This blog is called New Cambridge Observer–so I guess I should jump into the fray over last week’s arrest of  Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates by Cambridge Police Sergeant  James M. Crowley.   

Gates, 58, who is black and walks with a cane,  had gotten out of a cab in front of his home on Ware St, couldn’t find his house keys and, while he and the cab driver were breaking into the house in broad daylight,  someone called the police.

To begin with,  I can’t understand why anyone would impugn the intentions of  the woman who called the police :  911 tapes reveal that she said she wasn’t sure if it was a break-in and that she doesn’t mention race.

I CAN understand why Crowley would insist that Gates  come outside after showing proof that he lived there;  it’s possible, tho unlikely, that someone inside the home was dangerous,  in trouble, or pressuring the owner, in some way.

I can also understand why Gates would be upset: no doubt the incident triggered memories of his own and others’ experiences of deep racial prejudice between white cops and black men.  I can also understand why Gates would  lash out verbally, and why his resistance would trigger the officer’s reflexive  response to an unruly citizen: handcuffs and arrest.

It’s harder for me to understand why President Obama lost his usual cool and say the officer reacted “stupidly” but I’m glad that he  backed off and invited both parties to the White House to discuss the matter over  a beer.

A friend rightly points out that, rather than just let things go each of the parties took the extra step: calling the police; demanding to come inside, pushing back, jumping into a local fray.  My friend suggests that behind all that is fear: of break-ins, of losing hard-won respect and status, of  loosing criminals into the community, of criticism–in a time of war and heightened economic stress.

All true.

But now, news commentators are questioning everyone’s motives. This morning, one of them questioned Obama’s choice of drink for today’s powwow and called  him a racist who hates whites;  another (is it politically correct to mention that her skin appeared to be dark?) that Obama is a “racial opportunist ” whose administration is corrupt, and that he used the term “stupidly” to draw attention away from his difficulties in getting health reform through Congress.

This epiode has often been called a “teachable moment.”  Might I suggest that it’s a moment that has gone on too long? We get it. It’s a moment whose time has passed.

Let me know what you think!

–Anita Harris
New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA, as is harriscomblog.wordpress.com, which focuses on issues related to media, public relations, and HarrisCom clients–such as health, science, technology and the environment.  All entries are copyrighted by Anita M. Harris, the author.

While conservative commentator Laura Ingraham said yesterday on the Today Show that  President Obama has accomplished little of worth in his first two months in office, CBS  Evening News Producer Rick Kaplan would strongly disagree.

At a seminar held on Tuesday at  Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard, Kaplan said that Obama’s record  so far has been “extraordinary.”

The “first 100 days” is a construct that began with FDR (Franklin Delano Roosevelt) and can be a useful time for judging what policies are most important to a president– before Congress and  administration insiders have  a chance to “carve out turf”… and “start bickering,” Kaplan said.

In his view, Obama has used this period well.

The President  has frozen all of former President George W. Bush’s last minute  “midnight regulations,” ended the  “gag rule” prohibiting mention of abortion in organizations receiving federal funds; put  forth ethics and lobbying bills; and passed the $800B TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) legislation, Kaplan said.

Equally impressive was  Obama’s performance at the recent G20 Summit in London.  “I’ve never seen anything like it,”  Kaplan said. At the meeting of the Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, “people  listened and were impressed. When he stood up, it was a proud moment for America.”

At news conferences, “he let the other guy go first. He grabbed President Sarkosi and the President of China; he huddled with them and [got] them to agree on a contentious set of…offshore policies. He makes the deal and at the end, both Sarcozy and the Chinese leader are smiling.

“In a meeting with the Russians on an arms deal, he gets a promise for a summit.  He meets with the South Koreans to talk about their concerns about [that day’s] North Korean missile launch….”

“And as he’s leaving…in an ‘organized leak,’ he said he would allow Cuban nationals to go and see their families and give them money.

