Mariano Page 1 16

The Vanishing Newsroom

By Gary Mariano

New Media Technologiesand Mass Communication Education

De La Salle UniversityNovember 25 2000

1 Introduction

Let me begin by saying a few words about Balitang Kababayan of which

I was billed as being creator and editor Actually it was a collaboration with my

colleague Amelita Lopez I wrote the news portion while she did the

entertainment Balitang Kababayan was online from Aug 5 1995 until last

year not because there was no potential in it but because it was taking too

much time But there are some things worth saying about Balitang Kababayan

For one it was the first attempt to electronically publish news regularly about

and from the Philippines Previous efforts were sporadic delayed or unreliable

It went online ahead of the major broadsheets some of which at that time were

tentative (and some still are) about taking their product to the Internet

To my surprise Balitang Kababayan had a following Before we stopped

updating it there were about 1000 subscribers to our e-mailing list Most of

them were overseas Filipinos who sorely missed home but found Philippine

stories appearing on CNN and in the New York Times too little too scary or too

pessimistic For the first time they had in Balitang Kababayan some kind of

companion to their breakfast coffee and pan de sal whether they were in

Australia Germany or Canada The bigger attraction was Lopezrsquos Sari-Saring

Mariano Page 2 16

Chismis column At that time it was the only one of its kind that was trying to

whet the insatiable appetite of expatriate Pinoys for showbiz chiz Because ours

was a free service done during our spare time there were some rare days when

we did not go to ldquopressrdquo Immediately that would draw dozens of e-mail from

readers The inquiries were polite if we missed the hard news but sometimes

irate from those who demanded their chismis fix

Balitang Kababayan was something we did mostly in the office

sometimes at home ndash and on one occasion in Europe Besides Lopez and

myself we had no staff although I must mention that Doy del Mundo wrote a

few film critiques and promised to do so regularly But we were pioneer

publishers on the World Wide Web

In this essay I will attempt to show how technology has changed the way

journalists operate a particular consequence being the Vanishing Newsroom

how this change is upsetting the status quo and what I think can be done

about this The data come from my graduate research in 1989 and 1998

Quotes were lifted from Metro Manila journalistsrsquo oral histories as collected by

students of my Inprint (Introduction to the Print Media) class in 1998

Mariano Page 3 16

2 Technology and journalism

The Technological Determinists ndash Innis (1951) McLuhan (1965) and

Toffler (1990) ndash advanced the idea that over the years certain dominant

technologies have helped shape society The Stone Age is a reference to stone a

rather crude form of technology but technology nevertheless inasmuch as this

new millennium is called the Information Age McLuhan views technology and

media as synonymous Any technology he says is ldquoan extension or self-

amputation of our physical bodiesrdquo (p 45) Further he said that ldquothe medium

shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and actionrdquo (p 9)

and that ldquothe message of any new medium or technology is the change of scale

or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairsrdquo (p 29)

Manrsquos ability to communicate beyond his physical reach is determined by

the existing technology

21 Major technological developments and journalism

In the past 500 years a number of inventions have helped create a

product called the newspaper and transform it into a dominant medium of

mass communication beginning in the late 19th century Before the movable

type most printing was done using the xylograph and the text was limited to

the Bible and other religious documents Gutenbergrsquos 15th-century innovation

allowed printers to rearrange the same characters to form new words new

sentences and new ideas The next big improvements were inventions like

Ottmar Mergenthalerrsquos Linotype in 1886 (Baird 1980) the IBM selectric

composer in 1966 (Kelber 1967) and quite recently the personal computer

Mariano Page 4 16

In the 1960s the use of computers in newspapers was limited to

automating the typesetting function In 1977 the Los Angeles Times had linked

400 terminals of editors and reporters eliminating the need for typesetting

(and with it proofreading) (Smith 1980) Throughout these years it must be

noted that computers involved large and expensive mainframes

In the 1980s more newsrooms were able to enjoy the computerrsquos feature

of capturing the keystroke with the advent of the cheaper PCs for word

processing But the bigger impact came in 1985 when Apple introduced the

laser printer (Seybold 1987) This was soon followed by desktop publishing

systems like Pagemaker and Ventura Publisher for designating typographic

styles and sizes arranging text and images on a computer screen and

generating camera-ready material (Dallas 1988)

