news-record.com

Ever since the Romenesko dustup, I have been thinking about how the digital frontier’s lack of rules has changed or is changing or is going to change long-cherished rules of journalism. This is an unfinished thought of mine and I need your help in adding, editing or telling me where I’m wrong. I’m not necessarily trying to plow new ground; many of these are long-held beliefs by many digital denizens.

• Once we thought it was news when we said it. ------> Now it’s news when it hits Twitter, Facebook or a blog.

• Once we wrote headlines to invite readers. ------> Now we write headlines to invite search engines.

• Once sources were “officials” and people in power. ------> Now sources are everywhere. And they have become their own news organizations.

• Once “exclusives” were important. -------> Now “exclusives” only last for seconds and the source is quickly forgotten as a link is shared.

• Once we insisted readers wanted the highest quality writing and photography.-------> Now good is often good enough.

• Once people bought the newspaper because of its content. -------> Now they buy it because they like its package.

• Once we wanted everything to be complete before publishing. -------> Now we show our work.

• Once we didn’t acknowledge other new organizations.-------> Now we link to their work.

• Once newspapers were the “paper of record.” -------> Now there is focus.

• Once Twitter and Facebook were a waste of time. -------> Now social networks are a font of news, links and friends. In other words, a major source of news.

• Once we thought news was key. -------> Now we know connection is key.

• Once we thought objectivity mattered most. -------> Now we know that transparency, accuracy, fairness and independence matter most.

• Once newspapers had to speak with the voice of God, or at least James Earl Jones.-------> Now newspapers speak more with the voice of Oprah.

• Once we thought news would pick up advertising along the way.-------> Now it is decoupled from advertising.

These aren't in any order other than as I've thought of them. At first, I thought it would be tough to get to 10. But when I got to 20, I stopped and started eliminating some for ease of reading. As I look at them now, I'm thinking I didn't get down and dirty enough. That'll be a post for another day.

Please add some — or correct these — either in the comments or via email.

Gerald Witt, once a Rockingham County reporter and a Guilford County government reporter and now a sportswriter, is leaving us next week to join the Knoxville paper.

Gerald has been with us since 2006 and has done some seriously good work. Most recently, he was honored by the N.C. Press Association for his investigative work in the aftermath of the death of A&T student Andre Milandu.

Because Gerald and I been through the wars together, I told him to write this post for me. Here's what he wrote:

Humantarian, statesman and journalist Gerald Witt will leave the News & Record Dec. 9. He was an instrumental part of a staff of highly qualified journalists and has been known for turning over numerous rocks in his time in the bureau, covering Guilford County and as an enterprise reporter in sports. He kept the light on Skip Alston’s bunch and then broke stories in sports on A&T.

In his spare time he drinks beer and saves kittens from trees, when he’s not volunteering for the Sick Little Puppy Foundation of the Triad.

Most of the time, he writes non-fiction.

We'll miss him, and we have faith that he'll save a bunch of kittens in Knoxville.

Year ago, we instituted paid obituaries, as most papers have done. The idea of letting relatives have a final say about their loved ones was persuasive, as was the additional revenue. Before, when the obits were free, we had a standard form and length and all the obits pretty much sounded the same. Now obituaries are handled by our advertising department.

Today we published a paid obituary of Mary Ann Holder, who by most accounts was a fine, loving mother until last Sunday when something happened and she shot and killed five people and then killed herself. The obituary doesn't include any information about the homicides. (The paid obituary isn't online in the same form as it is in the paper.)

The paid obituary isn't a news story. On the news pages, we have certainly written a great deal about the shootings. Today, the same day the obituary ran, we wrote a front page news story about what the paid obit said and the scheduled funeral services.

Is the omission of the shootings an issue? I can imagine readers scratching their heads. It isn't uncommon for paid obits to omit newsworthy information. What may have brought this issue up is that the obits of the shooter and her victims were all published together.

Our policy — and, I think, the policy of most papers — is that the paid announcement of a person's death should include pretty much what the family wishes. We don't fact-check obits unless there is something glaring, and our experience is that most obituaries are an accurate biographical recounting of the achievements and positive accomplishments of a person's life. Meanwhile, if the person is newsworthy for some reason — positive or negative — the news department will write about the person's life and include anything that's relevant. But I hate it when we leave readers scratching their heads, so I'm not sure our policies are exactly right.

