This is the blog of Julie Starr. I write about the news business and consult on newsroom integration and change projects.
I am currently working on...
* Newsroom change management and web-and-print development for Fairfax Media NZ.
* Media liaison for Webstock 2012. It's going to be another great conference: here's the speaker list. Email me if you'd like to interview one of these smart people. (We'll do our best depending on everyone's availability.) julie@allaboutthestory.com.
All Evolving Newsroom
In 1940 you got 15 minutes of foreign news a week
I was talking to my Dad the other night about what news looked like when he was young.
He said they didn’t have a radio or a television, and the paper wasn’t delivered.
“Only milk and bread were delivered in those days,” he said. The butcher and grocer would deliver if you called in your order. But not newspapers.
The only foreign news he saw was in the news reels shown at the “2 o’clocks” on a Saturday afternoon.
“Half the news you got was at the movies, and that was the first thing you knew about what was going on in London or wherever.
“I didn’t go for that though, I mostly went for the serials and things like that. They used to have some pretty good serials back in those days. (The Lone Ranger was a hit.)
“They had about 15 or 20 minutes of news but then you’d get straight into the good stuff. That was the only news you used to get.”
I couldn’t find any news reels that I could embed here, but NZ On Screen has some and the British Pathe films are here.
What interests me is how different our sensibility is now about how much news we need in a day.
Dad grew up with 15 minutes of foreign news a week. Now we have foreign news round the clock. We have all kinds of news round the clock. Does it make my life better?