“It was extraordinary to see him work the room in a respectful, aggressive, impressive. way. The leaders didn’t all agree with him, but they liked and respected him.”

“He’s had an extraordinary run in just 60 days. He never shows tension, never seems impacted one way or another or angry. He’s the ‘coolest guy in the room.”

Still, Kaplan said, not all is rosy.

For example,   the  President had known  known for weeks that bonuses were to be paid in Wall Street firms receiving bailout money, which made Obama’s  expressed “outrage” seemed hypocritical.  The press “let him off the hook a bit… It’s great to have dialogue, and the press corps is nervous about shaking up the relationship”  at a time [of economic crisis] where everyone is looking for stability.”

Asked (by me) what he foresees for the future of print media, Kaplan said that papers like the Boston Globe must survive,  and that the current “unwinding” could turn out to be healthy in the long run. It will likely lead to new models and  put an end to newspapers driven by owners who are more concerned about investors’ profits than their own communities, Kaplan said.

AMH

The New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

Was surprised last night  when  two Pulitzer-prize-winning journalists locked horns on WGBH-TV’s  Greater Boston.

In a heated discussion of the New York Times’ threat to shutter the Boston Globe if employment concessions aren’t made,  former  Globe Columnist Eileen McNamara, who now teaches at Brandeis, charged that the Times is only out to save itself and doesn’t care about Boston or the Globe. She and host Emily Rooney criticized the Times for a lack of “transparency,” in threatening  to shut down the paper just a week after some 50 reporters were required to take buyouts or risk being laid off. McNamara called for an investigation into how Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr. could have  so mishandled the papers’  strategies and finances.

Alex Jones, the former New York Times reporter who now directs Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, said that Sulzberger has long been seeking ways to keep his papers on sound financial footing and pointed out that the Times and Globe are just two  of many papers threatened by  huge operating losses.  With countless subscribers migrating to “free” news on the Internet and advertisers cutting back in the current financial crisis, several papers have already declared bankruptcy.

I agree with Jones  that there’s no point in focusing on the New York Times as the bad guy in all of this;   the Globe is crucial to the Boston and New England communities, which must find ways to keep the paper alive.

The Boston Foundation  has put together a blue ribbon panel to seek with solutions–which might include a takeover of the Globe  by a consortium of nonprofits until the Globe’s economic situation improves.

The Globe reported this morning that both employees and management will be taking cuts in pay and security, and that 20 bloggers, organized by Paul Levy, president of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, simultaneously published a post asking readers to submit suggestions on how the Globe can improve its financial position.

(Levy’s blog is at runningahospital.blogspot.com).

I’ve joined the rally in a separate post.

I hope a solution is imminent  because good journalism provides crucial lifeblood to any community. As the so-called “fourth estate,” it serves as a watchdog on government, allows citizens to communicate with one another, and helps organize the thoughts, lives and livehoods of individuals and institution in a democracy.  Broadcast and Internet media certainly contribute to this–but, by and large, it’s  print reporters to do the heavy lifting.

AMH

Anita M. Harris is an award-winning former journalist who has founded a weekly alternative newspaper,  written for Newsday, produced documentaries for WRFM Radio and co-produced more than 100 live panel programs for the MacNeil/Lehrer Report (now the Newshour) of National Public television. She has taught journalism at Harvard andYale Universities and at Simmons College.

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

The New Cambridge Observer is pleased to join Beth Israel Hospital’s Paul Levy et all in the rally to help the Boston Globe. Here’s the post, followed by a partial list of participating bloggers. I believe the idea is to leave comments on Paul Levy’s blog at runningahospital.blogspot.com, but if you leave them here, I’ll link or forward.  AMH
Here’s the post:

Posted by Paul Levy at 4/06/2009 10:00:00 PM.

