The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 4,800 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 8 years to get that many views.
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Seventy-five budding artists, one music room, 10 country music industry professionals, seven hours, innumerable takeaways.
The University of Ottawa’s music department saw more than 75 budding country songwriters, singers and musicians gather on November 25 to hear from Canadian professionals in the country music industry – everyone from music directors to recording artists to booking agents to producers – on everything from radio to publicity and marketing to lyrics, style and business.
I live-tweeted the day-long event hosted by the Country Music Association of Ontario (CMAO) that consisted of two panels and a demo-rama session. See my Twitter feed, @stephbrooks_, for more of the panelists’ quotable moments and advice.
Below is a recap of the day, including the most prevalent discussions, topics and information. Let me tell you, I could’ve written a book from all the insider advice and knowledge the insightful panelists provided. But out of interest to keep my readership and abide by one of the facts I learned in this seminar (you have a short timeframe to make your point and an impression), I’ve summarized the most dynamic elements of the production below.
Panel one: How to get your songs to radio
Panelists:
Brian Allen, producer, Amplus Productions
KT Timmermans, music director, The Island
Joel Lamoureux, music director, Y101
Anya Wilson, Anya Wilson Publicity
Steve Parker, Canadian Country Spotlight
The CMAO put on the day-long seminar to 75 budding artists
Key takeaways from panel one:
As moderator for this panel, Allen did a stellar job bringing the topic of conversation back to the importance of the business aspect of putting music on the radio. He stressed, with necessary emphasis, that it is a money-making industry in the first place, and to get airplay it requires much more than just talent.
Some other important ideas to keep in mind:
Panelists outlined that country musicians are in a unique position as artists, as a result of the size of audience the genre captures, the connection listeners have with on-air personalities, the loyal characteristics of the audience, and the large demographic. As Timmermans so fittingly put it, it’s the “music of the people.” Lamoureux added, “the country music audience is the most passionate, and you need the songs to connect with them.”
Lamoureux said country music listeners are 60 per cent female, 40 per cent male, and it’s a genre based on a relationship format. By bringing a built-in audience to the game, he notes, you’ll be more likely to be considered for airplay. Therefore, a new artist has to know the audience, know the advertisers, and please both.
What goes into a radio station music meeting? Radio station music directors Timmermans and Lamoureux said:
A new artist has to know the audience, know the advertisers, and please both
Parker, whose show, Canadian Country Spotlight, showcases emerging artists, discussed the value of time on radio, and all panelists conceded the importance of having a business plan. “You need to have a footprint, or the beginnings of a national profile,” noted Parker. “We look at the business model and if there isn’t one, we have to say ‘no.’”
Wilson, a seasoned industry publicist, takes certain artists on as projects and lobbies radio to get them airplay. She consults on songs before they’re radio-ready, including ensuring it matches the sound of other acts on the radio at the time. Once radio adds something to its airplay, the song is played for at least 14 weeks, meaning it commits to those artists. Wilson makes it her job to ensure they’re capable of reaching that point. “I don’t want a one-hit wonder,” she said.
Anya Wilson
But, years in the industry have taught Wilson it’s not all about the song. “Radio is a blind medium,” she said. This means a song can’t be five minutes long. It also means there has to be more to an artist than just a hit.
An artist’s newsworthiness is critical to their ability to grow in popularity. Have a good story, Wilson adds, and the development and execution of that story is crucial in an artist’s success.
Timmermans, who views artist biographies daily on the digital music courier service DMDS, echoed the importance of having a good story. “Don’t make light of what your story might be,” she said. “That’s what helps market you.”
Panel two: Making it in the ‘biz
Panelists:
Wendell Ferguson, musician
Charlie Major, country star
Robert Wilson, manager/booking agent
Heather Ostertag, Ostertag & Associates
Key takeaways from panel two:
Panelists get ready for critiquing
The second and final panel was much broader in scope, touching on subjects from funding to fans to failing to fulfillment. Broken down by panelist below, read the industry insights on how the specialists got to where they are, where they would go differently, and when they knew they made it.
Charlie Major
When asked by moderator Wendell Ferguson what his biggest piece of advice would be for aspiring country artists, Major responds with a deep and quiet, “follow your bliss.” Seemingly simple words of wisdom from a chart-topping star from Aylmer, Quebec, who’s recorded six studio albums and released more than 20 singles.
