This trip to London, Bruges and Amsterdam marks the ninth time Helen Fallon, a professor in the School of Communication, has traveled with students overseas. She and Jan Getz, a retired faculty member, started these trips in 2008 to enable students to experience traveling abroad.
She also helps students afford these travels through the John E. Fallon Jr. Travel Fund, which she and her children, Amy and Stephen, started when her husband died suddenly in 2008. Her husband had traveled three times to Europe and visited 48 states with his family. He was set to join her and their children on the first Point Park trip to London to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary.
Students assisted in these fundraising efforts this year, under the guidance of graduate assistant Emily Kolek, and they raised $3,550.
Helen Fallon has served as the Honors Program director at Point Park University since 2009. Prior to that she helped create and found its School of Communication, serving as acting dean in its initial year of operation, 2008-2009. Before assuming that position, Fallon was chair of the university’s Journalism and Mass Communication Department for nine years. She started teaching full time at the private liberal arts college in 1986 after working for 11 years in the field as a reporter, copy editor and editor for three Western Pennsylvania newspapers and a brief stint in health-care public relations.
In addition to her teaching, Fallon works as a part-time copy editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, a position she has held in addition to teaching since 1987.
She’ll blog along with her students as she has found it the best way to remember these trips and all the group will learn and experience on their travels. Fallon, who occasionally writes as well as edits for the Post-Gazette, loves having the time and opportunity to write on this trip.
Just one more day ….
All the preliminary work is done and it’s time to travel. Thank goodness, as this has been a tough spring semester, with tons of activities and events. Spring semesters always fly past as graduation beckons our seniors and coursework builds for all the others. And we had unexpected work to do for this trip after terrorists bombed Brussels on March 23, and we decided to alter our trip and visit London instead.
We’re fortunate to have visited London twice since we conceived the International Media class, so that background helped. And of course we have the incomparable Jan Getz who always finds amazing places – media and cultural – for us to visit and experience. The schedule is wonderful, thanks largely to her, with an assist from former Point Park professor Kathleen Donnelly who now lives in England.
I get tired just thinking about all of it again. And I am still recuperating from an April that included an honors conference in Cambridge, Mass., which ended with unexpected flight delays and a forced additional overnight stay in a Queens, N.Y., hotel; a crush of final articles and assignments to review and then grade; a graduate assistant search with great candidates and a difficult decision of which one to choose; and special events and commencement ceremonies for our graduates.
All this has left me staying up late packing the night before our departure, following a whirlwind week of getting all the paperwork together and tackling an impossibly long to-do list of my regular work once I submitted grades.
A confession: I took a break this evening to watch the Pittsburgh Passion – our women’s football team that my daughter, Amy, plays for as the kicker. Fun night: The team crushed the Keystone Assault, 56-6, as it rolled to its 100th win in its history. Best of all – no rain!
So I am writing this and listening to jazz to calm my soul. Almost done, almost there. Can’t wait!
We’re in London!
Wonderful flights and easy connections meant we arrived just about on time in London. The only delay – incredibly long passport lines. We waited with so many others in this immense, stuffy room with no air conditioning. We survived and emerged from the airport to sunny skies and a smiling Jan Getz, who arrived early to double check arrangements, and our London tour guide Ed Taylor.
We always start our adventures abroad with a panoramic tour, and Ed with his wealth of knowledge of the city, its history and so much more. One fun fact: It’s not just London but there is a Greater London. You know you’re in the city or leaving it when you see the dragons on the sides of the roadway.
Unbelievable traffic everywhere in this beautiful city and tons of people. Ed explained that London officials had reworked so many of the road to one-way designations and traffic circles. We tried to reach Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guard today while the sun was shining but didn’t quite make it. We journeyed on checking out Kensington Palace, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Parliament and Big Ben (which may really have been named for a boxer …) We stopped several times for photo opportunities and a quick lunch. Bob O’Gara and I took our sandwiches outside to people watch near Westminster Abbey and recall where we had traveled on our first trip here in 2008. Good fun seeing it again with new students.
Our Hotel Ibis is modern and near the St. Pancras Tube Stop. One thing on my list – checking out the library that has some Beatles artifacts and a copy of the Magna Carta.
But first, a traditional fish and chips dinner and then some much needed sleep. Looking forward to tomorrow – rain or not – as I will get to see James Lang, a soccer coach from Wales who lived with us in 2006-2007. He can’t wait to play tourists with the Yanks!
