Next-Gen Is Hearst’s Next Step In News

When speaking with Hearst Television news executives about the station group’s Next-Generation Newsroom, avoid saying “one man band” or “digital journalist.” Those are fighting words — ones that they believe not only devalue what they are trying to do, but don’t accurately describe it.

“We are supplementing existing news technology, not replacing it,” says Joe Addalia, director of technology projects at Hearst. “We just call them reporters. We don’t make a distinction between digital and broadcasting.

“The whole focus of the Next-Generation Newsroom is to change the mindset of our news staff, to get them away from the thinking that we only publish to broadcast at 5, 6 and 11. We are now always live. We are always on the Web. We don’t sit on our news.

According to Addalia, the Next-Generation project cuts no staff jobs. It simply provides extra tools that reporters and photographers can use to simultaneously serve the demands of the Web and the broadcast.

On some stories, reporters and photographers work together as usual. On others, a reporter may shoot video with an iPhone or Blackberry and send it to the Web while waiting for the photographer to join him for a more complete broadcast story. Usually, the nature of the story dictates the crew and equipment requirements. 

Implementing Next-Gen is a major task — one that by the end of 2010 will have been completed at nearly half of Hearst Television’s 29 stations. Most of the staff has embraced the change, although a few, especially those not savvy with computers, have resisted.

“Our news staff is now finding ways to publish, post and broadcast faster than ever before,” says Brian Bracco, VP of news at Hearst. “They can now chase tornados and get it on live. They can Skype or Streambox interviews they could not get from other locations. They are texting stories and taking pictures when they first arrive on the scene. It’s like news radio. Their deadlines are immediate … now.”

Hearst conceived Next-Gen about two years ago and began pilot projects at WMUR Manchester, N.H.; KMBC Kansas City and WESH Orlando, Fla. — before expanding it to other stations.

Each reporter is equipped with either an Apple iPhone or RIM Blackberry smartphone that record video, a standard Dell laptop with a webcam and an AirCard, a broadband modem made by Sierra Wireless that can be used with various wireless services.

The Windows-based Dell laptop is loaded with an Adobe Premiere Pro editing application, which can input about any format of video, and Streambox transmission technology that allows reliable error-corrected streaming from either the iPhone or PC at lower bandwidths.

Each Next-Gen station also gets a pair of JVC GY-HM100 ProHD camcorders that fills the gap between the smartphones and the Sony XDCAM camcorders that Hearst stations still use for most broadcast shoots. The JVC camcorder, priced at $2,795, records native .MOV files to SDHC flash cards. These files can be used natively with the Adobe Premiere Pro application.

Although Hearst will not reveal its budget for the project, the cost is well under $5,000 to equip each reporter with new equipment, plus the cost of the two JVC camcorders per station, wireless bandwidth, training and other studio equipment required for handling the input of video feeds.

Laz Abalos, news photographer at KMBC Kansas City and a trainer for the Next-Gen project, still uses a Sony XDCAM for his newsgathering work. However, depending on the story, he sometimes adds alternative acquisition tools for the job. Abalos says he will use the smaller JVC camera in situations where he doesn’t want to be recognized as a journalist or when he needs greater mobility, such as in large crowds. Occasionally, he’ll record video with his iPhone.

That happened recently when he used his iPhone to shoot a 30-second video clip of a sudden storm that hit Kansas City. The video was used not only on the Web, but on the 5 p.m. newscast. “I have a $6.99 app called FTP on the Go on the iPhone that allows me to send back video at high resolution to any FTP address. It only took two to three minutes to get it back to the station,” Abalos said.

His job as a photojournalist is to acquire content, he says. “I’m looking at all the tools now available to get that content back to the station,” he says. That can be a full-size broadcast camcorder, a small JVC camcorder or his iPhone — whichever is the best tool available at the moment that fits the story.

So far this year, Abalos has trained other photographers at five Hearst stations. “I try to assure them these new methods won’t make their jobs more difficult to do. In fact, it might make their jobs a bit easier. Essentially, they need to know how to take a picture and use e-mail at a basic level.”

The big change is video quality. Even though KMBC and WESH are HD news stations, “the whole quality concept goes out the window” with the new acquisition gear, he says. Speed and mobility have won out.

The biggest challenge for the Next-Gen concept is dicey broadband connectivity. A USB-connected AirCard is part of every reporter’s package. However, the wireless carrier to support that AirCard is chosen on a market-by-market basis. Usually, it’s either AT&T or Verizon.

“I have grave concerns about using publicly available bandwidth for mission-critical work,” says Addalia. “These networks are crowded and difficult. There is the promise that 4G will open things up a little bit, but I’m very concerned from a technology point of view of committing more of our business to this wireless public broadband because, quite honestly, they are not very good.”

There are many cases when 3G networks are simply not available, he says. Hearst crews then have to tether the iPhone or Blackberry to the laptop and transmit the video through an alternative lower bandwidth connection.

This is where Streambox comes in. It allows reliable error-corrected streaming from an iPhone or PC at lower bandwidths. That may be from an Internet connection anywhere — the field, an office or a downtown coffee shop.

“If there’s WiFi with 1 megabit speed, Streambox will adjust to that 1 megabit,” Addalia says. “If the reporter uses his AirCard, that’s the speed Streambox will adapt to. It’s a good toolbox. The reporter doesn’t have to think. He clicks and it works.”

With a mostly enthusiastic staff and no union issues because the project involves no reduction in jobs, Bracco says Hearst is betting on new technology as a way to continue winning with its local news in a highly competitive marketplace. Having been in the TV news business about 30 years, he says constant change comes with the territory.

“Change is what we do everyday in the news business,” Bracco says. “When we went from typewriters to computers, that was a big change. When we went from film to video, that was a big change. From linear to nonlinear editing and from ENG to satellite trucks — all of it was a big change.

“This is no different. To survive, news has to adapt to the latest technology available to it. That is what we are doing here.”