Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

Half full or half empty? I suppose that depends on if you're drinking the Kool-Aid or not.

Today is to journalism what the Academy Awards is to the movie industry. Pulitzer Prize day. Win a Pulitzer, and you've been validated as the best in your field. For small and mid-size papers, earning a Pulitzer means you are as good as anyone, New York Times be damned. It is an honor that bestows far more than a $10,000 award and a citation from Columbia University, it is an honor that instills pride in your work, your paper, your choice of a profession.

And despite the constant drumbeat of dreadful news raining on the industry for well over a year, today was no different. Despite the constant drumbeat of dreadful news raining on the industry for well over a year, the Pulitzer Committee's selection for its 2009 awards reassures us that great journalism endures, that great journalism will never die, that great journalism is as important to this country as any bill coming out of Congress.

So much for the Kool-Aid.

A Pulitzer for local reporting (Detroit Free Press) went to a newspaper hanging on for dear life - a newspaper facing such financial turmoil that just last month it cut back its home delivery to but three days a week. Another Pulitizer for local reporting (East Valley Tribune of Mesa, Ariz.) was shared by a reporter who was laid off before he could find out he earned journalism's most prestigious prize. A third went to the editorial cartoonist of a paper (The San Diego Union-Tribune) that is in the midst of being sold to a Beverly Hills private equity firm.

Me? I've always liked Kool-Aid. Fact is, this is our second Pulitzer in four years, not bad for a paper that during that time has survived three rounds of buyouts (or is it four? I lose track) and is on the brink of a second round of layoffs. The recipient, Steve Breen is the best in the business. And as long as he doesn't take a buyout or suffer a layoff, we have a pretty good chance of winning another one soon.

...Speaking of layoffs
No word yet on whether I'll be working at my cush 50-60-hour-per-week, do-the-work-of-two-people job much longer. Everything I hear is that layoffs won't come until after Platinum's purchase becomes final. Which, sources say, will be announced come Monday, April 27.

Carpetbaggers

One thing you could say about the never-ending exodus of experienced reporters and editors heading for new careers as flaks - er, communication directors - for governmental agencies and businesses is that the quality of spokespeople is going to improve dramatically.

A few weeks ago, Tony Manalotos, a San Diego Union-Tribune reporter who covered crime and public safety, went to work as a communication specialist for City Councilman Kevin Faulconer. And today, I find out that Teri Somers, who has done a superb job as a business reporter covering the biotech industry, is leaving to become communications director for Biocom, which calls itself "the largest regional life-science association in the world."

Tony has already made an impact on Faulconer getting his message out more effectively. I suspect Teri will do at least as well with Biocom.

A contrarian view

Years of right-wing media bashing that began long before Spiro Agnew spewed his "nattering nabobs of negativism" nonsense, combined with a recession that shows no sign of loosening its grip, an endless march to the Internet and an utter lack of leadership in the upper ranks of management have left journalism - or more precisely, newspapers - in the precarious state we find ourselves in today. Tens of thousands of professionals have been laid off or bought out in the past year. Wages are being slashed, furloughs imposed. Newspapers are filing for bankruptcy or shutting down entirely. Yet a new generation of reporters and editors are eagerly preparing to join the ranks.

What gives?

That question was one of the motivations for me accepting an invitation to speak to an investigative journalism class at San Diego State University today. I figured I could learn as much from the 10 or so upper division students as they could from me.

What I found was refreshing. Young, intelligent, motivated students disgusted with the injustices the masses endure and a desire to do something about it. What I found was a young woman who has scoured search warrant affidavits and other court records for an investigative story on crooked Border Patrol agents - all part of a class project. What I found was another young student looking into the way nightclubs are manipulating their clientele to attract more money into their establishments - all part of a class project.

What I found was a refusal to give up on the profession.

And what, they all wanted to know, did I think about our future?

I'm a contrarian, someone who is not convinced newspapers are done for, that our challenges are as much rooted in the economic calamity every industry is facing as it is on Craigslist. And I'm a firm believer that regardless of the vehicle - be it newspapers, the Web or some yet-to-be discovered medium - there will always be a demand for the skills a good journalist must develop. There will always be a demand for good storytellers. And there will always be a demand for people who can write. Clearly.

The times they are a changin'

AP on Monday says it will demand payment from the likes of Yahoo and Google and so-called news aggregators, or else. About time. Yahoo, Google, the Huffington Post and other sites have been getting fat - or at least fatter - thanks to the free labor it gets from newspapers across the country. Time to pay up, boys.