CNN purges staff photojournalists

[emraphoto]

Memo out today.

From: Womack, Jack
Sent: Friday, November 11, 2011 3:59 PM
To: *CNN ALL Cities ImageSound (TBS); *CNN ALL Cities Tech Ops
Subject: NOTE TO STAFF

For the past three years, we have been analyzing our work process across Image + Sound, both in the field and in our editing and production areas.

Our goal has been to make sure we have the right resources in the right places to meet the demands of all of our programs. Technology investments in our newsrooms now allow more desk-top editing and publishing for broadcast and online. This evolution allows more people in more places to edit and publish than ever before. As a result of these technology and workflow changes, CNN is reducing the number of media editors in our work force in Atlanta. CNN Image + Sound will continue with high end craft editing that has positive impact on our networks and platforms.

We also spent a great deal of time analyzing how we utilize and deploy photojournalists across all of our locations in the U.S. We looked at the evolution of daytime and evening line-ups. We analyzed how stories are assigned and more importantly the ratio of stories assigned that actually make it on to our networks or platforms. We know that we have to sharpen our focus on stories assigned to ensure that this great work gets on air. We looked at production demands, down time, and international deployments. We looked at the impact of user-generated content and social media, CNN iReporters and of course our affiliate contributions in breaking news. Consumer and pro-sumer technologies are simpler and more accessible. Small cameras are now high broadcast quality. More of this technology is in the hands of more people. After completing this analysis, CNN determined that some photojournalists will be departing the company.

We cannot begin to thank these individuals enough for their service to CNN. They leave with our respect and our sincere best wishes.

Now that we have completed this three-year review, we believe that we have the right resources in the right places and the proper staffing at Image + Sound, and that the unit is well-positioned to have an even more positive impact on our networks and platforms.

Jack

*I guess citizen joutnalists are good enough for CNN

[Pickett Wilson]

Yep. And it's going to get much worse. They can get just about any video or still photos they need for free. Why pay professionals? Very sad.

[Jamie Pillers]

Its seems to be yet another case of "shareholder value" equals spending less on quality. At some point here, our sole sources of useful information will be blogs written by who-knows, fact-checked by no one, and filled with news imagery downloaded from the cheapest source and photoshopped by low-paid tech workers in some unknown country. How 'cheesy' does it all have to get before we all just unplug?

[emraphoto]

It's shameful.

I got an earful here a few years back when i said the future does not hold a place for staffers. I am not happy to be right.

[emraphoto]

Its seems to be yet another case of "shareholder value" equals spending less on quality. At some point here, our sole sources of useful information will be blogs written by who-knows, fact-checked by no one, and filled with news imagery downloaded from the cheapest source and photoshopped by low-paid tech workers in some unknown country. How 'cheesy' does it all have to get before we all just unplug?

I agree 100%. I encourage students to unplug now and start working on answers now.

[David Murphy]

What is a "pro-sumer" technology? Why don't these business wonks just say what they really mean: they are under pressure to cut costs, so they are going to try the cheaper route of somehow using amateurs with cheap cameras! That's not a new approach in photojournalism - it sort of harkens back to the age of the lone magazine correspond with paper pad, pen, and small 35mm camera.

My dad shot his own 16mm film when he was a TV reporter in the early 1950's (Bolex H16's - I remember seeing them on the family kitchen table). As TV news progressed, full 16mm sound crews came along and the quality was vastly better! (and reporters could focus 100% on journalism)

[Chinasaur]

Don't miss the point here. A photojournalist attaches context, meaning, reportage. There is an implicit trust. A known compass point. A picure, standing alone, can be maniuplated outside any context.

A picture, alone by itself, gives the illusion that reporting is occurring while the paper/website can impart any twist it likes as to context in the verbiage.

Of course, this has always been the case. However, now with no "named" photojournalists to dispute the website version, it becomes so much easier to distort and misrepresent.

Be aware.

[emraphoto]

Don't miss the point here. A photojournalist attaches context, meaning, reportage. There is an implicit trust. A known compass point. A picure, standing alone, can be maniuplated outside any context.

A picture, alone by itself, gives the illusion that reporting is occurring while the paper/website can impart any twist it likes as to context in the verbiage.

Of course, this has always been the case. However, now with no "named" photojournalists to dispute the website version, it becomes so much easier to distort and misrepresent.

Be aware.

again, another very good, and chilling, point.

[x-ray]

Its terrible to see professional jobs lost and quality degraded in the name of saving a few dollars. One of our local TV companies / Scripps (HGTV, DIY etc) was a few years ago the standard of high quality broadcast. The built three lsrgecstudios here and produced a major part of their programming. A new regional director (CEO) that came into the company decided to chang direction and totally shut down programming production and fired the staff and turned the studios into offices and storage. Quality is out the window now in favor of extremely cheap independent production. You would be shocked st how cheap people will produce 13 30 minute shows.

Now cheap isn't cheap enough and the new trend is to get young college or just out of school video students to write shoot and produce these shows for almost nothing. The net result of all of this is the reduction in quality and the loss of skilled proffesional jobs.

I see the same thing in my business. I'm a commercial photographer and see business drying up quickly. It due to two things brought on by cheap clients, cheap digital cameras and a growing group or amateurswanting to shoot photos and get them published just to see them in print or on the web. Companies that held me to the highest stsndards now accept very poor quality work because they see it as good enough and free.

I don't do weddings or portraits but see an even more serious problem happening in this industry. On a nice Sunday afternoon you can hardly walk through the parks near my home without falling over someone shooting bridal portraits or family portraits. Three weeks ago mybwife and I took a walk through the park and within sight there were four such shoots going on. I know for a fact because I know some of them, they moonlight from other non photo jobs and shoot nights and weekends. Don't get me wrong I'm not complaining about people shooting on the side but I am complaining that the majority do not have business liscens and do not pay tax on their work like those of us doing it legit. It really ticksme to see an industry Bering bled to death this way when the people that built this industry and supported an invested in the community are being screwed.