Thoughts?

Dustin Long is leaving us at the end of the week. We shared his salary and expenses with our sister papers in Norfolk and Roanoke, but he started with us 15 years ago as a high school sports reporter so we've always considered him ours. This parting is a tough one.

He has said goodbye on his blog. I want to share what one of his editors, Eddie Wooten, wrote about him several months ago.

Dustin has been a veteran of Landmark Communications. He joined the News & Record Sports team in 1997 after spending nine months at the Landmark’s Carroll County Times.

Dustin covered high schools and hockey for us, then he was selected in 1999 to take the Landmark auto racing job, a position shared financially with our sister newspapers. Dustin moved to the Charlotte area to be closer to the home bases for the top teams in NASCAR.

Dustin’s work ethic is as good as there is. He works hard, and he produces ideas. He likes to write takeouts, and he likes to break news. He likes to find different ways to tell stories he writes, and he likes to offer new ways to present information. He has embraced social media: He has 8,591 followers on Twitter (there is a #hiredustin hashtag already), and his blog, hosted at the Virginian-Pilot site, attracts more than 200,000 hits per month. He engages readers, listens to them and tells us what they’re saying.

The only old-school thing about Dustin is the way he created his brand, a term we’re hearing a lot these days. With Dustin, you get intelligent insight and hard work, not the irritating catch phrases and outlandish statements that pass for “journalism” from the many lazy “big names” in the sports world. Dustin is a go-to guy for his analysis, making frequent appearances, occasionally as a guest host, on the Sirius-XM NASCAR channel. We’ve seen him on ESPN “SportsCentury” documentaries and “NASCAR Now.” And with our blessing, he has written for SI.com this season; he had a previous arrangement with FoxSports.com. And in these difficult economic times and before them, Dustin has managed the company’s resources as if they were his own.

Most importantly, Dustin’s been a good guy and a friend. And for all he’s done for the company, that’s why we’ll miss him the most.

In the meantime, he’s got a few more laps to turn before he’s finished, and we are glad about that. One thing’s for sure: He’s not going to be just racin’ for the points.

If you're looking for a good reporter who can do just about everything, this is the guy.

We published a phenomenal package this morning on Ryan Leonard, who was born without arms. (The story on is in the e-edition. A photo gallery is here.) Columnist Jeri Rowe and photographer Jerry Wolford did their usual outstanding work, and they deserve the bulk of the credit. But some of the credit goes to those behind the scenes, as Jerry notes in a message about Rob Brown, our photo director, and Jennifer Burton, the designer on the package:

Rob pushed me into shooting this in a way that I really did not want to. I wanted to work on it slower and with wrestling only and all by myself. In hindsight, my way would not have worked as well. I shot thousands of photos and edited them down to over a hundred. Rob took that and worked up to the last minute for the final 12 photo edit. He even worked on it while in Asheville on vacation Saturday. Rob kept me on track, motivated me and gave me the time I needed to do it right.

Jennifer sure came through with the final product. When I knew she was doing the design I actually relaxed a little. With all that copy and photos I was a little worried how it would all work out. I was really scared about the inside B&W photos. I can normally see changes I would make with a layout and headlines but not this time. It really was an awesome presentation.

Precisely.

i would be remiss in not including Jeri's editors, Betsi Robinson and Teresa Prout, in helping with the conceptualization and editing of the story.

We have published Mary Ann Holder's photo on the front page twice since the Sunday morning murder-suicide. Both times, the smiling photo of the woman who shot herself and six others, was small -- what we call a thumbnail.

