Shops Where VJs Have Worked [Archive] - MediaLine's Open Line Forum

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 05:46 AM

Rosenblum has said on numerous occasions that his main goal is to make the journalism better. It's reasonable to adopt that goal as a measure of the success of his program.

Rosenblum also said back in the fall of 2005, in a discussion on B-Roll, that his system would improve ratings. He even claimed that WKRN would show improved numbers by January of 2006. It is therefore reasonable to adopt the goal of increased ratings as a measure of the success of his program.

Are there other measures of success? Sure. But he agreed to these measures, at least until he realized he couldn't meet his own benchmarks. If he can't demonstrate Frog's definition of success (which he has accepted as his own in numerous conversations), then he needs to stop pretending that this will make journalism better and improve ratings, and simply focus on the fact that it saves money.

Let's see how he answers. My bet is that he'll try to redefine success so that failure is included in the definition.

Consider This

Jan 11th 2007, 05:50 AM

Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
If you can't generate increased ratings by doing what Rosenblum suggests, then what's the point of doing it?Well, there's the whole saving money thing but I know that doesn't count because TV stations aren't for-profit enterprises.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 06:01 AM

Originally posted by Consider This:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
If you can't generate increased ratings by doing what Rosenblum suggests, then what's the point of doing it?Well, there's the whole saving money thing but I know that doesn't count because TV stations aren't for-profit enterprises.[/QUOTE]But that is NOT Rosenblum's stated goal. In fact, he vehently denies that's the point of what he's doing. It is, aparently, just a happy side-effect.

The Mockingbird

Jan 11th 2007, 06:01 AM

Profit, huh?

Sony pulled a 6 percent profit last year.

Many local television stations are pulling 40 and 50 percent profits.

Now, pray tell, exactly WHY is it such a hardship to spend money on a community service that validates the usage of the public airwaves, again?

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 08:42 AM

Have any of you actually read your company's mission statement? Do you know what a mission statement is? You will rarely find a mission statement that defines a company's mission as maximizing profit. Why is that?

When you're talking about the profit motive, you're often talking about two different things. The profit motive itself refers to the idea that the primary motive of business is to make money. But that doesn't mean that the primary motive is to make as much money as possible, other consequences be damned. No, the primary goal is to make enough profit to make the enterprise worth the effort. Beyond that is simply cherries. People often confuse this and think the profit motive means maximizing profits, but it simply doesn't.

The profit motive has to be weighed against other goals of business. People in this country often forget that these other reasons for business exist. One is to provide goods and services needed and desired by society. The Enron guys forgot that and were actually making money by NOT providing goods or services, and in some cases by denying service. If companies aren't providing goods or services, or if they are providing poor quality substitutes for other products, they are instead harming society and their own markets by skimming off the productivity of everyone else without putting anything back in.

Another goal of business is to employ members of society. A single company might save or make more money by employing fewer people; but if the profit motive results in widespread unemployment, people won't have the money to buy the goods and services these companies offer. Again, they harm society.

You go into business not just with the goal of making as much money as you can, but also with a responsibility to society to contribute something with your endeavor. Building a successful business doesn't just involve profits. Success also includes how a company interacts with and contributes to society. These other goals taken with the profit motive define success. Folks, this is basic economics.

And, strangely enough, companies that do well in these other goals usually do pretty well with their profits. That's because by contributing to society and becoming an integral part of society, they strengthen their position within society. People need them. Their survival is assured.

So, what do television stations offer society? They offer entertainment and information. They offer employment. Yet, Rosenblum is selling them a system that degrades what they offer, reducing the quality and reliability of the product while reducing employment. He is contributing to making television more of a drain on society and less of a contributor.

Is his system a success in saving money? It appears so, at least in the short run. Is it a success in making stations more profitable? I have my doubts about the long run effect on profit. Is it a success in contributing something to society and the economy? I don't think so.

But that's what Frog's questions aim to discover. It's hard to measure a company's contribution to society, but his questions go to really the only measurements we have. Are the VJ stations providing a product or service that people want (ratings)? Does the product or service provide the quality they want in that offering (critical praise)?

You can't simply dismiss these questions, because they do weigh on success in the profit motive and the long term survival of the company as well.

[ January 11, 2007, 09:56 AM: Message edited by: Spike ]

The Mockingbird

Jan 11th 2007, 09:04 AM

The rush for cash has blinded many people to the reality of the fact that corporations are supposed to do something besides take people's money.

That's why I think further government regulation is needed. Corporations need to focus on the customers, not the investors; politicians need to focus on the citizens, not lobbyist; videographers need to focus and shoot, while reporters do the interviewing.

I'm tired of the lowest common denominator, the most bang for my buck that's soon to be ten cents, and the brain drain that is happening (and I'm encouraging) in broadcast journalism because of ridiculously low compensation.

Something needs to be done.