In 1989 all but one of eight daily broadsheet newspapers in Metro Manila

used computers in varying degrees for writing and editing copy page design

and generating the camera-ready layout These tasks were performed on PCs

with the exception of the Bulletin the only newspaper with a dedicated

publishing system called the Atek (Mariano 1989)

But the biggest was yet to come starting in 1994 when a number of

newspapers started making available their content on the World Wide Web

(Mariano 1997)

22 IT and journalism

Mariano Page 5 16

Zorkoczy (1980) defines information technology as the devices used in

the gathering storage processing and dissemination of information

Interestingly these are the very tasks that journalists do cover an event take

notes shoot pictures write the story edit copy design the page print and

circulate copies We might want to add that editors and publishers are in a

constant race against time Because of its ability to dramatically cut through

processes if not rewrite (reinvent or reengineer) them IT can have a perfect

client in organizations whose business is to sell information

3 The traditional newsroom

Let us take a look at how newspapers operated before there were

computers or any advanced means of long-distance communication The

process usually started in the morning with reporters meeting with their

editors for their assignments Then they would go to their ldquobeatsrdquo to collect the

facts At a certain time of the day usually after the lunch hour reporters went

back to the ldquonewsroomrdquo In this place they wrote their stories and handed them

to their editors Editors would correct the copy and sometimes seek additional

facts or clarification from the reporters At around 3 orsquoclock editors would send

the manuscript for typesetting

As for photographers it was imperative for them to go back to the office

after taking pictures in order to develop their film and print copies

Objectively the editorrsquos job is to correct errors in fact grammar and

style and prepare a page ldquodummyrdquo In addition they regarded it their sacred

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 2 16

Chismis column At that time it was the only one of its kind that was trying to

whet the insatiable appetite of expatriate Pinoys for showbiz chiz Because ours

was a free service done during our spare time there were some rare days when

we did not go to ldquopressrdquo Immediately that would draw dozens of e-mail from

readers The inquiries were polite if we missed the hard news but sometimes

irate from those who demanded their chismis fix

Balitang Kababayan was something we did mostly in the office

sometimes at home ndash and on one occasion in Europe Besides Lopez and

myself we had no staff although I must mention that Doy del Mundo wrote a

few film critiques and promised to do so regularly But we were pioneer

publishers on the World Wide Web

In this essay I will attempt to show how technology has changed the way

journalists operate a particular consequence being the Vanishing Newsroom

how this change is upsetting the status quo and what I think can be done

about this The data come from my graduate research in 1989 and 1998

Quotes were lifted from Metro Manila journalistsrsquo oral histories as collected by

students of my Inprint (Introduction to the Print Media) class in 1998

Mariano Page 3 16

2 Technology and journalism

The Technological Determinists ndash Innis (1951) McLuhan (1965) and

Toffler (1990) ndash advanced the idea that over the years certain dominant

technologies have helped shape society The Stone Age is a reference to stone a

rather crude form of technology but technology nevertheless inasmuch as this

new millennium is called the Information Age McLuhan views technology and

media as synonymous Any technology he says is ldquoan extension or self-

amputation of our physical bodiesrdquo (p 45) Further he said that ldquothe medium

shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and actionrdquo (p 9)

and that ldquothe message of any new medium or technology is the change of scale

or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairsrdquo (p 29)

Manrsquos ability to communicate beyond his physical reach is determined by

the existing technology

21 Major technological developments and journalism

In the past 500 years a number of inventions have helped create a

product called the newspaper and transform it into a dominant medium of

mass communication beginning in the late 19th century Before the movable

type most printing was done using the xylograph and the text was limited to

the Bible and other religious documents Gutenbergrsquos 15th-century innovation

allowed printers to rearrange the same characters to form new words new

sentences and new ideas The next big improvements were inventions like

Ottmar Mergenthalerrsquos Linotype in 1886 (Baird 1980) the IBM selectric

composer in 1966 (Kelber 1967) and quite recently the personal computer

Mariano Page 4 16

In the 1960s the use of computers in newspapers was limited to

automating the typesetting function In 1977 the Los Angeles Times had linked

400 terminals of editors and reporters eliminating the need for typesetting

(and with it proofreading) (Smith 1980) Throughout these years it must be

noted that computers involved large and expensive mainframes

In the 1980s more newsrooms were able to enjoy the computerrsquos feature

of capturing the keystroke with the advent of the cheaper PCs for word

processing But the bigger impact came in 1985 when Apple introduced the

laser printer (Seybold 1987) This was soon followed by desktop publishing

systems like Pagemaker and Ventura Publisher for designating typographic

styles and sizes arranging text and images on a computer screen and

generating camera-ready material (Dallas 1988)

