Responsibility

New Media & Ethics Conference

Garth Beyer

I wish I had it recorded but in print will have to do. Below is my introduction to UW Madison Chapter’s PRSSA Conference. You can also find some great tips and cover by searching #PRSSA and #uwconf on Twitter.

 

I won’t ask you to, but who here can define journalism? If I were to ask each of you, everyone would have a different response, similar, but different.

Almost 100 years ago, journalism emerged and was defined by Lippman as the translator between the public and the policy making Elites. Simple. Straightforward.

Now we have dozens of different definitions and even more subcategories: analytic, backpack, community, enterprise, immersive, mobile, pack, tabloid… you get the idea.

Over thousands of years ago, ethics was easily defined by a few different principals. Aristotle established the Golden Mean principal of ethics, basically it meant that everyone was to strive for the balance between two extremes.

Similarly golden, the golden rule was established. Simple profound, and could be applied to everything in writing and in life.

Unfortunately, long before journalism was established, multiple layers of ethics soon overlapped the golden mean and the golden rule, leaving us with thousands of ethical questions to be asking ourselves.

In this new media age, with so many guidelines, it seems that we can’t do anything without breaking some ethical standard.

We even have people arguing the utilitarian John Stuart Mill and his ethical stance called “the greatest-happiness principle” which holds that one must aim to do that which will produce the greatest happiness among all beings.” How does that not cover it all?

While we have an assortment of speakers here tonight to tell you about new media and a bit about ethics, I would like to express two ideas with you. Think about them throughout the keynote and breakout sessions.

The first is this: have you noticed that we no longer blaze journalists who are the first to report to us? Think to any of the last shootings. Has there ever been a report, the first on a story that was completely correct? That gave the exact number of fatalities? That described the shooter with absolute detail? We have come to trade in ethical standards for being fed information quicker, to being connected, and to being the first to share news with each other.

In a worldwide journalistic mission of getting the story, and getting it first, we sacrifice what historic media interpreters would call professionalism. What were once ethical standards are now breached with the new media methods of being a journalist.

The second note is something that everyone here has heard before, but has yet to be strongly applied to journalism.

With great power comes great responsibility.

We are now more digitally powerful than ever before, most would agree that its beyond governmental control, and definitely beyond the control of one single ethical standard.

With great power comes great responsibility. This means we need to self-regulate ourselves. The age of having ethical standards has passed. There is no right ethical move, or wrong ethical choice, only actions that are popular and actions that are not. It’s up to us to define ethics for ourselves. If we set them correctly, only then will I buy the idea that were journalists.

Now that you have some things to think about and without further ado, I would like to introduce our keynote speaker of the night Theo Keith, reporter for WISC-TV

Waiting For Your Hero

Garth Beyer

Whenever you watch a Superhero film, or nearly any film for that matter, you are always waiting for the hero’s success or failure, survival or death. This hero’s journey that keeps the audience waiting for one event to take place after another is called the monomyth.

To the hero though, they never feel like they are waiting, they are always involved in the rising action that leads to the point the audience is waiting for. While you are waiting, the hero is not. If the hero were to wait with you, nothing would ever happen.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say we are all Superheros. We all have a special superpower if we think hard enough about what we are truly great at, whether it’s a natural talent or not. If we are Superhero’s, then why do we do so much of the waiting ourselves?

It needs to be realized that you are not your own audience. It’s not your responsibility to do the waiting. It’s your responsibility to create the rising action, to give the audience something worth waiting around for, someone to root for, something to be excited about.

Let’s not be confused about who the Superhero and who the audience is in our lives.

 

Stay Positive & With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

(You know this post would have been incomplete without ^ )

Garth E. Beyer

25 Life Lessons You Need To Know To Succeed

Garth Beyer
  • Begin taking responsiblity for everything in your life, even if you had nothing to do with it.
  • Implement an everyday attitude check: Are you believing in yourself?
  • Just do it… yourself. Don’t waste time telling others to do it. Do it yourself, take responsiblity. The more adapt you get to taking responsibilities, the more successfully you can handle your dream job.
  • Mistakes teach you what you should have prepared for. Learn them and appreciate them.
  • Invest in yourself.
  • Write a plan even if you never look at it again.
  • Stick with it until you win.
  • ^ Quit quitting. Finish. Ship. Just freaking complete it!
  • Do as much self teaching as you would learn from others.
  • The world doesn’t just give luck to anyone. Only to those with a positive attitude and who work hard.
  • You are the best, take people’s time, you deserve it.
  • Until we change what school is for, no one is going to stop and make sure you get your daily dose of inspiration.
  • Don’t wait for someone to come to you.
  • ^ People die standing still.
  • Procrastination is more expensive than the resources it would cost to achieve your goal.
  • Everyone believes they deserve better. At some point in your life, the only way to receive better is to quite complaining and do better.
  • The things you give for nothing can never be replaced.
  • The goal is new ideas and approaches, not consensus.
  • It will always be “the best time in all of history”.
  • Everything is dynamic.
  • If someone isn’t willing to buy, it’s not a loss, it’s a chance to improve.
  • Success is relative to the quality of the process.
  • Always seek to be surprised.
  • Trying gives you the right to try again.

 

Stay Positive & Share Your 25 Life Lessons In The Comments Section

Garth E. Beyer