After traveling around the world with his guitar, Major decided making music was what he wanted to do. “Know what you’re good at, and do it,” he suggested.
Throughout his career, he’s committed not only himself to follow through with “doing what he’s good at,” but also his team. “I go out there every night and give it my 150 per cent because I’m not just representing myself, but my booker, manager, record company, and so on. It’s a collaboration, and you have to be ready to take on that responsibility.”
Country star Charlie Major
And amidst the doom-and-gloom perspective of entering the industry prevalent throughout the panel, Major made sure to provide the audience of hopefuls with some optimism.
“Every week I listen to the Top 40,” he said. “And every week there are 40 songs. Somebody is writing those songs. Somebody is playing those songs. Every week, every year, there are new people coming out. It can be done if you want it badly. It’s not insurmountable.”
And while not insurmountable, it’s also not easy. Major said when he sat down to write music and play songs, he’d be at it for 15 to 16 hours a day. “That’s sacrifice,” he added.
Brian Allen
King of the session’s most quotable lines, Allen, as founder of a production company, focused predominantly on the business aspect of the industry.
Budding artists have to be willing to put in the legwork behind their music and BE the team before they HAVE a team, he said. “First, you have to have a brain,” he noted. “Nobody’s going to be interested in you if you don’t bring something to the table or have an interest in learning how to do some of the work that goes alongside just singing, like promoting yourself and booking yourself.” No one is going to come along and say ‘I believe in you and I want to lose a million dollars,’ he said. “You have to be strong enough to attract a team.”
And attracting a team is different than seeking out a team. “Some managers and agents will show up when they smell talent,” said Allen. “The best managers and agents will show up when they smell money.”
Play live to determine whether or not you should record a song
Allen made mention of the innumerable times he comes across someone wanting to make a recording to start their career. But, he advises, artists should be making a recording to further their career. “People want to be rescued by a recording and think it’ll pull them out of their dreary day job,” he noted. “I think that’s just wrong, unrealistic thinking. To figure out if you have a song worth recording, play live! If they don’t clap, don’t record that song.”
He added there are logical, tested, strategic steps to go through when coming up with your music business plan in the beginning, which he dubbed the “career equivalent of diapers.”
But how does one know when and if this is the right thing to pursue?
Allen said an artist will know once they evaluate the opportunity cost of making music for the rest of their life. “You know when it’s time to commit to music when you know that the value of what you are leaving behind is worth less than if you had not committed to it,” he said.
Top three Brian Allen quotes of the day:
Heather Ostertag
As former president and CEO of FACTOR, Ostertag knows the ins-and-outs of funding for musicians. While an option for some, funding programs are serious business and not for the faint of heart. “Funding is not an entitlement,” Ostertag said. “You may be lucky to get it, but you have a better chance of winning the lottery than getting the funding.”
All funding agencies (like the CMT video artists program, Canada Council for the Arts, FACTOR, and the Toronto Arts Council, for example) provide forums for competition for the money, complete with a jury to determine the successful applicant. “To have a successful application, you really need to think beyond just production,” she adds. “You can’t just have the talent. You have to have the knowledge, the expertise, the ability to take it into the marketplace and exploit it in moving your career forward.”
Put bluntly, none of the agencies are interested in giving you money just because you have talent.
The realist of the group, Ostertag added the industry is based on a lot of “no’s” and if you do so happen to get the funding, it comes with accountability.
Finally, she emphasized the importance of knowing what is being done on your behalf. “Know what’s been put on funding forms, especially if it’s done by a third party,” she said. “You are accountable for what’s down there.” While you require a team, it behooves you to know what’s happening. “I’ve seen artists who’ve been taken to the cleaners by their team and lose everything. It’s incumbent upon you to know the business in music. I’ve seen so many people have their dreams sold back to them because they didn’t do their homework.”
And my favourite Ostertag line of the day: “It’s evident by some of the people who came to FACTOR that they had been getting advice from friends or family or deaf people. Your friends and family don’t know. It’s a business.”
Wendell Ferguson
This panel’s moderator and accomplished guitar player, Ferguson brought intelligent and careful thought to the session, making sure to add a few jokes throughout.
Aside from his remarks like, “think like your audience,” and “your talent may be big, but you’re not,” what stood out for me was his recommendation on staying committed. “In Nashville, they say your first thousand songs don’t count,” he said. “Come to me when you’ve written 1,010, and they’ll probably be really good by then.”
