevron-creates-its-own-news-outlet-for-a-poor-city-that-it-pollutes/)

                  In September Money And Markets, the online newsletter of Weiss Research, complained about how Apple has the investment media eating out of its hands. The media just fawns over the latest product release from Apple and have become part of Apple’s marketing machine. I’ve noticed that even the non-investment media also seems to have been drawn into Apple. This is without Apple having to shell out a dime for such publicity. (see http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/journalists-addicted-apple-66027#.VI9JQGd0zX4)

                  Writing in The Dark Side Of Corporate Journalism, Arthur E. Rowse said, “Today’s media complex is drunk with economic and political power. Making money seems to come before making sense of the world.”

                  The downside of all this is that the media gets corrupted into being the mouthpiece of business (and government and organizations), undermining freedom of the press. Issues, like climate change, corporate donations and pay inequity either get ignored or downplayed as real discussion gets suppressed and fluff gets passed off as journalism.

This is not only bad for the public, but also bad for business. If only an approved view is what gets talked about weaknesses get brushed aside, which can ultimately prove fatal. One of the prime reasons corporate journalism tries to mimic regular journalism is that regular journalism is trusted and while businesses is not. Yet the process ultimately undermines the trust and credibility of regular journalism. What creates trust in regular journalism is freedom from outside interference.

                  Can corporate journalism and regular journalism co-exist? Yes, but not at the expense of regular journalism. I’ll have more to say on this in the future.

Getting Ideas

A problem many newcomers to journalism in all its forms have is where to get ideas? Ideas are all around all you have to do is catch them and refine them.

                  Ideas can come from your own life or the lives of friends and family or from complete strangers. They can come on your way to work, to the grocery store, while walking or cycling. They can come while lying in bed or in the shower. Ideas can from virtually anywhere.

                  I remember once reading an article in Writer’s Digest about Joyce Verrette,  who got the idea for her bestselling novel Dawn Of Desire from a dream. The idea for The Scarsdale Diet, another bestseller, came from a few lines in either a newspaper or a magazine and turned into a best seller Herman Tarnover and Samm Sinclair Baker. Other writers had read that same article and ignored it. T.v., the Internet, even movies can be another profitable source of ideas.

                  An old standby for more than one magazine was to sit down with a newspaper and go over it. They’d get hundreds of ideas. I managed to get a few ideas myself this way. Thanks to reports in some regional papers, I was one of the earliest to report on the quagga mussel and the round nose goby, both invasive species to the Great Lakes.

                  Other ideas come from personal experience. Over the course of 15 years (1995-2010) I was on and off caregiver for my parents when first my mother and then, after a 5 year break, my father came down with probable Alzheimer’s. That led me to article on Alzheimer’s for Canadian Living in 2008. Naturally, when I received the assignment, my father’s condition worsened making writing it even more of a challenge than I expected.

                  Some ideas come from going about your everyday business. I recall one writer, who regularly passed equestrians, I believe. One he stopped to talk to them and eventually turned it into a specialty. While out cycling one day I saw a river otter and another time, while walking my dog near my home, saw a beaver. I turned these sightings into a couple of news items on returning species.

                  My interests have been another source of ideas. I turned my love of postcards into a few articles and my love of trains led to numerous articles over the years and eventually to becoming a contributor to Trains Magazine for a while before bowing out.

                  So open your eyes and ears and be ready to jot down an idea or two or three. You’ll be surprised at what you might come up with.

Through The Valley Of Dispair - Suicide

Why do people, like Robin Williams and Matthew Warren, who seemingly have everything going for them commit suicide? And journalists are not immune from this either. Ernest Hemingway committed suicide as did a young t.v. journalist, who did so live. Basically they were all mentally ill in one form or another. And mental illness is as real as a broken bone, Alzheimer’s or heart disease.

I know as I was suicidal from age 8 to 43 and still have the occasional suicidal thought.  As mentioned in a previous post I have what is now known as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I had difficulty focussing, was immature, impulsive, hyper-energetic and anxious, among other things. I developed a track record of failure at school, in making friends and in coping with life.

I was constantly criticized by my parents, teachers, classmates, my church and others. I was punished a lot at school by the strap, by standing out in the hall, by writing lines and at home by being beaten with a belt, not to mention being physically and emotionally bullied. I pleaded with my mother to praise me for the one thing I did right and not the nine things I did wrong, but she never would. 

I was sent to a variety of psychologists and psychiatrists, most of whom needed professional help themselves. One of them was arrested for something two or three years after I last saw them.

I was hurting so much that by age 8 I was asking God to take my life away. It’s not that I really wanted to die, but rather I just wanted the pain to end. So how did I manage to turn things around and what can you do to help someone in a similar situation?

Fantasy was a big help initially. Later it became a crutch. In my fantasies I was successful, I was the hero, I righted the wrongs done to myself and to others and I got the girl.

