The best part is that the book is free! If you teach journalism or are interested in delving into multimedia, Westbrook’s book is a good starting point because it covers the basics and explains some important storytelling tools, as well as offering sage advice to novices, my favorite of which was: “Ready or not, start contacting editors, start filming, start editing, start writing. Go out there, and do it now! The sooner you start doing things the sooner you get results. And the sooner you fail, so you can get over it. Too many of us spend time being the proverbial think-tank, when we should be a do-tank.”

Among the expected arguments are that independent reporting contributes to an informed electorate through interpretation and analysis, and that it holds those in power accountable “to the legal and moral standards of public service and keeps business and professional leaders accountable to society’s expectations of integrity and fairness.” Reporting cannot be turned over to bloggers and anyone else capable of gathering information because:

“Something else would be lost, and we would be reminded that there is a need not just for information, but for news judgment oriented to a public agenda and a general audience. … Something is gained when news reporting, analysis, and investigation are pursued collaboratively by stable organizations that can facilitate regular reporting by experienced journalists, support them with money, logistics, and legal services, and present their work to a large public.”

Absolutely.

The problem with this, of course, is that much of the public doesn’t see journalism through this lens of autonomy and objectivty — they see self-interested talking heads and pundits who promote their own agendas on the air, on the Internet, and on the printed page.

The authors of the report, Leonard Downie Jr. and Michael Schudson, recognize this (to a degree) and hope their six models will lead the public back to a renewed faith in the press and its ideals. But in order to get to that point — and let’s be clear: the media never enjoyed particularly high ratings with the public, no matter which decade or century you look at — it’s going to take public support to get there. Convincing the public — through philanthropy, education, and some government changes — to support an industry that it doesn’t hold in particularly high regard is a tough sell.

Downie and Schudson are careful to say they are not calling for a government bailout of newspapers or other media, but that “this should not preclude government support for news reporting any more than it has for the arts, the humanities, and sciences, all of which receive some government support.”

Downie and Schudson propose, among other things, making it easier for news organizations to become nonprofit entities and refocusing public radio and television on local news. They also call for greater support from philanthropies and foundations, and for universities to create their own news organizations that encourage innovation. They introduce a plan to raise funds that would support local news reporting through fees on “telecom users, television and radio broadcast licensees, or Internet service providers.” On their final point, Downie and Schudson write that access to public information must be increased by local, state, and national government and the public should be made aware of the various sources for reporting on such information.

All in all, they’re pretty good suggestions for what the public can do to sustain journalism. But it doesn’t answer the larger question of how do we convince the public that journalism is worth the effort? Part of this should come from examining what journalism can do for itself, and for the public. Missing from the report were proposals of what news organizations should do to help themselves out of the economic mess they’ve fallen into; while Downie and Schudson detailed the relative success of upstart nonprofits like the Voice of San Diego and other hyperlocal Web sites, they didn’t offer much in terms of what existing news organizations should do to turn toward profitability.

Americans love stories of people who pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, who were self-reliant and resourceful to overcome challenges — not ones who asked for handouts. They feel the same way about businesses and organizations. News companies have to show they’re making changes and pursuing opportunities to right their own ships, instead of standing aside asking for someone else to help as their ship sinks. Their reconstruction needs to be based on what they can do for themselves, not relying on the public to essentially do it for them.

New models of journalism have to be based on the realization that the value of news, in and of itself, is finite. Media organizations don’t offer the same types of materials as those referenced by Downie and Schudson. People return to museums time and again to view paintings; they will read a good book over and over. This is not the case with news products. Instead, we must recognize that the public isn’t likely to offer widespread support for journalism because it is fundamentally different than other institutions. While independent reporting may do more to uphold democracy than a painting or a play, the public expects journalism to remain a self-sustaining industry. We need to focus on what the media can do to save itself.

Additionally, more than half of the journalists surveyed felt the quality of journalism has been damaged by cutbacks in the industry, which likely influenced their responses regarding the need for PR-produced content. More than 40% said the media’s dependence on content from PR agencies will increase because of editorial department losses and the demands of producing material for online. The report, produced by the Oriella PR Network, called this “good news for the PR industry.”

