Trustworthy, like Wall Street

No, I"m not joking. Anyone who's anyone in the financial field has heard of the CFA designation. Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Charterholders must undergo three incredibly difficult six-hour exams and then have four years experience in the finance field in order to obtain their title. It's worth it though. The difficulty of obtaining a charter is recognized throughout the field and charterholders are routinely offered prime finance positions and the confidence of their investors.

Knowledge of the time value of money and effective portfolio management are not the only things stressed by the CFA Institute upon their potential candidates. An entire section of their level 1 exam is dedicated to "Ethical and Professional Standards." They have these points driven into their heads:

• Place the integrity of the profession and the interests of clients above your own interests
• Act with integrity, competence, and respect
• Improve and maintain your professional competence

They go on to say that a financial analyst's duties are first: to their client, and second: to their employer.

A journalist's client is their reader. Their employer is the advertiser. Integrity in our profession is the reporter's creed of accuracy and honesty. Reporters and financial analysts are under the same kind of pressures. They must report their findings accurately and without bias, disclose any personal entanglements with their material that may color their opinion or coverage of it and submit their findings in a timely manner. They both have a lot of room for error and, at the same time, no excuse for it.

My class fell apart when asked about journalistic ethics. Four people, whom I think should remain nameless because they're students, had disastrous opinions on media ethics and the entire class just seemed unsure of how to answer certain questions about ethical behavior. Is a free concert ticket unacceptable to a journalist? Is one small lunch, paid for by a source, compromising the morals of a reporter? What these students need to find is the reason for the professor's frustration with their answers/ hesitancy. The CFA level 1 exam had a practice question that I think summarizes my point, I'll paraphrase it:

Analyst Bob is visiting Geico to obtain information to complete a research report on Geico's stock. He learns that Geico is wiling to pay all of his expenses for the trip, including meals, accommodations and his plane ticket. Does Analyst Bob?
a) Accept the expense-paid trip and write an objective report.
b) Pay for all travel expenses, including meals and incidental items
c) Accept the expense-paid trip but disclose the value of the services accepted in the report
d) Write the report without taking the trip

Now, I know somewhere my four classmates are treading the fine line of moral culpability with answers a and c, while some may even be thinking answer d is the moral high ground. The correct answer is b. It's b for analysts and it's b for journalists too. Swap Analyst Bob with Reporter Jane and we have a piece for the business section. The answer is b not because a and c are totally wrong but because b is the choice that compromises the analyst's/journalist's integrity the least and that is the best thing for either of them.

Journalists make their money on their word; people trust them to deliver accurate news to them. Every time a journalist compromises their integrity, even in the slightest way, it compromises it for the entire profession. The same goes for finance professionals. Just look at how people treated Wall Street after the housing bubble burst.

Every person has a set of morals. They are our guidelines for good behavior. For some professions though our own moral guidelines are not enough. For finance majors, the CFA guidelines are perfect, for us journalism majors I recommend The Society of Professional Journalists creed:

• Seek truth and report it
• Minimize harm
• Act independently
• Be accountable 

Remember, Wall Street wasn't the only one making headlines for unethical behavior.

End of an Era

The offices are empty. Stale air scatters dust over keyboards while vermin settle into the walls. The sign outside is for a newspaper no one has heard of in years. Out back, on the loading dock, tattered and yellowed copies are stacked awaiting a delivery that will never be made. The date is April 1st 2012.

Is this a bit drastic? Maybe so, but this is the doomsday future our professor is banging into our heads. The newspaper industry is dying. It has an ailment that needs to be remedied. It’s bleeding cash worse than a spoiled kid’s piggy bank. The problem is finding an answer within potential reporters is like searching for the giblets in an uncooked turkey; if you dig down deep enough you’re sure to find something, but it's bound to create an awful mess and might just make a few people sick in the process.

I, however, shall try again.

I believe that reporters are deluding themselves right now. They, or we (if I should be so bold), believe that somewhere exists a happy answer that will bring success, and money, back into our industry and allow us to continue to pump out papers and employ a small army of reporters to pursue every scintillating lede we desire. It’s a happy ending that we need to ax immediately. We’re not in the fiction business.

