Chasing truth in an era of instant media

MANILA, Philippines - In this age of instant news, print media is placed in a situation that is both a boon and a bane to news editors. Thus, a news editor must not only have the proverbial “nose for news” but must also now have the savvy to make use of modern gadgets to gather news.

Modern technology has sped up the delivery of breaking news that now come out almost instantly, such as those aired live on TV and radio. The newest media form through which breaking news are sent through instantly now include text messaging, Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking sites in the internet.

I could only thank my tech-savvy sons for helping me cope with my job as a news editor in this era of instant news. They’ve linked my Yahoo! email accounts with Twitter and Facebook. Voila! It has given me flexibility in my job as a news editor to do my work even when I am out of the office or while mobile here in the country or abroad.

Of course, one must have modern telecommunications gadgets to gain access to news sources. These include mobile phones like Blackberry, iPhone, Samsung Galaxy Tab, and other gadgets with Wi-Fi or 3G for internet access. This is not to mention that a laptop or notebook that you can take anywhere or wherever you go has become indispensable.

It is only through these modern means that a news editor worth his salt can run the newsroom at his or her fingertips. That’s just the part of monitoring that a news editor is obliged to do day in, day out.

For any news editor, getting the new­­­ –– whoever, wherever and whenever it happens –– is the biggest challenge. There is no such thing as a slow day or one in which nothing worthwhile is happening to make it to the news.

“In Manila, you don’t really find it difficult to report news because something’s always happening here. In a place like New Zealand, for example, you’d have a headline like ‘The church bell falls’ and the like,” quipped STAR editor-in-chief Isaac Belmonte, who goes on to say that the first challenge of reporting the news is having an event that is “newsworthy”.

A news editor is like a cheerleader or a rabble-rouser to the reportorial staff. If the reporter faces a blank wall in the course of going through the daily grind of the beat, the news editor comes in to give the lead, or angle, or slant of the story they can or should pursue.

Beyond this, however, the greatest challenge for a news editor is to be tasked to find “redeeming value” out of a great human tragedy that makes the headline news. Doing this, the news editor must try to extract from reporters their flair for human interest or human drama behind the news story.

A news editor’s job is also like that of a doctor of medicine who is on call 24/7 for any emergency. This is because while we have deadlines to meet, the news doesn’t sleep or take a rest. Fortunately for us in print media, we have a maximum deadline of 12 midnight in the case of The Philippine STAR to re-mat the front page in case of late night breaking news.

Like in any other media, news editors of print are “scoop-driven”. There is stiff competition in the industry to scoop, or to try to get “exclusive” stories, if not “hot” stories, to carry in the next day’s front page. Although broadcast media or those in radio and TV have the first crack to report events as they happen, print media has the advantage of getting into the substance and the details of the news that those in broadcast often fail to capture.

This has always been my challenge to our reporters and correspondents –– to let the competition follow the “scooped” stories of STAR, rather than us following up stories “scooped” by the others.

While the news we may have missed during the day can also be picked up from wire services or from late-night news broadcast on TV and radio, this certainly is not the kind of coverage that a news editor would like to get from reporters. It is only acceptable in cases or situations when an event happens late in the day and was totally unexpected as in the case of accidents, or earthquakes and other disasters and news of this nature.

For the past 25 years, The STAR has set the tradition of being the trendsetter of news that Filipinos follow. Since its existence, the newspaper put up by the late Betty Go-Belmonte and the late Max Soliven has had several news editors staying true to this tradition.

For the past 15 years that I have been working for the STAR, initially as a reporter, our newspaper’s motto, “Truth Shall Prevail”, has become our mantra on how to conduct our news coverage. In the search for truth, we get into the heart of the stories and bring them out in the light of day.

Since I became news editor of the paper since 2005, I have seen to it that our reporters pursue stories on the same principle of being the first to get the news out that are anchored on the truth. We have tried to live up to this honored tradition of the STAR family to become trendsetter of the news in the Philippines.

During their tenure, former executive secretary Eduardo Ermita once confided to me that officials at Malacañang Palace were wary each day of what comes out in the headline of The STAR. “You know, hija, The STAR headline sets the national agenda of the day of the government,” Ermita sighed. At first, his comment struck me as some kind of a warning until he went on to say that The STAR has always given the government, whoever is in power, a fair play.

Ermita was not alone in his sentiments about what stories come out in The STAR. While he was Justice Secretary of then President Fidel Ramos, now Senator Franklin Drilon related to us how they in the Cabinet dreaded getting phone calls very early in the morning from the erstwhile 24/7 Chief Executive. In between chuckles, Drilon remembered how then President Ramos would call their attention to the smallest news or column item that came out in The STAR.

Such is how our readers value the news and information they get from The STAR. And this is how we are guided to do the best in our job as news editor in this age of instant news.