Consider This

Jan 11th 2007, 09:28 AM

Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Consider This:
Well, there's the whole saving money thing.But that is NOT Rosenblum's stated goal. In fact, he vehently denies that's the point of what he's doing. [/QUOTE]I'm not certain what "vehently" means but right on his web site (http://www.rosenblumtv.com/consulting.asp) he promises "a 60%-70% reduction in costs." And if you read any of the articles quoting management at the VJ stations, they all mention the cost savings. So if by "vehently" you mean "does not," then, yes, he vehently denies it.

As for "WHY is it such a hardship to spend money on a community service that validates the usage of the public airwaves," it's because the government of the country has decided that the airwaves don't belong to the public. They belong, for the most part, to an elite group of companies whose purpose is to satisfy their shareholders.

Community service -- if the reality programming sometimes only loosely based on fact and designed to attract women of certain ages that masquerades as news can truly be considered community service -- is the happy side-effect.

I'm not saying any of that is good. I'm just saying that it is. And getting rid of Michael Rosenblum is not going to change the conditions that make stations receptive to his pitch. Stations go OMBs because they're cheaper. No other reason. Success entails filling the same news holes for less money. All that mumbo-jumbo about a "new journalism paradigm" is just a way for stations to spin the changes as more than budget cutting. The spin is what Rosenblum sells.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 09:34 AM

Originally posted by Consider This:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Consider This:
Well, there's the whole saving money thing.But that is NOT Rosenblum's stated goal. In fact, he vehently denies that's the point of what he's doing. [/QUOTE]I'm not certain what "vehently" means but right on his web site (http://www.rosenblumtv.com/consulting.asp) he promises "a 60%-70% reduction in costs." [/QUOTE]I guess he assumes that people who frequent media bulletin boards wouldn't look at his site, because, away from that website, he insists the better journalism is the objective of his concept.

...and "vehently" means I don't always check my typing before I post.

[ January 11, 2007, 11:46 AM: Message edited by: Michigan J. Frog ]

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 09:57 AM

Originally posted by Consider This:
Success entails filling the same news holes for less money.No it doesn't.

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 10:57 AM

Dear Boys

I respond here with some degree of trepedation. I am many things (fraud, snake oil salesman, destroyer of quality tv), but one thing I am not is a masochist. I don't mind intelligent give and take but I don't need abuse, not for what you guys are paying me. And needless to say, paying clients don't treat anyone this way.

You ask about previous successes with the model, either in ratings or in content.

As I told you before, no corporate client would ever engage me for this without a substantial vetting of prior projects. You may think that your mangers and owners are idiots. Trust me, they are not. The vetting process can often take up to a year and is very rigorous.

What did they look at? KMcGraw Hill looked at Nashville. They spent a great deal of time there. Young looked at the BBC and several European projects. You may think that European broadcasters have no similarity to US broadcasters. This is not true. You might as well say (and once people did) that Japanese car manufacturers had no relationship to US car manufacturers. That also proved to be not the case.

What is particularly interesting, in light of your fascination with 'quality' and the 'responsibility of news broadcasters to 'better serve the community', it was this and not cost cutting, that motivated the BBC to adapt this technique. They are, after all, entirely a public service broadcaster. They have an income fixed and guaranteed for ten years. They have little interest in cost cutting. It is, in many ways, anathema to what they do.

I spent 5 years with the BBC, trained 750 VJs, placed an average of 50 at each of their local news stations. I also converted BBC Scotland, BBC Wales and BBC N. Ireland. As you can imagine, this was a massive investment on the part of the BBC and a massive change in their ways or working. They did not enter into this lightly.

You can also understand that The BBC places a premium on quality. If this did not deliver quality they would never have pursued it for so long and with such vigor. Even had I been able to sell them a 'bill of goods', they surely would have stopped after the first year or two. They did not.

Their sole desire was to improve the journalism, which they spent a great deal of time and money analyzing and tracking. They focused group repeatedly and always found that audiences both preferred, and more importantly remembered the VJ pieces above the conventional pieces.They also found their ratings for local news improved.

The competition, ITV, tried intially to compete and instead has recently announced that they are closing down their regional and local stations.

On the other hand, the BBC's most recent experiment in local news - 5 hyperlocal VJ-driven nodes in Birmingham has resulted in a commitment to build out 60 such nodes across the UK. It is one of the core points of the Charter Revision just passed by the government.

The success of the BBC convinced other European broadcasters to adapt the method. Dutch Public TV, also primarily interested in content rather than savings has adapted this across all their local stations. We are about one third of the way through the conversion. ARD, Germany's public broadcast network has also adapted this, with 150 VJs trained and fielded so far. They, like the BBC place a premium on quality.

In Belgium, Concentra, the largest newspaper chain began working with us 3 years ago and built 4 local tv news stations all driven by the model. The TV stations are now the most profitable part of their media empire.

The model has only recently come to the US. When implemented correctly it results in both greatly reduced costs per minute of production as well as increased quality.

Many US stations will now move in this direction. Will they simply pay lip service to the concept and use it to cut costs and drive OMBs into the mix? I have no idea, but I am sure there are those who will. Will others adapt this properly and deliver both increased output as well as increased quality? I would expect there will be those who will see this as a better long term and ultimately more profitable goal.

