Journalists, politicos: Internet is transforming news, politics

By Cheryl Arvidson
The Freedom Forum Online

07.31.00

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Douglas Bailey, president and CEO of FreedomChannel.com, left, moderates yesterday's panel discussion "Cyber Political Revolution - 2000 and Beyond," which was held before the start of the Republican convention in Philadelphia. Adam Clayton Powell III of The Freedom Forum, left, Kirk Spitzer of USATODAY.com, Ann Compton of ABC News, California Secretary of State Bill Jones and Haley Barbour, chairman of Barbour Griffith & Rogers, agreed that the Internet would change the face of news and politics.

PHILADELPHIA — As Republicans gathered in the shadow of the Liberty Bell to begin their quadrennial exercise of nominating a presidential candidate, politicos and journalists agreed yesterday that both of their landscapes are changing because of the Internet.

Ann Compton, longtime White House correspondent for ABC News who is now involved in the network's "dot com" operations, said the traditional news side of ABC had scaled back its operations so much this year that if it weren't for ABCNews.com , she probably wouldn't be at the Republican National Convention.

"I don't think it is the last television convention," Compton told about 100 people who gathered for a program on the "Cyber Political Revolution" co-sponsored by The Freedom Forum and FreedomChannel.com, because cable television outlets will continue to engage in the more traditional, gavel-to-gavel coverage. But for network television, she said, "the days of convention coverage are somewhat gone."

Ann Compton

In the case of ABC, she said, the network made a controversial decision to air a "Monday Night Football" game tonight in lieu of the opening of the convention, with anchor Peter Jennings essentially doing only a "half-time show" on politics. However, ABCNews.com has "flooded this city" with correspondents and will be broadcasting five television programs a day for its Internet audience.

"We have no idea where it's going, but it has radically changed what we do in television and radio," Compton said of the Internet's influence on journalism.

Haley Barbour, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said the Internet has the potential of radically transforming politics as well. The Internet has already proven itself as an effective vehicle to raise money for the parties and to connect with potential voters. Such tools as streaming video and video e-mail can reach vastly larger numbers of would-be voters than any existing method, and that contact is "essentially free," Barbour said.

In addition, "the quality of the product can be so much better" than traditional voter education projects and fund-raising efforts that rely on volunteers manning phone banks or paid telemarketers.

"Has it transformed politics? Not yet. Will it? Absolutely," Barbour said.

California Secretary of State Bill Jones said his state was deeply involved in a project that would allow Internet voting. Although it is necessary to move cautiously and deal with such issues as protecting privacy and keeping the system virus-free, Jones said he was confident that the job would be done before the next presidential election in 2004.

"This is moving very fast," Jones said. "We need to be contemporary in what we're doing. The next language of young people is technology."

Bill Jones

Adam Powell, vice president of technology and programs for The Freedom Forum, said the United States might find good examples of how to use the Internet in elections and politics by looking around the world. Noting that online fund raising was pioneered in Britain and that Internet voting was possible in a recent presidential election in Croatia, Powell told the group, "There are lots of experiments going on."

Kirk Spitzer, politics editor of USATODAY.com, said that two or three years ago, the "dot com" side of USA TODAY was viewed as a "stepchild." "Now, we're far more integrated" in the operations, he said.

He said journalists must maintain the same high standards with their online work as they do with traditional media reporting, particularly in the areas of fairness and balance.

"We are not in the Internet news business; we are in the news business," Spitzer said, adding that on the Internet "the basics do not change a bit." A reporter still needs to get all the facts out to his or her audience as fast as possible and as completely as possible, he said, and that is why the mainstream news organizations are so dominating the Net.

Barbour said the Internet technology is a "great tool" to give consumers "control over what they see. There's a great appetite in America for more choices (of) where they get their news."

Compton said she did not think the television networks were in danger of losing their credibility by scaling back traditional news operations while at the same time increasing their "dot com" presence. Rather, she said, it was more likely that the newsroom of the future would blend the entire specter of coverage options into a single news operation.

"I can see the whole thing being one big wash," she said.

However, Compton says she thinks ABC's Web product is "a much better one than our television" product because it can provide links to other coverage and offer more depth than the standard newscast. Also, she says the Web product is better because "dot com" consumers are a more savvy and interested audience.

"We write more brightly. We throw in more slang," she said. "There's a richness to the dot com coverage that you really can't do on television."

Barbour says he thinks it will take some time before the Republicans and Democrats can realize the full potential of the Internet. But when that happens, "it's probably going to help the Republicans first," he said, because the current profile of a typical Internet user looks "much more like a Republican" than a Democrat.

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