Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1151507
OPINION 27 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 4 AUGUST 2019 Let our reporting be our yardstick Matthew Vella Matthew Vella is executive editor of MaltaToday TOGETHER with my col- league and fellow editor Kurt Sansone, it is crucial that we reassure readers what our newspaper stands for: the truth, the verification of facts, our loyalty to readers. Understandably, such a commitment could be com- promised by a media buying contract, something less than a novelty in the media world. On a daily basis, a news- paper's salespeople are busy selling print and online space to clients, corporate and public sector. Yet, MaltaTo- day is just one of the products of Mediatoday Co. Ltd – a company that produces other titles, magazines, polls, and occasionally ad hoc adverts or other client work. This time, a related com- pany, Business2Business, which does not own Malta- Today, is doing the job of the middlemen (the ad agencies) by buying the space of other newspapers on behalf of the roads agency Infrastructure Malta, that is: it uses the budget of the said agency to buy ad space and then keeps a commission on it. Readers should know that when a newspaper is paid to feature adverts, never does its editorial get compromised (or so we hope for the sake of the public good that journal- ism brings); we can guarantee that because the sales depart- ment that works on at least six products is also buying ad space on behalf of Infra- structure Malta, MaltaToday's editorial is not being compro- mised. Kurt and I want readers to take our recent editorial 'A recipe for traffic-induced dis- aster' as an example, and the stories by our senior journalist James Debono on the Central Link project; and our dedi- cated online section on the environment as examples of what we do on a daily basis. Let our writing and report- ing be the yardstick by which you measure our worth. Speak to us and we will be frank with you. Many modern-day publish- ers are in their own right, media companies offering an array of services. MaltaTo- day's publisher, Mediatoday, is just one of these companies expanding their business. Its polling arm started as a direct function of its newspaper, but now it has been disconnected from the newspaper into a company unit of its own, with external pollsters, not journal- ists, carrying out polling. A lot of this business is about disruption. When a media company goes directly to a company for its custom, it is actively telling it to save money by having to give an inflated budget to some advertising agency. When that media company says it will put its journalists at the service of the client, that is, use journal- ism as the branding vehicle for the client, not only is that company diluting the role of journalism, it is now no longer serving readers but its own paying clients instead. And that model does disrupt. It disrupts the public service of journalism. And it also disrupts a traditional flow of money: client, to middle-man agency, to media outlet. Now media buying has al- ways been in the hands of ad- vertising intermediaries whose role was to assess how best to spread out clients' budgets across the market's various media outlets. It has always been an unscientific process. Ad agencies will not neces- sarily advertise in the most successful title on the market. Personal and public politics, the everyday lubricant of social and power relations in Malta, have made the industry what it is. Budgets will be split across various titles and media outlets according to certain loyalties, friendships, and business relations. One harrowing anecdote from inside the PR world is of one of Malta's largest ad agencies, whose major client – a well-known conglomerate – included a senior direc- tor with healthy National- ist affectations. It had only reached his ear through some careless talk, that one of the men working on his brief – a round-the-clock business that had an urgent deadline – was, as it happened, a Labour voter. He was unceremoniously taken off the brief. This was a story from the glorious 2000s, when you sort of "could do these things" because Labour was consigning itself to the rubbish-bin of history with its steadfast antagonism to EU membership. Still, you can see from this extreme example how PR agencies, like media com- panies themselves, are not entirely guided by ratings or rankings, KPIs or revenues. When you have a big budget in hand, and you are disburs- ing it on behalf of a client, you want everyone to play nice, wag their tail and get their tongue out. And that means, being a nice journalist. MaltaToday has even lost ad- vertising from various clients for mocking Pope John Paul II in a newspaper cartoon upon his death. And best of all, was the on- slaught from the all-powerful ministry led by the incor- ruptible Austin Gatt, when James Debono and I wrote a piece dissecting the planning process that would give the fast-track permit to Smart City back in 2006. 