Parades, pomp and paintings
Finally, a good night’s sleep! As many times now that I have traveled abroad, I have not been able to master the art of falling asleep on a massive jet so that I am in better shape for our first day “in country.” I am just too jittery, on alert, whatever, and I have not yet tried sleeping pills or melatonin tablets to do get at least some rest. It always falls to getting that good slumber after we arrive. I fell fast asleep after writing my blog and watching just a bit of TV, but I woke up twice with terrible leg cramps. Finally, good, deep sleep came, and I awoke with plenty of time for a good breakfast (a perk of these European hotels) to handle the walking to our planned stops and visits.
Today the reward was even greater than in past trips as James Lang, a young man and soccer player/coach, who lived with us for nearly a year in 2006 was coming up from Wales. He’s joined us before and loves playing tourist with us. We had a full day planned for just that type of activity despite the rain. (Why I fussed with my hair this morning escapes me … it went wild amid the rain and humidity.)
We traveled first to Buckingham Palace to watch the changing of the guard. I found James while the group traveled farther with our guide Ed Taylor to watch the troops board their horses and prepare the parade to the palace. I’ve seen this now three times, and it never gets old. Then we headed for the Tower of London and a chance to see the crown jewels (spectacular), armor (how uncomfortable but oh so necessary) and more. Bob O’Gara, Jan Getz and James and I decided to forgo the Beefeaters tour (we’ve done I before) and headed to the National Gallery.
The 100 years of Vogue magazine covers we thought were on exhibit was not at this museum, but of course lots to see there – van Gogh, Degas, Cezanne, Braque and Gauguin paintings – and a marvelous talk about a Gerard van Honthorst painting of the Winter Queen, Elizabeth Stuart, who became the Queen of Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic) for a short time. Unfortunately for her, not only was that reign short lived but also her husband died while they were in exile. She also lost four of her 13 children. Her portrait yielded a connection to what we had learned at the Tower – Her brother was Britain’s King Charles I. During his reign civil war broke out, and he was beheaded by Oliver Cromwell’s military government and the crown jewels destroyed. The Stuart lineage and her nephew, Charles II, regained power in 1660, and Elizabeth returned to England and lived there until her death in 1662.
Van Honthorst, coincidentally, is a Dutch artist who had great success painting in a style influenced by Michelangelo Merisi Caravaggio. Following his return to the Netherlands he became a leading portrait painter. His paintings – samples of which we saw – emphasized his great skill at chiaroscuro, often painting scenes illuminated by a single candle, and they included lots of tavern scenes as well as religious paintings. (I looked some of this up to get this right when I finally had time to write this blog … so don’t be too impressed at my art history knowledge.) I hope to see I would love to see more of his work while we are in Amsterdam. It is just luminous.
We came back to the hotel to make sure James had dinner before boarding his bus and taking a four-hour bus ride back home. I just loved catching up and hearing all about his family—wife Tory and two lovely children. John and I always called our inviting him to stay with us that year the best 15-minute decision we ever made. I am so pleased we have kept up the relationship. I have seen him (including a visit with his family in Wales) every time we travel to England, and he’s been back to Pittsburgh twice. We have many more visits in our future.
Just as James left, former Point Park professor and now senior lecturer in public relations at Birmingham City University, England, Kathleen Donnelly arrived. She has helped us with every trip here, and Kathleen is responsible for one of our visits tomorrow. We headed to dinner at a great little pub around the corner. Jan and I decided on a traditional English lamb dinner to cap off the day. We headed back a bit early while Bob and Kathleen stayed behind to catch. And once I finish this blog, it’s time for what I hope is another good night’s sleep before our last full day in London.
Time to start the media visits
Two media visits today – Battenhall and BMB Advertising. The first we found courtesy of our dear friend, former Point Park professor Kathleen Donnelly, and the second Jan discovered while searching for the top new agencies in London and talking to a wonderful receptionist.
Battenhall’s founder Drew Benvie has a mission: He wants to find the right clients and provide the right services in today’s digital world. The idea is to build the PR agency of the future. But he reached back to his hometown to name his business, and amid the gamut of social media, he was very proud to point out that he started the first PR blog in the United Kingdom in 2002. The agency that just turned three and started with Drew, a desk and a small office in East London now has 34 employees.