I hesitate to say this but I see plenty of this in this forum. If you want to shoot for money do the right thing. Get your business liscens, collect sales tax and support your state and community. Quit bleeding the people who built the industry.

[emraphoto]

question. how does one communicate to the mass audience the implications of removing 'professional' from journalism?

[gb hill]

iphones, flip cameras, & You Tube killed journalism around the world. Will Magnum Agency & the Leica be next? I say Occupy CNN!!!:D

[Brian Legge]

I visit CNN a few times a day. I've come to realize that I basically ignore 95% of the stories that are video only and prefer written stories. Its more time economical for me to open a story, skim it to see if its interesting and either finish or move on to the next than it is to watch a video.

I sincerely hope they aren't moving more towards video stories. They certainly have a place but the ability to skim a written story and the additional depth presented there makes them vastly preferable to me.

I wonder what percentage of CNNs budget was for photographers. Given that many companies are making deep cuts due to the economy as it is - and how much harder the news industry has been hit - this may be a necessity to stay in business. Its these times where I wish we had a BBC equivalent - an educated population is too important to leave to pure capitalism.

I hope everyone lands on their feet soon. Its a lousy situation all around - particularly for those impacted but also for their families, coworkers, bosses and for all readers.

[SciAggie]

I have seen this already in our small community with our local newspaper/news website. Our local paper will not pay for articles or images, they expect folks to give them material. Plenty of folks have done that just to see their work in print, but it's amazing how fast the thrill fades.

Now our paper is in very real danger of going out of business. No one reads the paper because there is nothing worth reading. No one looks at the images because they are cr%p. Now the advertisers are unhappy and may stop buying ad spaces. It is an ugly downward spiral.

[huntjump]

Anyone have a contact to write and complain?

[-doomed-]

Don't miss the point here. A photojournalist attaches context, meaning, reportage. There is an implicit trust. A known compass point. A picure, standing alone, can be maniuplated outside any context.

A picture, alone by itself, gives the illusion that reporting is occurring while the paper/website can impart any twist it likes as to context in the verbiage.

Of course, this has always been the case. However, now with no "named" photojournalists to dispute the website version, it becomes so much easier to distort and misrepresent.

Be aware.

Given the way the industry is going, "citizen journalists" are becoming the norm. I hate to say it but I am a fairly well-trained freelancer now, and If it weren't for the other skills I offer the publication I work with, the locals would take over. It's not a good sign, but at the same time it's also not as bad. Sure, the work comes for free and the quality is so-so and it's cost effective. But like most too good to be true things, "citizen journalists" aren't held to a standard and there are times when publications, broadcast media and the like need people with the skill and knowledge to not get them sued in the action.
In the past few weeks I've been to a few shootings, an ATV crash where I was heckled by gang members and shooed away by police. I also went back to the office and delivered the best work I could give within the circumstances. I missed the photo, but knocked out a few grafs for the web.
At the shooting scenes, I was a block away from two more shootings and a car jacking, most of the local "citizen journalists" go after the fact and therefore they usually find nothing.
In a town like the one I cover, real deal journalists and photojournalists are still king. We're crazy enough to run towards the action when others run away or wait 'til the coast is clear.
I took away a piece of advice from the original poster in a paper I had to write last year. It's true, the fear drives you. I notice that I am hesitant at first, but once I arrive I harness it for the moment. I'm sort of a weird traveler making my way through the industry on my way to other goals, but rest assured, where there are violent towns -- there are still places for professionalism to shine through.
With that, I'll say I'm still learning the ropes.

[Bobbo]

I have seen this already in our small community with our local newspaper/news website. Our local paper will not pay for articles or images, they expect folks to give them material. Plenty of folks have done that just to see their work in print, but it's amazing how fast the thrill fades.

Now our paper is in very real danger of going out of business. No one reads the paper because there is nothing worth reading. No one looks at the images because they are cr%p. Now the advertisers are unhappy and may stop buying ad spaces. It is an ugly downward spiral.

+1 to this several times over. I worked for 4 years for a chain of small daily newspapers. I was laid off because having someone who knows how to lay out a paper, knows how to spell and is able to do every job in the newsroom (most of the time better than those already doing it) was too expensive (the company is notorious for buying and selling newspapers, divisions and the entire company like popcorn, so the layoff was necessary to make it look like they make money to potential buyers). The company also shut down presses at papers left and right, so if I were dumb enough to buy a "local" newspaper, it's printed 100 miles away, and if that press breaks, it's a 200 trip).

I really want to talk one of the bigger local businessmen into setting up an alternative weekly and driving the last paper I worked for into the ground (I'm not bitter, they are just that horrible of a firm. I signed a severance contract with a 2-year non-disparagement clause, so ask me in 21 months what company, what they did horribly wrong, and the ethical and possibly criminal violations I saw while working there :)).

Another fun tidbit: CNN is far from alone. Gannet (not who I worked for) is in the process of taking all of their page layout responsibilities out of the individual newsrooms and moving them to 5 regional layout centers, costing hundreds of jobs.

All I know is going to school for journalism was one of the dumbest things I've ever done. I should have become a nuclear engineer and moved to Iran. At least there all I'd have to worry about is Israel or the US bombing my office back into the stone age :D.

Send your complaints to their advertisers / sponsors. Tell them you are switching to Fox News channel.

Absolutely never, ever ever. Sorry, I don't support people who hack into a missing girl's voicemail, making her parents think she is still alive long after her death. How about we just stop watching television news and read the Washington Post?

[Leigh Youdale]

Like everyone else I greatly regret the dumbing down of news and current affairs reporting and the tendency to do all the research (such as it might be) and editing on a desktop in the station.
However, this is not going to go away no matter how much we moan about it. It is just another industry/profession/occupation that has been overtaken by technology. Once it was expensive and hard to get good images. Now every college student and wannabe photographer can access first grade equipment for very little relative to years ago and make damn good images.
News and current affairs is not delivered in magazines, journals and newspapers very much any more. It is now delivered in bite sized images and abbreviated quotes or comment by studio-based presenters using teleprompters in a format designed more to entertain than inform or educate. This is then syndicated across the nation so that replication is achieved at minimum cost while apparently offering the viewer "local" content as well. Interviewees are cut off or their comments cut and edited so that they can often be made to look as though they support things they actually do not - or vice versa. True local news organisations will wither.