'Red Carpet Treatment for Smart City' seemingly angered the people at the Gatt ministry back in the day, bringing all the pres- sure to bear on Saviour Balzan and Roger Degiorgio. And money was in the balance. We were insouciant journal- ists, ignorant of the reality of how advertising money, so fundamental to the survival of the business we were tasked to carry out, was then used as a way to coerce editors and owners into banging the clients' drum. And yet here we are today, still refusing to kowtow to moneyed inter- ests. Say what you will of my newspaper title, but let the first journalist/blogger who has never had to crawl on their stomach for money cast the first stone; let the first log- rolling yea-sayer cheerleader for governments past and present who has never had to grease themselves up before serving up the public good to the country's business giants, cast the first stone. You know who you are. You know who you are be- cause you have turned jour- nalism into a branding vehicle to siphon off as much money as you can from your corpo- rate clients. You have turned journalism into an advertising billboard. You have turned journalists into 'influencers' and marketeers. You have used your blogs as unofficial mouthpieces for the parties you support, for the divisive factionalists who will not dirty their hands with the muck they want you to rake. You have used journal- ism's great voice not to serve the public. But to serve your corporate and partisan clients and masters. We have always placed Mal- taToday at the heart of those readers who feel powerless; those who want a critical per- spective on politics, society, life and culture; and as further away from the partisan bludg- eoning of our minds. We have been dedicated to the preservation of the environment, and advocated radical ideas for the protec- tion of urban and rural spaces and good governance (for example, our anaylsis on ODZ gave way to a review of PA rural policy rules yet to see the light). Other newspapers delight in skewering us, not only be- cause of the thirst for finance (whether it is through obscure sponsored content or opinion parading as adjective-laden news) but because the news industry is fraught with terri- toriality and facile puritanism. We should also make clear two important realities about our newspaper title. First, the money. Without any attempt at cynicism, Me- diatoday is a media company and not one newspaper, with a hefty salary bill. The rev- enues of any media company tend to be slim. Those salaries must be paid but also raised: afford me the digression that we tend to lose jobs to the world of publicity and gaming, where salaries are higher (yet, we get publicly criticised AND punished by lost ad revenue when we question tax prac- tices of these sacred cows of the Maltese economy – vide our MaltaFiles coverage). Secondly, our power struc- ture. MaltaToday was founded by the publisher of The Circle with Saviour Balzan as its first editor, who in turn acquired the newspaper title and then built Mediatoday Co. around its flagship product. Today, I (Matthew) am its executive editor, while Saviour Balzan is managing editor. That means I am editor-in- chief, but the business and sales and operations of the newspaper (and other prod- ucts) are handled by Balzan, who employs me. This makes for a marathon of argument and constant disagreement, mainly insti- gated by yours truly with – no coyness about this – a sincere belief in what MaltaToday stands for, and the benefit that a public-minded newspaper gives by the way it informs and empowers readers. Readers may be confused because Saviour Balzan is a towering figure in the name that MaltaToday built for itself; yet the title is built by its newsroom, and the journal- istic values it prides itself on cultivating. Balzan can make his voice heard clearly, but as a shareholder he is often left wondering why he can be easily drowned out by the unruliness of the people he employs. It is all down to our particu- lar pedigree: we are not parti- san journalists, we enjoy being the heretical, critical voice in a sea of yes-people, and we root for the underdog. Surely, transparency here should become a major con- sideration, ie. if Mediatoday is a media company expand- ing its business in all possible avenues, we must ensure MaltaToday is not affected by key business transactions which, ultimately, are also carried out to ensure financial sustainability. As editors we do not get to decide whose money to refuse, except when it comes to far- right organisations or entities we deem unacceptable. We have been running ads on our media spaces for government agencies since 1998. Why should anything change now? An abridged version of this opinion piece, co-authored with MaltaToday online editor Kurt Sansone, appeared on MaltaToday.com.mt Let our writing and reporting be the yardstick by which you measure our worth. Speak to us and we will be frank with you