AK Press Club - What Do Media Folks Talk About At Their Conferences?

It's getting late, but I have some pictures and notes about the panels I went to today.

I'll just do them in chronological order.  I already posted about Matt Pearl's discussion on how to put together a video story.

Then came Matt number two - Matt Eich, a photographer who shared his photos that have been put into book form.  His projects are ambitious.  He finds interesting people and gets permission to hang out with them over a long period of time taking pictures.  You can see the albums on his website at the links below, including a better version of the picture on the right (it's in Carry Me Ohio).

THE INVISIBLE YOKE

• Carry Me Ohio
• Sin and Salvation in Baptist Town
• The Seven Cities
• We, the Free

It's Matt's head in the lower right of the photo, sticking up out of his computer.  I had a little trouble balancing the brightness of the screen so you can see the photo and the darkness of the room so you can get a sense of that too.

I had some trouble understanding Matt over the sound system so I missed a lot of the explanations of the photos, but this is serious photography and commitment.

Then I went looking for the Hearken Meet-up, but ended up in another session in the old TV studio on campus that had a video connection called "Smart, effective and ethical audience interaction."  The program says "Join presenters from the West Region of the Associated Press for best practices to apply your journalistic ethics in the world of social media."  While I was there the discussion was focused on how to find stories and contact people using Facebook.

But I really wanted to hear the Hearken meet-up talk.  It said it was about a way for radio folks to connect better with their audience.
It turns out to be an online system for getting suggestions from listeners for story ideas and there's a way for all the listeners to vote on the suggestions.  The idea is to engage the audience more.  It also costs stations and this was a sales pitch.  But it was an interesting discussion of one attempt to connect more to listeners.  Below is Steve Heimel talking with Hearken's Ellen Mayer on the right.

After lunch I listened to Jenna Johnson with moderator Liz Ruskin.  Johnson is a reporter for the Washington Post and followed the Trump campaign.  I've got lots of notes from that discussion, but given I'm trying to get all these in before I go to bed, I'll just offer a few things I found interesting.
Johnson said that she was curious about some of the off-the-beaten-campaign-path cities that Trump was speaking at so she used census data to come up with profiles of the places.  They were all well under the average US income, education, and employment levels.

Jenna Johnson and Liz Ruskin

At one point in the campaign, reporters had to get tickets and wait in line like everyone else.  No one from the campaign came around - as they did with other campaigns - and gathered voter data or offered water (it was hot) or even apologies for the inconveniences.  But she said the Trump supporters didn't seem to mind.  And she came to value these situations where she could get a more visceral sense of the people there and could slowly reveal herself and get interviews.

Johnson said that one good thing about the campaign was that you need it would end on a certain date.  But then Trump was elected and she ended up in the White House press.  Some asked if things gotten less hectic.  In the video below she answers:




Someone asked if Trump voters had  simmered down a bit.
Johnson said they had.  Once Trump won, they won.  Before that, they were angry at media.  Once election over it was cool.  They don’t have to fight you any more.  They had their victory.

There was lots more, but time to move on.





NPR reporter Kirk Siegler's topic was "making news stories pop.'  I liked Siegler's laid back style, which goes along with his rural beat.  There was nothing slick about him.  He came across as genuine.  Some of the points he made about getting good stories included:

• A strong character, and the example stories he played did all have strong characters

Kirk Siegler

• Tension - competing values or loyalties
• Knowing the point of your story
• Take your listener on a journey - he gave an example of walking from one end of a wildfire zone to the other, stopping along the way to make comments on talk to someone
• Immediately after the interview, jot down notes - "what is the most important thing she said?" What are some of the interesting takeaways you want to remember?  Write it down right away.
• Find a local guide.  A fixer.  When you're going to a place you don't know for a short time, you should contact someone who can then lead you to others.  Do this before you get there.

[UPDATE June 27, 2017: The Alaska Press Club has put Kirk's talk up on Soundcloud. You can now hear it all.
You can hear several other talks from the conference here.]

OK, that's a very abbreviated view of what I took in today.  These conferences always give me things to think about, new ways to do things, a checklist for how I do things, and sometimes confirmation that I'm doing things right.  

Alaska Press Club Conference Ends Saturday Sunset

Susitna was silhouetted by the sunset as we left the Awards Dinner for the Press Club.  Steve Heimel got honored with a first amendment award and gave a passionate speech about the need to fight constantly to keep the first amendment.

Vera Starbard, and her husband Joe, two of our table mates, took home several awards for First Alaskans Magazine.  She's also written a play - Our Voices Will Be Heard -that's scheduled to be performed in Anchorage next January.  Lisa Phu and Matt Miller from KTOO were also at our table and also got awards. 



There's so much to write about the conference.  I have lots of notes, but didn't have time to do anything with them.  I went to four sessions on data journalism - using data sets to find trends and ways to graphically display them.




I'll try to write more about them, but meanwhile, here's a picture of Andy Eschbacher during his presentation on data mapping.  He works for CartoDB with offices in Madrid and Brooklyn.  They have software for combining data and maps, including a free level, and I intend to try my hand at their tutorials to see if I can get to a point where I can use this.