Is this going to happen? I think you can bet on it. Otherwise there would not be so much activity on this topic every time it surfaces on a board. If you work in the business now is this going to impact on your life? Doubtless.

I have no doubt that now one or two of you will pull a selected sentence from the above and write some snarky response. Have fun, if this is what amuses you.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 11:56 AM

I won't pull any quotes from that post. But let me boil down all the words you used, and re-ask the question:

Can you name one US newsroom that has adopted your concept and as a result, has seen an increase in ratings?

[ January 11, 2007, 12:59 PM: Message edited by: Michigan J. Frog ]

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 12:08 PM

Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
I won't pull any quotes from that post. But let me boil down all the words you used, and re-ask the question:

Can you name one US newsroom that had adopted your concept and as a result, has seen an increase in ratings?Do you not know how to read?

Here was your question verbatim from above:

"I'd consider "success" to be (a) a ratings increase, an indicator that the product is seen as "better" than traditionally-produced newscasts by the viewers, or (b) critical praise by reviewers, most likely in newspapers."

The fact that all these stations have moved to this is an indication that, in your own words, "the product is seen as 'better' than.." Otherwise they would not have done it. Trust me, this is an expensive and wrenching move to make. It is not easy.

Your problem is that you think you are some kind of TV District Attorney - "isnt it true that ratings have not improved?"

You know what? I don't know. In the US stations, I don't know. There has been some anecdotal movement upwards a tick or down a tick but ratings can be due to lots of things. There has been no explosion of ratings and no collapse either. (go and start pulling that line out with some KRON number for 4:30 on tuesdays). Overall we are far too early in the day to get a clear ratings read as yet.

Marty McFly

Jan 11th 2007, 12:20 PM

Dear Froggy,

Get this through your green head:

IT'S NOT ALL ABOUT THE RATINGS.

It IS all about the MONEY.

Rosenblum's concept does MORE with the same # of employees. Rather than have 15 two-person crews, you now have THIRTY one-person crews. (Example)

Is it designed to increase ratings? Of course not! No one has a sure-fire, guaranteed way to increase ratings. No one can possible know how to please 50,000 viewers overnight and make them switch channels and love a specific station.

NO ONE.

So get off the ratings kick. There are stations that get the bronze every ratings period and don't hold a candle to what other stations do. But guess what? THEY STILL MAKE TONS OF MONEY.

Again, if your ONLY pathetic argument to Rosenblum's concept is that it is not a guaranteed way to increase ratings, then you'll win the ridiculous argument every time.

Enjoy!

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 12:56 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
You know what? I don't know. In the US stations, I don't know. There has been some anecdotal movement upwards a tick or down a tick but ratings can be due to lots of things. There has been no explosion of ratings and no collapse either. (go and start pulling that line out with some KRON number for 4:30 on tuesdays). Overall we are far too early in the day to get a clear ratings read as yet.Oh, come on. As a businessman, you are telling me that you don't know if what you've been pitching has increased ratings once it has been implemented?

After you give your whiz-bang sales pitch, don't the GMs and NDs want to see examples of how this concept has made ratings jump?

Or maybe they're satisfied when you get to the part about the 60-70% reduction in costs--although you did just claim the conversion to VJs is expensive.

How long must a station use VJs in order to see an increase in ratings?

This, by the way, is why we use words like "snake oil salesman": You come here telling us about advocacy journalism, "more cameras on the street" equalling more and better coverage, better serving the public, and all the rest.

But in reality, you can't show any benefit for those things--like a gain in the number of viewers watching the product, or critical praise.

You do show a massive cut in the expense to produce news, though, That, you can support. Unlike the lofty goals you've been talking about here, for which you can't show examples, you're definitely able to tell clients all about how much money they'll save.

So why not just be up-front about it? Just admit that your goal is to show TV station management how it can save a lot of money but still put news on the air.

At least you'd be honest if you did that, instead of trying to convince us that you care about producing a newscast people will watch. You just admitted you don't care about that when you said you "don't know" if your own concept has resulted in higher ratings.

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 01:09 PM

You will notice that I do not promise 'better ratings'. This is your thing. It is not something I promise to deliver. No one can.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 01:18 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
You will notice that I do not promise 'better ratings'. This is your thing. It is not something I promise to deliver. No one can.No, you don't.

But why all the rest of the drum-beating about better journalism? It's clearly not what you're selling. Why the charade?

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 01:26 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
What is particularly interesting, in light of your fascination with 'quality' and the 'responsibility of news broadcasters to 'better serve the community', it was this and not cost cutting, that motivated the BBC to adapt this technique. They are, after all, entirely a public service broadcaster. They have an income fixed and guaranteed for ten years. They have little interest in cost cutting.Uh, no. They DO have an interest in cost cutting. That's why they had that budget crisis last year in which they had to lay off thousands of employees and cut most departments' budgets by 15%. You must think us dumb ol' Amurkins don't pay attention to what's happening across the pond.