In 1989 all but one of eight daily broadsheet newspapers in Metro Manila

used computers in varying degrees for writing and editing copy page design

and generating the camera-ready layout These tasks were performed on PCs

with the exception of the Bulletin the only newspaper with a dedicated

publishing system called the Atek (Mariano 1989)

But the biggest was yet to come starting in 1994 when a number of

newspapers started making available their content on the World Wide Web

(Mariano 1997)

22 IT and journalism

Mariano Page 5 16

Zorkoczy (1980) defines information technology as the devices used in

the gathering storage processing and dissemination of information

Interestingly these are the very tasks that journalists do cover an event take

notes shoot pictures write the story edit copy design the page print and

circulate copies We might want to add that editors and publishers are in a

constant race against time Because of its ability to dramatically cut through

processes if not rewrite (reinvent or reengineer) them IT can have a perfect

client in organizations whose business is to sell information

3 The traditional newsroom

Let us take a look at how newspapers operated before there were

computers or any advanced means of long-distance communication The

process usually started in the morning with reporters meeting with their

editors for their assignments Then they would go to their ldquobeatsrdquo to collect the

facts At a certain time of the day usually after the lunch hour reporters went

back to the ldquonewsroomrdquo In this place they wrote their stories and handed them

to their editors Editors would correct the copy and sometimes seek additional

facts or clarification from the reporters At around 3 orsquoclock editors would send

the manuscript for typesetting

As for photographers it was imperative for them to go back to the office

after taking pictures in order to develop their film and print copies

Objectively the editorrsquos job is to correct errors in fact grammar and

style and prepare a page ldquodummyrdquo In addition they regarded it their sacred

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 3 16

2 Technology and journalism

The Technological Determinists ndash Innis (1951) McLuhan (1965) and

Toffler (1990) ndash advanced the idea that over the years certain dominant

technologies have helped shape society The Stone Age is a reference to stone a

rather crude form of technology but technology nevertheless inasmuch as this

new millennium is called the Information Age McLuhan views technology and

media as synonymous Any technology he says is ldquoan extension or self-

amputation of our physical bodiesrdquo (p 45) Further he said that ldquothe medium

shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and actionrdquo (p 9)

and that ldquothe message of any new medium or technology is the change of scale

or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairsrdquo (p 29)

Manrsquos ability to communicate beyond his physical reach is determined by

the existing technology

21 Major technological developments and journalism

In the past 500 years a number of inventions have helped create a

product called the newspaper and transform it into a dominant medium of

mass communication beginning in the late 19th century Before the movable

type most printing was done using the xylograph and the text was limited to

the Bible and other religious documents Gutenbergrsquos 15th-century innovation

allowed printers to rearrange the same characters to form new words new

sentences and new ideas The next big improvements were inventions like

Ottmar Mergenthalerrsquos Linotype in 1886 (Baird 1980) the IBM selectric

composer in 1966 (Kelber 1967) and quite recently the personal computer

Mariano Page 4 16

In the 1960s the use of computers in newspapers was limited to

automating the typesetting function In 1977 the Los Angeles Times had linked

400 terminals of editors and reporters eliminating the need for typesetting

(and with it proofreading) (Smith 1980) Throughout these years it must be

noted that computers involved large and expensive mainframes

In the 1980s more newsrooms were able to enjoy the computerrsquos feature

of capturing the keystroke with the advent of the cheaper PCs for word

processing But the bigger impact came in 1985 when Apple introduced the

laser printer (Seybold 1987) This was soon followed by desktop publishing

systems like Pagemaker and Ventura Publisher for designating typographic

styles and sizes arranging text and images on a computer screen and

generating camera-ready material (Dallas 1988)

In 1989 all but one of eight daily broadsheet newspapers in Metro Manila

used computers in varying degrees for writing and editing copy page design

and generating the camera-ready layout These tasks were performed on PCs

with the exception of the Bulletin the only newspaper with a dedicated

publishing system called the Atek (Mariano 1989)

But the biggest was yet to come starting in 1994 when a number of

newspapers started making available their content on the World Wide Web

(Mariano 1997)

