Andy Carvin's Waste of Bandwidth

Andy Carvin: Hi everyone, Andy Carvin here. Right now I'm with former CBS anchor and veteran journalist Dan Rather. Thanks for taking the time to sit down with us today.

Dan Rather: Delighted to be here, Andy.

Carvin: I wonder if we could start talking a bit about what you were saying at your keynote earlier today at South By Southwest when you referred to media concentration, media cross-ownership, and the impact it has on both journalism and civic discourse. Could you expand upon that a bit more in terms of how you see media concentration affecting specifically local news, as well as national news?

Rather: Well, the biggest thing, the most important point I was trying to make today is that we need to think about what I describe as the corporatization of news. I'm not even sure if corporatization is a word, but larger and larger corporations - fewer and fewer in number - have taken control of more and more of the major disseminators of news in the country. To the extent now that you could make the case - and I would make the case - that four, five, no more than six really large corporations control the principal mass media outlets in the country. This is not in itself a bad thing, and I don't argue that the people who run these large corporations are any less patriotic than I am or less public spirited.

However, what is true is that the corporatizing of the news is one of the factors in making our news coverage less independent, less probing in questioning. I've said it has less guts. We need an American journalism spine transplant. I do no except myself from these criticisms. And part of the reason we need those things is because of what I call the corporatizing of the news. And here's the way it works. A larger and larger corporate entity - frequently a mega-corporation on a global scale - news is only a small part of their business. In some cases, they stay in the news business only insofar because they think it can help them with their legislative and regulatory needs in Washington. Or for that matter, in state capitals, when they need it. And I think the public, those who haven't thought about it, need to think about the effects on our government, on our system of government, on the democratic process.

If on the one hand you have a head of the corporation very far removed from news, who hasn't heard a journalist say, "Great journalism begins with owners and publishers who have guts, and who are public service-minded." They probably never heard it, or if they did here it, paid attention to it. That the needs of the corporation to produce ever-increasing stockholder value puts the top of the corporation sometimes in direct opposites - makes them direct opposites - over journalism that will dig, investigate and expose, particularly in Washington or a state capital.

So here's how it would work. Corporation X, which has all kinds of worldwide, great interests, owns a news entity, tells a lobbyist, "Listen, we need this from the FCC." Or "We need this piece of legislation passed." Or "We need this piece of legislation stopped. We need more stations, we need more station coverage...." Whatever it is. And if the person representing it in Washington says, "You know what? Our news operation is investigating the very people I'm trying to convince to give you what you want."

This is a conflict of interest. Now it doesn't happen every day, it doesn't happen in every instance, but it's where some sunshine needs to shine in. And I hope the public understands that, because if they do, they'll hold these mega-corporations more to account. I do think it's time to look and see if any of these practices are monopolistic practices. But whether they are or aren't, the relationship between the top of the corporate body, which needs regulatory and/or legislative help of all kinds in Washington - probably having nothing to do with their news operation - with billboards, with aircraft engines, with whatever. When someone says we don't get much gutsy journalism any more, we don't get many tough questions any more, we don't have the kind of investigative reporting we used to have, well one of the reasons is because what I call this corporatizing of the news.

Carvin: Well, if this is the system that has evolved, and the fact that you have corporate journalism on the one hand and government on the other, with this "cozy" relationship as you've described it -

Rather: And that's the generous way of putting it....

Carvin: The generous thing, perhaps.... How do you change the system, if the entities that are in a position to change it are the ones who benefit from the relationship they've created for themselves?

Rather: Well, the answer is not easily, but we can do it - this is America. And, you know, here, We the People do rule. How can we change it? One, let the sun shine in. People need to know how it works - how it really works - as opposed to how somebody would like to convince them that it works. I believe in, you know, sunshine cures mildew in damp basements. But let the sunshine in. Let's call some attention to this.

Number two: hold people accountable. The Federal Communications Commission is supposed to represent We the People of the United States, and is supposed to husband, supposed to represent our interest with the people's airwaves, which I think rightly so. Corporate entities are allowed to make money, to create profits and to create jobs and all that. But, the regulatory agencies, whether it be the FCC - you name one - they're supposed to represent We the People. Now the question - and to ask the question is not to suggest that I know the answer - do these regulatory agencies still represent We the People? Or are they handmaidens of the very corporations, particularly large corporations, in which they're supposed to be the people's representative to. So, make people aware of it, put the sunshine in, hold them accountable.

More often than not now, the regulatory agencies, they will be - soon after elections - they will be stocked with highly partisan, political operatives. Who are there, frankly in some cases, to squeeze money out of corporations. Or in other cases, represent the political well-being of their party or the person who's just been elected. That's not the way it's supposed to work, and we all know it.

Now, this kind of thinking is not original or profound. It's essential to the American system. Your question was how to change it? Sunshine in, hold people accountable, remind people that they work for us. They are representatives of We the People of the United States, and I don't think it'll take all that much to affect some change. It'll be difficult; in some cases it'll be controversial because powerful interests don't want this to happen. Very powerful, well-financed interests say, "You know, don't pay any attention to the Dan Rathers of the world - they're journalists. They're nice people, and yes, sometimes they do good work. But you know what - they don't understand business." And I'm the first to say that my craft is journalism, not business. But I do understand this business. And in this case I'm doing my best to speak truth to power.