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
I spent 5 years with the BBC, trained 750 VJs, placed an average of 50 at each of their local news stations. I also converted BBC Scotland, BBC Wales and BBC N. Ireland. It was interesting how when you started spinning this stuff over on B-Roll, an actual photog who actually worked for the actual BBC in the actual local service chimed in to point out places you were wrong. For instance, I'm working from memory here, but I believe he said that the local efforts were actually using photogs and reporters, NOT exclusively one man bands. He, himself, is a photog, working in one of these places you say is all VJ.

Then he told us stories of having to edit for the VJs who were in fact being used, because some of them didn't actually edit for themselves because they acknowledged the craft operators did a better job. He also told us about his most recent newscast, in which the only VJ produced item was a story about a record-breaking onion. (For those who didn't know, that was the original source of the occasional comment about VJ stories being about record breaking vegetables.)

I think he also said that there were NOT 750 (actually, I think you said 850 then) VJs in the BBC, because most of the people who went through your training then went back to their regular jobs and didn't actually work as VJs. I don't recall the math, but I do recall that he worked out the number of employees at the various local operations and showed that there could not possibly be as many VJs working at the BBC, despite the number you claim to have trained. He said a good portion of those, for example, were producers who never went out into the field but who were sent to your training center for a few weeks and sent back to their old positions, NOT going out into the field.

So, if I'm recalling all this correctly, all your claims about the BBC seem to smell of bovine excrement.

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
They also found their ratings for local news improved.I'd like to see those numbers. I'm sure Frog would as well.

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
The model has only recently come to the US.Really? I thought the model started here in the US. Isn't NY1 your crowning achievement in this country?

It's funny how you use NY1. Sometimes you use it in your sales pitch to show how long you've been doing this. Other times you conveniently forget about it.

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
I have no doubt that now one or two of you will pull a selected sentence from the above and write some snarky response.I don't think the word you were looking for was snarky. I think you really wanted to say that some of us would recognize ordure of cattle and comment appropriately. You've perjured yourself so often that you can't keep your misrepresentations straight.

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 01:26 PM

I believe, and experience has borne me out, that when properly employed, that is, when you hit a critical mass of VJs in house so that you end up buying more time for each VJ to work on their materials; when you only require 2.5 pieces a week or less, that the quality of the journalism increases. Good journalism takes time, it takes the ability to take risks, which means the ability to tolerate a certain percentage of pieces you may pursue which will never pan out. This is in fact what happens. But, as I have said repeatedly, you must implement the entire system. You cannot just extract the cost savings aspect of it because in the end it will not work. This is not secret and I am always very up front with clients who want do try this.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 01:27 PM

Originally posted by Marty McFly:
It IS all about the MONEY.
No, it isn't.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 01:36 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
I believe, and experience has borne me out, that when properly employed, that is, when you hit a critical mass of VJs in house so that you end up buying more time for each VJ to work on their materials; when you only require 2.5 pieces a week or less, that the quality of the journalism increases. Okay, you said experience has borne this out.

Where?

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 01:40 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
You will notice that I do not promise 'better ratings'. This is your thing. It is not something I promise to deliver. No one can.Actually, you did promise to deliver just such a thing when you converted WKRN. You said that WKRN would see an increase in ratings. You even said that they would see that increase by last January, a year ago.

You're a year late, with nothing to show for it.

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
But, as I have said repeatedly, you must implement the entire system. If they implement the entire system, it should convert everyone over to VJs, right? So if they had 15 two man crews on the street, they would then get 30 VJs on the street, right? You need all those people on the street to allow everyone to scale back to 2.5 pieces per week, right?

So how in the hell do they get a 60-70% reduction in cost, if they're still paying the same number of people?

Gotcha.

The contradiction there is obvious. In order to get the 60-70% reduction in cost you sell them, they can't possibly run the program the way you've been trying to sell it to us. You know they won't. So you can't come here now saying that if it doesn't work, it's not your fault that they didn't do it right, because you KNEW they wouldn't--no, couldn't--do it that way in the first place.

Making claims about a product that you know cannot possibly fill those claims is fraud, isn't it?

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 01:41 PM

Originally posted by Michigan J. Frog:
Okay, you said experience has borne this out.

Where?New York One. :D

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 01:49 PM

Experience has borne this out in the European stations, which have been at this far longer. The cost reductions are calcualted on a cost per piece or per minute basis. That is, cost of goods produced.

Michigan J. Frog

Jan 11th 2007, 01:53 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
Experience has borne this out in the European stations, which have been at this far longer. The cost reductions are calcualted on a cost per piece or per minute basis. That is, cost of goods produced.Your post said the quality of journalism goes up; it didn't say anything about costs.

But, see--you go right back to the money element, even when I ask about journalism.

[ January 11, 2007, 02:54 PM: Message edited by: Michigan J. Frog ]

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 01:54 PM

that was in response to your pal spikes question about how i can say we cut the costs/

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 02:18 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
Experience has borne this out in the European stations, which have been at this far longer.Longer than New York One?