I took steps to get out of myself by taking day and overnight trips and by becoming active in the community. This boosted my self confidence and helped give me a sense of purpose and accomplishment.

Writing was both a help and a hindrance. It was great to be published, but frustrating as I really needed structure to succeed and freelancing doesn’t provide it.

I went from being a high school dropout to being a university graduate with an overall average of 74%, higher than anything I was ever able to accomplish in public school. However I was not able capitalize on it and soon fell into a cycle of hope and despair.

Caring for my parents, both of whom had probable Alzheimer’s helped to break the pattern as it forced me to think outside myself. An even bigger help was meeting my wife, who gave me encouragement, guidance and acceptance. She helped me to realize that just because someone is angry with me doesn’t necessarily mean they hate me, just my behavior.

Last, but not least my Christian faith has been a big help and comfort to me, although the church and most Christians have not. My faith gave me a sense of acceptance and belonging. After all if God can accept me and love me in spite of myself, then so can I.

However, none of this would have worked if I hadn’t been willing to change, albeit somewhat reluctantly at times. I have also never been one for holding grudges or seeking revenge and I usually managed to keep a sense of humor.

I still have the occasional suicidal thought, which I overcome by thinking of things I have be thankful for, like my wife and having enough to eat. I also distract myself by such things as going for a walk or reading.

While I have not sought professional help as an adult in retrospect I probably should have and kept at it until I found the right therapist. Aside from taking Ritalin as a child, I have not taken any medication due to bad reactions and as I haven’t needed it. That isn’t to say that some might find medication very useful.

I’ve learned to be patient with myself. Change takes time and effort. I reward myself occasionally for positive change. I’ve found looking at myself in a mirror and thinking or saying out loud positive messages helpful. Smiling even when I haven’t felt like it, is a surprising help.

If you suspect someone maybe suicidal ask them. If they aren’t you won’t be putting the thought into their mind and if they are you asking them just might save their life.

And by all means, if you feel you can, befriend someone who is suicidal and/or mentally ill. It could be good for both of you, but check your motives and know your limits. Do not let the sick person dominate you. Be encouraging, be patient and keep a sense of humor. And if you’ve bitten off more than you can chew don’t walk away and not take action. Try to get the person some help.

While I still struggle, I’m a happier, more relaxed and more stable person than I have ever been in my life.

A Writer's Reference Library

What’s in your reference library? There are basics that we should all have, like dictionaries and thesauruses. Beyond that it depends on our own individual needs, specialities and tastes. If you speak and write in more than one language you’ll probably have reference books to reflect that. Alas I only speak one language.

In my library I have six dictionaries: five American and one English, plus two combination dictionary/thesaurus, one American and one Canadian. Dictionaries are among my most used books. I also have five straight thesauruses. A thesaurus comes in very handy when you’re at a loss for words or rather tired of using the same word or words over and over again. J. I. Rodale’s The Synonym Finder is or was supposedly the largest, most comprehensive thesaurus then in print (1986).

One of my favorite reference books, which I recently acquired, is The Barnhart Concise Dictionary Of Etymology: The Origins Of American English Words. I’m fascinated by the origin or words, as I mentioned in a previous blog. From time to time I pick up the book and just look through at the various word origins.

And no journalist’s reference library would be complete without good old Strunk & White’s The Elements Of Style. It’s a small little book, which packs a lot of punch. For example it has sections on using the active voice, omitting needless words, placing yourself in the background and words and expressions commonly misused, like “Thanking you in advance.”, unique and farther, further.

About 1987 I bought Funk & Wagnall’s New Encyclopedia at IGA. It came out two or three volumes at a time. It was fun collecting them as I soon discovered that sometimes one IGA would have some volumes that other IGAs didn’t have yet. Today all the IGA stores I bought the encyclopedia at are closed. I also bought for a time the annual year books as well the two volume dictionary, which is still heavily used, and the atlas. I still refer to them from time to time and still prefer a physical set of encyclopedia to an electronic set.

When my local library owned it, I used to periodically borrow A Treasury Of Great Reporting edited by Louis L. Snyder and Richard B. Morris. While published in 1949, it is still a classic book on reporting with the earliest example dating from 1587. Surprisingly it does not mention the Titanic or the assassination or the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. However, it does cover the American civil war, World Wars I and II and numerous other stories. It is chiefly American focussed with a few English stories.

Other reference books I have for writing include: various versions of the Bible,  Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules Of Writing, The Huffington Post Complete Guide To Blogging, Facing The Line: Writers On Life And Craft, The Business Writer’s Handbook Ninth Edition, James J. Kilpatrick’s The Writer’s Art, The Handbook Of Good English and another old standby H. W. Fowler’s A Dictionary Of Modern English Usage, which although dated (The edition I have came out in 1952.) is still very useful.