22 IT and journalism

Mariano Page 5 16

Zorkoczy (1980) defines information technology as the devices used in

the gathering storage processing and dissemination of information

Interestingly these are the very tasks that journalists do cover an event take

notes shoot pictures write the story edit copy design the page print and

circulate copies We might want to add that editors and publishers are in a

constant race against time Because of its ability to dramatically cut through

processes if not rewrite (reinvent or reengineer) them IT can have a perfect

client in organizations whose business is to sell information

3 The traditional newsroom

Let us take a look at how newspapers operated before there were

computers or any advanced means of long-distance communication The

process usually started in the morning with reporters meeting with their

editors for their assignments Then they would go to their ldquobeatsrdquo to collect the

facts At a certain time of the day usually after the lunch hour reporters went

back to the ldquonewsroomrdquo In this place they wrote their stories and handed them

to their editors Editors would correct the copy and sometimes seek additional

facts or clarification from the reporters At around 3 orsquoclock editors would send

the manuscript for typesetting

As for photographers it was imperative for them to go back to the office

after taking pictures in order to develop their film and print copies

Objectively the editorrsquos job is to correct errors in fact grammar and

style and prepare a page ldquodummyrdquo In addition they regarded it their sacred

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 4 16

In the 1960s the use of computers in newspapers was limited to

automating the typesetting function In 1977 the Los Angeles Times had linked

400 terminals of editors and reporters eliminating the need for typesetting

(and with it proofreading) (Smith 1980) Throughout these years it must be

noted that computers involved large and expensive mainframes

In the 1980s more newsrooms were able to enjoy the computerrsquos feature

of capturing the keystroke with the advent of the cheaper PCs for word

processing But the bigger impact came in 1985 when Apple introduced the

laser printer (Seybold 1987) This was soon followed by desktop publishing

systems like Pagemaker and Ventura Publisher for designating typographic

styles and sizes arranging text and images on a computer screen and

generating camera-ready material (Dallas 1988)

In 1989 all but one of eight daily broadsheet newspapers in Metro Manila

used computers in varying degrees for writing and editing copy page design

and generating the camera-ready layout These tasks were performed on PCs

with the exception of the Bulletin the only newspaper with a dedicated

publishing system called the Atek (Mariano 1989)

But the biggest was yet to come starting in 1994 when a number of

newspapers started making available their content on the World Wide Web

(Mariano 1997)

22 IT and journalism

Mariano Page 5 16

Zorkoczy (1980) defines information technology as the devices used in

the gathering storage processing and dissemination of information

Interestingly these are the very tasks that journalists do cover an event take

notes shoot pictures write the story edit copy design the page print and

circulate copies We might want to add that editors and publishers are in a

constant race against time Because of its ability to dramatically cut through

processes if not rewrite (reinvent or reengineer) them IT can have a perfect

client in organizations whose business is to sell information

3 The traditional newsroom

Let us take a look at how newspapers operated before there were

computers or any advanced means of long-distance communication The

process usually started in the morning with reporters meeting with their

editors for their assignments Then they would go to their ldquobeatsrdquo to collect the

facts At a certain time of the day usually after the lunch hour reporters went

back to the ldquonewsroomrdquo In this place they wrote their stories and handed them

to their editors Editors would correct the copy and sometimes seek additional

facts or clarification from the reporters At around 3 orsquoclock editors would send

the manuscript for typesetting

As for photographers it was imperative for them to go back to the office

after taking pictures in order to develop their film and print copies

Objectively the editorrsquos job is to correct errors in fact grammar and

style and prepare a page ldquodummyrdquo In addition they regarded it their sacred

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 5 16

Zorkoczy (1980) defines information technology as the devices used in

the gathering storage processing and dissemination of information

Interestingly these are the very tasks that journalists do cover an event take

notes shoot pictures write the story edit copy design the page print and

circulate copies We might want to add that editors and publishers are in a

constant race against time Because of its ability to dramatically cut through

processes if not rewrite (reinvent or reengineer) them IT can have a perfect

client in organizations whose business is to sell information

3 The traditional newsroom

Let us take a look at how newspapers operated before there were

computers or any advanced means of long-distance communication The

process usually started in the morning with reporters meeting with their

editors for their assignments Then they would go to their ldquobeatsrdquo to collect the

facts At a certain time of the day usually after the lunch hour reporters went

back to the ldquonewsroomrdquo In this place they wrote their stories and handed them

to their editors Editors would correct the copy and sometimes seek additional

facts or clarification from the reporters At around 3 orsquoclock editors would send

the manuscript for typesetting

As for photographers it was imperative for them to go back to the office

after taking pictures in order to develop their film and print copies

Objectively the editorrsquos job is to correct errors in fact grammar and

style and prepare a page ldquodummyrdquo In addition they regarded it their sacred