It's not going to change. The remedy is an individual one. Turn off the TV and subscribe to a journal which analyses, interprets, and prints commentary by respected journalists who are credited with their input and who attach their names to what they write.

And if you aspire to a career in photojournalism, train first in something you can safely fall back on for an income, because PJ jobs will be like hen's teeth.

[Leigh Youdale]

We're crazy enough to run towards the action when others run away or wait

There's a small book I have titled "Little Bunch of Madmen" written by Mort Rosenblum and subtitled "Elements of Global Reporting" - it's about a quote from a Hearst reporter from the 1930's, saying "Whenever you find hundreds of thousands of sane people trying to get out of a place and a little bunch of madmen struggling to get in, you know the latter are newspapermen".

A great read on this very subject. ISBN 978-098259082-9. Just $12.

[redisburning]

remember what happened to Circuit City when they fired all of their "expensive" but good workers?

hate to see people lose their jobs through no fault of their own.

Anyway, CNN sucks. Personally I get my news from the little 10 minute sections that bookend A Prairie Home Companion, lol. CNN has been doing that "everyone with an opinion deserves a voice regardless of factual accuracy" crap for too long and it's eventually going to catch up with them. CNN's journalistic integrity was gone when they started giving voice to people who believe things in spite of a preponderance of evidence; so I hardly see this as being out of line with their behavior.

My condolences if you are a professional photojournalist for a newspaper.

[jky]

... would you say then that a pro pj's best bet are long term projects? That's something that Joe Blow down the street with a camera phone does not have particular access to...

[jan normandale]

I've deliberately chosen to shun papers, employers and companies that substitute amateurs and beginners for pros. Would you let your doctor's receptionist diagnose and prescribe for you? Would CNN's executive?

So bait and switch for the advertisers is fair game for CNN. Tell advertisers they are a professional organization but they lie they use non professional staff. I shun them and all their confreres. I will support those who do not practice or employ these ethics. It will take a while but the likes of CNN will reap what they sow. Continued declines in viewers, corresponding declines in ad rates until they fail. The management always blames the employees and never look in a mirror. Management and CEO are supposed to be leaders. They are not. The janitor can do their jobs.. for 1/100th of the pay. They better look out.

BTW: the shareholders are long term losers in this game. They just don't realize it yet

[Leigh Youdale]

The janitor can do their jobs.. for 1/100th of the pay.

Well said. I was visiting a large utility company a year or two ago and came across a door with a sign that read "Director of Janitorial Service". I cracked up and laughed out loud at this joke. Only to discover that it was no joke. Just about everybody in the organisation was a Director or Vice President.

[Roger Hicks]

In order to improve our service to you.... We're going to make our service worse.

Banks, tax offices, police... They all do it.

Cheers,

R.

[Gabriel M.A.]

Don't miss the point here. A photojournalist attaches context, meaning, reportage. There is an implicit trust. A known compass point. A picure, standing alone, can be maniuplated outside any context.


Yes, but a vetted "who cares!" to shareholders is obviously good this fiscal year. If most companies in the U.S. had thought about long-term instead of short-term megabucks, they wouldn't have outsourced all their manufacturing power overseas. There is no social responsibility, only CEO bonus responsibility.

[emraphoto]

In order to improve our service to you.... We're going to make our service worse.

Banks, tax offices, police... They all do it.

Cheers,

R.

awesome, love it Roger.

for the record, i have seen a few photojournalists/journalists run in the same direction as the sane folk (including myself on occasion).

i don't for a second believe that responsible, professional photojournalism or storytelling is over. the market was severely bloated with some serious mediocrity and needed the purge. where i have a problem is the choice to abandon the folks that have really put it on the line to provide content. for anyone lucky enough to be billing and getting assignment work, the behaviour of a lot of media outlets etc. in the past few years has been piss poor to say the least.

stringers, who generally work with little to no budget, are out with zero security or resources to mitigate risk and beyond a few outlets, the pay is miserable (if you can get it). this is a shameful and dangerous situation.

in the early fall i was in a region where fighting had erupted. it wasn't the sort of fighting that is predictable or with any sense of control. it was very fluid, unpredictable and very dangerous. i met at least 1/2 dozen freelancer/stringers working away with no insurance, resources for security, body armour/helmets or any hope in hell should they be detained. these folks are everywhere and the media is gobbling the cheap images up. no more day rate. no more expenses. $100, again if you are lucky, for an image that involved risking life and limb to get. everyone is aware of this and it disgusts me.

[dave lackey]

CNN, as well as the others, drive me crazy. I agree with the bad future trend when news reports are in the hands of non-professionals.:eek:

I also hate the political bias of each of the cable news programs.

But one thing is disturbing...not only are the TV screens filled up with so much graphic displays that you can't see half of the reportage, but now they spend so much time with social media quotes as to be nauseous. THIS is professional reporting? A bunch of kids tweeting and facebooking whatever is on their impressionable, inexperienced minds?

The world is in a spiral downward in so many respects. The world of journalism will take two paths eventually but that will only happen when the professional journalists decide to make that path a reality and own their own news channel/publication.

[emraphoto]

i agree Dave. ownership is an idea for moving forward. feel free to toss out more folks... genuinely interested.

[dave lackey]

i agree Dave. ownership is an idea for moving forward. feel free to toss out more folks... genuinely interested.

Boots on the ground! A professional should be out there always! Without it, we risk losing our basic rights.

How many professionals are out there? It is time for them/us to form our own organized news source. It can be done, it just takes leadership.:)

[Colin Corneau]

"...the unit is well-positioned to have an even more positive impact on our networks and platforms."