Some people commented on a post yesterday, disagreeing with our use of the photo, saying it was inappropriate given what she had done. Unfortunately, like an idiot, I inadvertently deleted the entire comment stream. (I apologize. This gives the commenters the opportunity to comment again.) But some people on Facebook also said the use of the photo bothered them. Joe Scott has several comments, which for the sake of readability, I'll piece the relevant ones together:

While morbid curiosity can get the best of all readers at times, I think I might be better off not knowing what this horrible person even looked like.... But it almost reminds me of the reaction immediately after Bin Ladin was killed. People wanted to see photos of his dead body. Other people wanted to view his actual dead body and were upset it was hastily plopped into the ocean. I myself found it appropriate that a mass murderer was denied the dignity, honor, and humanity we give people at funerals or in the obituaries. There are many reasons why I don't want to see what Osama looked like after he was killed, but the biggest one was that I don't want to risk the chance that his humanity might in some way be restored in the hearts and minds of the public. I honestly wouldn't feel bad if I never have to look at a photo of Osama at any point in his life for the rest of mine.

Cheryl Pressley responded:

I think the photo is strangely appropriate. A reminder that she was a normal human being like all of us. Not a monster. Something incredibly wrong happened here...something evil and horrible to change this smiling woman from a loving mother and caretaker of the children of others, into a cold blooded murderer. It makes absolutely no sense and I hope that the investigation is able to shed some light on it and partially ease some troubled hearts.

Thoughts?

I've been trying to figure out why Sunday's tragic murder-suicide hasn't gone national. It is the most dramatic and violent tale of death and mayhem since the Klenner-Lynch murders. It has all the elements -- sexual affairs, temporary restraining orders, threatened alienation of affection lawsuit, apparent payoffs. And of course, murder. Five people dead so far. Four of them children. A sixth on life support.

But best I can tell via Google, virtually every media outlet outside of the area is using the Associated Press dispatches. (Except the New York Daily News which is running bylined stories.)

Possible reasons:

* It is effectively a vacation week for most news media so there is difficulty dispatching reporters.
* It is viewed as a domestic quarrel gone horribly bad, but with little universal interest.
* It isn't a whodunit; unlike the stereotypical missing child story.

I can understand why the big papers aren't doing much with it. They're cash-strapped and, presumably, focused more on local issues than some random crime in North Carolina. But it seems tailor-made for television, both the tabloid kind and morning news shows, given the sorts of lurid, sensational programming they often do. On the other hand, without video or family members talking to the media, I suppose it's problematic for TV.

I find that fortunate. I don't wish that kind of national coverage on the families involved or our community.
 

Some fun and not-so-fun facts about today's paper.

* It weighs 4 pounds, 12 ounces.

* Mine has more than 40 store circulars. (This figures varies based on where you live.)

* It isn't the largest paper of the year. Historically a couple Sunday papers in December are bigger.

* The paper is so large it has to be delivered in two trips.

Now for the not-so-fun:

* If something can go wrong it will. We had serious press problems that forced us to shift some pages around. Consequently, they aren't where they're supposed to be. Some of the pages that should be in the first section ended up in the Sports section. It isn't our way of enticing  you to read the entire paper, but that's an idea!

Our apologies.

Thank you all for visiting, reading and commenting. We may argue here, but your comments are always enlightening and appreciated.

I hope you're able to spend today with friends and family.

As a holiday, Thanksgiving is a problem for journalists.

It's only one day, but people have now stretched it to be a Wednesday through Sunday holiday from work. We struggle ourselves to find the balance between giving our staff members time off and covering the news.

And news? One of our primary sources of news -- government -- basically shuts down the entire week. Consequently, news organizations cover the same-old, same-old stories year after year. We've written about how to cook Thanksgiving meals and Black Friday shopping. We have included stories about all the salt in what you're going to eat tomorrow, and tomorrow we will tell you how much that meal typically costs. We'll also tell you what local leaders are thankful for.

But is there a dumber, less useful story that is written year after year than the one about the president pardoning the turkey?  I didn't think so until a friend, Guy Lucas, sent me this one from The Washington Post.

Consensus at last: almost all Americans – from coast to coast and across stiffening party lines – have favorable views of Thanksgiving dinner, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Overall, 93 percent say they have positive views of the traditional meal, including 77 percent who say so “strongly.”

Not everyone, however, is equally enthusiastic about Thursday’s main event. Fully 89 percent of Republicans have strongly favorable views of Thanksgiving dinner, a number that slides to 77 percent of Democrats and 68 percent of independents.

I was hoping it was intended satire, but I can't find any indication of that.

For the record, I am one of the 93 percent.

Happy Thanksgiving.