So, let’s observe this problem of dwindling finances from a financial perspective, shall we?

1) Newspapers are running on a deficit.

2) New forms of revenue are in short supply and venture capital is scarce, therefore

3) Newspapers must look for areas to cut back on spending before their debt threatens to overwhelm them

Yes, cutting spending. It’s the topic that’s routinely greeted with shaking heads and grim smirks. Yet, if we face it, we may find an answer to our predicament.

So, let’s make another list and call it Things to cut!

1) Newspapers.

Yea, I think we’re complete.

Cutting print copies is something that has to be done. Decreasing circulation cuts down on the number of printers needed, labor costs in printing room, delivery costs and the cost of retrieving unsold copies. Let’s face it; it’s the best option as it involves the least amount of reporters being laid off.



Source: Nielsen Media Research, Pew Research Center

for the People & the Press, Audit Bureau of Circulations. 1



Network television doesn’t reach everyone but you don’t see CBS financing the expansion of their television signal so they can reach those 3 people that live in a cave with Kevin Costner and his pack of wolves. So why do newspapers feel an obligation to deliver the news to everyone? They’re practically printing the money out of their bank accounts and delivering it to a consumer that likes to do some of the crosswords on it before they pop it into a bird cage for Polly to poop on.  

 No, it’s time we cut back on print and focused on the web entirely. The world is moving there, and if we don’t follow it we’re going to be left behind. Of course, as the graph below points out, close to 90% of newspapers ad revenue comes from print not online.

So, cut down, cut back but don’t cut it out. We can survive in a world with less print newspapers. Will it be a world with fewer reporters as well? Hopefully not, if technological advances have shown me anything it’s that less computer savvy people are doing more with the little computer know-how they have. They may not be creating perfect web products but they’re passable and profitable, which is more than enough.



Source - http://stateofthemedia.org/

Picture - http://www.fiscalfizzle.com/

The Price of Information

Professor Huber sits down in front of his class, a copy of the Times Union, crumpled and folded, lies in a heap on the table in front of him. He had just asked them what the future of the news industry will be. Does information want to be free or expensive? Maybe the question is better posited as: do people want information badly enough to shell out some dough for it?

Huber picks up a section of the paper and proclaims loudly that one cannot walk out of Stewarts or any other store with this paper without paying for it first. This is a great claim indeed and would be true if people weren’t strolling out of the stores all the time with a free copy of the Times Union tucked neatly into their computers.

My classmate, Reid Buchanan, said that the argument is over, that people already made their decision, and they are not going to pay for the content that the Times Union, and others, is already giving away for free. So how does information gain back its price tag? Buchanan thinks the information that can sell is information “that solves a problem” or is “information you have to have,” which he likens to the Wall Street Journal’s financial coverage or ESPN’s sports news.

But where does general news coverage fit into this? We know it’s necessary for people to know what is going on in their world and to have good, unbiased reporters tell them. Yet, how willing are people to actually pay that reporter that wants to earn a living doing this when someone else will offer something similar for free?

I talked about The New York Times pay wall previously. Jay Rosen says “It’s a gamble” Michael Wolff describes it as a “Hail Mary strategy.” But what if they’re wrong?

I suggested in class that an online pay model may work if it’s built around a niche. There are niche markets online for many things. Why not journalism? The Wall Street Journal has a big niche: financial news! There are many investors willing to toss a few bucks at financial experts that spew information that’ll net them some positive gains or at least some good insight. Insight seems to be a key word.

One of my classmates mentioned ESPN Insider, which supplements the site’s basic sports coverage with exclusive blogs and juicy news tidbits.

But sports and finance are only two niches and there are infinitely more of them. Another example, video game ezine The Escapist, serves up biting editorials and game news from talented writers and buoys this with a Publisher’s Club membership that offers mobile and tablet access and an advertising free version of their site, along with HD, or HTML5, video. The same thing can go for VIP access to celebrities in entertainment or access to in depth reporting from countries across the globe. Pop your interests into a virtual shopping cart and you're ready to check out.