Vince Gill said if you’re getting into the biz, learn to love every aspect of it
Clearly an esteemed musician, Ferguson recounted an exchange he had with Vince Gill. “He told me, if you’re getting into this business, you have to learn to love every aspect of it. If there’s something that drives you crazy, it’s going to keep driving you crazy until you can’t handle it.”
Seems like some of these lessons are not only those helpful in the music industry, but life lessons, as well.
The down low on CanCon
Being a Canadian seminar with Canadian industry professionals, it wouldn’t be truly patriotic without the mention of “CanCon” – Canadian Content. Love it or hate it, the CRTC-regulated policy is a reality that today’s Canadian radio stations must abide by. The CMAO panelists shed some light on what makes up music that fits these strict guidelines.
The MAPL system defines that to be Canadian Content, or CanCon, at least two of these letters have to be true:
Further resources
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It was a true spectacle in every sense of the word. Elaborate sets, a well thought-out storyline, lavish costumes and special effects made Carrie Underwood’s three-hour Ottawa show last night an incredible production that left the sold-out crowd truly, blown away.
Aside from the country queen’s killer vocals that left fans’ jaws dropped in awe, kudos goes to the Oklahoma-native’s production team. From set to design to clothing to lighting and technical aspects, the production elements complemented the pitch-perfect vocals and brought the story behind the album to life.
Carrie’s Blown Away set
After hearing from the sweet and charming Ottawa native and rising country star Kira Isabella, Louisana-boy Hunter Hayes had the young girls in the crowd ooing-and-awing over his musical talent (Hayes played a different instrument for each song).
Opening with Good Girl, Carrie had the largely female crowd immediately on their feet and wishing their own were adorned with the diamond-laden heels Ms. Underwood danced around in. Telling the audience, “we have a long show in store for you, I hope that’s okay…” garnered screams and even more when she swapped the word “American” to “Canadian” in All American Girl.
In a black and white vintage-looking dress exposing her to-die-for legs, Carrie sang Randy Travis’ challenging song, I Told You So, and explained it was one she grew up singing.
Frilly ensembles and diamond-clad footwear adorned the songstress
Although growing up a singer, Carrie’s move to Nashville has her foraying into songwriting, as well, and she described the heartfelt ballad Temporary Home as one she is particularly proud of crafting.
While predominantly performing her big hits from her latest album, Blown Away, a Carrie show would not be complete without some of the American Idol winner’s older girl anthems like Before He Cheats, Last Name, Wasted and Cowboy Casanova.
About halfway through the show, a fenced-in portion of the stage lifted from its place and rose up and over the multitude of fans on the stadium’s floor, complete with massive Ikea-like circular paper lanterns to give the set a dreamy feel.
A Carrie concert wouldn’t be complete without a flying stage.
While hoisted in the air, reminiscent of her previous tour in which the singer sang in a pick-up truck suspended from the ceiling, Carrie sang her hit Thank God for Hometowns. Having spent a great deal of time in Ottawa and even living here for a while with hockey hubby Mike Fisher, Carrie gave a shout-out to the city for being a second great hometown to her.
On her way back to the main stage, she “got the party started” with her summery song One Way Ticket, for which massive beach balls were launched into the crowd and really got the audience engaged.
Beach balls were launched into the crowd during “One-Way Ticket”
Carrie appealed to the men in the crowd with her rendition of Aerosmith’s Sweet Emotion – and man, can she rock.
But a personal favourite was her performance of her duet with Brad Paisley, Remind Me, for which her CMA Awards co-host appeared on-screen to sing.
Finally, after rising up to the stage from below to cheers and screams, Carrie belted out her album’s single, Blown Away for the encore.
Her Blown Away finale
What goes through my mind during every concert I see is the dedication artists must have to sing the same songs, in the same order, in a similar way, day-in, day-out from city to city while on tour. The real measure of a great performer, then, is to make fans feel like it’s the first time the artist is singing it – to make the audience feel something and engage with the song.
I was shaking my head in amazement last night many times because of Carrie’s ability to convey meaning through each and every song. It was evident she was truly giving it her all, and that is what made me – and I think everyone else – feel their money was incredibly well spent.
And that, my friends, is what really blows people away.
To view a slideshow of photos from the concert, click here.
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“By the Brooks” looks at @gretchenrubin’s hit book, The Happiness Project, and the relationship between happiness and its manifestation in modern advertising. What is your relationship between happiness and purchases?