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
The cost reductions are calcualted on a cost per piece or per minute basis. That is, cost of goods produced.Your website says absolutely nothing about calculating the savings this way. A station doesn't produce stories for individual sale. The station's product is the full newscast. Someone reading your website or listening to your pitch is going to assume that the 60-70% cost reduction applies to the cost of producing the newscast, not individual stories.

If you haven't reduced the staff size, then the labor costs of the newscasts stay the same. There's no possible way the station can reduce costs 60-70% if the labor costs remain the same. You've intentionally selected a meaningless calculation to misrepresent what you're selling.

Further, your own numbers don't bear out your claim. If a station normally has 15 two person crews on the street turning two stories a day, that's 30 stories for each day's newscast. If you have 30 one man bands on the street instead, turning 2.5 stories per week (your number), that's only 15 stories per day (30 x 2.5 / 5 = 15). If the cost of producing the entire newscast is the same, each story produced by a VJ will cost TWICE what it would cost under the conventional two man system.

So even your per story calculation is wrong. I'm guessing math isn't your strong point.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 03:04 PM

And one other thing, while I'm thinking about it.

Cost of goods produced is not calculated by unit. It's calculated by the full inventory of units that have been produced during the accounting cycle. You were referring, instead, to the per unit cost. If you say to someone with a business background (management or accounting) that you promise a 60-70% reduction in cost of goods produced, they are going to understand you to mean the total number of units produced. They will NOT assume you mean the per unit cost, because that's not what you said.

I think you know this already and are simply using buzzwords in your sales pitch to mislead people. If you don't know this stuff, you probably shouldn't use words you don't understand.

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 03:17 PM

Hoo boy!
You got me!
I've been pulling the wool over the eyes of all those CFOs with their fancy MBAs. But you uncovered it!
You should call my clients and reveal how I hoodwinked all their finance guys. You broke the code Spikey! Mazel tov. Now what am I gonna do????

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 03:34 PM

So no actual response to the challenge to your math and the built-in excuse for failure of the impossibility of implementing the program the way you describe it while still maintaining the 60% cost reduction you promise? Maybe you can explain how you get a lower per unit cost while reducing the number of stories available to the newscast at the same cost of goods produced?

[ January 11, 2007, 04:36 PM: Message edited by: Spike ]

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 03:44 PM

Whaddya mean no response? I said, you got me!

Marty McFly

Jan 11th 2007, 04:18 PM

Originally posted by Spike:
<blockquote>quote:<hr />Originally posted by Marty McFly:
It IS all about the MONEY.
No, it isn't.[/QUOTE]Yes, it IS.

How long will a business continue to do something that doesn't result in a profit?

A week? A month? A year?

If a tv station or any other business is doing something results in losing money, chances are that it is going to stop doing that eventually.

It will either stop because of a management decision or a CUSTOMER decision (the business closes).

Desert Rat

Jan 11th 2007, 04:35 PM

If it's not all about money can anyone here give me another reason..besides financial concerns..why the stations that have done away with their news departments..did so.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 04:47 PM

Originally posted by Marty McFly:

How long will a business continue to do something that doesn't result in a profit?

A week? A month? A year?

If a tv station or any other business is doing something results in losing money, chances are that it is going to stop doing that eventually.No, that is a straw man. Nobody said anything about losing money. You cannot assume that a company will automatically lose money if it has other goals in addition to making money.

It's simply not all about the money, because money is only half any transaction. If it were all about the money, we would just all trade money back and forth. We wouldn't trade any goods. We wouldn't produce anything. We wouldn't provide any services. To say it's all about the money is to ignore approximately 50% of all economic activity that happens on this planet.

Again, the profit motive only says that the primary goal of business is to make money. It doesn't say it's the only goal. It doesn't say the goal is to make as much as you possibly can, damn the consequences. It simply says the goal of business is to make enough money to justify the effort.

Why is that so hard to understand?

If it really were all about the money, Enron would be the gold standard of corporate America.

[ January 11, 2007, 05:48 PM: Message edited by: Spike ]

Marty McFly

Jan 11th 2007, 04:47 PM

Originally posted by Desert Rat:
If it's not all about money can anyone here give me another reason..besides financial concerns..why the stations that have done away with their news departments..did so.Who's to say that there were other reasons (not financial) why the newsrooms were chopped?

Running a newsroom is VERY EXPENSIVE.

Go ask your news director if you can see the MONTHLY BUDGET for your news department. You would be floored.

First, there's the salaries of every news employee. Depending on your shop, that will include sports & weather so you may be looking at the minimum 25 employees (small shop). Figure out the math on what you think everyone makes and see what you think is being paid every month just in salaries.

Don't forget to add in what the station pays in that yummy Social Security, unemployment and benefits.

Whew!

Sat trucks and microwave vans aren't cheap.

Neither are the ENG cameras that photographers use.

All those VTR's in the edit bays weren't donated to the station.

Let's not forget those expensive studio cameras (there's 3), the set that cost 85k and the 25+ production folks who also work at the station who make it possible to put a newscast on the air.

The surface hasn't even been scratched yet.