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 6 16

duty to prepare the next generation of editors Ermin Garcia Jr former

publisher of the Manila Times said journalists then went through the rigors of

working directly under the supervision of their editors ldquoOur editors today were

trained in the old schoolrdquo he added Augusto Villanueva of the Standard

credits that method ldquoThatrsquos the reason why in those days we learned more

and learned fastrdquo Ernesto Tolentino of Peoplersquos Journal says it was effective

because most of these reporters rose to occupy top positions in newspapers

Diego Cagahastian now a sub-editor at the Bulletin said old-timers compelled

their reporters to ldquolearn your language to be perfect in your writing with your

factsrdquo

But there is more to this To the ldquocubrdquo reporter or even a number of

veterans the editing process was a tense moment Editors pressed for time

were normally at their witsrsquo end and could launch a tirade at the slightest

grammatical error

Seasoned journalists recall such outbursts of temper ldquoNaninigaw yan

Parang terror siya Sa newsroom hihiyain ka niyardquo said Cagahastian ldquoThey

really banged the table and shouted at yourdquo recounted Tolentino Ernesto

Singson of confided ldquoKapag nagkamali ka mura ang aabutin mordquo Villanueva

described his former bosses as having ldquothe habit of shouting at you and

scolding yourdquo Ben Rodriguez Bulletin editor once spoke of how Jess Bigornia

then a reporter fainted while his editor the legendary Felix (ldquoJudgerdquo) Gonzalez

was giving him a dressing down

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 7 16

4 The new technology and its impact

Through the years new technologies found their way in the newsroom

and forever changed working habits When the telephone became a regular

fixture in the newsroom reporters no longer had to physically get their

assignments from their editors Some journalists covering remote events or way

past the deadline were also allowed to phone in their stories However phone

dictation was more of a privilege than the norm because of the effort it required

