AMERICAN journalists have a name for it: "computer assisted reporting", or CAR. In a media world of shrinking resources, fewer staff and little money for newsrooms, American media managers and journalists are placing increasing emphasis on computer technology as a way of revitalising their industry and restoring public confidence in journalism.
The use of computers for investigating news stories, providing background to profiles allowing analysis of complex financial data and generally sharpening up news, will probably have greater impact on the news media than newspapers going online and being available on email or on the World Wide Web.
News stories and other content is usually the same, whether on paper or online. All that computer technology has offered so far is a distribution system. Computers in the newsroom, the apostles of CAR maintain will make a qualitative difference to the content of news itself and change journalism forever.
Rose Ciotta in the American Journalism Review, writes of CAR producing excellent journalism and of winning fans among high level newspaper executives and investigative reporters. She is computer assisted reporting editor of the Buffalo News and a director of the professional body, Investigative Reporters & Editors.
CAR faces a new frontier "as it moves from the computer nerd in the corner to the centre of the newsroom. Thanks to the computer's power, reporters are tapping into data and producing high impact stories on topics ranging from criminals among nursing home workers and school teachers to unsafe elevators and the influence of political contributions.
"Pulitzer winners in each of the last six years used computer techniques to uncover racism in mortgage loans, arson fraud medical malpractice, government waste and lax building codes. While cutting back in other areas, editors and television news directors are buying equipment and creating new CAR jobs, because they see the value in the stories computers make possible," she said.
Ciotta quotes Brian Duffy, assistant managing editor for investigations at US News & World Report, saying CAR has become an integral part of the magazine's competitive strategy, producing investigative reporting based on "almost courtroom quality evidence. While CAR costs money, it is a wise investment that will help, restore confidence in American journalism".
The National Institute for Computer Assisted Reporting, (NICAR) has offered training seminars for some 5,000 journalists in the US over the past 18 months. The body's director, Brant Houston says: "What everyone is having a difficult time accepting is we are in a revolution in terms of news gathering"
While CAR specialists in the US complain of the difficulty of exciting journalists, still suspicious of computers, not all managements are willing to offer real training or invest in the necessary equipment. Newsrooms have to move to personal computer based systems. "That is the tool for modern day reporting," says Jonathan Krim of the San Jose Mercury News Reporters should be using personal computers rather than the so called "dumb terminals" that only allow reporters to write and edit stories. The personal computer will allow the use of other software, and access to online services and the Internet.
The Poynter Institute for Media Studies in St Petersburg, Florida, says investing in computer hardware and software is, not important but "essential".
On its Web homepage under its "frequently asked questions" on CAR, it says: "In addition to the computer's ability to handle and manage large volumes of information, it is a communications medium - the fastest growing medium in the country, and the world. Rapid advances in software, hardware and online, services have made the computer the great equaliser. For the first time in history, the same quality and volume of information has become available to large and small news organisations alike." Failure to capitalise on this will leave communications companies behind, it warns.
But if US media institutions tend to view any development in a way that might be considered, slightly over the top this side of the Atlantic, there is little doubt that fast access to databases, the ability to test statements made by those in authority, could revolutionise journalism. It will release journalists from the constraints of sources, giving them as much information as those they routinely speak to.
Tom Koch, author of Journalism in the 21st Century praises the use of online services for reporting. "At the very least, this potential informs reporters or editors in a significant way, empowering them, through this electronically gathered, background information, with a perspective that allows them to question critically an official posture, no matter how politically powerful its official source may be."
A report for the Annenberg Washington Programme by Ellen Hume, called Tabloid, Talk Radio and The Future of News Technology's impact on Journalism, says that high quality, journalism has never been easier to produce. "Instant access to endless archives, government documents, and other databases enables reporters to bring facts and contexts together as fever before. Computers help reporters sort our patterns in housing discrimination, crime and toxic waste dumping. Political contributions can be lined up instantly with votes on critical issues. CAR is transforming the depth, and quality of coverage, particularly in print."
CAR will not, however, replace the traditional (paper) notebook toting reporter. Gene Roberts, managing editor of the New York Times, quoted by Ciotta, says "It's critical to flesh out the numbers with people, with the sights and sounds of the street, and strong narrative." Referring to projects the Times was working on he said: "Once the numbers have been crunched and studied, reporters will hit the streets with the job of breathing life into the data."