It is VERY EXPENSIVE to run a newsroom and put on a newscast. Who's to say there are other reasons, besides financial, why a station would choose not to do news?

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 05:22 PM

Originally posted by Desert Rat:
If it's not all about money can anyone here give me another reason..besides financial concerns..why the stations that have done away with their news departments..did so.The assumption in your question is wrong. Just because some stations made a financial decision to drop news does not mean money is the only motivating factor in all business decisions. You picked a situation that IS motivated by money and tried to apply it to all other situations. It's like saying that since date rapes sometimes happen, all men want to rape the women they date.

Some people, managers even, actually have pride in their product. Where one station might decide that the return from producing news isn't worth the cost and effort (the profit motive), another in the same financial condition might decide that the connection to the community maintained by continuing the news is worth it.

I happen to know of one very successful television station, still family owned, that went full HD before any other station simply because the owner wanted the pride of being the first in the country to do it. From a purely profit-oriented viewpoint, that was a stupid move. But his company is doing just fine, and he's much more satisfied with it than he would have been had he said, "Oh, since it's all about the money, and HD is only going to cost us loads of money without much of a return for several years until HD sets costs less than $10K and more than 500 people in town have them, I'll just pass."

That's an example of where the profit motive wasn't the only factor. In fact, it was outweighed by other factors, and yet the company didn't go out of business as Marty would have predicted.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 05:28 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
Whaddya mean no response? I said, you got me!So, let me get this straight. You're admitting you lied to these people to get them to hire you?

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 05:31 PM

whatever you want to believe. what's the difference with you? You're like a Muslim fanatic. Any intelligent conversation is absolutely pointless. have a great time.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 05:52 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
Any intelligent conversation is absolutely pointless. You keep saying this, but I don't actually see any intelligent conversation coming from you. All I see are sales pitches that fall apart under logical scrutiny. Yet you say that serious and reasonable objections to what you're doing aren't intelligent?

In other words, "If you don't agree with Rosenblum, you're stupid. Na na na na."

The reason you're not answering isn't that we're stupid. The reason that you're not answering is that us dumb ol' camera people and reporters turned out to be smarter than you thought, and you simply don't have answers to the questions posed.

That must be embarrassing for you.

By the way, you weren't calling me stupid a year and a half ago when you were picking my brain for ideas and saying I had a bright future as a consultant. Oh, that's right. I'm only stupid if you can't convert me over to your way of thinking.

Rosenblum

Jan 11th 2007, 06:52 PM

we all make mistakes.

Spike

Jan 11th 2007, 07:00 PM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
we all make mistakes.Excellent. I think we've made a real breakthrough today. Now that you understand that your VJ system is a mistake, can we count on you to go away and leave our craft alone?

writer2

Jan 12th 2007, 05:00 AM

Spike, I loved the part where he said you were like a Muslim fanatic (terrorist?) Must have been taking a page from our President's campaign playbook.

[ January 12, 2007, 06:03 AM: Message edited by: writer2 ]

Rosenblum

Jan 12th 2007, 05:32 AM

If I were taking a page from the President's playbook I would go on a bender and say I had choked on a pretzel.

[ January 12, 2007, 06:35 AM: Message edited by: Rosenblum ]

Spike

Jan 12th 2007, 05:58 AM

Originally posted by Rosenblum:
If I were taking a page from the President's playbook I would go on a bender and say I had choked on a pretzel.Hey now, you can't criticize the President if you haven't ever held public office yourself, remember? Didn't we go over that one when you kept insisting that your detractors reveal their background and experience? You also can't criticize the President because so many people voted for him. Twice. I think we hit that one when you kept trying to argue that companies wouldn't hire you if what you were doing wasn't a good idea. Well, if that's true, then people wouldn't have re-elected President Bush if what he were doing wasn't a good idea. The vetting process for a President is very vigorous. Don't you recall his background being thoroughly scrutinized? I bet the press even looked in Europe to see if he had wrecked any television networks there.

Rosenblum

Jan 12th 2007, 06:48 AM

oye. with you its endless.

Consider This

Jan 12th 2007, 07:10 AM

Originally posted by Spike:
If it really were all about the money, Enron would be the gold standard of corporate America.Most of that post was merely nonsense but this rose to the level of genuinely stupid. Enron cooked its books to artificially inflate its stock price. If anything it demonstrates how much money matters in corporate America and how aggressively shareholders demand that companies find ways to increase profits.

WRAL-TV in Raleigh was the first station to go HD. It is still locally owned and may be one of the great stations in the country. I wish all stations operated the way Capital Broadcasting Company runs WRAL. Unfortunately, it is the exception that proves the rule. Deregulation has discouraged family owned (or at least locally owned) stations, who don't have to answer to stockholders.

Look at Media General's homepage (http://www.mediageneral.com/). What's the most obvious thing on the page? Its stock price -- updated to the minute! In the center of the page are links to stories under the heading "Company News." Every single one of them is investor related. This from a company whose flagship station recently had one of its main anchors celebrate her 30th anniversary at the station. Not worth a mention?

