Producers talk about old and new media

Serghino René

During a recent conference on African Americans and television news, longtime ABC producer Michel Martin recounted the 2005 deaths of two media giants to illustrate a point on the difficulties inherent in mainstream media.

Last August, John H. Johnson — publisher of Ebony and Jet magazines, founder of the world’s largest black-owned publishing company and a business titan worth an estimated $500 million — died within days of “ABC World News Tonight” anchor Peter Jennings.

Even after all her years at ABC News, Martin, an award-winning journalist, was not able to get one minute of airtime to talk about Johnson, despite extensive coverage afforded on the front pages of the New York Times, the Washington Post and other national newspapers. Meanwhile, Jennings was the subject of countless television shows.

The disparate coverage was an issue for Martin.

“[Johnson was] just a painful reminder of what black content producers bump up against when the majority decides what makes the news,” she said.

Now, with the emergence of the Internet and other new media, black content producers are wondering aloud how they can balance the existing gap — as well as impact the future of news coverage.

Those issues were discussed last week at the 2006 TECHNOLOGY NOW! Leadership Summit presented by The National Black Programming Consortium, WGBH-Boston and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. In attendance at the WGBH studios for the event were an array of content producers, technology strategists, public television leaders and supporters.

“NBPC believes that the Internet, portable devices and all related digital media offer the potential to engage a truly diverse American public in innumerable and wide-ranging conversations about all aspects of American society,” said Jacquie Jones, NBPC’s executive director. “But we realize that, in order for this to happen, media makers of color — interested in telling stories that would otherwise be left untold in purely commercial media outlets — must be equipped with the skills and tools needed to take advantage of the latest digital production and distribution technologies.”

The summit took a critical look into the future of public media, produced by and for people of color, and the impact of African Americans in the new digital world. Public figures such as hip-hop pioneer Chuck D. of Public Enemy, PBS President Paula Kerger, filmmaker and MacArthur “Genius” Award recipient Louis Massiah, Orlando Bagwell of The Ford Foundation, Andrea Taylor of the Microsoft Corporation and John Henry Thompson, one of the chief architects of Web design giant Macromedia, were among the guests at the event.

Studies have shown that African Americans are excellent consumers of information sources and technology. They read 15.4 percent more magazine issues per month compared to 11 percent magazines for Americans overall. They listen to 41 hours of radio per week, four more than the national average. Percentage-wise, they own more iPods than any other population group in the United States, and they lead the market in cell phone use.

Martin, who will soon be hosting her own daily talk show on National Public Radio, expressed surprise at how unresponsive television is to African Americans — although blacks make up only 13 percent of the nation’s population, they watch more television than any other ethnic group in the nation. Studies show that African Americans watch 76 half hours of television per week compared to 60 percent of the general audience.

“You kind of think people would be kissing our you know what,” said Martin during her keynote speech, “but maybe we are to television executives what we are to the Democrats. They know they got us, but they don’t feel like they have to kiss us first.”

Similar thoughts reflected the conference’s recurring conclusion: that African Americans must be the controllers of their own content.

“The people we are all doing this for are looking for us. The people want to know more about Africa, the Caribbean and the rest of the Diaspora,” Martin said. “They want to see more characters of color in entertainment, news, hear stories on racial profiling, the way skin color permeates in our culture, how kids struggle in inner city schools and so forth.”

With outlets like BET and TV One leading the way, Martin suggested, African Americans must turn from consumers into leaders, buyers and owners of their own media enterprises.

“I see the new media world as a crowded dance floor where the person you want to dance with is looking for you [and] as content providers, we have to find the people that want to dance with us,” she said.