And then there's the log guy who I met at the last session.  He's from Kentucky, I think he said, visiting a friend in Alaska, and he carries this log around a lot.  There was something about being good when he works with kids.  (I can hear some of the presenters asking, "But where's the rest of the story, you're leaving us hanging  . ."  I think some mysteries are good, and all the readers can create their own story about the log guy. 



What Do I Know?  got some recognition at the dinner - two second places.  One for Best Current Events/News Blog and and another for Best Commentary Blog.  There was also a third place in Arts Reporting Print/Online small organization.  That was for a my Q&A page for the Anchorage International Film Festival.      It's nice to know that others think this little blog is doing some things right.  Thank you Alaska Press Club. 

The Press Club's Facebook page says all the rewards will be posted at their website on Monday.  And the Twitter hashtag #AlaskaPressClub already has a lot of pictures of awards up.
[Update May 3:  Here's the whole spreadsheet of the winners at the Alaska Press Club site]

Steve Heimel, Bill Weimar, Joe McKinnon, Paul Fuhs, and Cal Williams Talk About the Old Days - Monday Evening

Photo from 2007 at Federal Court Building

Looooooong time radio news man Steve Heimel will do a public oral history collection session

Monday (April 20) at the  KAKM studio, 

6:30-8 pm.

Subject will be the Ad Hoc movement of the early 1970's in Alaska

Participants:   Bill Weimar, Paul Fuhs, Joe McKinnon, Cal Williams.

The public is welcome.

Jack Roderick, former Anchorage Borough Mayor, writes about the ad hoc Democrats on page 359 in  his book Crude Dreams:

Now this is a particularly colorful group.   Bill Weimar later ran private prisons and halfway houses, and made a $30,000 loan to Frank Prewitt, who was commissioner of corrections at the time.  The FBI's stake out in the Baranof Hotel in Juneau that led to a string of convictions, started with interest in the private prisons.  Frank Prewitt decided to cooperate with the FBI and was a key witness in the trial that convicted Tom Anderson.

I remember in court when Anderson's attorney cross-examined Prewitt about that $30,000 loan from Weimar.  From my blog June 29, 2007: 

"When Stockler finally did get to start his cross examination of Prewitt at 3:45pm, he lit right into him and then he began to try to show Anderson's behavior in a more positive light. First he hit Prewitt with a series of incidents that he suggested he could have gone to prison for.

1. A $30,000 loan Prewitt, while Commissioner of Corrections, got from Allvest another firm that subcontracted with the Department of Corrections (I think that's what he said.) Prewitt said he got the loan and paid it back.

Stockler: Is there anything in writing? Isn't it true it was a bribe?

Prewitt:  No.

Stockler:  How did you pay it back?

Prewitt:  I worked for Allvest for four months - $7500 per month.

Stockler:  Did you pay taxes on the $30,000?

Prewitt:  No, it was a loan.

Stockler:  But you say you worked for it.

Prewitt:  No, I was paying him back.

Stockler:  So, all of us could avoid paying income taxes by having our employer loan us our pay before, and then we'd repay it by working and not have to pay taxes?"  [I've reformatted the Q&A to make it clearer.]

Here's Weimar's indictment from an August 11, 2008 post:

• Count 1

...William Weimar, Candidate A, Consultant A, and others known and unknown, did knowingly and unlawfully conspire . . . to deprive the the public of the honest services that Candidate A would provide as an Alaska State Legislator, through a scheme to disguise WEIMAR’s direct payment to CONSULTANT A of approximately $20,000 in expenses for CANDIDATE A’s campaign for the legislature, without reporting the payment as required by applicable Alaska law and regulations and without routing it for payment through CANDIDATE A’s campaign, and through the foreseeable use of the mails, interstate were communications, in violation of Title 18 US Code Section 1341, 1343, and 1346.

• Count 2

Weimar concealed the money through breaking the $20,000 into three payments to avoid the required reporting of transactions over $10,000.

And here's Michael Carey's  bio of pre-Alaska Bill Weimar.   [Monday, April 10, 10:30am  I've fixed this link]


I knew about Paul Fuhs as a fish guy.  He's been mayor of Dutch Harbor and commissioner of the Department of Commerce and Economic Development.  While looking for more on Fuhs I found this video on Youtube. 

"This performance by Steve Nelson (piano, vocals) and Paul Fuhs (vocals) with accompaniment by members of the Soviet Border Guard Military Band and their conductor was recorded in Vladivostok, Russia in May 1990 at the studio of the local state television station."  [The link gives a longer account of how this video came to be.]

I met attorney Joe McKinnon at the redistricting board meetings.  Actually I think I met him during the political trials - I think he was representing one of the witnesses.  This link goes to a brief video of Joe after one of the redistricting board meetings.


Finally, Cal Williams, who moved to Alaska in 1973 after working for civil rights in his home state of Louisiana.  He's been involved in Alaska politics since. 

This should be good stuff.


Tuesday, Steve's going to reading from a manuscript, "My First 50 Years in Broadcasting" at the UAA Bookstore."  4pm.