I truly believe we’re all looking for happiness. Happiness may not be all we’re looking for, but everyone, fundamentally, is seeking it in one form or another. Many, though, are not willing to put in the effort to achieve it.
Gretchen Rubin is. Rubin, whose book, The Happiness Project, soared to a #1 international bestseller, sought to find happiness through a series of resolutions over the course of one year. Each month she charts a theme and experiments with defined, tangible resolutions designed to increase her happiness.
While the book isn’t for everyone (one of its teachings holds that what makes on person happy isn’t the same for another), everyone wants happiness.
Gretchen Rubin’s hit books
The book is extremely powerful, in its provocative, yet simple, way. So powerful, in fact, that it made me think deeper about its relation to another subject area of particular interest to me: marketing and advertising.
The night I finished reading the book, I opened a bag of Lays chips (much to the chagrin of the author, who rejects “fake foods” as part of her project), and read in a small, cursive-black font, a “Happiness is simple” slogan on the back of the bag.
It got me thinking: if the pursuit of happiness is such a pervasive theme in our lives, how commonplace is marketers’ efforts to capitalize on this basic, perhaps unconscious, characteristic of human nature? How does positive psychology impact our purchasing power, and how pervasive is it?
I started out in my apartment searching for examples. My shampoo and conditioner? “Colour Me Happy.” My lotion? “Happy Sensation.”
Some advertisers are more overt than others in their happiness-promising messaging
A quick Google search yielded hundreds of results, proving my conviction wasn’t unfounded. To name a few:
I reached out to my network on Facebook to find even more ideas:
Petsmart’s slogan
Did I buy those products because they promised me happiness? No, but I bought them because they make my hair and skin look better, which in turn, makes me happy.
This notion is perhaps more interesting, and more significant: even if marketing does not directly reference the word “happiness,” most advertising works to try to get us to buy something by promising happiness as an indirect result.
Advertising attempts to make you feel you’ve achieved a certain status, or embody certain values through purchasing a product or service that, in turn, make you happy. Things like better health, more freedom, beauty, family ties, and more time are ideals many people are seeking, because they are an element to bringing them happiness. Tim Hortons, for example, is a great example that successfully ties its brand to the idea of family, and bringing people together, through the use of emotion – that through purchasing Tim Hortons’ coffee, you are a family person. This is an idea that targets the Timmies’ market segment as one that would make them happier people. See the “Proud Fathers” commercial here.
Rubin hits the nail on the head on this notion in her second book, Happier at Home (which, for the record, I read in two-days!) She writes:
“Even advertisers hawking pleasure-driven, instant-gratification purchases tie their products to deeper values. The ad for expensive bath salts appeals to notions of health and serenity. The cell phone ad promises we’ll grow closer to friends and family. The car ad invokes safety and reliability, or contrariwise, freedom and adventure. Eleanor Roosevelt said, ‘happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product.’ But that’s a false choice. Happiness is a goal and a by-product. The activities a person would undertake to pursue happiness directly are identical to the activities that would yield happiness indirectly. Helping others, finding engaging work, building close ties to other people, going for a run, finding opportunities for fun and challenge, clearing out the garage – in what ways would these two paths differ?” (p. 185, Happier at Home)
Without getting too academic, the idea brought me back to fourth-year public relations class in which we studied the “Father of Spin,” Edward Bernays, and his theory of mass persuasion. Bernays was the nephew of famous Austrian-born neurologist Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis. Bernays was the first to use Freud’s ideas of the unconscious and use them to manipulate the masses, of which we see great comparisons to today’s marketing. The BBC documentary on Bernays, “The Century of the Self,” (first part entitled “Happiness Machines,”) details how, “he showed American corporations, for the first time, how they could make people want things they didn’t need by linking mass-produced goods to their unconscious desires. By satisfying people’s inner-selfish desire, one made them happy, and thus docile. It was the start of the all-consuming self which has come to dominate our world today.”
Bernays was preoccupied with the idea of mass persuasion and of humans as “happiness machines”
Bernays is credited for turning the frowned-upon word, “propaganda,” into what is now known as “public relations.” Through his work for President Woodrow Wilson during the war, he became fascinated by the idea of mass persuasion, and said, “if you could use propaganda for war, you could certainly use it for peace.” As America became a mass industrial society toward the end of the 19th century, Bernays was determined to find a way to control how “the crowd” thought and felt. He did this by tapping into people’s irrational emotions and making money by manipulating unconscious decision-making. The most famous example was his Torches of Freedom campaign, in which he convinced women, in an era when it was taboo for women to smoke in public, that cigarettes were a symbol of challenging male power. After staging a media event in which he got young debutantes to smoke in New York City’s Easter Day parade, sales of the cigarette brand Lucky Strikes increased dramatically as women, supporting equality, felt compelled to purchase “Torches of Freedom.”
