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May 7, 2003
Journalism's Future May Start
in Tampa
By Edmund Sanders, LA Times
Staff Writer
TAMPA, Fla. — In this sunny Gulf Coast city, photographers for the Tampa
Tribune lug both still and video camera equipment to all assignments. That's
because they're also working for a local TV station, WFLA Channel 8.
Extra sweat notwithstanding, the arrangement usually pans out — though a
newspaper photographer once didn't have time to switch cameras while shooting TV
footage of a bank robbery in which a police officer was killed, and the paper
was left with only a grainy video frame shot of the scene on Page 1.
So the journalistic future is still ironing out the kinks, even as the Federal
Communications Commission considers a rules change that could make such
collaborations routine.
The Tampa paper hasn't won a Pulitzer Prize in nearly 40 years, has a relatively
modest circulation of 238,176 and often scrambles to keep up with a bigger rival
across the bay. But by pushing the "convergence" envelope, it has
become one of the world's most closely watched publications.
A steady stream of law- makers, professors, regulators and media executives
pours through its slick concrete-and-glass newsroom each week, to glimpse a
world in which the oil and water of television and print journalism are
thoroughly mixed.
Three years ago, Richmond, Va.-based Media General Inc., the Tribune's parent,
spent $50 million on a bold experiment to combine its Tampa paper with WFLA, its
local TV station. The marriage, permitted under a regulatory exemption, marked
the first attempt to put a co-owned newspaper and station under one roof.
As the FCC reviews a 1975 rule that usually prevents companies from owning a
newspaper and TV station in the same market, the Tribune-WFLA combination has
emerged as a test of what may become the media industry's next wave of mergers.
The FCC is expected to vote June 2 on this and other media ownership rules. The
agency's three majority Republican commissioners, two of whom have toured the
Tampa facility, favor permitting newspaper-television matchups in all but the
smallest U.S. markets, sources said.
The deregulation is likely to spur a race by owners of newspapers and TV
stations, including New York Times Co., Belo Corp., Hearst-Argyle Television
Inc. and Gannett Co., to buy one another or make strategic trades, enabling them
to follow Tampa's example in search of greater cost efficiencies, advantages
with advertisers or even new journalistic forms.
"That's going to open the door for more combinations," said newspaper
analyst John Morton. "But the idea of TV and newspapers collaborating is
still a recent phenomenon. We don't know how it will work."
In Tampa and other cities, co-ownership has been allowed because a single
company already held a station and newspaper when the ban was imposed.
In Los Angeles, Chicago-based Tribune Co. owns both the Los Angeles Times and
KTLA-TV Channel 5 — which share resources on a fairly limited basis — under
an arrangement that is permitted until the station's next license renewal in
2006.
The Chicago company has been lobbying to end the co-ownership ban.
"The rule is an impediment to our growth," said Tribune lobbyist Shaun
Sheehan, who contends that the company needs cross-ownership to remain
competitive. "There's a migration of audience away from the traditional
media of print and broadcast. We are trying to refocus our thinking."
So far, the Tampa experiment promises less than a revolution. To the chagrin of
numbers crunchers, the combination hasn't yielded big savings: Budgets and
staffing levels for the paper and TV station are about the same as before,
executives said. And cross-platform advertising deals added just 2% to the
Tribune's revenue last year.
At the same time, dreams of creating a new-style "multimedia
reporter," adept at both television and newspapers, have fallen flat. After
three years, only one print reporter regularly produces stories for the TV
station, the top-rated in the market.
Tampa Tribune managers point to pluses for their paper.
"Being with TV, you have to move faster. We're quicker. We're more
visual," said Tribune Executive Editor Gil Thelen, whom many credit with
deftly navigating the experiment. "We moved from being a mediocre paper to
one that is good."
Yet media watchdogs are nervous.
"Convergence may be good for media companies, but it's bad for
journalism," said Robert Haiman, president emeritus of the Poynter
Institute for Media Studies, who has been a Tampa Tribune consultant and was
once executive editor of the rival St. Petersburg Times.
Without the cross-ownership ban, experts worry that newspapers would fall under
the influence of large TV station groups or media conglomerates, such as AOL
Time Warner Inc., Viacom Inc. or News Corp., which might emphasize entertainment
and profit over journalism and community service.
Haiman says newspapers and TV stations have long had distinct work cultures and
warns that mergers would distract newspapers from their journalistic rigor and
investigative work.
"It may help the TV station, but the newspaper is diminished," he
said.
Local journalism professors say they see little change in the Tribune, for
better or worse.
"They put some things in motion in the beginning, but they've had to slow
down a lot," said Ken Killebrew, a University of South Florida journalism
professor who is writing a book on convergence.
Indeed, the Tribune's circulation is about the same as it was when the
experiment began in February 2000, while the St. Petersburg Times — which is
skeptical of convergence — widened its lead by more than 11,000 to 354,869
during the same period, according to figures from the Audit Bureau of
Circulations.
"I'm quite a doubter on the advantages" of joint ownership, said
Andrew Barnes, chairman of the St. Petersburg paper. "We find we can keep
our people fully occupied just tracking down the news and writing it well."
Over in Tampa, Tribune journalists describe an experience that has been by turns
exhilarating, frustrating and occasionally troubling — as when TV writer Walt
Belcher was told to stop writing about local TV news immediately after his
newspaper moved in with WFLA, to avoid perceived conflicts. Belcher has resumed
coverage but acknowledges softening his criticism of other stations lest he seem
to be favoring WFLA. "It's self-censorship," he said.
