5. Reaching an audience of 24 million a week , Public News Service is the “ most widely used independent news service you’ve never heard of.” ~ AlterNet
10. Step-by-step Check List Reporters produce the story Reporters upload stories to our web database Editors proof copy RSS editors ready the story for distribution Stories are distributed to media outlets via email News editors log-in to our database to access stories Tracking reports are generated and distributed to members
11. Production of the Stories Thaw with her gentle persuasion is more powerful than Thor with his hammer. The one melts, the other breaks into pieces. ~ Henry David Thoreau
AMBER: The Public News Service is going through a time of transition. Today, we are a public interest news service providing content to more than 20,000 media outlets across the nation. MATT: We come with a proposal for all members to consider as we plan our future. Today, we want to show you our content distribution system that we think could become the public interest news equivalent of the AP and Reuters. [20sec] [slide editing notes: - Can we make a better style for the bullet points? - Can we shorten the second bullet pt?
MATT: In 1996, founder and CEO Lark Corbeil saw radio newsrooms shrinking and losing the capability to produce high-quality news reports. Hard hitting reporting was increasingly being replaced by conservative political talk shows that carried big-money interests. Other voices involved in the political dialogue were being drowned out. [18sec]
AMBER: Beginning in the northern Rocky Mountains, Lark took her expertise from working with Reuters and launched the first member supported independent news service model to provide news coverage to radio stations across Idaho. Factcheck please! Her new service provided an avenue for the voices of non-profits, charitable foundations and public interest groups to appear on the same local air waves as those with more money and louder voices. [15sec] [from Birth Story tp's: Lark volunteered for the local public radio station in Boise and was shocked by the amount of extremist right wing material being used on a daily basis. There was a republican news service paid for by state taxpayers but nothing giving a balance. And she volunteered for a bunch of non-profits were so outgunned and unable to get the type of media attention they deserved because they were overworked and understaffed and the larger PR agencies were getting the bulk of the attention from the media. So, being from reuters, she thought she would create a media outlet that would balance the outlets and the voices.]
MATT: The Northern Rockies News Service thrived with the support of the sustainable development and environmental conservation communities and began to expand to neighboring states. Today, the Public News Service provides free news content to media outlets across 33 states, with Maryland, Arkansas, and Utah in development. [20sec]
AMBER In each state, a reporter works a local beat covering stories on issues important to the local community. The content is multi-platform, distributed to and used by radio, television, print and digital media outlets and covers over 30 different issue areas. Each dot on this map represents a media outlet that has used our content in 2010. [14sec]
AMBER As the previous map illustrated, our distribution network is large and growing every day. Two important things to note are: 1) that we are consistently getting great pickup throughout the our 33 states and; 2) that we are reaching large audiences, from those in rural areas that have little to no local news to national networks like Clear Channel and Sirius. [15sec]
MATT - We're in a fire marshall-approved conference center. So there has to be a fire extinguisher in here, right? How many of us know where it is? How long would it take you to find it? . . . the same problem exists for news users - they have great resources, but may not be able to find everything that is out there. Finding news may not be an emergency situation, but people often approach it with the same urgency and impatience. [22sec] [some scary picture of fire or a burning building]
MATT - We may be masters of the Google algorithm and capable of summoning any story with the first query. Annnd this room may be filled with smartphones and iPads, but unfortunately, this is not representative of the mainstream. Our multi-platform content distribution system gets stories into the local media that are a fixture of people's daily lives. Stories are right there on the radio when they get in the car to drive home, they are on the evening news and in the local paper. [20sec] [can we get a good Far Side cartoon showing someone being dumb-founded by a new piece of tech?]
AMBER It is our goal to give a voice to those that are not often heard. As we strive to be able to offer not only quality content, but the ability to track that content, we have developed a few valuable resources for our members. We want to show you this distribution system because we think it could be the content management system that could propel the work of all Media Consortium members to the mainstream media outlets across our nation. [16sec] [need to change the graphics to match the rhetoric]
MATT: A series of check offs provides an accountable system for work to be proofed remotely and alert the next person in line that a story is ready for editing, posting, etc. [28sec] [can we work with the numbering graphic to reduce/prevent any overlap of numbers with words?]
AMBER: We have a team of highly skilled reporters connected to the pulse of local communities across 33 states. They use local “unlikely spokespeople” and a quieter (less inflammatory?) writing style to get our issues out there. We pride ourselves on using our experience and knowledge to produce stories that receive pick-up from both sides of the political spectrum. In this way we are able to quietly let our messages seep into the consciousness of wider audiences influencing a measurable change. [21sec]
MATT: In the wee hours of the morning, our network of news outlets receives all stories local to the state in which the outlet is located. Border markets are included in the distribution - for example, if we have a story from Louisville, KY, the Cincy and Indianapolis would be included. These email alerts show news editors at the receiving outlet all parts of the story (cuts, scripts, etc) that are available for download. [21sec] [change to an #OWS story]
AMBER: Our web interface for broadcasters allows news editors to log-in and download whatever they need in order to produce the story on their end. Depending on the newsroom, they are able to take the fully produced audio story, text version of the story, or individual audio cuts. Broadcasters can also download the script and re-voice the story with their own local reporter. All of this is tracked! (next slide)] [18sec]
AMBER: These reports We use Arbitron audience and circulation size numbers in our reports, as you know, this only includes the top 300 markets, which means that we do not report audience sizes for a lot of the smaller stations. This and the fact that radio stories can run multiple times throughout the day (giving our issues even wider exposure) makes our reported numbers quite conservative, but we can stand behind our reports and that integrity is important to us. [32sec] [save this for rebuttals if we face questions, otherwise, do not address . . . Just because they take it, do they actually use it? They don’t have the time to find these stories and to download the information unless they plan to use it. These reports automatically come to members about three days after the story runs. The links are perpetual and you can click on them any time and get individual usage as they are picked up. These are a couple highlights on the story. We are doing our best to get you all the information on the media outlet pickup Looking at this information all together gives you a good idea of the whole picture.
MATT: I don’t know enough about soundbite to write anything here but we want to lead into it having the same distribution network and interface so we can talk about what we can offer TMC AND maybe mention about how they are not bound by the same restrictions as PNS so we can be more advocate-y
AMBER: What does this mean for The Media Consortium? We have a ready made platform and distribution system for your stories. The network is already in place, and we are ready to help you to get content out to the public. We have the capability to offer a site accessible only to Media Consortium members, or one that will provide your news through our channels! With your support, the options are limitless.
AMBER: Our mission is to give a microphone to the quieter voices to bring about social change, and we know that each of you is striving to do that as well. Let us use our network to amplify your efforts and to make a difference together. [19sec] [no clue of the visual for this slide]
MATT: Now, instead of yammering on for every last second of our 5 minutes, here's a beautiful picture and a few moments of time to just relax! [5sec]