“It made him realize that it was possible to persuade people to behave irrationally if you link products to their emotional desires and feelings. It meant that irrelevant objects could become powerful emotional symbols of how you wanted to be seen by others.” – The Century of the Self
This certainly holds true to today’s more overt advertising – from the products listed above, to brands’ incessant drive to align themselves with an emotion, status, and/or symbol.
Bernays’ Lucky Strikes campaign
“Bernays saw the way to sell a product was not to sell it to your intellect – that you ought to buy an automobile – but that you will feel better about it if you have this automobile. He originated that idea: that they were not just purchasing something, they were engaging themselves emotionally or personally in a product or service.”
– Peter Strauss, employee of Bernays
Could the pursuit of self-happiness and improvement Bernays struck upon so long ago also be one of the many reasons Rubin’s book did so well? It tapped into this unconscious aspect of human nature. Could it be a reason her new book has been another big hit?
Finally, my endless thinking on the topic brought me to some questions I would ask the author of both The Happiness Project and Happiness at Home if I were ever given the chance. Please share your answers to them below, too, and comment on how you are influenced by happiness-promising products.
PS: Read Rubin’s books, especially the July chapter of The Happiness Project, in which Rubin tackles the money and happiness equation in “Buy Some Happiness.”
Questions for Rubin:
Interesting links:
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It’s not always I write about concerts, but when I do, it’s because it’s one that was worth writing about. That, and I haven’t blogged in months.
It was a balmy 40 degree-night in downtown Toronto, which made it feel like 50, and thousands of plaid-clad fans were piling into the Molson Amphitheatre. I almost passed out when I saw the endless crowd of sweaty, intoxicated people all trying to get into one entrance of the 16,000-seat venue. Luckily, the VIP on our tickets got us smoothly through the chaos and into our box, where we would find cold beer and hot sun waiting for us.
As we settled in, newcomer Rachel Farley was warming up the stage with laid-back songs like Ain’t Easy. Farley looks too young to be at an event selling alcohol, but she opens her mouth and a matured, deep twang tells me she’s been at this a while.
Rachel Farley
Then out came Luke, to arguably a louder cheer than his following act, proving that many fans were here just to see the first talented Georgia gentleman. Funnily enough, Bryan started out his set with Rain Is A Good Thing from his second album, during Toronto and eastern Canada’s drought. Bryan’s energy was contagious, and the heat, evident through his grey-turned-black v-neck tee, didn’t seem to slow him down on stage.
A row of high-school girls in front of us had t-shirts that said, “NO, Luke Bryan, YOU shake it for ME.” Shake it for me was one of the last songs he played, and it was clear it was the one everyone was waiting for.
But the one I was waiting for also seemed to be a crowd favourite. As soon as the guitars started strumming for I don’t want this night to end, the entire theatre erupted. Bryan mixed it up with some of his slower songs, like Do I, where he played the piano and had every country girl oohing.
Luke Bryan
That’s not the only thing that had the ladies, me included, covering their mouths with excitement. Bryan is a natural-born entertainer, dance-moves included. Swiveling his hips, dipping down low, and taking off his backwards baseball cap to smooth down his hair before throwing it on again, were just some of his signature moves.
For an outdoor country concert in the middle of summer, nothing really beats Luke Bryan. Jason Aldean couldn’t have gotten a better amp-up for his performance.
It was Aldean that pulled the show together and made it the best country concert I’ve ever seen. From the minute he donned his class cowboy hat and his drawl met the mic, Aldean meant business: he was there to infuse this party town with a little southern hospitality. And damn, did he deliver.
Jason Aldean
Sounding even better than he does on his albums, Aldean is the epitome of what real country is. Big Green Tractor had everyone on their feet, but it was after he played Fly Over States that I turned to my boyfriend and said “I can die happy now.”
Aldean performing “Fly Over States”
Aldean even delighted the crowd with two new songs off his new album coming out this fall. The songs, which are not out yet but will be on the radio in the next few weeks, were nothing short of incredible.
