The Drowning Pool

[johnastovall]

"Journalism is not quite a blood sport, but in the right hands or the wrong hands, depending on your point of view, it is very competitive. Or it should be. But today something is afoot on the land that is fast putting competition to rest...."

The rest of the Drowning Pool...

[janikphoto]

Funny. I've seen a lot of the freelance assignments disappear in the local papers, as they started actively sharing photo coverage. Same idea... Paper X and Paper Y used to HATE running the same photo. It was a knock to them. There was a fight to see who had the best pic that day. The two competing papers would hang their copies up side by side on a board in their respective newsrooms, so each journalist could see who was winning/losing the competition for best story/best photo/best layout/best coverage.

As budgets became tighter and tighter, they decided to start collaborating on stories. You send your crew to cover Britney Spears and we'll run your content. Then we'll send our crew to cover Aerosmith and you can use our content. No more war. No more competition. Band together to save money. Share to survive. I miss the fight, though...

[Imagebuffet]

Originally Posted by janikphoto

Funny. I've seen a lot of the freelance assignments disappear in the local papers, as they started actively sharing photo coverage. Same idea... Paper X and Paper Y used to HATE running the same photo. It was a knock to them. There was a fight to see who had the best pic that day. The two competing papers would hang their copies up side by side on a board in their respective newsrooms, so each journalist could see who was winning/losing the competition for best story/best photo/best layout/best coverage.

As budgets became tighter and tighter, they decided to start collaborating on stories. You send your crew to cover Britney Spears and we'll run your content. Then we'll send our crew to cover Aerosmith and you can use our content. No more war. No more competition. Band together to save money. Share to survive. I miss the fight, though...

Your town had TWO papers?

[JohnT]

Originally Posted by Imagebuffet

Your town had TWO papers?

Dallas used to have the Dallas Times Herald (my parents subscribed when I was a kid) and the Dallas Morning News. Now it's just the latter as you know.

[janikphoto]

Originally Posted by Imagebuffet

Your town had TWO papers?

Don't act like you aren't from the metroplex. It says Garland right under your name. I'm sure you've seen the two largest publications in the area. remember DFW is made up of both Dallas AND Ft Worth... Jeez.

[MHampton]

What has bothered me is the fact that the new outlets are turning more and more to content that they can get for FREE. "Send us your photos and we'll put them on TV!" And people are falling all over themselves to do it, just to maybe have their 30 seconds of fame. Check out all the self-proclaimed "reporters" in the iReport section of CNN. How many photographers has this scenario put out of business?

Serious news reporting is a thing of the past. Seems a lot of the professionals are going where the money is and that is who can get the most unflattering picture of the celebrity of the day.

Yes, our 4th estate is in sad shape. The idea of pooling also means you get one viewpoint of a story and that viewpoint can be shaped by those in power because they tell the news where and when they can set up their camera. Gone are the days when you have 5 news crews out there fighting for the story, and all 5 get back with the same story but from different vantage points.

But... this rant could go on forever and I've probably already lost the 2 people that even started reading this post.

[Cajungaltx]

The Houston Chronicle sent out a reporter and a photographer/video person yesterday to interview my husband and I on the ATT issue. We expected them to be here an hour... maybe an hour and a half. They were here for almost 4 hours... the photographer took tons of photos, and pulled out the video equipment...and did a short segment kind of going over what we'd discussed in the 'paper notes' part of the interview.

I was amazed actually - at the thoroughness of the writer....

Her situation is a bit different however - both her AND the photographer will be embedded with my husbands unit for a while - so they are spending lots of time with the families in the unit it seems. They were at the marriage seminar a couple weeks ago that we went to.

[janikphoto]

Originally Posted by Cajungaltx

The Houston Chronicle sent out a reporter and a photographer/video person yesterday to interview my husband and I on the ATT issue. We expected them to be here an hour... maybe an hour and a half. They were here for almost 4 hours... the photographer took tons of photos, and pulled out the video equipment...and did a short segment kind of going over what we'd discussed in the 'paper notes' part of the interview.

I was amazed actually - at the thoroughness of the writer....

Her situation is a bit different however - both her AND the photographer will be embedded with my husbands unit for a while - so they are spending lots of time with the families in the unit it seems. They were at the marriage seminar a couple weeks ago that we went to.

This is because the big papers are realizing that they can't beat the internet in quick daily news, but they can beat it with long term, deep stories. The DMN has a team now devoted to creating stories that make take a whole year to develop. The kind of thing you'd actually need/want to sit down and read for fifteen or twenty minutes.

[Imagebuffet]

Originally Posted by janikphoto

Don't act like you aren't from the metroplex. It says Garland right under your name. I'm sure you've seen the two largest publications in the area. remember DFW is made up of both Dallas AND Ft Worth... Jeez.

LOL! Actually, I'm from Albuquerque, one of the last towns to have two major newspapers (the "Journal" and "Tribune").

[janikphoto]

Originally Posted by Imagebuffet

LOL! Actually, I'm from Albuquerque, one of the last towns to have two major newspapers (the "Journal" and "Tribune").

Oh, well then... you have a legitimate excuse. I saw Garland in your info and assumed you actually lived in Garland, TX. Both Dallas and Ft Worth have their own paper. They've always considered each other rivals... competitors.

[Imagebuffet]

Originally Posted by janikphoto

Oh, well then... you have a legitimate excuse. I saw Garland in your info and assumed you actually lived in Garland, TX. Both Dallas and Ft Worth have their own paper. They've always considered each other rivals... competitors.

Actually, I do live in Garland. I've lived in Garland, Longview, North Dallas, Frisco and Plano over the last 15 years. I've seen the "Dallas Morning News" in each of those cities. I don't usually run across anything printed in Fort Worth.

[janikphoto]

well, the Ft Worth Star Telegram is a big North Texas paper, and the DMN's biggest, closest competition. Obviously, there are other big newspapers in TX, but they don't really compete for DMN readership like the Telegram does.

[C!LLY]

I should have known this topic wasnt about music.....