“This is about the “app mentality.” People are clearly willing to pay for content and experiences that they consider valuable and important,” says Arthur Sulzberger Jr. Chairman of The New York Times Company. So, maybe The New York Times isn’t as out of touch as some say they are. The Times needs to foster this “app mentality” and other newspapers need to take notice. Sell your paper piecemeal and maybe the audience will like every section so much they’ll give the whole thing a chance.

Here’s a new depiction of the family dividing up the paper. Dad has a paper copy of the business section on the couch. Junior scans the sports section on his laptop, while Sis dabbles in the entertainment section on her phone, all while Mom checks the local section on the desktop. Each walks away with a section of news that they care about and within each section is a group of reporters that they can, hopefully, remain loyal enough to support.

Extra! Extra! A paper actually wants to get paid for its services!

Screen Print of the Article - Just in
case they decide to change that header

The New York Times has finally decided to put up a pay wall. In an oddly bold printed article with the web banner titled “New York Times to Impose Fees for Web Readers on March 28,” they lay out their plan for subscription web access to readers. Website and mobile access is $15/month and an extra $5 if you prefer the iPad to your phone. A rather useless $35 “all-access plan” is also available, if you absolutely must have access to all three. If you’re only a casual viewer, don’t worry, you’re guaranteed access to 20 articles per month. I assume this means access to any article will now require registration, by which they can count your 20 article limit.


I was a little hung up by the terminology they used in the article header. A Fee is usually a charge with a negative connotation. Your bank charges you fees for overdrawing your account. Your job might charge you a fee to replace your lost desk key. Late fees are your library’s punishment for keeping their books and movies for too long . Your credit card charges fees for anything, because they are an instrument of Satan. The theme is that fees are charges that are levied when one exploits a service.


So, in The Times Freudian-slip of a header, I believe they are actually chiding their online readers for their selfish behavior. Do I think it’s right of them? HELL YES! It’s about time The New York Times stood up for themselves and decided that their 1st rate news coverage cannot be gobbled up by news hungry web crawers and headline nabbing bloggers. Their basic web access subscription is a ridiculously reasonably priced plan. To compare, The Wall Street Journal is $8.62 a month and the Los Angeles Times is 12.99 a month for their eEdition, which is an electronic carbon copy of their daily paper (their online content appears to have no pay wall).


So, is “fee” the correct word choice for the New York Times new subscription plan? Yes. Should they use it to notify their readers of this change? Probably not, but hey, they’re The New York Times not some sissy, tabloid nonsense and people will pay for the privilege of reading their fine paper.

Milk, Cookies & Crazies




Although it's quite cinematic school should never actually feel ominous

 The other night my wife and I had an unusual craving. We were just about to watch the horror movie “The Crazies,” which involved scenes of horrific violence, gore and naughty language when we were overcome with a pang for milk and cookies. My wife had just baked a couple leftover batches from the weekend and we couldn’t resist them despite the crude entertainment. I have to say though; a warm chocolate chip cookie alongside a pitchfork to the gut does me just fine, but would probably be an odd juxtaposition for anyone else.

It makes me think about the odd relationship of bullying and school, namely that the one cannot exist without the other. School has a noble purpose, to educate our youth in a number of fields, to stretch their minds and flex their cognitive prowess, and to help prepare them for the world they will face as adults. Like any noble endeavor though, it can become tainted. Our army has a goal of protecting our nation but fails to protect women and gays within its own ranks. Our markets attempt to diffuse risk to allow for greater financial access for all Americans and a stable economy to support growth but they became shortsighted and greedy and nearly destroyed our entire financial system. Likewise, our schools have strived to teach our youth, yet they have fostered an environment of bigotry and violence that has grown so enormous that they have lost any control over it. They have lost their students trust and ours as well.



