What Melissa Carlson is doing is not only groundbreaking in her region, it’s groundbreaking in her industry. And it speaks just as much to the future of journalism as it does to the course of social media.
If you live in the Reno-Lake Tahoe area, you likely know Carlson as a KRNV Channel 4 news anchor. If you live in Australia, Austria, or the UK, however, chances are you’ve met Carlson on Google+, where she leads daily (Monday through Friday) 20-minute online Hangouts in her “CyberStudio” (watch a webcast here) with people around the globe. She picks four to five topics a day (it could be something serious in nature, such as the disturbing upward trend of shootings in U.S. schools, or something as lighthearted as the Pope starting a Twitter account), posts those topics on her Google+ page to generate interest, and hangs out with five to 10 people about 45 minutes later.
Only a week ago, Channel 4 started incorporating Carlson’s Hangouts into its noon telecast, dedicating about three minutes air time while they get a feel for the public’s reaction.
According to Carlson, KRNV is only the second television news organization in the nation to use Google+ on a continuous basis. The first to do so was Sarah Hill, a news anchor from KOMU-TV in Columbia, Missouri. I recently hung out with Carlson, who explains in the video below how the Reno station came up with the idea of incorporating Google+ Hangouts into its news coverage.
In my opinion, Carlson and Hill are vastly ahead of the news curve and exemplify where news in general is headed: more real-time “man off the street” interaction. As a society, we have become more interested in each other’s input and opinions, which is very much a result of our constant participation in social media. We like dialogue and are moving away from the one-dimensional news model, in which we hear the anchor’s words or read the writer’s story, but are unable to engage in a conversation. This is why the “comment” function is so popular on newspaper websites — the readers have a say in the subjects they’re passionate about.
In the next video I ask Carlson to rate the success, so far, of her Google+ venture. She is enthusiastic about the possibility of increased community participation in the news, particularly breaking stories.
You heard it from Carlson: “I think that this is the way that news will eventually go.” She mentions the Caughlin Fire, which devastated Reno in November 2011, but I also think back to the tragedy that transpired at the 2011 National Championship Air Races and Air Show in Reno. The videos of the plane crash, which killed 11 people and injured 70, were provided by spectators (who had uploaded them on YouTube) and shown continuously on local and national newscasts. So the common person is already participating in news more than ever before, aka “citizen journalism.”
Hill is a lot more matter-of-fact about the paradigm shift in news coverage. “News ‘anchors’ are a dying breed,” she wrote to me in a recent e-mail. “We are news ‘buoys’ now as we float between platforms and serve as a beacon to news content within the stream.” She elaborates on that concept in this blog.
“Google+ Hangouts expand our reach in the world,” Hill continues. “People don’t just want to get the news…they want a forum to talk about it. Facebook and Twitter are text-based engagement. Hangouts are face-to-face interaction in real time during a newscast.”
And, interestingly, this means traditional news sources are letting their guard down and relinquishing some control to an audience that has become accustomed to having a voice. “It is live television, so unscripted material has an uncertain factor to it, but at times that’s the allure of the program as you never know what’s going to happen. …It’s kind of like a coffee shop where news is served on the menu daily,” Hill concludes.
What do you think? Do you want to see the public have a bigger voice in the news? That perhaps begs the larger question: Just how do we define “news” today?
Matthew –
Great write up. I have been on Google+ since July 08, 2011 back when it was in Beta testing. I live in Columbia, MO, and am one of Sarah Hill’s original Cyber Co-Hosts for her U_News program. It has been so much fun to help pioneer what has become such a expressive and inclusive format to use between journalists and “citizen journalists.” It’s two-way television at its best.
Both Sarah Hill and Melissa Carlson have really taken the initiative to show how Google+ Hangouts can serve a community. A community that is international, but has been brought closer together by this wonderful new technology. It’s the Brady Bunch meets the Jetson’s, only now it is reality. That excites me!
I would love to visit with you further about all this, let me know if you have time.
Dan
https://plus.google.com/109499411748464808418/posts
Great use of the hangout technology! Glad to see someone else using it in the newsroom now!
I have been spending as much time around Sarah as I can since shortly after the beginning of her broadcasts and have fallen in love with what she is doing with the technology. I am so glad to see more and more people following in her footsteps!
There other stations who have tried using hangouts, but were expecting only their “local” audience from their viewing area.
There are issues with using hangouts while broadcasting, mainly around using the equipment (mics, earphones, external noise sources) and this is part of the education that is going on at present.
Given that last night a tornado ripped through the southern parts of Missouri and there were people on the ground who were able to explain what is going via a mobile hangout, this is a very powerful news-gathering tool.
The funniest comments though are from people who just joined Google Plus to get on their local TV news and see themselves live on TV. They get a real kick out of being able to do that.
The technology will improve over time beyond what we know now and like all new tech,, there are bugs in the system.
The days of live-to-air on-site reporting with the associated field army are very numbered when comparing this new technology to how ENG has been covered until now.
Thanks for your comments Dan, Peter, and Michael. This was an intriguing (and timely) post for me to formulate because it fit my blog theme — the blending of journalism and social media — so perfectly. The two mediums truly are seamless in how they work together.
Michael, yes, I think the technology will really take off in the breaking news realm, which Melissa emphasized.
Peter, I think that’s why Sarah truly is a pioneer in her profession. She took a new facet of social media — Hangouts — and put them to an extraordinary use.
Dan, I am working to fit Google Hangouts into my own career (Nevada Magazine editor) and personal life. It just needs to become part of my routine!