Aldean performed his singles and the crowd-pleasers like Tattoos on this town, Crazy Town, She’s Country, and even brought in Kelly Clarkson via video to perform Stay – when you could tell the pop fans in the crowd piped up and sang along. He came back after eardrum-splitting applause to do an encore of one of his new songs and finish with Hick Town.
While I always find it a little ironic to be listening to a concert in downtown Toronto with lyrics about cornfields and pastures, we certainly did see a lot of tailgates and tanlines at this show – not to mention talent.
DID YOU KNOW?
Luke Bryan’s sister, Emily West, is also a country singer, signed to Capitol Records Nashville. Listen to Blue Sky, her duet with Keith Urban, here.
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CTV's Craig Oliver's autobiography
If a year in politics is a century, as the saying goes, then Craig Oliver is immortal.
His 55–year journalism career, ongoing to this day, has seen everything from Margaret Trudeau blowing marijuana smoke into a reporter’s face to covering the Meech Lake Accord to 911 to dealing with Harper’s control of the media.
He chronicles all in his memoir, Oliver’s Twist: The Life and Times of an Unapologetic Newshound, which he began writing 15 years ago.
“It’s a story about how anyone can rise above a difficult start and recover if you’re determined to do it,” he says.
A natural storyteller with many stories to tell, Oliver covers everything from elections to war to romance to journalism to foreign relations, only leaving out some highly anticipated photos to decorate the middle of the book.
Growing up the only son of alcoholic parents in Prince Rupert, Oliver learned early on lessons that would later help him in his work as CTV’s chief parliamentary correspondent. Through being transferred to one broken foster home after another, he learned to look out for himself and to judge people with cold logic, by their actions rather than their words.
Having seen his share of abuse and depression and after his bootlegging father went to jail, Oliver headed to Saskatchewan where he found employment doing the only thing that felt natural: knowing other peoples’ business and asking often rude questions.
At 18, Oliver became the youngest CBC radio staff announcer in the country. With no post-secondary schooling, he got by with his natural curiosity and understanding of newsworthiness.
Now a star of Canadian television news, Oliver was in the business long before the medium’s introduction. The technology transfixed him and he set out to cover politics for CBC TV in Regina in the 1960s. This landed him reporting on the CCF in its rise to power, helping shape his political philosophy for years to come.
From there, he followed the natural course for an up-and-coming broadcaster and headed for Toronto, where he joined CTV and helped introduce Canada AM.
While Oliver toured with some of world’s most elite journalists and politicians, it’s clear in his recounting of grueling details of war that he paid his dues to get there. As a foreign correspondent, he was sent to such tumultuous countries as El Salvador, Nicaragua and Argentina. Here, where risk and resilience defined his time chasing stories while dodging bullets and bombs, tough lessons were learned.
“When people cannot settle their differences: they kill each other. The last man standing wins. One simply did what was necessary to survive.”
It’s clear this hardened perspective helped in his later successes as CTV’s Ottawa bureau chief and in the United States where he was the network’s Washington correspondent for nine years.
Oliver’s time at the White House served as a chance to distance himself from the dangerously tight relationship he had with Pierre Trudeau during his years in office. Oliver admits to having covered some events with less than professional detachment, including the late prime minister’s resignation and funeral. Oliver’s obvious and overt praise in the book for his canoe partner and friend makes it understandable that he often got criticized for unfair coverage.
While Oliver admits there is a line that can be crossed, he makes no apologies for knowing many politicians backstage.
“The benefits are there for a reporter in terms of context, in terms of understanding things,” he says. “Competitively, if I want to get an interview with a minister and it’s someone I know well, I can call them up because I have a personal relationship with them. It’s a very powerful edge on my work.”
Oliver’s time in the States proved to not be such a terrible price to pay for escaping the Canadian political scene.
In one charming anecdote, Oliver recounts being wined and dined by former president Ronald Reagan and his wife only later to realize he was the wrong Craig Oliver to be invited.
Readers are offered somewhat of a break from political tales in Oliver’s many recounts of his canoeing expeditions. The founder of the Rideau Canal and Arctic Canoe Club, Oliver participated in 30 rigorous northern adventures over 30 years, all while being legally blind.
He writes about his horseback riding summers in Alberta that got both Oliver and colleague Lloyd Robertson away from the halls of Centre Block, and still does.