Someone explain to me how less staff and fewer qualified professionals equals having an 'even more positive' effect on your final product?

Is that kind of like putting less gas in my car and being able to drive farther?

[dave lackey]

"...the unit is well-positioned to have an even more positive impact on our networks and platforms."

Someone explain to me how less staff and fewer qualified professionals equals having an 'even more positive' effect on your final product?

Is that kind of like putting less gas in my car and being able to drive farther?

It's called desk-jockeys. Give em a keyboard in the morning and out by air time. Their source? Twitter. Facebook. Ireporter. Whatever. The average person watching is being sucked in to all of this social media as if it were professional reportage and think it is high-tech truth when in the end it is all opinions and biases by whomever is being quoted.

How on earth are we to keep an eye on governments, crime, and all the other issues we face? :( We are rapidly losing our rights to the truth.

[dave lackey]

"...the unit is well-positioned to have an even more positive impact on our networks and platforms."

Someone explain to me how less staff and fewer qualified professionals equals having an 'even more positive' effect on your final product?

Is that kind of like putting less gas in my car and being able to drive farther?

LOL...now they are comparing themselves to a UNIT...don't even start with that noun.:D:D:D

[dogbunny]

Funny, iReport content is their justification for why they shouldn't have to pay anyone and it was my justification for why I didn't need to visit that website anymore. I wonder who has their finger on the pulse of America? I might be the odd man out.

[emraphoto]

Boots on the ground! A professional should be out there always! Without it, we risk losing our basic rights.

How many professionals are out there? It is time for them/us to form our own organized news source. It can be done, it just takes leadership.:)

i agree, it has been the topic of conversation amongst myself and a few of my colleagues for a while now. how to make it work, marketing etc.

some super talented folks are tossing it about. i think regional focus is what we will see. N49 out of Western Canada is a good example

[emraphoto]

"...the unit is well-positioned to have an even more positive impact on our networks and platforms."

Someone explain to me how less staff and fewer qualified professionals equals having an 'even more positive' effect on your final product?

Is that kind of like putting less gas in my car and being able to drive farther?

less people cloggin' up the server when the 'journalists' are loading wikipedia

[emraphoto]

Funny, iReport content is their justification for why they shouldn't have to pay anyone and it was my justification for why I didn't need to visit that website anymore. I wonder who has their finger on the pulse of America? I might be the odd man out.

bravo, i will not be swinging by CNN for news. at the rate they are going i can just fire up facebook.

[v_roma]

I'm in my early 30s and my entire professional life has been in the current "quaterly earnings above all" era. From what I hear/read, there was a (mythical) time when companies were guided by their desire to make a quality product and not by the stock market. I say this is a joking way but I often wonder what it would've been like.

That aside, is CNN to blame here? I recognize, like most people here, that they may just be shooting themselves in the foot. Everyone is making a crappy product for less so we're going to make our product crappy too kind of thing. But, to me, the question is, do they have a choice? Were they to choose to keep those photojournalists and improve the quality of their reporting, would the average consumer care/notice? Would they be able to survive and compete with other networks doing things on the cheap? I honestly don't know.

[dreilly]

What a fascinating, depressing thread. I'm a supporter of citizen journalism--at least to the extent that it can fill in the gaps/omissions of a professional media with clear biases and blind spots, but I also value enormously good reporting. I'm a citizen journalist myself, publishing a quarterly zine for the last few years about the city I live in. It fills a niche that has been utterly ignored, the need for good quality local coverage--of the feature variety. A quarterly can't do the police beat obviously. We do long-form interviews, I like to think of it as human interest storytelling done right. We still have a local daily...in my mind that might be one of the few remaining markets since TV won't cover the small places and neither will be the few standing big city papers. But it's not a bright future for sure.

[Paul Luscher]

First Olympus, no thanks to M.B.A. folly, and now this. There's a reason I have no respect for the Gospel of the Harvard School of Business.

[MikeL]

Eventually, an event will be reported with microsoft icons pasted into an image from google street view.

[Matus]

...
That aside, is CNN to blame here? I recognize, like most people here, that they may just be shooting themselves in the foot. Everyone is making a crappy product for less so we're going to make our product crappy too kind of thing. But, to me, the question is, do they have a choice? Were they to choose to keep those photojournalists and improve the quality of their reporting, would the average consumer care/notice? Would they be able to survive and compete with other networks doing things on the cheap? I honestly don't know.

I think you are making a valid point. In general most people think that most large companies are making loads of money and introduce this kind of measures to make the load even bigger. Indeed there are some that do, bot for most the declining willingness to pay by customers (or headless pricing fight with the competition - I mean - look at the cheap flight companies) got them on the edge of red numbers. I am not saying that the particular approach of CNN is the best approach - it is just the one companies take most often (they somehow feel that this is the only "safe" approach, often leaving more viable and in the longer run more productive solutions aside to avoid risks or consulting fees)

[-doomed-]

What a fascinating, depressing thread. I'm a supporter of citizen journalism--at least to the extent that it can fill in the gaps/omissions of a professional media with clear biases and blind spots, but I also value enormously good reporting. I'm a citizen journalist myself, publishing a quarterly zine for the last few years about the city I live in. It fills a niche that has been utterly ignored, the need for good quality local coverage--of the feature variety. A quarterly can't do the police beat obviously. We do long-form interviews, I like to think of it as human interest storytelling done right. We still have a local daily...in my mind that might be one of the few remaining markets since TV won't cover the small places and neither will be the few standing big city papers. But it's not a bright future for sure.

I don't think that there is zero value in "Citizen Journalism" in some cases as you said it helps paint a clearer picture. I work at a daily and we have a few citizen journalists who have been invaluable, and a couple who are pushy and demand that we run their stuff first over staffers.
I'll say that for the small town I work (Trenton,NJ) , we're probably one of the few two paper towns, though one is a bit more concerned with what is going on in the ritzier towns that surround the town it supposedly covers.

[shadowfox]

Don't miss the point here. A photojournalist attaches context, meaning, reportage. There is an implicit trust. A known compass point. A picure, standing alone, can be maniuplated outside any context.