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

Partial list of participating bloggers:

http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/
http://www.bluemassgroup.com/
http://www.letstalkhealthcare.org/
http://healthblawg.typepad.com/
http://geekdoctor.blogspot.com/
http://patientdave.blogspot.com/
http://endlessknots.netage.com
http://billives.typepad.com/
http://cseries.typepad.com/celebrityseries/
http://amatterofdegree.typepad.com/a_matter_of_degree/
http://venturecyclist.blogspot.com/
http://www.insideoutchina.com
http://www.negotiationguru.blogspot.com/
http://baystateliberal.blogspot.com
http://hilforum.com/
http://www.byeday.net/weblog/networkblog.html
http://www.healthbusinessblog.com/?p=2137
http://mikegil.typepad.com/

April 07, 2009 5:26 AM

Paul Levy said…

And two more:

http://achronicdose.blogspot.com/2009/04/blog-rally-to-help-boston-globe.html

http://www.healthcontentadvisors.com/2009/04/06/blog-rally-to-save-the-boston-globe/

In his 3-05-09 post “Probe the Past to Protect the Future,”  Washington DC business-advocate- returned-investigative journalist Andrew Kreig says that the idea that the country should look forward without addressing the wrongs of the recent past is  “nonsense”.

He writes: As always,  justice starts by a review of the evidence. ‘Sunshine is the best disinfectant,’ Supreme Court Justice Louis Bandeis famously said. But pest control is useful too.  Either way, strong measures are required to build public confidence for legitimate initiatives on such complex questions as which companies are “too big to fail,” and which ones should pay the price for their terrible decisions.”

The media are unlikely provide much insight,  he implies.

Their income stream is increasingly dependent on affiliated businesses and not on serving subscribers. The major TV networks,  for instance, make virtually nothing form direct customer billings via cable and satellite, although many in the public naively assume that they’re being served via a “marketplace of ideas.”

In fact, traditional and new media alike depend heavily on the goodwill of government officials, plus advertising. The financial reports of the Washington Post, for instance, show that since 2007, it has been making more than ten times its revenue from its education industry affiliates as from its Post subscriptions,  new media are more entrepreneurial and increasingly broader-based in consumer appeal, many of their roots are in fairly recent federal Internet research and privatization policy–and many of their futures are highly dependent on favorable regulation, merger approval and stimulus spending.

Kreig calls for transparency in the Obama Administration’s decisionmaking process and for vigorous public pressure to ensure that current Congressional investigations into allegations of Bush Administration wrong-doing are not just for show.

I’m not anxious to delve back into the murky recent past and don’t relish the possibility of investigations, indictments, or imprisonments. Bytemperament, like Obama,  I’d rather move forward and let it all go.  But as George Santayana said, “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”  I do think it’s important to find out why things went so wrong in hopes that we never have to go through times like those–or these–again.

AMH

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA.

In the last few days, I’ve been in on several Webinars–some more effective than others.

Hubspot’s “5 Tips for Advanced B2B Business Blogging” was well organized and to the point. ****

Although  host and Hubspot Marketing VP Mike Volpe insisted on calling potential customers “personae,”   (in my book, the persona is the character telling the story as opposed to someone you’re trying to reach)–he did a good job of explaining that instead of using blogs to push your products,  you should offer information that will interest potential customers in order to draw them in.  Among other suggestions:

• Offer a mix of posts–news, features, opinion, photos video, audio, lists, bold statements, funny bits, email  or videocam interviews–and information about how to get photos, via flickr.
• Format in a readable way
• Be patient: this sort of marketing is a marathon, not a sprint,

The webinar video and slides are available at:
http://www.HubSpot.com/archive/b2b-business-blogging;
you can find  a basic introduction to business blogging at
http://www.HubSpot.com/archive/blog-webinar

Elizabeth Marshall’s “Striking Content Marketing Cold” with Newt Barratt, Chris Brogan, and Paul Gillin, the authors of “Get Content Get Customers” was a bit roundabout. **

With four panelists,  it was difficult to know who was speaking.            The authors, who also used (and perhaps coined?)  that peculiar
term “persona,”   focused on what they call “content marketing,”
which involves using (or possibly employing the authors?)
to   use  “story” to bring in customers.

