Lindsey Mastis

To me, Al Neuharth is the Elton John of journalism. He breaks all the rules, jazzes it up, and revolutionizes the industry. He is a rock star. But if you were to ask him, he’d just say he’s an SOB.

I read his book “Confessions of an S.O.B” back in high school. I dreamed of one day working for Gannett. That’s when I was interested in becoming a newspaperwoman. I thought the ultimate job would be working for USA Today (Neuharth founded USA Today, The Freedom Forum and the Newseum). I’ve certainly realized my dreams at a young age, working instead for Gannett’s broadcast flagship station WUSA-TV as a reporter.

Today I met the legend. It was during a program at the Newseum called “The Future of News” and today’s topic is “Who Decides What’s News” with guests Bob Schieffer (CBS Face the Nation) and Krishna Bharat (Google News creator).

Sitting front and center (next to my friend and photo obsessive genius Bruce Guthrie) is Al Neuharth. I almost fainted! Neuharth is in town for the Free Spirit Awards which honors, educates, and provides scholarships to high school journalism students. Neuharth has also written a book titled “Free Spirit” which is a fast, easy and inspiring read.

Neuharth sat with the students as Schieffer and Bharat talked about news. I found myself nodding my head in agreement with the main themes: That people need to get their news from more than one source. That there has to be a balance between what people want to know and what they ought to know. That fact checking is more important to credible news sources than getting the story first but wrong. That social networking sites like Twitter can be used as news tips. That aggregators are helpful tools to determine what most editors believe is news.

An additional point Schieffer brought up is about money. He believes journalists and their news organizations that break news stories should get paid for the work. For example, a news organization could pay one of their investigative journalists to spend weeks exposing government waste spending and interviewing whistle blowers. The story runs and in a matter of minutes other news agencies are reporting the story and citing the source. The other news agencies did not have to invest time, money, and stress into the story. Yet the audience is getting the same information. Is there a solution?

Neuharth has been called an SOB and even worse. And it’s not just because of his managing style. It’s because he created USA Today– or the McPaper. He is the one who made newspapers sexy (placing “tits above the fold“). He had reporters write shorter articles and place information in easy to understand graphs. He was criticized, yet it was where the eyes were and he made it profitable. And now we live in a society that needs to fit its thoughts in 140 characters or less.

The problem today: free news for the consumer, with high costs and low profits for the news organization. Neuharth made profits at a time when everyone said it was impossible. Today, people say it’s impossible to make money on the web. Yet that is where the eyes are. The question is, how can news organizations provide trustworthy and ground breaking content for free online and still make a profit?

In my opinion, people will not pay for news. News is free on TV. News is free on Google. We can even get the news by reading one word on a Twitter trend list. But there is a way to capitalize on this new and continuously evolving technology. All the industry needs is another Neuharth to figure it out.

By the way–Neuharth is not my idol for being an SOB, nor for making a profit. It’s not even for starting USA Today.

It’s because he believes in the audience. He hired minorities and women to reflect the readership. He wanted bold pictures and simple graphs so people could get a better understanding of the story. He wanted people to get important news along with the watercooler stories. And he made sure people everywhere in the nation could access the same information. Not to mention, he worked hard.

Neuharth is turning 86 next week. When he first started in the industry he had to deal with crumudgeons, cynics, and naysayers. Those people still exist. They always will. But to those of us wanting to make a difference in this world, Neuharth is  ”a perfect embodiment of a concept.” And that concept is the evolution of the news media.