A picture, alone by itself, gives the illusion that reporting is occurring while the paper/website can impart any twist it likes as to context in the verbiage.

Of course, this has always been the case. However, now with no "named" photojournalists to dispute the website version, it becomes so much easier to distort and misrepresent.

Be aware.

Wise words. A good piece of photojournalism challenges readers/viewers to think. It does not lead on with an agenda-biased elements to elicit certain expected reactions.


CNN doesn't care what you think.


Agree, read on to my next quotations.



The world is in a spiral downward in so many respects. The world of journalism will take two paths eventually but that will only happen when the professional journalists decide to make that path a reality and own their own news channel/publication.

i agree Dave. ownership is an idea for moving forward. feel free to toss out more folks... genuinely interested.

i agree, it has been the topic of conversation amongst myself and a few of my colleagues for a while now. how to make it work, marketing etc.

some super talented folks are tossing it about. i think regional focus is what we will see. N49 out of Western Canada is a good example

This is what I hope to come out of this discussion.
Those professional ex-CNN journalists ought to create their own broadcasting mechanism.

And it takes a lot of infrastructure to do that globally, not just reportage talents and minds.

[emraphoto]

the ability to create the bodies to produce and distribute work is not the stumbling block for most. the problem is value for goods. how to convince the audience that it is in their interest to support the work financially.

we have a very, very clever and diverse group of people here and perhaps they can offer their thoughts?

[Nikon Bob]

In order to improve our service to you.... We're going to make our service worse.

Banks, tax offices, police... They all do it.

Cheers,

R.

Yea, and the double speak BS just keeps coming. You have to wonder if they really believe what they put out or do they believe everyone is stunned enough to swallow it? If either answer were yes then it is just pitiful.

Bob

[redisburning]

As far as TV news goes, CNN is probably one of the last organizations that has any integrity for telling the real news from both sides. It is vitally imperative that we have neutral news organizations that can gain access that individuals can't, otherwise you end up not getting news, but propaganda, like from Fox and to a smaller extent, MSNBC. If the truth can't come out, how can the populace make informed decisions? I think back to when I was a kid watching the news. Interviews were exactly that, interviews. Now an interview is just an excuse for the interviewer to give their opinion.

you are mistaking what they are doing for neutrality.

it's a false equivalency; just letting people who disagree with reality talk is not neutral at all. it's idiotic.

neutral is when there is NO opinion.

for example, if a new study came out talking about a decline in the ice density in glaciers due to climate change you would expect to see CNN invite both a climate scientist and some denier who has absolutely zero real expertise on the matter who now can come on tv and spout absolute horse **** with no fact check.

that is not neutrality. a neutral story invites only a scientist who has an expertise on the body of work but did not participate in or review the study for a journal. two opinions don't cancel out into a fact, they just give credibility to those who deserve none.

CNN's take on neutrality is one that I can live without. I want a news source where it is clear that it is not opinion that I am getting but just the most complete set of facts that are out there.

[Ezzie]

They have missed the point of photojournalism. Anybody can supply a photo of sorts, and many are willing free of charge. But who´s going to supply the journalism to go with the photo?

[emraphoto]

As far as TV news goes, CNN is probably one of the last organizations that has any integrity for telling the real news from both sides. It is vitally imperative that we have neutral news organizations that can gain access that individuals can't, otherwise you end up not getting news, but propaganda, like from Fox and to a smaller extent, MSNBC. If the truth can't come out, how can the populace make informed decisions? I think back to when I was a kid watching the news. Interviews were exactly that, interviews. Now an interview is just an excuse for the interviewer to give their opinion.

i have to disagree with this assessment of CNN. i agree with the overall body of what you have said CNN is just as bad as the next.

i remember sitting in a room in the Niger Delta watching the CNN report from the same region, about 20 mins from where i was at the time. i couldn't stop asking 'what Niger Delta is this guy in'?

he did look good in his flak vest ripping down the river with the JTF. ironically those are the guys that make me wear a ballistics vest on occasion.

[emraphoto]

They have missed the point of photojournalism. Anybody can supply a photo of sorts, and many are willing free of charge. But who´s going to supply the journalism to go with the photo?

the Arab Spring should have cleared up the fact that journalism left the building a long time ago.

[emraphoto]

Neutrality in news means looking for the truth whatever it is, sans agenda, and reporting it. Otherwise, I agree with you and simply ask if there is a better source for news? I would like to know. I generally inform myself from a myriad of sources and always question those sources for bias. I just want to find the truth myself. Most news is manipulative by nature these days which is why I called it propaganda.

If CNN is going to rely on citizen journalism then I will probably end up not watching the network any longer. Citizen journalism always has a bias.

indeed.

i think one of the challenges is that news/journalism can't be properly communicated in 140 characters.

maybe that is where regional, specialized coverage might have a roll. the al jazeera/cnn racket will roll on with the soundbites. when you want to know more? well, you get the point.

[Harry Mueller]

Photography will live on. So many students in high school and college still want to take a photography course. I for one will encourage the image as part of our lives and hope that design and photographs live on. Take a look at all the cameras still being sold today and the resurgence of film. Facebook site, Film is Fun for one.

[tom.w.bn]

Who needs photographers. Real news now comes over Twitter. Have you seen photos on Twitter? Ok, that's a bit sarcastic and I don't even use twitter but I noticed that twitter is cited more and more in "real" news media. So if 160 characters is enough for a bit of news information then we absolutely have the state of news publishing we deserve.

And please don't overuse the term shareholder value. That sounds like they make more money by reducing cost. I assume that in this business area they desperately try to reduce loss to stay alive.

[Roger Hicks]

you are mistaking what they are doing for neutrality.

it's a false equivalency; just letting people who disagree with reality talk is not neutral at all. it's idiotic.

neutral is when there is NO opinion.

for example, if a new study came out talking about a decline in the ice density in glaciers due to climate change you would expect to see CNN invite both a climate scientist and some denier who has absolutely zero real expertise on the matter who now can come on tv and spout absolute horse **** with no fact check.

that is not neutrality. a neutral story invites only a scientist who has an expertise on the body of work but did not participate in or review the study for a journal. two opinions don't cancel out into a fact, they just give credibility to those who deserve none.