While his client list and awards would be of interest, what I liked hearing about was the perks of working there: a 1,200 pound technology allowance, 300 pound wellness package (one person told us he used his to travel to Rome but is now looking at personal training sessions …), unlimited holiday time and 20 percent time of to do something innovative. And of course, flex time for employees, meaning they can work at home, although most come in for the drinks and camaraderie on Fridays.
Drew asked us to keep his clients and work confidential, which is a shame as they are quite impressive. Two things, though, stood out to me: The use of Whatsapp and the fact that because video is critical the agency hires lots of vloggers. Couple that last point with the fact that hiring popular YouTubers is very expensive … but well worth it.
Biggest platforms after Whatsapp: Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram and Our Monthly, which is Battenhall’s e-newsletter. When the agency gets a mention on a social media platform, a logo lights up in the office …and we did see that indeed happen!
BMB (originally named Beattie McGuinness Bungay) advertising has been in business for 11 years. Its new office – just three months old – charmed the students with its brilliant and colorful décor, complete with Salman Rushdie’s typewriter and many other artifacts. It reflects one of the founders, Trevor Beattie’s dedication to creativity and its claim to be a populist agency, supported by the principles of generosity and candour (British spelling). David Corfield, head of creative services, several of his teams and Louise Sloper, head of art and a new hire, took us through case studies of some of their best campaigns.
David explained something that mirrored our earlier visit – Although they agency used to do big TV ads, the teams are learning that turning out smaller pieces of work can result in reaching millions on social media. It’s become, naturally, a large growth area.
But two campaigns – using a teddy bear to help sell vacations and a hate theme to sell soccer shoes resonated with all of us. The first for Thomson won a bronze award in the Cannes Lions competition and took five months. The second was quick turnaround for two reasons: soccer star schedules and quick shoe launches.
A brief respite in presentations: The students worked on a case study that agency staffers will review – fun exercise. Then one of the three founders, Trevor Beattie came in to talk not only about his agency but also his ventures into filmmaking, theater work and space travel. Virgin Galactic is one of the agency’s major clients, and Trevor already has his ticket for the space flight on Virgin that is set to occur next year if all goes well.
His passion for space started in his youth and continued when he did some work for the Royal Air Force — pro bono, so in lieu of payment he got a ride on a fighter jet and could shoot footage with a camcorder jammed into his hand. He was hooked.
BMB will be the agency of record for the Virgin flights, although no marketing is needed now as the six-person first flight is sold out.
Trevor told us about his new films in the works, including a project with comedian Eddie Izzard and a Rudolph Nuryev documentary. He just finished guest editing a magazine and said he will be financing plays. (When I checked, adbrands.net reported that Trevor and the one remaining partner have reduced day-to-day work with the agency and hired CEO Juliet Haygarth in 2014, something not mentioned today.)
Fun fact: Trevor named the late and great David Bowie as one of his greatest influences, and David later told me that Bowie’s son, Duncan Bowie had worked at the agency as a copywriter. But now he’s on to bigger and better work on movies as a producer, director and screenwriter. In fact, the first film he directed in 2009 was one of the movies Trevor mentioned he was involved in: “Moon.”
The day’s end for me? A wonderful Italian dinner with Bob, Jan and Kathleen at Carlucci’s in the beautiful Renaissance Hotel at St. Pancras. Great company, great food and great wine made for a perfect ending to our time in London. On to Bruges tomorrow …..
From London to Bruges
We packed what we could into our final morning in London. Bob and I headed to the British Library after breakfast to check out its Treasures Exhibit. Colleen Loverde power walked past us en route to the same place, and Jessica Federkeil found us once we made it to the library.
Jan had recommended we stop there, and she was so right: We found amazing treasures: a copy of the Magna Carta, a letter from Michelangelo to his nephew, sacred books dating back to the third and fourth centuries, Shakespeare’s notebooks and a few early publications of his work, and original Beatles lyrics. So much to see and do that we ran out of time to see the main exhibit, Shakespeare in 10 Acts, which Colleen did manage to run through. I could’ve stayed there for hours.
On the bus then and headed right into major London traffic. We thought we had allowed enough time to head for our 3:40 ride on the Pride of Kent ferry over to Calais France. Thanks to the expert side detours by our driver, a native, we did. (And we had a first look at the social housing – akin to our Section 8 housing that exorcises Republicans and others – which is being squeezed for gentrification and sale to profit-making developers.) We arrived with 40 minutes to spare, but plunged right into confusion.
