The Indiana Publisher

Ray Cooney, Commercial Review (Portland) Goodbye, Facebook. Goodbye also to Twitter and Instagram, though, to be fair, you're not really the issue. Beginning immediately, The Commercial Review will no lon- ger be posting links to each of its stories, photos, editorials, etc. on the various social media outlets. This decision has been a long time coming. The following are a few of our reasons: Behavior It's atrocious. There are some who are able to have civil discussions about legitimate issues on our Facebook page. But, at least in our experience, they are the exception. It seems that some spend most of their time watching Facebook, waiting to pick a fight with or antagonize someone. It's disturb- ing. Even having our profanity fil- ter set to "strong" is not enough. Some of you still find ways to be inappropriate and/or to harass others. We reserve the right to ban those who are regular violators, and we have done so. But it takes time and effort to constantly monitor your comments on our Facebook page. We feel that time and effort can be better spent elsewhere. It would be one thing if these sites were being used for a pro- ductive dialogue, but that's not what's happening. Giving our product away While journalism can cer- tainly be seen as a public service — we took down our paywall at the beginning of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic for just that reason — newspapers are businesses. It is a regular occurrence on our Facebook page that followers see a post about a story they're interested in and, rather than buy- ing a newspaper or getting a sub- scription, they ask someone else to screenshot the story and post it. Inevitably someone does. We shouldn't have to point out, but we will, again, that it costs money to produce a news- paper. Someone has to write the stories and take the photos. Someone has to print the paper. Someone has to deliver it. None of them do it for free, nor should they. Subscriptions range from 43 cents to 57 cents per issue, depending on your location and payment frequency. We don't think that's too much to ask. Impact on journalism industry Last month, we ran an edito- rial by America's Newspapers, an organization committed to being the voice of newspapers for sup- port, for advocacy, for education, for connection. That editorial addressed part of the social media dilemma. Social media platforms get most of their news content from news outlets like us and "the major tech platforms still refuse to compensate most news publishers, even while they pay creators for the ability to dis- tribute music and lots of other kinds of content." While that is true, newspa- pers also must bear some of the responsibility. We have been, after all, voluntarily posting our content on their platform. It would be difficult for us to make a legitimate push for change while we're actively contributing to the problem. So, we're not going to anymore. To be clear, we are under no obligation to have social media accounts. Up until about a decade ago, those accounts didn't exist. You will still be able to receive our product as you have for nearly 150 years, in its print form. You can also visit our website at thecr.com, where you can sign up to have daily head- lines emailed to you. You can download our mobile app. Our individual reporters will remain free to share their stories via their own personal social media accounts, or to create professional accounts for that purpose. Whether they accept your follow requests or not is entirely up to them. If you'd like to comment on a story, photo or editorial, you're welcome to do so. But that will no longer happen via our social media pages. You'll have to take the time and put in the thought to write and send a letter to the editor. Social media has its positives. We would not argue otherwise. But, at least for us, those are far outweighed by its negatives. And we will no longer contrib- ute to that toxic atmosphere. Ray Cooney is the editor and publisher of the Commercial Review (Portland). Editorial: We're saying goodbye to Facebook Page 12 December 2020 Editor discusses staff decision to unplug newspaper from social media In explaining to readers why the Commercial Review was signing off from its Facebook page, editor and publisher Ray Cooney summed up one of the reasons simply: the behavior of posters is "atrocious." The possibility of the paper stepping away from social media had been raised and backed off from several times before the decision was made. "We sat down together as a staff and said let's talk about this," Cooney said. "I said, 'I don't want this to be a move that I make uni- laterally. I want everybody to be involved.' " The staff discussed the pluses and minuses of remain- ing on Facebook. Cooney said he expected but did not get push back from his relatively young staff. Ongoing uncivil and unseemly conduct by posters prompted the move. Users emboldened by a level of anonymity offered by the web engaged in profanity, belligerence and toxic dialogue that left Cooney banning some readers and/or reminding them to behave themselves. "That's not the kind of con- versation I think I should have to have with adults." Cooney said it was no one individual instance that was a straw that broke the camel's back but just a consistent pat- tern of bad behavior. If readers want to com- ment, they can collect their thoughts and write a letter to the editor, Cooney said. "On Facebook, there's very little time taken to think about what to say. If you're doing it right, you set that down on your desk and let it wait for a day ... and that doesn't happen on social media." Navigating the social media landscape is a challenge for all news organizations and Cooney said it's good to question the benefits and drawbacks. "When writing the editorial, I knew this was something that would be picked up beyond Jay County because of the subject matter," Cooney said. "I hoped not necessarily that others would follow in our footsteps, but that others would think about what their policies are and why they have them and if that's the path forward where they want to go."

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