Carvin: I'd like to shift gears a little bit and talk about the blogosphere. When you spoke today you expressed concerns about anonymous blogging, in particular when they use anonymous blogging to hide themselves and use it a way of attacking people in "scurrilous" ways, using the term that you mentioned. How do you balance that problem with the use of anonymity internationally in the blogosphere? For example, bloggers in China, Zimbabwe, Tunisia who use anonymity as a way to speak truth to power while protecting their own rights?

Rather: Or whistleblowers in our own country?

Carvin: Absolutely.

Rather: Yeah. Well the answer to how do we do it is "not easily." And I don't have all the answers. I may not have any of the answers. And to ask the question is not to suggest that I have some solution. And this was said in the context of, I think, do blogs overall in the main add to consumer value, news consumer value. Do all of them? No. Do I like all of them? No. But, you know, we have the First Amendment. Congress shall pass no law restricting speech and information.

Internationally, when it comes to someone in China who must have the anonymity. Otherwise they die or go into prison in some societies. I think we can all agree that that's a case in which anonymity is justified, and we understand that it's justified. And in the case of whistleblowers in this country - that is, someone who's deep in the bowels of Agency X and knows the outrages that are happening. That's why I prefer that they call a reporter and if they're looking for one, Dan Rather is available. But to use the Internet for that - there are people who use it for scurrilous purposes, either just to smear and ruin the reputation of a neighbor they don't like or to undercut someone in business - a business competitor, and say, the way to get at him is to spread something scurrilous about him.

My hope is over time, that the marketplace will deal with this. But short- and medium-range, it's a problem, and what I tried to do today is say, "This bothers me." I don't know what to do about it. It may be that there is no solution to it, because you do want to protect those who need anonymity to speak truth to power, to expose corruption. You don't want to give it to those who user it for nefarious, scurrilous purposes. But like a lot of things in which freedom is involved, that it comes at a price and it's sometimes messy. I wish I had the answer to it.

I think, in terms of this country, domestically, that for those who use it for what I call for scurrilous, nefarious purposes - which can include partisan political purposes, saying something terrible about a candidate - I think it's a little easier if someone is really dedicated, you can find it out. It just takes a lot. But if you're the neighbor who's getting cut up, it's harder.

I'm afraid I'm not very good on this subject because I honestly don't have an answer. What I was trying to do is just lay out, "Here's a problem." I did say what I thought were some of the advantages, but here's a problem. And it's a problem that needs to be dealt with. It may be that there is no solution, and we just have to go. Because the Internet - and I only said half-jokingly - we've passed the Elvis Presley stage [and we're] at the Beatles stage. Which is to say, it's beginning to mature. But it hasn't reached its full maturity. I don't expect to see it do that for a very long time.

Carvin: Do you worry that the public lacks the media literacy skills to tell the difference between a blogger who has integrity and sincerity, versus a blogger who is trying to use a blog purely for ulterior motives?

Rather: Well, some do; some don't. But, you know, I trust the audience. My experience, in first print, then radio, then television, and now, early on in the world of high-def television and the Internet, overall in the main you can trust the audience. The public at large - particularly in our country, with its freedoms - the public at large has a pretty good bullshit indicator. They may not be watching the meter all the time; they may misinterpret it some of the time. But by and large, they'll separate bullshine from brass tacks. And I think that's the way it is with blogs. Maybe not immediately - but we've gone through this before. We've gone through it on radio - Father Coughlin back in the 1930s. Most people now don't even know who he was. But he was a demagogue at the time. And some people were very worried, saying, "You gotta silence him, because people are not smart enough to catch up with who and what this guy is."

We've had periods, the McCarthy period in the 50s, a lot people were worried about it for the same reason. So while this danger exists in what some like to call the blogosphere, while on any given day or hour I might say, "Gosh, I wonder if people recognize this as propaganda." It is. Then I just come back to, in this country, I trust the public.

But I said to someone earlier today, and you might find this too off the mark, but I hope not - that I hope people aren't too quick to dismiss the potential for outright propaganda on the Internet, including the blogosphere. That new technologies, new ways of conveying images and information are particularly vulnerable to highly concentrated efforts to use it for propagandistic purposes. When talking film first came in, talking movies if you will, it corresponded roughly with the rise of what we call Nazism in Hitler's Germany. And an early master of the talking films - really high-quality films - was named Leni Riefenstahl. Leni Riefenstahl turned out a masterpiece of propaganda called Triumph of the Will. I wish every school child in America could see it, be in a course about it. Because here's the point: I don't think it's far off what we were talking about before. Here was a new technology developing - film, film with sound on it, high-quality film - a master took it and put it to service of a dictator and a megalomaniac. And as they say, the rest is history.