Our dear tour guide, Ed Taylor, thought we could just walk through as foot passengers, but the security personnel said, no, we had to go into a group. Long story short but we had to show passports twice, have our carry-on baggage screened before we made it to the gate. Again, Ed had to show them our passports. As she checked again, we all realized we were not going to make the ferry. So we had to wait for another hour and boarded the Spirit of France instead. Smooth sailing finally, and in just over an hour, we made it to Calais, France.
Next up a quick bus ride up the coast to Bruges led by our new tour guide Summer Allman and driver Jimmy. As we drove, Summer gave us an update on the migrant crisis in Europe among other information. Calais had been the site of terrible protests in the fall, which I had asked students about in a JOUR 101 current events quiz. So many of the Syrian refugees had England in their sights as they traveled through Europe, much like other refugees from other war-plagued countries, and Calais was a connection point for their travel. We saw the remnants of their encampment there, but worse, as we traveled up the road we saw a group of plywood shacks with mostly men surrounding them. That had been the answer – this type of temporary housing as a way to avoid horrible conditions (no water for showers, she said, and when there was in an encampment, maybe just one and a six-hour wait.) and the spread of disease. Headlines and news brought into full view. Sobering.
It didn’t take long to arrive in Bruges, past farms, some food factories and a DuPont plant (a company some Fallons had worked for in its glory days). Our hotel here is quaint and a distance away from the main squares. We enjoyed another memorable dinner at the Bistro Den Huzaar and walked back to the hotel. We older folk turned in for the night while I the students ran back out to explore. Too tired to write, not sure how to connect to the WiFi, so I am writing a combined blog for these two days.
I love playing tourist, so I enjoyed all we saw today – the squares, the Markt, the Burg and so much more – beautiful houses with the step tops of steep three story-houses and buildings dating back to the 1600s. One street with more beautiful row homes than another. Our open top canal boat ride took us past many of the streets and important structures, churches, town halls and museums. Not enough time to touch much of it, that’s for sure. We made two stops – one at the Basilica of the Church of Our Lady to see Michelangelo’s Madonna and Child (as beautiful and amazing a statue that I have seen) and the Chocolate Museum of Bruges (a big bag of chocolate at the end!) before we headed off to our own shopping and adventures.
Bob O’Gara trailed Jan and I as we searched for our own gifts and treasures – patient man! Tonight we headed out for dinner before turning in and had some amazing food at the Bistro de Schilder. (I had rabbit while Bob and Jan tried the fish. Delicious!) We have an early morning call tomorrow to leave Bruges behind to board a bus again and head through the Dutch countryside for our final destination: Amsterdam.
Chilly Amsterdam!
Today has been mostly a travel day. The students made it downstairs in plenty of time to depart Bruges by bus. A lost phone and a misplaced water bottle and hotel key gave us a bit of a delay, but we trudged up the side street to meet our bus and be on our way.
I always feel pangs of regret as we leave these cities on the way to our next destination. Never enough time to see and do all we want to do. Jan and I had planned to climb up the bell tower in town but never made it. We missed some of the museums and churches we wanted to stop in to view, particularly the relic of the holy blood. We know from these trips that you can squeeze only so much into a day. And Amsterdam awaits.
We had an uneventful bus ride up to the Keukenhof Gardens, an attraction in its last weekend for visitors. Unfortunately we missed seeing the fields of tulips as a warm winter had sped up the process and the flowers in the fields were already deadheaded. Lots and lots of beautiful specimens of tulips of many different colors in every imaginable type and size inside the grounds. I couldn’t stop taking photos on my phone. (And thanks to Jan, I discovered the panoramic function! Really cool!) Many, many people – including a number of tour groups – packed the place on this final weekend. Bob, Jan and I found a great gift shop, and before we knew it, it was time to leave.
We got back to the bus expecting to stop at some windmills, a cheese factory and a clog manufacturer. But our bus driver said he couldn’t do it as he had been sent out on another trip before picking us up and couldn’t by law work any longer. So we’ll pack that in tomorrow.
Our last stay is a hotel on the outskirts on Amsterdam, a new Meininger hotel, full of young people. We’ve already seen some interesting groups, including a fun bunch of guys from England who debated the value of getting a beer in the restaurant on the first floor before checking in …. Lots of activity!
