Canadian Heritage Committee on May 17th, 2016

[Ian Koenigsfest]

They're looking, in particular, at digital and online metrics. Traditionally, radio and television have based their metrics on ratings. There's a whole new frontier out there for understanding the consumption of local news. Part of our discussions at our national conference next month will be about broadcasters, news managers, and journalists getting a better understanding of what new metrics are out there. As the delivery of news is changing, so are the ways people are measuring it. We therefore need to get a better understanding of how that's done.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Have you done any studies as to how that is changing?

[Ian Koenigsfest]

No, but we will be having some presentations at our conference on the new metrics.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

All right.

Have you developed any analysis on what new revenue models might be in the changing market?

[Ian Koenigsfest]

We haven't. Once again, as an association we see our role as providing for discussion and as a forum for debate. The revenue model issue is obviously a major concern, not only to the major networks but also to all journalists in terms of sustaining new delivery systems of news and information without necessarily getting the same return on investment. That, again, is another forum of discussion we are hosting.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have two minutes, Julie.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Yes, okay.

I know that Mr. Breton had a question, so I'm giving him my last two minutes.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Thank you very much.

Thank you for being here.

I have a question.

We have heard from many witnesses since we began our study. They talked about investments, income, spending, and advertising. They also talked about how social media platforms are often not Canadian. That is something that we have been hearing regularly. Witnesses also mentioned that social media do not produce very much local content. I would like to hear from both of you on that. We have approximately a minute and a half.

[Ian Koenigsfest]

Social media outfits are often merely aggregators of other people's news. There are some organizations that may have offices in Canadian cities but don't have any reporters on the ground. What they are doing is aggregating other people's information and then using it, dispersing it pretty much.

Our recommendation for social media aggregators would be to abide by our code of ethics, because then we know there's journalistic integrity and professional conduct. The next step would be to try to get these organizations to have reporters on the ground. That's our concern, boots on the ground and a diversity of voices, because an aggregation service is not necessarily adding any new information, and is not adding anything to the discourse and dialogue within Canadian communities.

[Andy LeBlanc]

I think I would add—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You only have 15 seconds.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Go ahead.

[Andy LeBlanc]

I would differentiate between the journalist on social media versus the individual who is on social media and who doesn't necessarily follow journalistic practices. I think there's a significant variation in the level of trust that someone reading social media will have. It depends on whether the person is an original source with a journalistic background, or an original source from Joe on the street who sees something happening. They each have varying degrees of credibility.

[Pierre Breton, Liberal, Shefford, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Now, Mr. Waugh for the Conservatives.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

I always thought that your organization was top down and that it really only centred around the news directors. In small and mid markets, everyone was scrambling in February because you have these national awards. To be frank with you, the journalists in the newsrooms were never aware of anything until somebody picked their story to go up for a national award.

I'm going to be very critical here, since the fact is that I've been in a newsroom for 39 years. We were never really associated with your organization as reporters. It was always top down. The news directors went to your meetings. They would never come back and share with us, unless your organization would happen to have its annual meeting in our city that year.

Has that improved? If you don't mind my saying, we never heard from you unless you guys actually had the annual meeting in Saskatoon. Or if I was up for a national award, and they knew in advance that I would win something, I might have had the chance to go to Brandon or Winnipeg, or wherever you were holding your meeting.

I really thought your organization was top down and didn't get the journalists on board. Has this changed in the last three or four years?

[Ian Koenigsfest]

Yes, and thank you for your question.

We were in Saskatoon, I believe, in 2006; I think that's the last time we were there. In 2011 when we changed the name of the organization, we also changed the fact that it was not only for news directors, but open to journalists. I would say there has been a significant shift in the operation of the association to make it welcoming to students, for example, and to make it welcoming to reporters. At our last convention, we probably had more working journalists attending our sessions than we had news directors and news managers.

It's a valid criticism, but I would say that the process to change began in 2011, and we continue to make it an open and diverse group. With our new code of ethics, the move now is to push it even further and to include as many people as possible.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

I think you have to go there, and I think you guys know that you have to go there. You're going to have to engage some journalists.

In a lot of newsrooms in this country, there is no PD, no professional development. It's just trial and error, and if you screw up, you're into the office the next day. That has to be addressed in this country, because many news directors are so busy pushing paper right now that they can't deal with the day-to-day stuff, and deal with journalists and to improve the product on the air.

You made a point, and you're very correct, that we're still filling massive hours. Every news bureau in this country still has the hours to fill and many of them are exceeding those hours, but the quality is certainly not there, as you pointed out.

I want you to talk about how we are going to get journalists up to speed, because the quality of journalism that I've seen in this country over the last 40 years has deteriorated greatly.

[Ian Koenigsfest]

On the quality of journalism, I'm not sure I agree with you, sir, respectfully. If our national awards and our local and regional awards are an indication of the quality of storytelling, I think it matches storytelling in journalism anywhere in the world.

Where I do agree with you about there being fewer voices and a lack of diversity. The commitment that our association has made is to broaden the dialogue and the extent of the discussion of journalism in this country. Through our code of journalistic ethics we offer opportunities to sign up to a professional code of conduct, whether you work for a network or you are an individual working on social media, that I believe will protect the integrity of journalism in this country.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

I came from a C market or maybe a B market. When we lose broadcasting in Red Deer, in Kamloops, and all these small markets, I saw the journalists coming into a mid-market or so, and they were struggling.

They used to be able to own their trade in really small markets and then jump to mid-markets. Now there are no small markets. I think that's where I'm coming from. That's maybe where your organization should focus, as I do see the bottom tier in the newsrooms really struggling right now.

They are coming in with little experience. The newsrooms just don't spend enough time on professional development, and they have never in my 40 years of broadcasting spent any time on professional development.

Can you comment on that, because we don't get anything: there is no personal development whatsoever. There is no PD in any newsroom. It is run day to day, 24-7. Nobody is accountable until you screw up.

[Andy LeBlanc]

I have about 36 years in the business, so I understand a number of the viewpoints you have. I think that when it had the initial name of RTNDA back in the day when it was mainly news directors and new managers, they would come to the conference, have the various learning opportunity sessions, discussions with other news directors and so on, and bring that information, that knowledge, and whatever they picked up back to their newsrooms and use that as an opportunity to teach staff.

In many cases I do think that has happened. There are a number of times.... One of our awards, the Creative Use of Sound, was in its first year, and a number of people saw the results of that. The news directors took that back to their newsrooms, and the next year the submissions that came in for that particular category were amazing.

I had the ability of judging—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have one minute.

[Andy LeBlanc]

—that particular category. It was quite nice to see that people took what was discussed at one conference, and the next year you saw concrete results. People actually said, “I'm going to get one of those.” Many people didn't get the award, of course, but what they did was that they tried, and just raised the bar slightly on the quality level.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

I'm going to mention the photojournalists. When they came in, it was like, “You've got a camera, go do it.” You'd come back with blue video and somebody would say something and that was it. That's what I'm talking about here. It's this lower echelon, because we have fewer people in newsrooms today than we did yesterday. When you get stuck with a camera, go out and shoot and come back, there's very little training in this business.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much, Mr. Waugh. Your time is up. I want to congratulate you on being politically correct in mentioning both Brandon and Winnipeg in the same sentence.