Same at Sinclair's site (http://www.sbgi.net/). Stock price right on the home page. Company news and calendar both include only investor related items.

Belo Corporation (http://www.belo.com/) was as close to a dissenter as I found in my brief search. You have to scroll down the home page to get to the stock price and one of the company news items is titled "Belo Television Stations Provided 146 Candidates Free Airtime During The 2006 Political Season."

In another thread (or maybe this one, they get confusing), I had asked whether VJ jobs were better than no jobs since it seemed that stations desperate enough to go OMB would be more likely to drop news entirely than to re-fund positions necessary to do it "right." Spike answered "neither" and seemed to suggest that Young Broadcasting was using the VJ model to prep KRON and WKRN for sale. (Forgive me if I misread the post. There was a lot of writing, articulately assembled, that didn't say anything clearly.) Say that (a) that's what Spike meant and (b) that he's right and Young dumps the two stations.

Who's going to buy them? A Capital Broadcasting Company? Look at recent sales. In ones I've read about, the buyer has been another investment company that thinks it can squeeze even more profit from the operations it's taking over.

At most stations, the bottom line really is the bottom line. Managers answer to remote people in faraway places who see only numbers on a chart. It might not be right but it certainly is true.

If Rosenblum Associates decides tomorrow to get out of consulting to focus on creating VJ programming for cable networks -- or on farming yams -- will you be happy? Or will you see, as Hawkeye Pierce once uttered on M*A*S*H, "You've cured the symptom. The disease rages on."

News Is Broken

Jan 12th 2007, 10:10 AM

Holy hell.. Spike, bud, we love ya but please give it a rest. Rosenblum ain't gonna stop what he's doing just because some anonymous dude on a media message board says so. I've read through the numerous rants on b-roll too over the last couple years and I'm sorry to say it but nothing you say or do in here is going to dissuade the man from "destroying your craft" as you say. If it would, believe me, the bashing he took on b-roll would have done that for us long ago.

Now, I've been a photog before, so I can tell you a few things about your "craft". It's how I got my start in the biz.

It's not brain surgery or rocket science. It was actually very easy for me. I may or may not have been very good at it, but in this business, sadly, you do not need to be. All you really need to know is how to listen to a scanner and play nice with the cops. The rest is evident to anyone who bothers to take a couple hours watching someone else's work. I didn't win any NPPA awards at it, but when you're chasing car crashes and house fires, or standing in a parking lot framing up the talking head during the live shot, well... who cares? There are days that I still miss it, and then there are others when I'm glad I don't do it anymore.

Now with this VJ thing going around, maybe I'll be called upon to do it again someday. I may decide to try it. I may decide to sign up for truck driving school instead. (I always wanted to do that, ever since I was a little kid.) But at least I'm aware that it's coming and that's good enough for me.

THAT is what you should take away from what Rosenblum says. Nothing else (unless you just happen to own your own TV station) is really relevant to you or me, is it? I'm flattered that you have taken it upon yourself to champion the cause of oppressed newsies everywhere, but in all reality it really doesn't matter what WE say about it - it's up to the suits to decide whether to do it or not. The only thing up to us is whether we want to take part in it, or not.

If it were to happen to me today, I'd go sign up for trucker school. But that's only because I slept in late, woke up with a headache and it looks like rain outside. Tomorrow I might feel differently about it. That's just me.

Life's too short to fight unwinnable wars, Spike. Go have a green tea frappuchino and a smoke. Relax. Marty will cover the phone for you while you're gone.

Ralphie the buffalo

Jan 12th 2007, 11:53 AM

Originally posted by News Is Broken:
All you really need to know is how to listen to a scanner and play nice with the cops. The rest is evident to anyone who bothers to take a couple hours watching someone else's work. I didn't win any NPPA awards at it, but when you're chasing car crashes and house fires, or standing in a parking lot framing up the talking head during the live shot, well... who cares? Judas Priest. Are you kidding? That is like the lowest form of this job. If that was all there was to my future I would leave.

- Interesting people
- experiencing different things
- traveling around the country
- covering exciting sports events
- and most importantly...working with a reporter who makes me raise my game up a level

are just a few of the reasons I stay. It sure isn't for spot news. I could care less if I cover another tragedy even though I am very good at it.

Spike

Jan 12th 2007, 03:52 PM

Originally posted by News Is Broken:
Rosenblum ain't gonna stop what he's doing just because some anonymous dude on a media message board says so. You don't really think I believe I can stop him, do you?

I have no illusions on that point. I know that very few managers in a position to make this kind of decision read this board. Maybe a few news directors, but this will happen above their heads.

So why bother? The same reason Rosenblum continues to post here, and the same reason Rosenblum posted on B-Roll for so long, when he also knows I won't reach any of the people paying his fees. It's a struggle for the attitudes of the people who will be directly affected by this. Rosenblum comes on these message boards to try to grease the way, to convince people that what he's doing is a good thing so that they won't flee or rebel when he shows up. The last thing he wants is for all the good journalists to skip out and leave only the people not good enough to leave, all with a bad attitude toward the training and their new duties. He wants the good photogs to stay. He wants the good reporters to stay. If he can convince them this isn't a disaster in the making, he thinks perhaps they'll stay and help him succeed.