CNN's take on neutrality is one that I can live without. I want a news source where it is clear that it is not opinion that I am getting but just the most complete set of facts that are out there.

It doesn't happen. There is never room for "the most complete set of facts that are out there". At the most basic, the news agencies must always choose what to report: a war, or a stolen chicken? And they have to work with the people from whom they get their information.

There are two kinds of bias: admitted, or unadmitted. But it's always there. Often, it's unadmitted because the reporter doesn't realize that they're a product of their society, their education, their choices, their intelligence. Or because the reporter's biases chime with those of the person who is reading or watching the story, so that the 'consumer' (for want of a better word)can't see the bias.

Thus, for example, many Europeans regard many Americans are 'right wing' while many American regard many Europeans as 'left wing'. Or to choose more specific examples:

Being brought up in a society which offers universal health care inevitably introduces a bias when dealing with societies that don't have it.

Being brought up in a society that is completely terrified of guns (the UK) makes it hard for some people to accept that not everyone is that way (you should see the hunters and their guns by the roadside here in France).

And then there's religion...

Cheers,

R.

[Pickett Wilson]

Well said, Roger. None of us are disinterested observers. Who would want a disinterested reporter, anyway? Any time we stray into interpretation, though, our bias influences the story, and the bias becomes obvious (unless, as you said, the audience shares the same bias).

I think the difference, though, between those of us who news gather professionally and the "citizen reporter" is that most of us are aware of our own bias and attempt to keep it out of our reporting (even if it occasionally creeps in). Citizen reporters may, though, believe that the world really is as their eyes see it, and share that bias without examination.

If we lose professional, educated reporters of the news and must rely on our neighbors and their Iphones for "news," we will not be able to trust what we read or see.

[Roger Hicks]

Well said, Roger. None of us are disinterested observers. Who would want a disinterested reporter, anyway? Any time we stray into interpretation, though, our bias influences the story, and the bias becomes obvious (unless, as you said, the audience shares the same bias).

I think the difference, though, between those of us who news gather professionally and the "citizen reporter" is that most of us are aware of our own bias and attempt to keep it out of our reporting (even if it occasionally creeps in). Citizen reporters may, though, believe that the world really is as their eyes see it, and share that bias without examination.

If we lose professional, educated reporters of the news and must rely on our neighbors and their Iphones for "news," we will not be able to trust what we read or see.

There are two other possibilities, too.

One is to make our biases clear. Gerda Taro, Chim and Capa were NOT reporting the Spanish Civil War 'impartially': they were clearly on the Republican side. As I am on the Tibetan side when dealing with the Chinese.

The other (much clearer in the UK than the USA) is that there are media of known bias, e.g. Daily Telegraph (Torygraph) on the right, Guardian (Grauniad, Guradian) on the left. Or of course the late News of the World in the gutter. The big difference between the UK and the USA is that even though both Torygraph and Grauniad readers KNOW that they have no biases, but are the only people who can think clearly, neither can quite ignore the other's choice of newspaper.

There's wonderful old joke that I have difficulty in remembering in its entirety, but it goes something like,

The Times is read by those who think they run the country.

The Telegraph is read by those who used to run the country.

The Guardian is read by those who think they ought to run the country.

The Financial Times is read by those who own the country.

The BBC, I suspect, must be one of the most objective and best-balanced news sources, because they are attacked more or less equally by the right ("Lefties!") and the left ("Establishment arse-lickers!")

Cheers,

R.

[helenhill]

iphones, flip cameras, & You Tube killed journalism around the world. Will Magnum Agency & the Leica be next? I say Occupy CNN!!!:D

haha...very Good Greg ....!!!!!!!!!...:D

[jsrockit]

I want a news source where it is clear that it is not opinion that I am getting but just the most complete set of facts that are out there.

You'll be wanting a long time... everyone has an agenda.

[Roger Hicks]

I know for a FACT that Fox News has people in the CNN newsroom who are telling the Journalists what they can and cannot write. This has been going on for several years.

Yes, but suggest that Fox leans towards the right (as does the Telegraph in the UK) and the those who like Fox will scream blue murder, because they don't want any version of the news that doesn't suit their prejudices. I know that politics is supposed to be taboo on RFF but it's flatly impossible to ignore it in the context of newsgathering.

Cheers,

R.

[eric rose]

Fox has people in the CNN news room calling the shots. Ya right. Where's your proof.

[emraphoto]

CNN has a LOT of newsrooms. they are in the process of building a huge outlet in Sarajevo.

as per Fox controlling content, i would have to see the empirical evidence on that one.

[emraphoto]

wasn't it CNN who accused FOX of lying when FOX claimed the Libyan government was using journalists as human shields? that one seemed to slip through the FOX dragnet i suppose?

[eric rose]

Good on you, stick by your friend. However I still think it's a bunch of cow pucks. If this were true this indeed would be BIG news. If your friend is any kind of journalist I would expect them to come forward and provide some proof and blow this scandal out as front page news. I can see it now, the headlines will read "News Corp Hogties CNN". But of course we will never hear anything about it since News Corp evidently controls major news outlets.

[Roger Hicks]

Good on you, stick by your friend. However I still think it's a bunch of cow pucks. If this were true this indeed would be BIG news. If your friend is any kind of journalist I would expect them to come forward and provide some proof and blow this scandal out as front page news. I can see it now, the headlines will read "News Corp Hogties CNN". But of course we will never hear anything about it since News Corp evidently controls major news outlets.

Dear Eric,

Well, yes. It's their business. The only question is how many major outlets they control, and how effectively.

Cheers,

R.

[BillBingham2]

.......
Those professional ex-CNN journalists ought to create their own broadcasting mechanism.
............
And it takes a lot of infrastructure to do that globally, not just reportage talents and minds.