We all had dinner together at Bret, a new restaurant in the complex. The adults and a few more came back to rest while a group of the students set off to explore. I need a good night’s sleep again before tackling all tomorrow’s visits and a dinner that will include two alumni. Can’t wait to meeting them!
A packed Sunday in Amsterdam
Sunday became a busier day than planned. We decided to make up for the bus snafu yesterday and take the students to Windmills of Zaanse Schan, a tourist site that included a Dutch clog maker’s workshop and a Dutch cheese factory. Interesting stops at each part of this, but my favorite was the pigment windmill. These traditional windmills are intriguing in the manner in which they work and still contribute. This one grinds limestone boulders into powder for paints. Our guide for this has worked with the windmills for 35 years, and his son is following him in the business. They live on site and are on call to tend to the windmills in case storms disrupt their work. Upkeep and replacements can run into thousands of euros.
Good demonstrations at the clog and cheese areas, too. Making clogs the old-fashioned way by hand would take three hours, the young man there explained. But using machines – one made in Germany and the other in France – took just minutes. What is amazing? How wet the clogs are once the work outside and inside is done. They have to dry for a few hours before being painted and varnished. Somewhere in the finishing process has to be waterproofing. Our windmill expert showed us his (worn with light shoes inside or heavy socks) as did the clog demonstrator. We saw children jumping rope wearing them.
Our favorites: The diamond-studded clogs and the beautifully decorated wedding clogs.
Back on the bus to Amsterdam once we finished our purchases. We wanted to tour the Anne Frank House first, but incredibly long lines forced a switch to our canal boat tour first and a great look at the architecture we had seen only in videos and books. We loved looking up from the boat at beautiful rows of houses with the varying gables and the hooks at the tops to pull up furniture and slide it in through windows. Many of the houses date back to the 1600s that we could see, and beautiful mansions – some turned into hotels and museums – gave us great photographic opportunities.
We saw some big city changes, many of which we see in the U.S.: One gorgeous former official building has been turned into a high-end shopping mall. A former church now houses the World Press Photo exhibition building, which we will see later this week. I did not see (from the boat at least) many for rent signs. Interesting to see lots of houseboats along the canal, some well-kept and others not, too. Our tour guide said those are tough to regulate. It also seems that many of the row house owners have boats that they dock right near their houses. With the traffic we’ve seen, that appears to be the way to go.
Back to Anne Frank’s house and a long queue. We stood there with many, many other for two hours before finally entering that tiny structure. The tour is a must-see, and as someone who read the book twice – once in junior high and another time in college – it was high on my list. The tale is so sad, and I am so grateful that Otto Frank could muster the courage to read his late daughter’s diary and other notes and share it with the world. What a gift and a reminder that we are all human beings who need to tolerate others. Maybe we need to send the book to the Trump campaign.
I had always known the structure was small, but walking through it demonstrates just how tiny and claustrophobic their living area was for those two years. Imagine not being able to walk around or use the toilet or talk with any volume all day long while the workers in the jelly factory below did their work. I marveled again at the bravery of the four people who enabled the Frank family and the others to stay there at great peril to themselves and their own families. The stress for all was just overwhelming. And we know the tragic deportation to concentration camps and the horrible ending for all but Otto Frank.
We crammed as much time in there as possible but had to leave before I could decide what book to buy. A dinner with two alumni currently living in Amsterdam waited for us. We let them talk mainly to the students, but I had a great chat with both about their days at Point Park. Matt, a transfer from the Western School into the criminal justice program, now teaches English here. He wanted me to send out a hello and remember me to Dr. Marilyn Davidson, an adjunct professor of English whom he admires. Mikut, a dance major, and I shared memories of the wonderful late Ron Tassone. She also told Colleen Loverde, our dance major, how much Doug and Judith Leifer Bentz meant to her, as well as Susan Stowe and others. She now works in special events. She grew up right near Amsterdam but found Point Park when she looked for dance programs in the states. Her brother still lives in the U.S., and she visits him regularly in Sarasota where he now lives.
We came back for a group meeting, said goodbye to Summer and hello to our new tour guide, Joost van der Wegen. I always have a hard time falling asleep once our days are over, and this night was no exception. This time, though, that sleeplessness gave me time to reflect on the memory of all those people standing patiently in line on a really cold day to see the Anne Frank House. With so much presumed emphasis that the coffee shops and Red Light District are something to see when visiting here, it lifted my spirits and faith in people.