Journalists have always been dependent on information from public relations workers — as Sigal (1973) and others have explained, officials and other sources like PR people provide a steady flow of information that helps media professionals meet their deadlines and add background/context to stories. Offering information to journalists aids the provider as well, allowing him or her to shape the presentation of that information, as Gandy (1982) explained: Sources provide information because it enables them to influence journalists by “controlling their access to and use of information” (p. 61).

So while this may indeed be “good news” for PR workers, its implications for the future of journalism, in terms of its quality, contribution to a well-informed electorate and democracy, are far more ominous.

And innovation is what the media, and newspapers especially, need. As was pointed out in an article in the MIT Sloan Management Review, innovation should be happening at every company because technology makes it so inexpensive and easy to try out new ideas. Technological changes enable organizations to test multiple new ideas in a matter of days or hours, whereas the same process (even a few years ago) would have required a team of people working for months or more. What this means is that companies can afford to take more risks and chance small failures to learn from them, leading to bigger successes. For this to happen, though, managers must relinquish some of the control they hold — they have to encourage employees to pitch ideas for changes and give them the freedom to pursue those innovations, knowing that there may not be a significant payoff at the end. But then again, there might be. And it’s the giving up of control — going from what will be because that is what the manager decreed, to what might be because of someone else’s idea — that stifles innovation and reinforces a corporate culture that ultimately hurts the organization. An open approach to pursuing new ideas can ultimately change the corporate culture that is, in essence, allowing newspapers (and other media) to slowly commit suicide.

The article provides some details on the subscription models of various newspapers, as well as other profit-making ventures like pairing with online sites. Some of these may be profitable — the New York Times’ Co.’s digital revenues, which include the Web sites of the New York Times and the Boston Globe as well as about.com, were more than $350 million last year. What’s important here, and what the article recognizes, is that different newspapers will need different models. Some may need more than one. For example, the larger prestige papers like the New York Times may have more success in attracting readers willing to pay for their content. And smaller papers with local content that can’t be found elsewhere (small markets without television stations, for instance) may also be able to make some money with paid online subscriptions. These revenues likely won’t cover much of the newspapers’ operating expenses, so other money-making innovations will be necessary as well.

But others see online subscription models as only delaying the inevitable demise of newspapers, which was also reflected in the article: “Some observers, like author and new media guru Clay Shirky, see little chance of newspapers surviving no matter what they do, and argue that the iTunes model is a distraction, since free news will win out over the paid kind.”

Gade isn’t alone — Vint Cerf, who is often referred to as the father of the Internet, has said newspapers should use the iTunes approach to selling news by charging marginal amounts of money for access to their information. The Kindle has shown some promise in attracting newspaper readers (for the New York Times, at least). Wired magazine was one of the first to note how newspapers could use Kindle to draw additional income: “Moving reading off the web and onto a wireless device makes it possible for newspapers to create exclusive content that would provide incremental revenue.”

This strategy, however, has the potential to backfire by frustrating readers who feel they’re being forced to track down the information they want through three different sources (print, online, and Kindle). It also focuses on appealing to people who are likely already newspaper readers and not pulling back those who have abandoned print.

Before newspaper managers leap into the waters of charging for content, they should know that Amazon takes the lion’s share of the profits from Kindle downloads. (Newspapers get less than one-third of the revenue they generate on Kindle.) It’s also important to consider what paywalls did for the recording industry. Sites like Napster took the music world by storm with their free file-sharing, and the recording industry took them to court and won, paving the way for pay sites like the new Napster and iTunes. In the process, though, the recording industry’s image took a hit and became the “bad guy” in this situation. Newspapers, already suffering from ethics scandals and near-constant moans of their eminent demise, should think twice about inviting further tarnishing of their reputations.

And, as Hugh Martin from the University of Georgia explained at the conference I attended last week, the pay-for-content model hasn’t been totally rosy for the recording industry. He referred to a study that found of the 1,000 or so songs the average iPod owner has on the device, only about 20 of those downloaded had been paid for. (I think he was referring to a 2005 article, which noted iTunes downloads were accelerating.) As long as the same information is available for free on the Internet, most members of the public aren’t likely to pay for it on newspaper Web sites. And unlike music downloads that have an infinite shelf life because users can listen to them over and over, newspaper downloads are likely to be read once and then discarded. Their value is a fraction of the value of music in the eyes of the consumer.