Click for a larger view

 The Cyberbullying Research Center, directed by two professors with doctorates in Criminal Justice, has been running studies on students since 2004. Their website is a vast resource for anyone interested in concise, empirical evidence of this problem. Their most recent study found that about 20 percent of students have experienced cyberbullying and roughly the same percentages of students have admitted to cyberbullying. Their research has also found a startlingly high percentage of students that had been bullied within 30 days of the survey. [see their chart]

Tuesday night the College of St. Rose and the Times Union hosted a panel that discussed the rise of cyberbullying and various ways to hopefully prevent it. My social media class joined a large group of parents to see what information they had to share.

Lori Cullen, a plump and cheery mother of three children and Times Union blogger, said she recently had a “shared introduction” to social media with her children, finding out that her young children already had an internet presence on sites such as Facebook.

Sandra Morley, discussed “teaching etiquette” in her classrooms. Her perfectly erect posture and stern expression gave away her profession as Principal of Bethlehem Central High School as clearly as her introduction from moderator Lydia Kulbida, the news 10 anchor. She spoke of a need for schools to “know your students and know them well.”

The discussion stalled when it came to Joseph Donohue, state police lieutenant with a strong jaw and white hair, who riddled his comments with cliché after cliché. He had a lot to say but said nothing stronger than bullying had gone too far by the time it reached the police.

The opposite end of the contribution spectrum was Professor Stephen Birchak. He wore a dark, tailored suit and a disarming grin and shook things up with a joke or two before settling into his lecture. This wit obviously helps him in his appearances as Dr. Bird, speaker and therapist for children dealing with esteem issues. At the meeting it aided him in conveying his points.

Birchak found that most cyberbullies don’t realize the pain they cause by making hurtful comments online about others. He believes most of them do it seeking attention for themselves and that they are “ignorant to the pain and suffering they cause.” Birchak also described the need for administrators to seek out the bystanders and believes that they are the key to overturning bullying in any environment, in school or online.

This coalesced nicely into the final panelist, James Preller, author of the novel “The Bystander.” The book covers the topic of bullying in the middle school environment and the fear experienced by the student on the sidelines, the silent witness. Preller utilized visits to actual schools and his own life experience to create what he called a work of “realistic fiction.” He told the story of reconnecting with a bullied classmate on Facebook and how this grown man had never fully rid himself of the terrible memories of his youth and the dreadful feelings that these recollections still evoked.

“How we treat each other has lasting effects,” said Preller.

Then two students from Shenendehowa High School introduced a mock demonstration of what they termed the “virtual bathroom wall.” It was an example of a Facebook profile, created by cyberbullies, with the sole purpose of ridiculing and humiliating a fellow student. In addition they created Facebook group pages and a Formspring account to detail every avenue cyberbullies are using to torment their victims.

The St. Rose panel comes on the heels of President Obama’s conference that discussed the problems of bullying. This seems to beg the question, what plan will work as an effective means for, if not deterring bullying, to lessen it and its harmful effects?

Is the federal government’s intrusion into local schools an effective means to this end or is this another area best left to local administrators?

I like to believe that bullying can be prevented as a result of curbing the “bystander effect” and allowing victims more outlets to report being bullied. Bullying is not exclusive of schools but that doesn't mean that schools can't be exclusive to bullying. If the problem were given the attention it deserves, and maybe now it finally is, then perhaps we can eventually conquer it. In the meantime, I like what Professor Birchak said to one of the questions at the end of the panel.

“[Victims] feel there’s a permanence to things,” he says. What students need to realize, he says, is that these things shall pass and that there are people that love and care deeply for them that they can turn to. He says that often times talking to someone about their plight helps them to see the bigger picture, that being a victim of a bully does not define who they are. To the parents, he says, their obligation is to “keep that conversation open.”

UAlbany, there’s egg on your face

This weekend University at Albany students took early morning drinking to a new level and found the blogosphere more than willing to broadcast it to the nation.

Our city's annual buffoonery, also know as “Kegs and Eggs,” commenced this weekend with five UAlbany students arrested and city police almost as scratched and battered as one Nissan Maxima .