and the disasters they often caused

In the 1990s the fax machine became standard office equipment and

quickly became a favorite among reporters In 1998 Metro Manila journalists

cited the fax as the most used means of submitting copy (Mariano 1998) Since

many press offices had typewriters and some even had computers all reporters

needed to do was to type their stories and send them by fax This was the

beginning of the vanishing newsroom With the copy now in their editorsrsquo

hands there was no compelling reason for reporters to go back to the

newsroom ndash and put up with cantankerous editors In 1998 more than half of

beat reporters rarely saw their editors

Today e-mail even threatens to be the final stroke that would eliminate

the physical newsroom E-mail is cheaper quicker and more accurate than fax

An added attraction is that editors can directly manipulate without retyping

the contents of e-mail In contrast fax copy had to be retyped Two years ago e-

mail submissions ranked only as the third most common means of handing in

stories However this is expected to have already risen in the interim

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 8 16

True the physical newsroom still exists But there are hardly any

reporters In a sense gone are the days of the newsroom and cigarette smoke

spilled coffee racing typewriters crumpled copy paper and grisly editors

5 Side Effects

McLuhan once said that the impact of media on society can be compared

to a double-edged sword The same is true when one speaks of the effects of

technology on journalism

It does make little sense to require reporters to be physically present in

the newsroom After all their job is to collect information and feed it to their

editors These they can do without ever setting foot in the newsroom or meeting

their editors in the flesh

Hence Doreen Fernandez calls the fax machine a ldquoblessingrdquo Eugenia

Apostol says that computers in fact make things very easy for both editors and

reporters According to Joem Macaspac

ldquoWe are very glad to have fax machines and computers because they

speed up the work Before you could only produce about two stories

[Now] we produce about six stories Habang pina-fax mo yung unang

istorya ginagawa mo yung pangalawa You can imagine the

conveniencerdquo

Even payday is no longer reason to go to the office especially if salaries

can be drawn from ATM machines Inquirer news editor Nilo Paurom says he

hasnrsquot seen of his reporters ldquoin monthsrdquo

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 9 16

The editor himself does not have to be in his office In real lifethey still

report for work However given the new technology he can be at home or at

some tropical resort directing operations retrieving copy and forwarding

edited stories to the printers or Webmasters by e-mail When this happens we

can say that the newsroom will have totally vanished

To most editors this spells doom The most modest concern is the loss of

camaraderie and personal relationship between editor and reporter Others are

mourning the loss of control over their reporters But the biggest question is

how the vanishing newsroom will affect the training of future editors Says

Ermin Garcia

ldquoToday reporters find it unusual that they have to come back to the

office But that is exactly what improved them when they worked

together with their editors Now they donrsquot get that chancerdquo

6 Conclusions and recommendations

Toffler (1970) describes future shock as the ldquodisease of changerdquo the

condition resulting from an inability to cope with rapid technological

advancement Yet he cautions against turning off the switch of technological

progress Doing so he said would not only be ldquostupid but immoralrdquo (p 428)

Therefore there should be no going back to the past no dumping of fax

machines no swearing off e-mail access and no forcing physical interaction

with reporters Rather news executives must find creative ways to use the

technology without losing their sight on the original goal The physical

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 10 16

newsroom may have outlived its usefulness Yet editors and reporters can

continue doing what they did with the help of modern technology In this light

allow me to propose a couple of suggestions

61 News organizations can set up an electronic message board in

which editors and their reporters can leave notes for one another This is

possible with free online services like E-Groupscom and Milomailcom

Message boards though are open to more than one person If they do not

want their messages to be accessible to everybody members of an e-

group can resort to ordinary e-mail

62 They can also create an electronic chat room in free sites like

Chatroomcom in which editors can discuss a story in real time (or

synchronous mode in IT-speak) with their reporters Likewise an editor

and reporter can go over copy interactively onscreen minus the

histrionics

It is my contention that a technological problem or one caused by

technology requires a technological solution among others Faced with the

very real prospect of vultures flying overhead journalists will have to live

survive and thrive with computers In that way they can prevent the newsroom

from totally disappearing and transform it fully functioning as in the days of

old into a virtual newsroom

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 11 16

Works Cited

Dallas Graham The Pros and Cons of Desktop Publishing The Philippine Printer March-April 1988

Innis Harold The Bias of Communication Toronto University of Toronto Press 1951

Kelber Harry and Carl Schlesinger Union Printers and Controlled Automation New York The Free Press 1967

Mariano Gerardo Computers and the Philippine Press The Use of Computers in the Newsrooms of Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Daily Newspapers MA thesis University of the Philippines 1989

--- Filipino Newspapers on the Internet Fine Print 3 1996 Online httpwwwdlsueduphcollegesclacommfineprntinternethtml

--- Mediamorphosis How Journalists in Metro Manilarsquos Broadsheet Newspapers Use Computers for News Gathering Processing and Transmission PhD dissertation draft University of the Philippines 1998

McLuhan Marshall Understanding the Media The Extensions of Man New York McGraw-Hill 1965

Seybold John W The Desktop Publishing Phenomenon Byte May 1987Smith Anthony Goodbye Gutenberg The Newspaper Revolution of the rsquo80s

New York Oxford University Press 1980Toffler Alvin Future Shock New York Bantam 1970--- Powershift Knowledge Wealth and Violence at the Edge of the 21st Century

New York Bantam 1991Turnbull Arthur T and Russell N Baird The Graphics of Communication 4th

ed New York Holt Rinehart amp Winston 1980Zorkoczy Peter Information Technology London Financial Times 1980

Oral Histories

Apostol Eugenia Oral history Audio cassette By Joan Medina De La Salle University 1998

Cagahastian Diego Oral history Audio cassette By Odessa Cervantes De La Salle University 1998

Fernandez Doreen Oral history Audio cassette By Corazon Atayde De La Salle University 1998

Garcia Ermin Jr Oral history Audio cassette By Sarah Go De La Salle University 1998

Macaspac JM Oral history Audio cassette By Llaverne Reyes De La Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998

Mariano Page 12 16

Paurom Nilo Oral history Audio cassette (Interviewerrsquos name currently unavailable) De La Salle University 1998

Rodriguez Ben Oral history Audio cassette 1995Singson Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Jessica Gonzales De La

Salle University 1998Tolentino Ernesto Oral history Audio cassette By Candy Diaz De La Salle

University 1998Villanueva Augusto Oral history Audio cassette By Joyce Santiago De La

Salle University 1998