Music users who pay 99 cents to download a song aren’t likely to willingly pay the same amount for an article online. Even a few pennies might seem ridiculous when, with a few clicks of the mouse, they can access the same information for free on another site.

There may be one area in which people might fork over some small change: specialized local content. Newspapers are still pretty much the only game in town when it comes to consistently providing local news. I offer this example using the newspaper I grew up reading, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: The P-D has a decent Web site, but I have to navigate around to find the news I’m interested in and all the back-and-forth annoys me after a few minutes. I look for information about the community I lived in, as well as news about the Cardinals and Rams. I also still like to read a couple of its columnists. If I could tailor the site to show me those things each time I pull it up (while still being able scan the headlines from other sections, but on another page) I’d pay a few dollars each month for that. Of course, $3 a month won’t save the paper, so here’s one way to supplement the cost: make it easy for me to find the ads I’m interested in as well. We know that people buy newspapers for the ads, but it’s hard to get to them online. Give me a link to the local Best Buy ad on my personalized page and charge Best Buy for it.

What’s important in all of this is that newspapers continue to innovate and to offer their products on a variety of platforms with a variety of options for personalizing the content. Will Kindle save newspapers? No. Will the Internet? No. Newspapers have to save themselves, and there’s no magic single way to do it.

The new documentary “Breaking News, Breaking Down” by a veteran television anchor (who was recently laid off) examines the effect of reporting on traumatic events, such as the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 and Hurricane Katrina. As James Rainey, the Los Angeles Times’ media columnist, explains: “The military, law enforcement and firefighting are often cited as the professions that require running toward danger. Walter’s documentary demonstrates, quite movingly, how journalists must be added to that list. ‘Breaking News, Breaking Down’ shows how reporters and photographers dive headlong toward disaster, seldom imagining that they can be snared in the psychological trauma.”

This 36-minute documentary by Mike Walter includes the story of a newspaper photographer in New Orleans who covered Hurricane Katrina and its destruction of his hometown. His anguish — over what had happened to his city, over losing his own home, over covering others whose lives and homes were torn apart — became so great that he nearly took his own life.

Although many journalists may never report on events as extreme as these or suffer reactions to the same extent, the day-to-day reporting on disturbing events can take its toll, especially because journalists are socialized to be tough and distance themselves from the emotional pull of the job. This mindset often takes root in journalism schools, where students are learning the skills they need to take into the field. While we talk about inverted pyramids and nutgraphs, there isn’t much discussion of the psychological side of the job. Students go into journalism with the tools they need to produce news stories and video reports, but they aren’t really prepared to handle what they see and feel when they’re out on assignment, whether it’s in a war zone or — as is far more frequently the case — at the scene of a crime or at the home of a victim.

Films like “Breaking News, Breaking Down” can be used in the classroom to facilitate a forthright discussion of what it’s like to be a journalist, and how to manage the emotional highs and lows that are inherent to the job. It’s also a good opportunity to invite local journalists into the classroom to talk about their experiences and how they cope, as well as to have students brainstorm ways they would cover disasters and other traumatic events. (A good resource is the Dart Center for Journalism & Trauma.)

As Umair Haque explains in the manifesto: “They’re not the same old newspaper, sold a different way. They are 21st century newspapers, built on new rules, that are letting radical innovators reinvent what ‘news’ is.” Among these rules are supplying topics rather than articles so people can increase the breadth of their knowledge rather than read a story that is quickly forgotten. He cites the Talking Points Memo’s revelations of the Bush administration’s firings of U.S. Attorneys as an example, which was curious considering that most of the materials on TPM are presented as articles, complete with bylines. What’s more, the information on the TPM home page isn’t predominantly categorized by topic but rather listed by the latest headlines, much like you find on newspaper home pages. Probably not the best example of what he envisions.