Despite the confusing format, the authors must  have done
something right because here I am spreading the word on their
behalf!

The webinar may be downloaded from:
http://marketingmarshall.com/recommends/getcontent
Audio is available  at http://authorteleseminars.com/audio
/getcontent1.mp3 and a  written summary, in blog form,  at
http://bit.ly/s2Jv

Vocus Teleseminar: -Build Your Proactive PR Strategy for 2009 , featuring the increasingly visible Peter Shankman founder of  the Geek Factory and HARO (Help a Reporter Out )and Kim Keelor, PR Director of Gaylord Entertainment, was informative  but  included a few discouraging words. ***

The Vocus moderator, in  good social media  marketing form,
kept discussion of Vocus’ media relations outreach offerings to
a minimum.

I felt  encouraged when Keelor pointed out that PR consultants
seeing “free media” stand to do well as dollars for expensive
advertising sink  in the current flailing economy.

I also  found the advice to target a few key reporters rather
than send releases to huge  list and to use social media tools
like Twitter and Gawker to find out what reporters are
covering–to be right on–especially with reporter layoffs, and
remaining journalists increasingly assigned to  numerous
beats.

I was not shocked when Shankman predicted the imminent
demise of the press release–to be replaced by social media
tools used to reach individual reporters who have specific
informational needs.

I was, however, taken aback  when one speaker (perhaps the
unnamed moderator?) expressed anger when  asked
how to find reporters’ Twitter addresses– because he’d
posted instructions several months ago, online. If you can’t
figure  out how to Google to find that information,” he asked,
do you really belong in this [PR]  business?

As a long-time PR practitioner who is relatively new to
Twitter,   I have to ask whether insulting potential Vocus
customers–I mean… personae– who ask honest  questions is
an effective marketing tool.

That webinar and others are available at
http://onlinepressroom.net/vocus/.

The New Cambridge Observer is a publication of  the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

With the ever increasing fall of bookstores and impending newspaper layoffs, I’d like to echo Alex Beam’s call for readers to reach for their wallets.

In case you missed his January 9 column, “Closing Costs,” in the Boston Globe, it opens: “Here is a dispatch from the Land of No Suprises: Bookstores–buffed by the recession, by Amazon, by electronic reading devices–are closing their doors”. He points out that, easy as it is to go to Amazon for books and read newspapers online for free, by behaving normally, “you kill the things you love.”

In Boston, after several waves of reporter buyouts, people keep telling me that they’ve dropped their subscriptions to the Globe because it’s gone downhill, and, anyway, they can get it on line, for free. Duh.

My apologies for stating the obvious, but many of my friends don’t seem to get that, in  a vicious financial cycle,  with fewer paying customers,   the paper can get fewer advertisers, revenues go down, and, as a result, the Globe and many other papers have had to  “encourage”  their most senior,  talented reporters to leave.  The Globe announced  a new round of editorial layoffs just last week.

I’ll be writing more about this–but for the time being, please support the  free press–by paying for it.

The New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group, of Cambridge, MA.

Report on the Nieman Foundation’s 70th Anniversary Convocation,  held

November 7-, 2008, in Cambridge, MA

In early November, I attended the Nieman Foundation’s 70th anniversary Convocation, which was  entitled “True Grit, Advancing Journalism’s Covenant in the 21^st Century”. The morning program, moderated by former Nieman Curator Bill Kovach, featured  talks by former Nieman Fellows on “Preserving Nieman Values Through the Years.”

The afternoon program included a keynote by  Len Downie, former executive editor of  The Washington Post,  who spoke on “The Moral and Ethical Obligations of Journalism in a Digital World,” and a panel entitled “Voices from the New World of Journalism”, which was moderated by Geneva Overholser, NF ’86, director of the School of Journalism at USC’s Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Southern California.

The evening program included a talk by Ellen Fitzpatrick, professor of American Intellectual and Political History at the Univrsity of New Hampshire, and a panel discussion on Press and Politics in the New Administration, moderated by Tom Ashbrook, Host of NPR/s On Point.

