TV and digital journalism

Are pared-down teams using smaller, lighter equipment the future of network news?

Network executives say smaller cameras and laptop editing software offer them a lifeline as they struggle to contain costs. Instead of relying on different people to produce, report, shoot, and edit stories, one or two people with the right equipment can handle those tasks. In dramatically overhauling its newsroom structure, ABC offers a stark illustration of how the economic squeeze is remaking traditional media organizations and what viewers see on the news. Stories shot with handheld digital cameras often have a personal, rough-hewn quality familiar to a generation raised on amateur Web videos, and can lack the polished production values of network news. Some veteran broadcasters are skeptical. While it may save money, "what it is going to do in the process is simply cut down on an individual's ability to tell the story properly and well," said Ronald Steinman, executive editor of the Digital Journalist, a magazine about visual journalism, who spent four decades producing news for NBC and ABC. That sentiment is shared by many ABC staffers, who declined to be quoted by name for fear of losing their jobs. They worry that the expectations being put on digital journalists are unrealistic.