OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2015
Disruption is a good thing for editors
By LAURA SELLERS
The Daily Astorian
D
igital. Diversity. Disruption.
These three words could apply to-
day to, I imagine, every enterprise out there.
The 3Ds mean dif-
ferent things to differ-
ent industries. Together
they generally mean one
thing: CHANGE.
In newspaper and
broadcast media news-
rooms around North
America, the 3Ds were
explored at the Associ-
ated Press Media Editors
Laura
and American Society of
Sellers
News Editors conference
in October on the Stan-
ford University campus in Palo Alto, Califor-
nia.
More than 350 newsroom leaders met for
three days to share journalism, innovation,
ideas and battle scars. These are editors from
our nation’s largest publications to the small-
est, which I daresay, just might be The Daily
Astorian and EO Media Group. It was our
largest gathering in years.
What did we learn, besides celebrating our
successes, dissecting our misses and getting
a boost of renewed energy for the cause of
quality journalism? Here are some takeaways
that likely relate to your business, too.
Laura Sellers/The Daily Astorian
Editors listen to a presentation by American Press Institute’s Tom Rosenstiel about “What’s New? What’s Next?” at the Associated
Press Media Editors and American Society of News Editors conference at Stanford University.
A
mong the discussions:
• Millennials are our pathfinders:
Tom Rosenstiel of the American Press Insti-
tute says millennials, or people being born
or reaching young adulthood around the year
2000, are not just our next audience or cus-
tomer base – they are a path to all users or
customers by leading their parents and fam-
ily members. Look at the rise of Facebook,
Twitter, texting, mobile and streaming in
sharing news.
“I believe there are still new audiences to
be conquered,” said Alfredo Carabajal, man-
aging editor at Al Dia at The Dallas Morning
News. “We continue to define audience as
the people that at some point chose to give us
money to get a print paper, and we struggle
with that idea to go beyond that. Now, every-
body who has a smart phone is potentially
your audience.”
• You can transform your data and analyt-
ics: Rosenstiel points to a study that aimed
to boil down the many statistics we can get
from digital — page views, visitors, time on
site — with what that meant for the value
readers found online. The study found: Ma-
jor enterprise stories earn nearly 50 percent
more engagement. Long-form stories drive
23 percent more engagement. Adding a pho-
to gains a 19 percent boost. Adding audio
and video gets a 36 percent.
• Improve coverage of your magnet fran-
chises: He suggests a news organization
finds its niche and blow it out of the water
rather than being thinner in many areas. This
plays out for The Daily Astorian in our re-
duced national/international coverage and a
focus on what impacts the Columbia-Pacific
region.
Rosenstiel says we need to get away from
the “general store” mentality. Another panel-
ist, Mizell Stewart, said: “We need to be able
to do a select number of things extraordinari-
ly well. It’s not good enough to be all things
to all people anymore. Editors have to be far
more focused on identifying what’s working
and doing more of that and being willing to
make the hard decision to do less on areas
that are not working.”
Pew Internet
Research into the gap between scientists and public opinion. Learn more online at
http://pewrsr.ch/1O4MJ1w
Too often, people
rely on personal
experiences,
political affi liation,
or demographics to
formulate opinions
about science.
ONLINE
W
e also examined the gaps between sci-
entists and the public in a session ti-
tled The War on Science: What Journalists
Need to Know.
Too often, people rely on personal expe-
riences, political affiliation, or demograph-
ics to formulate opinions about science, said
Lee Rainie, director of Internet, science, and
technology at Pew Research Center.
A survey Pew conducted last summer
contained startling results comparing what
scientists believe and what the public be-
lieves. For instance: Thirty-seven percent of
U.S. adults believe it’s safe to eat genetical-
ly modified food, compared to 88 percent of
scientists;
On climate change, 50 percent of the gen-
eral population think it is due to human ac-
tivity, compared to 87 percent of scientists;
Just to be contentious: 65 percent of the
general public believe humans evolved over
time; and the scientists, 98 percent;
Pew Internet research:
http://pewrsr.ch/1O4MJ1w
Seelig’s Insight Out video:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWKDu8Irtb0
APME/ASNE conference coverage:
http://bit.ly/1LbNOQD
Carl Earl/The Daily Astorian
A few of the APME regents at their annual dinner in Palo Alto, Calif. From left, Andrew
Oppmann of Middle Tennessee State University, Suki Dardarian of the Minneapolis
Star-Tribune, Annette McGruder, Laura Sellers and Karen Magnuson of the Rochester
(N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle.
W
e all need to occasionally recharge our
businesses and lives.
Through the APME experience over the last
20 years, I have watched newsrooms trans-
form through editors around the nation. Some
of those changes were cataclysmic and some
were just a part of rolling with the punches.
In the past year, I’ve watch Gatehouse
Media buy the family-owned Columbus Dis-
patch, while its longtime managing editor
became the editor and struggled with budget
cuts.
Bill Church, the executive editor of the
Sarasota (Fla.) Herald Tribune and formerly
of the Salem Statesman-Journal, has re-imag-
ined his newsroom to tackle huge enterprise
projects on a tight budget.
I’ve watched as Karen Magnuson and her
Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle
leads the way in diversity through action and
community discussion.
The chance to celebrate and commiserate
with peers and be inspired by new ways of
framing the issues and solutions is a good
way to be ready for the next disruption, which
is likely just round the corner.
Laura Sellers is the managing editor of
The Daily Astorian and the president of the
Associated Press Media Editors.
Open forum
Thanks for the help
H
ow many Masons does it
take to screw in a light bulb?
I am an 86-year-old widow
of a Master Mason, and while
I was at the Masonic Lodge I
happened to mention that I have
about ¿ ve burnt out light bulbs
in my house, and that my son
lives in Portland. One of the
men overheard and immediately
volunteered to replace the bulbs.
He not only came to my house,
but also stopped at the store and
bought the bulbs on the way.
This action is not uncom-
mon for these men, but I sel-
dom see a public thank you in
print, so here it is. Thank you
very much, Masons.
SALLY SMITH
Gearhart
The dilemma
I
n reference to the article,
“The homelessness dilem-
ma” (The Daily Astorian, Oct.
23), I suggest that our com-
munity’s bigger problem is, in
fact, the 95 percent of home-
less people “... who usually are
just ¿ ne (behaviorally),” and
not the 5 percent who insist
on disrupting the tranquility of
our lives.
For those of us who have
a home, with a bathroom just
down the hall, with closets
and drawers in which to safe-
ly store our belongings, with a
kitchen where we have a stove
on which to cook the food we
have in abundance and can
save in the fridge, and a bed-
room where, in its warmth,
we can sleep through the night
without fear of the elements,
human and otherwise — for
us, the real dilemma is how
best to continue to ignore the
realities of those 95 percenters.
JULIE SNYDER
Astoria
STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher • LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor
BETTY SMITH, Advertising Manager
• CARL EARL, Systems Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
• DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
HEATHER RAMSDELL, Circulation Manager
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