Here’s the url to a microsite where more information and videos are posted, followed by  my 2 cents worth on the event (well, maybe more, but given the state of journalism, these days, I’ll take what I can get).

Convocation Microsite:

http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/Microsites/70thAnniversaryConvocationWeekend/Home.aspx

Video URLS:
Len Downie: http://www.niemanlab.org/2008/11/len-downie-online-standards-should-match-print-standards/

Charlie Sennott: http://www.niemanlab.org/2008/12/charlie-sennott-on-the-state-of-international-repr\orting/

Michael Skoler: http://www.niemanlab.org/2008/12/michael-skoler-on-newsroom-culture/

My 2 cents
The overall meeting was both a discussion and demonstration of the state of journalism–much of it focused on traditional versus new media standards and practices, and the problem of finances.

The most dramatic moments came during an afternoon panel when Josh Benton,  Director of the Nieman Journalism Lab, told the crowd that newspapers aren’t doing enough to empower their readers and that “You have to love your readers.”  Someone from the audience responded,  “But they say such mean things to us!”  Then, a Washington Post  reporter stood up. She seemed near tears when she said, “I already work 12 hours a day. Now I have to do blogs, spend hours answering emails, learn to use a video camera. Then the ombudsman is mad because I haven’t given the readers what they want for the next day’s newspaper.”

Other highlights included:

• An exchange at a Friday evening cocktail party between Margot Adler and Len Downie, who had recently stepped down as executive editor of the Washington Post and voted for the first time ever in the 2008 presidential election. As editor, Downie had declined to vote for fear of biasing–or appearing to bias–the Post’s coverage.  Margot held that everyone is biased in one way or another and that being aware of your biases makes you bend over backward to be fair.  (Having seen too much of Lou Dobbs on CNN, recently, I’m not sure that Margot’s theory applies across the board).
  
• Downie’s Saturday afternoon keynote, in which he described the current state of journalism as a “Darwinian struggle” that some news organizations will not survive. He was sanguine about the future of online journalism–if someone can figure out a way to pay for it. He suggested that nonprofit philanthropy might play an increased role….although that could lead to coverage of certain causes and fields, at the expense of others.  He recommended instituting a blogger’s code of ethics to help promote high-level journalistic standards—and, that, at the very least, bloggers  identify themselves.

• Former Boston Globe reporter Charlie Sennott’s description of the new  “Globalpost.com– an online Web site with content provided by freelancers living all over the world who will receive regular stipends and shares in the company. The site, which he founded with New England Cable News Network founder Phil Balboni,  was expected to launch in early 2009.
  
  
• The chagrin expressed by Nieman Reports editor Melissa Ludke  regarding sites sponsored by news organizations that take no responsibility for the content. As editor, she seemed mystified at being challenged by a journalist-turned-blogger who pulled his story rather than accept her edits—then wrote about the experience on his blog, where he referred to establishment journalists as “thumbsuckers”.  (I thought that was funny but I’m not sure that she did).

Clearly, journalism is undergoing a seismic shift. As Ellen Goodman put it “The only thing that hasn’t changed is the time it takes to really understand an issue.”

At the meeting, I was saddened by the dissension and disillusion of journalists caught in what Margot called  “a dying industry.” But I also felt slightly elated. Having started my journalistic career by founding an alternative newspaper because establishment media wouldn’t hire many women and  didn’t give voice to racial minorities or the poor, I’m excited by the increasing democratization of the marketplace of ideas.

True, I am concerned about the lack of standards on the Web and don’t put much stock in the so-called “wisdom of crowds.”  But business, government, the arts, the sciences and the public need reliable information on which to base decisions. I predict a consolidation–in which national multimedia news organizations will each amass many local outlets—as do the TV networks today—funded by local advertisers or consumers’ online purchases of goods and services unrelated (I hope!)  to the editorial content at hand.