Is Collaboration the New Competition?

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This editorial is, naturally, a collaboration between Chattarati editors John Hawbaker and David Morton.

Last week, John Shearer wrote a feature story on Ruth Holmberg, granddaughter of Adolph Ochs and longtime publisher of the Chattanooga Times. While discussing the competition and subsequent merger between the Times and the News-Free Press, Ms. Holmberg said, "I don't think anything that costly and difficult was good competition. Creating the publishing company was the right thing to do rather than do daily battle. The only people who benefited from competition were the readers." (Emphasis added). While we understand and sympathize with the financial implications of printing two newspapers, we also can't help but wonder about the extent to which the two editorial boards are slowly homogenizing with one another.

Recent council endorsements (Times, Free-Press) are but one indicator of that process, but the lack of teeth shown by both boards on matters of state and federal politics are quite telling in their similarities. Sure, you can always count on each page to return to its separate, default corner, but we have serious reservations about the blunted perspectives presented every day as 'divergent opinions.' And given the extent to which local outlets feed off of TFP coverage, the convergence has severe implications for the average reader—no matter how informed he/she tries to be. "The only people who benefited from competition were the readers." Ms. Holmberg's statement speaks volumes on the current newspaper crisis. During the 1990s, media conglomeration was the order of the day. We saw it in Chattanooga, and we continue to see it all across America.

Meanwhile, citizen journalism and social media are on the rise as people seek alternative voices because long-standing institutions are moving closer and closer together. Social media is not just a blog, or a Twitter post, or talking to your friends on Facebook (those are just tools): it's the new battleground of ideas. And that battleground is at times combative and all-inclusive.

Chattarati is itself an example of this trend. As news consumers, the homogenization of perspectives and increasing amount of noise in local media is what led us to create something new. We seek to offer a unique voice and provide a filter for that noise, highlighting the stories we find most interesting or valuable. And even as we have expanded our team and increased original content, the fact remains that we simply can't cover every story.

Consider another local example, ChattOutLoud. Donald and Matt created a live weekly webcast to discuss, simply, what people in Chattanooga are talking about online. It's purely meta, and it relies on crowdsourcing and the work of other media outlets. At the same time, their often-humorous commentary adds value. Both Chattarati and ChattOutLoud value the coverage provided by others in Chattanooga's local media ecosystem. But is the feeling mutual?

Most local media outlets, it seems, prefer to act as if they are the only game in town—neither acknowledging the existence of or communicating with their competitors. This observation was brought into stark relief last week by WRCB, the latest local news station to embrace Twitter, when they blocked NewsChannel9's Dan Lehr and Mike Costa from following their feed. Costa, who is an active and open Twitter user, publicly campaigned against the embargo with a dash of humor:

"Instead of #fridayfollow ask @wrcb to unblock @mjudecosta, @newschannelnine @public_interest LET MY PEOPLE GO!" -@mjudecosta

In a post on Tennessee Ticket, Joe Lance called the action "literally pointless, in addition to being petty and silly." We couldn't agree more. It revealed a fundamental misunderstanding of social networking and the new paradigm of relationship-building. Several days later, WRCB relented, welcoming the station, Costa, and Lehr.

Will "tear[ing] down this Twitter wall" will usher in a new era of collaboration for Chattanooga's media community? What, then, does the future hold for our local media community? Former newspaper editor and media commentator Dan Conover predicts that news organizations will share not only content, but infrastructure as well, arguing that "five competing reporters covering the same routine house fire is an inefficiency the new economics will not support."

Perhaps Ms. Holmberg was ahead of her time. The future we imagine is one where we all play to our unique strengths, collaborating when it provides reader value, and where we continue to provide the diversity of perspectives and coverage that greater Chattanooga deserves.