Inside the print-broadcast facility, a central hub is the convergence desk,
which includes staff from the newspaper, TV station and a jointly run Web site.
All three send representatives to one another's daily meetings.
When the consolidated newsroom opened, convergence advocates predicted that the
setup would allow the TV station and newspaper to team on stories, each covering
different angles and then swapping work so both got twice as much.
Critics feared the real agenda was eventually to send just one reporter and lay
off the other.
In fact, neither appears to have occurred. Frequently, editors have found that
the newspaper and station simply aren't interested in the same stories. And when
big stories break, each side still sends its own reporter.
"We quickly learned that you can't just use the same story on TV and in the
newspaper," said Allyn Divito, a photo editor who is now part of a growing
infrastructure of editors and managers devoted entirely to making convergence
work.
One area, sports, is now being managed jointly. Tribune Sports Editor Rick
"Duke" Maas was recently appointed to also oversee WFLA's sports
coverage, creating one of the country's first newspaper-TV editing jobs.
By and large, however, the newsroom matchup has meant sharing tips and story
ideas, cross-promoting each other's product and featuring the newspaper's
reporters on TV.
Only a few reporters produce stories that cross boundaries. The TV station's
weatherman, for instance, provides a map for the paper, and its consumer
watchdog writes a column. The newspaper's business reporters routinely tape a
one-minute summary of their top stories.
Despite training sessions, many print reporters found themselves sweating,
stuttering and freezing before the camera.
"It was a disaster," said Keith Morelli, the paper's police reporter.
"They tell you, 'Don't worry. It's only a two-minute interview.' Well, it's
a long two minutes."
Many reporters resent not being paid extra for TV work and say even a quick TV
interview detracts from reporting time.
"In the beginning, it took me 20 hours to produce a two-minute
segment," said Michelle Bearden, the Tribune's religion writer and the only
newspaper reporter who regularly produces TV stories. "But now, of course,
it's second nature."
The writer has been pleased with her experience overall. She says that TV work
has forced her to meet sources in person and that the wider exposure has meant
more story tips.
"It's re-energized me as a journalist," Bearden said.
Most Tribune staffers, in fact, talk less of radical changes than of simple pros
and cons. Morelli says he no longer remains chained to the police scanner
because the TV station agreed to monitor it. But he resented having to share his
exclusive interview with the parents of a serial killer when WFLA saw his story
on a shared list and scooped him on the evening news.
Also, Morelli says, the paper seems to be running more "TV stories,"
such as big traffic jams or car wrecks — a shift he attributes to the
partnership.
Indeed, some in the newsroom worry that the TV hookup has threatened the paper's
reputation for seriousness. Tribune journalists were embarrassed by WFLA's
launch of "Daytime Show," an advertising program that features plugs
from product sponsors and car dealers, presented in an interview format. The
paper resisted attempts to put its writers on the show.
For some, the experiment proved too much. Former Tribune Assistant Managing
Editor Patti Breckenridge is a believer in convergence, but she quit two years
ago after concluding that the paper was losing its commitment to readers.
"Convergence is like the atom," said Breckenridge, now a recruiter at
a supermarket chain. "You can turn it into nuclear power or you can turn it
into a bomb. That's what scares me."
Many point to Canada, with its different regulatory landscape, for examples of
TV-newspaper combinations gone bad. In 2001, for instance, TV station giant
CanWest Global Communications bought one of the nation's largest newspaper
chains and started imposing rules that required all papers to carry the same
editorials. The company backed down after several top-level editors resigned in
protest and complained that the new owners were meddling in local coverage.
The Tampa Tribune's Thelen, who will soon add duties as acting publisher, has
been praised for avoiding a similar journalistic meltdown.
"In Tampa, they've been light-handed when it comes to cracking the
whip," said Gene Kimmelman, co-director of the watchdog Consumers Union.
"What I worry about is what happens after the rule goes away and nobody's
watching anymore."
Thelen maintains that convergence will actually make for better newspapers. Yet
even he concedes that the potential for abuse is real.
"This requires hard, patient work," he said. "If you're looking
for shortcuts, you're going to get lousy journalism."
*
Dual ownership
Here is a sampling of markets in which one company owns both a newspaper and a
TV station (listed alphabetically):
*
Atlanta
Company: Cox Enterprises
Newspaper: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
TV station: WSB (ABC)
*
Chicago
Company: Tribune
Newspaper: Chicago Tribune
TV station: WGN (WB)
*
Dallas
Company: Belo
Newspaper: Dallas Morning News
TV station: WFAA (ABC)
*
Fargo, N.D.
Company: Forum Communications
Newspaper: Fargo Forum
TV station: WDAY (ABC)
*
Hartford, Conn.
Company: Tribune
Newspaper: Hartford Courant
TV stations: WTIC (Fox) and WTXX (WB)
*
Los Angeles
Company: Tribune
Newspaper: Los Angeles Times
TV station: KTLA (WB)
*
Milwaukee
Company: Journal Communications
Newspaper: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
TV station: WTMJ (NBC)
*
New York
Company: News Corp.
Newspaper: New York Post
TV station: WNYW (Fox)
*
Phoenix
Company: Gannett
Newspaper: Arizona Republic
TV station: KPNX (NBC)
*
Tampa, Fla.
Company: Media General
Newspaper: Tampa Tribune
TV station: WFLA (NBC)
*
Source: Los Angeles
Times