Here’s where I think Haque got it right (with using Talking Point Memo as an example): Nichepapers let stories/topics snowball, with readers commenting and critiquing on what resonates most with them. THIS is how the Bush administration’s actions really came under fire. (If you notice on the “revelations” page, there’s a link at the top where people can contribute information for the timeline.) Based on the response from stories or topics that they pitch, nichepapers roll with what rises to the top. That kind of decision-making and coverage doesn’t happen on the Web sites of most mainstream newspapers, or at least it’s not as transparent as on nichepaper sites.

Finally, Haque pinpointed why the business model of nichepapers is making them the newspapers of the 21st century: “What is different about them is that they are finding new paths to growth, and rediscovering the lost art of profitability by awesomeness.” Yes, awesomeness. Fortunately, he explains this. By specializing, nichepapers like Huffington Post can transform themselves into the leaders of information on select subjects and in doing so, readers benefit from the thorough, timely content and publishers reap the rewards of having lower production costs and overhead and ultimately, less risk.

Awesomeness indeed.

As Alfred Hermida writes in Media Shift, journalists shouldn’t think about new media in terms of something else they have to do along with their traditional reporting. He recently fielded a question like the one above at a conference for journalists, and his response was that engaging audiences doesn’t come from a single multimedia trick.

Hermida explained: “My answer to the beat reporter was that she should reassess what she does to figure out how she can best serve the audience. It could be that writing two or three stories a day is the answer. Or blogging may provide a way to develop a closer relationship with that audience. The digital revolution is less about adding multimedia tricks than it is about reinventing the role of the journalist.”

That reinvention of journalists is part of what the future of journalism is about — getting them to see beyond what journalism was and to stop clinging so tightly to those notions. Yes, good storytelling will always be a part of journalism. But now it’s more than just writing those stories in the “traditional” newspaper sense. How journalists can and should tell stories is fundamentally changing, and journalists should embrace this opportunity. Instead of just one way to tell a story, they have an arsenal of multimedia tools they can use.

Journalists can’t insist they’re only writers or only editors anymore. The field of journalism is more than that, and they must be too.

“And let’s get another thing straight: they still live and breathe the key qualities of journalism: curiosity, accuracy and a desire to root out good stories and tell the truth.”

Notice there’s no mention of support from a mainstream news organization. I’ve been interviewing journalists who have been laid off and one of the questions I ask them is what defines a professional journalist. While a few have listed working at a mainstream media organization as a qualifying characteristic, others have been more open to the image Westbrook lays out. The former journalists I’ve talked to (for the most part) recognize that journalism won’t be done in the same way as it once was, but for them, the idea of professionalism in the field hinges on objectivity. Westbrook hints at this with his mandates for accuracy and truth-telling, but in American journalism, objectivity seems to be the defining factor of what makes something “journalism.” (Autonomy can probably also be included here as well, but in my research, objectivity is what resonates most strongly with journalists.) The idea of objectivity-as-maker-of-journalism is particularly interesting given the frequent criticism from the public that the press is too partisan. Perhaps this stems from the rise of partisan press in the United States, where people can now find media that supports and reinforces their own views, thus leading them to believe that anything else that doesn’t “agree” is not objective.

Getting back to Westbrook’s image of the journalist of the future, the picture he presents is of an ideal journalist, an on-the-go, not-hampered-by-office-politics figure who markets their work so brilliantly that work comes to them (in the form of being selected to work on projects, rather than having to do much pitching on their own). And although being a jack-of-all-trades is required, so is specialization. Westbrook acknowledges that the public won’t pay for general news and proposes the future is in niche markets, where people are more likely to dole out a few dollars for reports focused on a particular topic. (He suggests business, entertainment and sports news as potential sources.) He explains: “They are a freelancer, yes, but not a slave to the odd newsroom shift or rubbish PR story; instead they are in command of their destiny by creating content people will pay for.”

And that’s the big question — how will the journalist of the future make money? Freelance journalists will definitely play a huge role in shaping the future of journalism, but how will they do it? Will media companies pay for their reports, or will the freelancers cut out the middleman and distribute their reports online themselves? If so, will people really pay to access it? Will appealing to a niche audience generate enough revenue to support continued reporting by the freelancer?