My “partying” friends usually overwhelm me with funny stories of their drunken expeditions with colored photos to document it. This year I haven’t heard a thing from them but I already have an earful.

The Times Union wrote and blogged about it, local bloggers called out students and faculty, while YouTube and Local NBC affiliate WNYT passed the disturbing videos along. Even a site called Irishcentral.com covered it. All of this culminates to an Associated Press piece nabbed by nothing less than the Wall Street Journal Online.

Apparently, while some students were rioting, throwing beer bottles and attacking police officers, others decided to assault the aforementioned car. Apparently nobody noticed, or cared, that they were being videotaped during this.

It’s been reiterated repeatedly how instantly information is passed on in the blogosphere, now UAlbany knows just how fast, and horrible, this truly is.

The internet sucks and I hate it

It’s hard to create an argument against a medium while using it. Clary Shirky discusses this conundrum when he describes the Abbot of Sponheim, defending scribes in a text proliferated by the printing press. “The abbot’s book praised the scribes, while its printed form damned them.”

Despite this, I intend on proving my point.

Take a look at this.

Now, this could be a video that supports my argument or a video of cats doing stupid things, either way it doesn’t matter. You will more than likely click on that link and see what’s on the other side of it because I told you to. This is a prime example of the arrogance and distracting nature of the web. We live in a world where even a well-rounded argument cannot be sufficiently gleaned from an article. Not only do these hyperlinked potholes abound on the web but we now expect them. Our browsers adopted tabs so that we can conveniently pile them up and flip-flop between them.

I meant to give you this.

This Pew study has a number of interesting points to it but one they stress to make is that blogging in the younger generations of internet users has been on the decline.

Only half as many online teens work on their own blog as did in 2006, and Millennial generation adults ages 18-33 have also seen a modest decline—a development that may be related to the quickly-growing popularity of social network sites.

They go on to make the point that older generations are actually increasing their internet use, especially on blogs. Why to some this point is pertinent, I’d rather ignore it for now as I believe the older generations influence on youth’s online behavior is minimal as evidenced by this chart from Pew.

In fact, the opposite seems to be suggested by Pew’s data shows that use of social media sites by users age 46-64 has increased by over 25%

However, what is applicable is the switch from long-form blogs, like Blogger or LiveJournal, to the short and sweet forms of status updates or tweets. If the internet has spawned more and more examples of ways to distract its users, from Farmville to Funny Cats, perhaps blogs are just another casualty of our lack of attention.

Yet, there are some that would look toward this as a good sign. They might argue, how is attention less accessible now than before? They would say today’s youth are privy to mountains of information, in tweets, status updates, blog quips, article summaries and aggregated content, and they somehow find a way to process it all and retain it.

Author, Steven Johnson, argued that information overload allows our brain to build new pathways to process information faster. While his book never approached the internet’s potential benefits one could conceivably piece an opinion together based on his approach to other mediums such as television and videogames.

Jamais Cascio, who cites Johnson, does just that in his article, “Get Smarter,” saying that, “The trouble isn’t that we have too much information at our fingertips, but that our tools for managing it are still in their infancy.” He finds that some occupations may have to suffer or dissolve completely from the changes wrought by the internet. The rest of his article sounds like a hypothetical android world.

Perhaps this is what we have to look forward to. Cascio describes a world where brain augmentation is a snack food and complex digital assistants are so commonplace as to “not even merit comment.” But, this, he says, is probably an age 50 years or so in the future. So don’t expect R2-D2 to beam into your garage and suddenly transform into a Chevy Camaro.

The argument appears to have changed however. It is no longer a question of how the world’s technologies will change society into a global online community. It’s not even a question of when. The argument itself is over. As Clay Shirky succinctly puts it, “the future belongs to those who take the present for granted.”

But, while I hold his small, orange book “Here Comes Everybody” in my hands and read the printed words pressed onto off-white parchment, I find myself hoping for that change to slow down. I hope it doesn’t consume the printed word that I’ve grown to love as quickly as it seems to be. If it does than I truly will hate the internet, despite all its benefits and I don’t think I’m alone on that one.