Coming from dysfunctional families and experiencing hard times growing up, both men “learned to look to the future rather than regret the past. After such a start, we agreed, life could only get better, and it did.”
Oliver says while on the surface the book is about politics, it is really about life and survival.
“In the voyage down the rivers and meandering tributaries of our lives, we cannot hope to change the end, yet we can control the journey.”
And what a journey it’s been.
-30-
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This column was published by J-Source on December 12, 2011. It created considerable buzz and controversy in the Twitterverse as well as on OpenFile.
——
As a fourth-year journalism student at Carleton University and wannabe social media guru, I am not naïve to the ways in which today’s reporters are finding and writing their stories.
With over 880 Twitter followers, I’m an advocate for the effective use of social media in the newsroom. Today’s social world with unlimited connectedness and ability to reach people in real-time provides unprecedented opportunities for networking, business, and journalism.
But what I am learning in the classroom, in newsrooms and the online world about journalistic ethics and accountability lies in stark contrast to the way Twitter is currently being used by reporters with some major media organizations.
The trend toward using people who tweet as legitimate sources in stories, and using stand-alone tweets as quotes, counteracts a primary function of the profession and promotes reactive reporting. There is a right way and a wrong way to use Twitter in journalism — making the digital platform journalist’s best friend and journalism’s worst enemy.
My concern about this was piqued when I read a Toronto Star “article” about a jibberish tweet sent from PC leader Tim Hudak’s account. The piece is based solely on comments posted on the social media site, including the use of two quotations the reporter took from Twitter. The story then lists six tweets from various users speculating the cause of the tweet. Aside from the problematic sourcing, my bigger problem with this article is: how is this news?
What really threw me over the edge on this topic was discovering one of my own tweets had been used by the Star in a piece on an Ottawa school’s decision to ban yoga pants. While I understand what is posted on Twitter is in the public domain and can be seen and used by anyone, it still surprised me to find out I had been quoted in the paper when someone from the Star tweeted me saying, basically, “by the way, we used your tweet.”
That the use of tweets for sources passes for journalism astounds me. If the reporter had contacted me (easily done through Twitter, getting my phone number and calling me) she would have found out more about what I posted and why. My tweet, which read “Every school should have uniforms,” was grounded in a strong conviction I hold about clothing in secondary education and one I would be happy to explain and defend. The reporter, should she have contacted me, would have found out that as a student who has experience in almost every school system – public, homeschool, private – my time wearing a uniform was the best and the reasons why. Would this information not have provided for a better, more enlightening story?
As a journalist and journalism student, I find this incredibly problematic. If this is what passes as a published story in the real world, where are my well-honed interview skills, and ability to chase down a source going? If we as students in j-school cited something a person said on Twitter as a source in our stories, we would fail the assignment. So, why is this becoming the accepted norm within news media organizations?
It seems we’re moving towards lazy journalism when a reporter can simply do a Twitter search of a subject or hashtag and use a tweet in lieu of a quote or paraphrase of a source. This gets rid of one of the core functions of a journalist – going out into the world and talking to people face-to-face or calling up individuals to speak with, ask questions and understand the entire story: context, feelings, surroundings and all.
Using Twitter strategically means garnering true and meaningful story ideas, finding sources, crowdsourcing, and then reaching out to people on your own.
In the recent shooting at Virginia Tech, journalists took to Twitter to find students and witnesses to get information and a firsthand account of the atrocity. For example, a CBS News journalist tweeted “Hey #vatech – looking to speak & get updates from students on campus.” This use of Twitter for finding sources is good, presuming the news organization follows up with them to do some more traditional reporting.
But copy-and-pasting tweets into copy is something else entirely.
Storify – the social platform that creates stories for users by consolidating tweets, pictures and posts – is great for individuals and businesses, but not so much for journalists. In its facilitation of quick-and-easy reporting, it makes sense that cash-strapped newsrooms are using the site more and more. While it may be the go-to tool for citizen journalists, those in the profession should know it can be an assistance, but not a dependency.
Storify helps prove that today’s journalist – professional or amateur — doesn’t have to leave the office, let alone their laptop or smartphone, to write a story. But as these platforms proliferate, will there still be a place for quality reporting and investigative journalism in the future? I certainly hope so, as do my classmates who will soon graduate with nearly $30,000 journalism degrees.
While I would be the first one to support an increased role of digital communication and social media for journalists, there is a way for it to be properly and ethically used — one which more reporters should follow.
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