But I DO want them to leave. I want these people to see what a bad thing this is and rebel. I want the ones who remain to make this as difficult for him as possible. I would love to see them stand up and organize in response to him.

I know I won't reach any managers. But I also know that people who otherwise might not have understood what was happening have likely read this thread and will be prepared if he shows up with his sample case, ready to sell.

Originally posted by News Is Broken:
Now, I've been a photog before, so I can tell you a few things about your "craft". You have misunderstood. When I say that I want Rosenblum to leave our craft alone, I'm not talking about photojournalism. I'm talking about the craft of television journalism altogether. I'm talking about the craft of reporters, producers, editors and yes, photogs. All of them. Because we all work together on a common product, in a common craft.

Originally posted by News Is Broken:
It's not brain surgery or rocket science... I didn't win any NPPA awards at it, but when you're chasing car crashes and house fires, or standing in a parking lot framing up the talking head during the live shot, well... who cares? Shooting video is easy. Shooting it well is not. Writing is easy. Hell, everybody with a sixth grade education can do that. Writing well is NOT easy. Even speaking is easy. But speaking well is not.

It's not whether the activity is easy in its most basic form. It's whether you can do it well while also doing other things at the same time, things that use different parts of the brain that conflict with each other. The overwhelming majority can't.

The proof is in the work itself. The stations that have gone VJ converted experienced photogs over to one man bands. What did we see? When the photogs had other responsibilities thrust upon them, the video suffered. Award winning photogs were making what I would consider rookie mistakes, with bad framing, bad focus, jump cuts in the editing, and all manner of mistakes that shouldn't have happened if things worked like the sales pitch said they would.

I agree with you about how difficult it is to shoot video. I could train just about anybody to get a picture. I could probably train the majority to do it well. But the majority will not do it well when other responsibilities prevent them from concentrating on doing it well. The brain just doesn't work that way.

A final example. Driving a car. Any idiot can drive a car. Proof of that is that idiots pass the driver's test and get licensed every day. But people have the damnedest problem talking while driving a car. Safety researchers had noticed this long before cellphones, discovering that a large percentage of accidents were caused by people trying to talk to other people in the car with them while driving. They discovered that driving and talking used different parts of the brain that competed for attention. The talking was a distraction from driving. People on average simply don't drive as well when they're trying to hold a conversation. This didn't really become a major issue until so many more conversations were taking place inside vehicles as a result of cellphones.

Operating a car isn't really that complicated. Most of us have been driving a long time. It should be second nature. But even when something is second nature, you can't go against the structure of the brain. How often do you see people on cellphones weaving, speeding up and slowing down, running red lights, etc.? I see it every day.

Likewise, you can't ask the motor, visual and verbal centers of the brain to compete with each other in television and expect a good outcome.

[ January 12, 2007, 04:54 PM: Message edited by: Spike ]

News Is Broken

Jan 12th 2007, 04:26 PM

Originally posted by Spike:

The proof is in the work itself. The stations that have gone VJ converted experienced photogs over to one man bands. What did we see? When the photogs had other responsibilities thrust upon them, the video suffered. Award winning photogs were making what I would consider rookie mistakes, with bad framing, bad focus, jump cuts in the editing, and all manner of mistakes that shouldn't have happened if things worked like the sales pitch said they would.
That's not because they were OMB's. That's because they were given the title of VJ but not allowed to work the way Rosenblum describes, i.e. 2 stories a week, 2 weeks to work on features, etc. It's the same daily turn run and gun stuff as before, and that's why it sucks. Not his fault.

Originally posted by Spike:
The last thing he wants is for all the good journalists to skip out and leave only the people not good enough to leave, all with a bad attitude toward the training and their new duties. He wants the good photogs to stay. He wants the good reporters to stay. If he can convince them this isn't a disaster in the making, he thinks perhaps they'll stay and help him succeed.

But I DO want them to leave. I want these people to see what a bad thing this is and rebel. I want the ones who remain to make this as difficult for him as possible. I would love to see them stand up and organize in response to him.
All that will do is put the people you are fighting for out of work. Any ND can tell you - there are stacks and stacks of reels out there from people ready to replace you at any time. So what if half the staff or even ALL the staff walks? They can be replaced in a week or less. And they'll be replaced with people fresh outta school who think being a VJ is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Now what?

We all already know what he's all about and how well the system works (or more precisely, doesn't). All you're succeeding in doing is giving him attention at this point and playing right into his hands. He's loving all the free attention right now... trust me, he will turn it all against you and say something like "See, if you look here you will see what some of your less desirable employees will say - you should be on the lookout for guys like this and get rid of them ASAP if you want your VJ implementation to succeed. I've found that if you just say 'everyone will do this or there's the door' then that little problem tends to solve itself."

Think about it - you're a fool if you don't realize he's just using you for his own ends. He hasn't made millions of dollars in the cable tv biz by accident, and he's no dummy.