They should form some sort of agency/co-op. Hire a grant writer or to and sell their work where they can.

They also should look to new outlets like Current. Perhaps even start their own for pay sight that has in-depth reporting we do not see on CNN or other places any more.

I wish them luck.

B2

[Steve Bellayr]

This nothing to be shocked about. For qround 30 years now News Networks have been cutting staff. In the past you had a reporter stationed in each major area. Now there may be one covering 2 continents. Fox initiated the taling heads concept of news which was not only extraordinarily profitable but incredibly inexpensive to produce. All the company needs is a short video pulled off the internet and a guest who is not highly paid but doing it to increase his/her media exposure for book sales. As for CNN their news coverage has IMHO gone down. They cover a lot more soft stories with fewer people and those that they do employ seem to be of a lower caliber.

[Comrade Conrad]

This (http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-704542?hpt=hp_c2) was on CNN.com this evening. I don't even know what I'm watching. Is it supposed to be comedy? It surely isn't about journalism. Is this what staff photojournalists at CNN have been replaced with? If it is, I want to puke. If it isn't, it's just plain embarrassing anyway.

[Pickett Wilson]

The future of news reporting. Nothin' ain't worth nothin' but it's free.

[emraphoto]

question. how does one communicate to the mass audience the implications of removing 'professional' from journalism?

would still love to hear folks thoughts on this? consider it a favour granted

[DominikDUK]

I think firing good journalist in order to make money is absolutely disastrous on the other hand 80% of the journalists I know are no more competent or objective than the average man from the street. The remaining 20% are absolutely important for our society and democracy and I am absolutely glad they exist.

CNN and objectivity is a contradiction in itself these days. Most medias are ownes by big corporation with an agenda. Just take the reporting about Iran or Lybia objectivity is something else.
I am sorry for the journalists that will get fired and I've personaly been hoping for a newspaper and or TV Station that tells the stories that aren't told by the big media outlets or tells stories in an objective way. Maybe this will lead to journalists forming their own media (newspaper or TV).

Dominik

[Pablito]

Tell them you are switching to Fox News channel.

That's a joke, right?

[jordanstarr]

When my ex-girlfriend worked at the Edmonton Sun in Alberta, Canada a couple years ago, they laid off their most senior and expensive photographers and bought a Canon G10 for $400 and sent my girlfriend at the time through a few hour photography course and said she can take photos of the stories she does without the need of a photographer. They also got her to do video for their online stuff. So, she had to do double the work for the same pay while the biggest media giant in Canada skimmed off workers and raked in another fat chunk of cash. They still have photographers, but not like they used to. She will even admit she had little idea what she was doing. Shame.

[mervynyan]

Stop paying for CNN years ago, they are not objective and tried to brainwash the populace at large, Georgian War is case in point. Regardless, many good reportage photo guys are still producing great works depends on their narratives. In globalized world, their narratives are no longer valuable and become political, NGOs are only way to make your mark, for better or worse.

[Leigh Youdale]

Fox has people in the CNN news room calling the shots. Ya right. Where's your proof.

Well, indirectly, here it is.
Rupert Murdoch clearly controls FOX and all his other satellite investments through News Limited and the financial structure he's established. He owns newspapers and TV stations here and elsewhere around the world. He is known to be extremely hands on in the day to day operations of his empire, fully up with the detail but handles most of it by phone and non-permanent communication. So he and his family can deny they knew anything about anything and that whatever goes wrong is the fault of people lower down the food chain. He pays them well and protects them as long as he can but abandon them when it gets too hot. He is known to cultivate powerful and influential relationships in Government and is able to call on political leaders for meetings to discuss matters of interest to him - political or business.
The people who report directly to him and are well paid to do his bidding hotly deny that they receive any overt direction from Rupert. They are tough people and argue his cause strongly, but there are numerous defectors from the ranks of print journalists in this country (and no doubt elsewhere) who have gone public with stories of how their stories are cut, edited or downright distorted to reflect the politics and financial imperatives of the owner - never by direct face to face instruction but always on the instruction of those in management who take their orders from Murdoch. Sometimes it's not by direct "order" but by the way the second line of management deliver the "line" that Rupert has indicated is "acceptable".
The conflict with their values has caused these journalists to seek work in other organisations. These are experienced and respected journalists who found it impossible to be coerced into reporting according to the Murdoch 'line' and maintain their integrity.

The News of the World scandal is illustrative of his methods. You should not delude yourself that his modus operandi changes elsewhere in his Empire.

[Leigh Youdale]

This (http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-704542?hpt=hp_c2) was on CNN.com this evening. I don't even know what I'm watching. Is it supposed to be comedy? It surely isn't about journalism. Is this what staff photojournalists at CNN have been replaced with? If it is, I want to puke. If it isn't, it's just plain embarrassing anyway.

It's designed to be very 'hip', very cheap to produce, without accountability (blame the 'citizen journalists' if it's wrong) and is Rupert's answer to Twitter. A big advertising revenue stream he's just realised is coming over the hill and he might otherwise miss getting his share.

[Red Robin]

Snagging a gig as a photo-journalist was never a easy way to earn a living. The trade has all kinds, the good ,the bad, and the gifted. They all started somewhere, some by chance, some went to school but they had to learn the craft. The photo schools are still turning out grads every year and it makes me wonder. With the decline of the magazines, the disappearance of most of the newspapers and now the lay-offs of photo-staffers at the networks, I wonder where will the next "great" photographers come from? It takes time to learn most any skill where will that happen now, by chance - with a phone camera?

[Coldkennels]

The photo schools are still turning out grads every year and it makes me wonder. With the decline of the magazines, the disappearance of most of the newspapers and now the lay-offs of photo-staffers at the networks, I wonder where will the next "great" photographers come from? It takes time to learn most any skill where will that happen now, by chance - with a phone camera?
Flickr. The next generation of photojournalists will effectively only cover botany stories and instead of Pulitzers they'll be rewarded by irritating twinkly .gif images.