The Triumph of the Will, perhaps more than any single other thing led to Hilter's being able to manipulate, and get behind him, the German people. And we paid a terrible price for that. Now I'm not suggesting that the current blogosphere or the Internet will lead to that, but it's just a little yellow warning flag of "Let's not be too blasé about it." Because that potential exists; it has with every new technology. When television first came in, some politicians and some partisan political operatives said, "You know what? We can manipulate this medium and we can use it to our own partisan political advantage. And they did so. But again, in this country, I believe so strongly we have the corrective devices but let us hope so. But I have somewhere back in my head Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will, Hitler, new technology.... Let's be on the lookout; let's be on the alert.

Carvin: So if that's the case, is appropriate for us, for example, to think more seriously about implementing some form of media literacy curriculum in our schools, so students can actually - and adults as well - can actually view these pieces of media and review them critically?

Rather: I'd be very much in favor of it. But I don't want to mislead anybody and be hypocritical - that I believe the most important things are the three Rs: reading, writing and arithmetic. But somewhere along the line, I think media literacy is an important part of teaching civics. I don't know whether anyone teaches civics under that name any more, but it was required when I was in school. In seventh grade you took physics - I mean civics. Eighth grade you might take physics. But I'd be all in favor of doing that. But educators, I think, would argue, "You know, I think it's hard enough to get the three Rs taught, basic science and technology courses." But the key to not falling victim to something like Leni Riefenstahl and Hitler's Triumph of the Will is to have media literacy. I'm happy to say that there are some courses on the Internet you can take in media literacy. So if you can't get it anywhere else, just get up on your computer and take a look under media literacy, and you'll find a course.

Carvin: Do you ever see yourself possibly creating your own blog?

Rather: Yes, I've thought about it. I don't have any present plans right now to do that. I have about as much work as I can say grace over, doing this one-hour news program every week for HDNet. I'm a little inclined to think that for myself, I don't know if I want to blog as such. Would I consider it? Yes. Have I considered it? Yes. Do I do it now? No. I'd be more interested if there were an opportunity to help mold a new site that includes other people's blogs, and maybe one of my own. But, you know, I've spent nearly all of my life aspiring to be an honest broker of information. And I'm still trying to be a good, never mind great, journalist, and I hope some day to achieve that.

I don't know whether I'd be good at blogging. I recognize that maybe some people hoot at this, but I try to keep my own opinion and my own biases out of my own reporting. Have I done it perfectly? No - nobody does it perfectly. But that's what I've been trying to do, and that's what I'm still trying to do. So I don't know whether it lends itself to blogging or not. But I have thought about it from time to time, and probably will consider it again. Do you blog?

Carvin: Yes, I do. I blog personally, I blog professionally, and somehow manage to balance them. Most of the time.

Rather: Well, it's a lot of work. That is to say, that's the other thing I recognize: a blog takes work. I think some people think, well, a blog is just, you know, sit down at the machine and rap off a few words, a few sentences - and that's a blog. Well, it's a blog of a sort, but most of the time it's not a blog worth doing. I admire most those bloggers - and this will come as a surprise to nobody - who spend time on the telephone, talking to people, doing what reporters do, and yes, getting out and attending events, knocking on doors, wearing out shoe leather, and do original reporting. Those are my favorites. They're not limited to that, and I read them, but those are the ones I like the best.

Carvin: I'm not sure if you've been following the case, but there's a young man, a video blogger who's spent the last 200 days in prison. His name is Josh Wolf, and federal prosecutors have held him in contempt of court because he's refused to turn over footage of video that he shot at a protest about a year or so ago, perhaps a year and a half now. And one of the arguments that prosecutors have made is that he doesn't qualify as a true journalist because he's not accredited, he doesn't work for a mainstream media outlet, and so therefore, he can't make that argument.

Rather: Yes. One, I know about the case, I think it's in California. I do know something about that case, and yes I knew the French either passed the law or were on the verge of passing the law. This is a big subject that requires a lot of thought. I don't know enough about the law, and now we're talking about the law in this country to know whether has ruled, is settled, on what the definition of a journalist is. And I do understand, now jumping to the French case, the legitimate concern about people trying to control the images in order to achieve their nefarious gains or goals.

Look, it's very complicated; I'm not an expert on it. My instinct - my immediate instinct is to be anti-control. Now clearly, and especially in democratic societies such as our own, the old "you can't shout 'fire' in a crowded theatre" argument carries a lot of weight with me. But I always start from the perspective of a broad, rather than a narrow, definition of who is a journalist, and what is a journalistic enterprise. And I generally start with the premise of less control, not more. But having said that, in each of these cases, I do think they're harbingers of things to come, that we'll face these same issues both in our own country and abroad, increasingly as we get deeper and deeper into the Internet. Wish I had an answer for you, but on that one, I don't.

Carvin: Well, I'd just wanted to thank you for taking the time to talk with us today; it's been a real pleasure.

Rather: Well, it's been my pleasure. Good questions - wish I had better answers.

Carvin: Thanks again. This is Andy Carvin, talking with Dan Rather.

Rather: Thank you.