Media Convergence: A Case Study of a Cable News Station

Huang, Jen‐Hung; Heider, Don

doi:10.1080/14241270701521717

Cited by 20 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Following the ethnographic lead of Gans (1999), Boczkowski (2005), Huang and Heider (2007), and Paterson and Domingo (2008), I studied a specific newsroom in the midwestern United States—one that had quit its 17,000 circulation daily product to concentrate online. After layoffs and other staff changes, the newsroom employed about 35 reporters and editors in 2009 (down from about 55 a year earlier); the only department to grow was the online staff, which was at six as of early 2009.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Scholars have explored the innate tensions in the widespread digital reconfigurations of newsrooms, and a bit of this research hints at spatial dimensionality. Huang and Heider (2007) found that stubborn organizational, behavioral, and attitudinal routines stymied full integration of newsrooms as much as technological hurdles. The researchers recommended place‐based changes, such as requiring that directors from both media be present at all meetings.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Convergence Crises: News Work and News Space in the Digitally Transforming Newsroom

Robinson

2011

Journal of Communication

119

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This research documents newsroom transitions from print worlds to digital ones by uncovering the relationships that news producers negotiate and nurture with their work and their workplace. An ethnography of a hybrid newsroom and in-depth interviews with journalists in transitioning places comprised the method; an understanding of interactions of journalists in their physical, virtual, and symbolic spaces informed the analysis. The analysis reveals labor-fed tensions as reporters and their editors incorporate new technologies into their news production routines. A working diagram of the newly converged newsroomis put forward, demonstrating changed power hierarchies that privilege laborers with technological skills engaged in digital domains. Meanwhile, reporters with print-cultural mindsets find themselves increasingly isolated in the newsroom, often excluded from new workspaces.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Convergence Crises: News Work and News Space in the Digitally Transforming Newsroom

Robinson

2011

Journal of Communication

119

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“…By analyzing narratives surrounding changed work habits or redefinitions of skills or missions because of new tools, a researcher can collect a more nuanced understanding about subtle cultural shifts and the social significance of that change in a real way (Downey, 2003b). Furthermore, Gans (1999), Boczkowski (ZOOS), Paterson & Doming0 (2008), Huang & Heider (2007) and others demonstrated that ethnography specifically would reveal the deep context of these transformations in ways that would show the values, routines and attitudes behind new manifestations of journalistic work. In April 2008, the author joined The Capital Times, which had announced it would switch its all-print staff (then putting out an afternoon paper with only superficial online presence] to an online-centric product (with a twice-weekly magazine).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“Journalism as Process”: The Organizational Implications of Participatory Online News

Robinson¹

2011

Journalism & Communication Monographs

123

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This Monograph will explore the empirical and theoretical ramifications of journalism as social media, specifically "journalism as process."The piece calls for an end to thinking about news as a discrete product and the beginning of considering news production as a shared, distributed action with multiple authors, shifting institution-audience relationships and altered labor dynamics for everyone involved. Using the exemplar of one Midwestern city -Madison, WIand its information-production/consumption community, this research stems from a newsroom ethnography and 100 interviews with journalists, bloggers, and members of the socially mediating public. It puts forward the idea that news has become a transportive, transactional object of professional, social and civic work for both journalists and audience members. SUE ROBINSON

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“…In particular, the news table seems to draw people towards it and offer a space for (or perhaps enforce) negotiations among journalists. Like other scholars, we have found that digital technologies significantly shape journalistic work practices and categories of media workers (see Huang andHeider, 2007, Nikunen, 2013). What our study highlights, however, is that the news table can be considered a journalistic and a management tool at the same time: On the one hand it focuses the discussions among journalists on news and their priority -and recognizing and prioritizing news are considered to be the core of their profession.…”

Section: An Increased Collaborationmentioning

confidence: 90%

“…Also, several studies have documented tensions between news workers and their bosses (Smith et al, 2007;Huang and Heider, 2007). Tensions exist between professional subgroups and the organization as a whole, where managers are obviously seen to represent the entire organization and news professionals identify with so-called 'cultural in-groups' (van den Bulck et al, 2013).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital technologies and a changing profession

Plesner

Raviola

2016

JOCM

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate what role particular new management devices play in the development of the news profession in an organizational setting shifting to new technologies. Design/methodology/approach This is studied through of observations of work practices in the newsroom and through documentary research and qualitative interviews with managers, editors, and other professionals. Findings It is shown that management devices such as the news table and the news concept are central to the reorganization of news work, as they realize managers’ strategies, just like they produce new practices and power relationships. It is shown that the devices produce increased collaboration among journalists and interaction between managers and output journalists, that mundane work and power is delegated to technological devices and that news products are increasingly standardized. Practical implications The wider implications of these findings seem to be a change in the journalistic profession: TV news journalism is becoming less individualistic and more collective and professionalism becomes a matter of understanding and realizing the news organization’s strategy, rather than following a more individual agenda. Originality/value The paper’s originality lies in showing that profession and management are not opposed to each other, but can be seen as a continuum on which journalistic and managerial tasks become intertwined. This is in contrast to previous research on news work. Furthermore, the paper’s focus on devices opens up for conceptualizing power in the newsroom as distributed across a network of people and things, rather executed by managers alone.

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Media Convergence: A Case Study of a Cable News Station

Cited by 20 publications

References 24 publications

Convergence Crises: News Work and News Space in the Digitally Transforming Newsroom

Convergence Crises: News Work and News Space in the Digitally Transforming Newsroom

“Journalism as Process”: The Organizational Implications of Participatory Online News

Digital technologies and a changing profession

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