In all seriousness, this whole shebang worries me for very personal reasons. I just graduated from university with a writing degree. A friend of mine graduated from the same uni with a journalism degree. We are now both sat on the scrapheap, wondering why we didn't just do apprenticeships to become plumbers. :bang:

[jsrockit]

I don't wonder where they will come from so much as for those that do come forward where they will go?

The art world! ;)

[BobYIL]

As long as the means like Photoshop exist citizen photojournalism won't work for serious institutions like the CNN; and if they implement it in large scale then in short period they will end up being "dull" to play safe. Who can trust unknown "citizens" for key news coverage!!! Here's an example:

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=114173&highlight=north+korea

[emraphoto]

well perhaps a bit premature, letting the cat out of the bags sort of affair but...

i say 'to hell' with the outlets. they are a serious pain to deal with, seem to be under the illusion that they are doing you a favour by running your work and the return on investment is not good.

in the coming year i don't plan to target/approach/rely on any media network or outlet to keep working. i think that horse has been flogged to death.

instead, a few like minded and seasoned photojournalists, a full time grant writer and researcher, a great and experienced writer and a marketing guru and i are making sure we have our yearly salary's and operating capital in place before we even begin. currently ironing out the details of a 'collective' to gets rolling.

[emraphoto]

The art world! ;)

you have no idea how right you are

[emraphoto]

I think firing good journalist in order to make money is absolutely disastrous on the other hand 80% of the journalists I know are no more competent or objective than the average man from the street. The remaining 20% are absolutely important for our society and democracy and I am absolutely glad they exist.

CNN and objectivity is a contradiction in itself these days. Most medias are ownes by big corporation with an agenda. Just take the reporting about Iran or Lybia objectivity is something else.
I am sorry for the journalists that will get fired and I've personaly been hoping for a newspaper and or TV Station that tells the stories that aren't told by the big media outlets or tells stories in an objective way. Maybe this will lead to journalists forming their own media (newspaper or TV).

Dominik

that is a very interesting idea for the future Dominik. i suspect some folks are looking into it right now.

[gm13]

well perhaps a bit premature, letting the cat out of the bags sort of affair but...

i say 'to hell' with the outlets. they are a serious pain to deal with, seem to be under the illusion that they are doing you a favour by running your work and the return on investment is not good.

in the coming year i don't plan to target/approach/rely on any media network or outlet to keep working. i think that horse has been flogged to death.

instead, a few like minded and seasoned photojournalists, a full time grant writer and researcher, a great and experienced writer and a marketing guru and i are making sure we have our yearly salary's and operating capital in place before we even begin. currently ironing out the details of a 'collective' to gets rolling.

So glad to hear, best of luck with it!

[Teuthida]

American media is a complete joke. It's corporate dictated pablum spooned to the brainless masses. Propaganda in the purest sense. CNN is exhibit one.

[emraphoto]

American media is a complete joke. It's corporate dictated pablum spooned to the brainless masses. Propaganda in the purest sense. CNN is exhibit one.

so uh, don't beat around the bush. tell us what you really think:)

[benlees]

What a fascinating, depressing thread. I'm a supporter of citizen journalism--at least to the extent that it can fill in the gaps/omissions of a professional media with clear biases and blind spots, but I also value enormously good reporting. I'm a citizen journalist myself, publishing a quarterly zine for the last few years about the city I live in. It fills a niche that has been utterly ignored, the need for good quality local coverage--of the feature variety. A quarterly can't do the police beat obviously. We do long-form interviews, I like to think of it as human interest storytelling done right. We still have a local daily...in my mind that might be one of the few remaining markets since TV won't cover the small places and neither will be the few standing big city papers. But it's not a bright future for sure.

I agree with this. The more people involved the better. If more people are engaged there is more noise. Quiet is bad. There is certainly room for cell phone pictures and professional journalism.

[boomguy57]

As sad as this story is, it is not really about photography or photojournalism. This is another instance of the perpetual march of corporations against the rights of workers. For the past 40-odd years workers wages, benefits, working conditions, and job security have stagnated at best, and been severely restricted if not downright criminalized at worst.

Bottom line: the future, as it stands now, has all of us working as independent contractors, day-to-day, with no job security to speak of, zero benefits, and declining pay. The worst part of it? We're all just happy to have a job at all.

The great lesson that corporations learned from the recent economic downturn is that they can make do with fewer employees. They laid off swaths of workers, and the ones that remained were so desperate to keep their jobs they agreed to pay cuts, or just doing more work for the same remuneration (which is essentially the same thing). Capitalism thrives on high unemployment--it acts to depress wages and benefits, and only helps those who own the capital, not those wage workers at the bottom.

There are certainly other variables at play here too: the explosion of digital photography, and subsequent democratization/popularization/accessibility of the medium, has made these news conglomerates realize that they can cut costs by skimping on professional photography and selling us on the "wow" factor of someone's footage of a flood from their mobile.

Times, they are 'a-changing...

[Teuthida]

^Well said. The "Land of the Free" has become a Corporate State, bought and sold by multinational corporate money and influence. American "Democracy" is an Orwellian sham.

The scariest part is that corporate America has convinced the very people it exploits so ruthlessly and cynicaly that it is the solution, not the problem. Its insanity.

We need a thorough going revolution.

[mdarnton]

*I guess citizen joutnalists are good enough for CNN
No, not citizens--since they now uncritically broadcast propaganda directly from politicians' own PR staffs, they have no need for any journalists at all.

Perhaps some of you missed, and I don't have a link at the moment, one of the NYT's editors' seeking opinions last week on his blog as to whether the NYT should make an effort to ascertain the truth of what the subjects of their stories say--as if there could be some debate about the question, and implying that the NYT doesn't currently do that. There we have the essence of contemporary journalism: it's no longer about the truth. If you think reporting lies and political propaganda is what news media does, and apprently contemporary "news" believes that, journalists aren't necessary at all.

[Red Robin]

Nothing new here. move along- move along.