Update on the Netherlands Media
We all needed a good night’s sleep after a long but enriching day yesterday. It might be a holiday for Amsterdam residents (Whit Monday, the second day of Pentecost) but not for us. We headed to Vrije University to hear from Dr. Jolien Arendsen, a professor in the Department of Communication Science.
She researches pornography, journalism and Harry Potter (an interesting mix!) as well as how fear is used in marketing and advertising. Today she was giving us an overview of the Netherlands media, something we normally do for all of us on all of these trips. I look up as much information on the media as possible and having former graduate assistant and now Ball State professor Dr. Robin Blom, a native of Holland come for a visit gave us some of the basics (although to my chagrin my students couldn’t recall learning much about it …..). I am always concerned that we don’t uncover the most recent of statistics.
Jolien’s numbers and information was a bit more recent than mine, from 2014-15 rather than the two years prior that I had found in my research. She started off explaining that press freedom is guaranteed here, although it can be found in Article 7 of her country’s constitution unlike our No. 1 status among the Bill of Rights. Dutch TV has had laws and regulations as well, including a prior ban on ads on public broadcasting, an insistence on diversity and information for groups – religious and political. Now the stations can not only sell ads but also they can sell memberships. The diversity stipulation remains, and the broadcasters must assure there is balance and programming is “”pluralistic, varied, high quality and diverse.”
Her research has shown that despite some concerns, there is no right wing agenda on newscasts and programming. In fact most news shows “offer a lot of the same,” including agenda journalism.
Media law changes are still being debated in 2016, she said, but what is upcoming are major budget cuts (probably about 200 million euros), stricter task descriptions and fewer broadcasters (prediction—drop from 21 to eight).
She mirrored a great deal of what I found: the Dutch consume a great deal of media (about 3.36 hours per day) and rely on television for news and information. They never did get Tivo but rather “crappy DVRs,” she said.
As of 2013 more than 93 percent of all Dutch have been online and using all types of devices, from traditional desktop and laptop computers to mobile devices. The buy lots of goods online, Jolien said. Social media is very big as well, although Facebook use is declining.
The big online news site is NU.nl, started in 1999 and now boasting 2.5 million users. (Not bad for a country o f17 million.)Those users read 300 articles per day and log 1 billion page views each month.
Young people in the Netherlands, much like the U.S. and other countries, don’t read newspapers much and don’t watch serious TV news. They prefer online sites, more soft rather than hard news – in fact they have an ambivalent attitude toward news, she said. Jolien called them “news snackers.”
Two fun notes: Whatsapp is big in this country, and Android users outnumber iPhone users.
She reviewed very similar declining newspaper numbers, ad revenue and circulation numbers to what I had found. Digital revenue is still low but slowly climbing. Slight upticks in subscription revenue comes from selling digital subscriptions and soft pay walls.
Jolien reviewed two new media ventures: The Correspondent’s 60 euro one-year subscription for a completely ad-free digital subscription and a focus on community news, relevance instead of breaking news, and more research journalism and fact checking. Blendle, a new online site that The New York Times invested 3 million euros in it in 2014, has a digital news kiosk approach. The idea – readers can pick just one article and pay an average .20 euros to access it. The business model is different, too – 70 percent of the revenue goes to the publisher, and it’s attracting that elusive younger reader with 60 percent of them making up its subscriber base.
Blendle has the same approach as Spotify, she told us. And it now has 650,000 users in the Netherlands. There are some click bait accusations, but she sees it more as catering to interests and the need for background articles.
Jolien participated in an interesting television citizen journalism project with two “bad” Amsterdam neighborhoods – Kanaleneiland and Wittlevrouwen. Most journalists report on these neighborhoods from afar, only when there is trouble or crime stories there, and they rarely cover them in person. Local residents aren’t interviewed but just officials. Called UindeWijk, it involved city council, a housing corporation and a regional news council. Professionals were called in to help show the residents how to report, use camera equipment and edit their work. The goal: offer a new news source.
It started with 10-minute programs per week, some different and original content. Professionals call it “clumsy” and “not objective,” she said. At times there has been stress and tension between the citizen journalists and the professionals, who want the residents to rework and reshoot their stories. But she said it really did work, and residents had their chance to tell their stories (she cited a good human interest story on residents who live in trailer parks as an example), and the professionals provided producers and cameraman to help the project. The big difference: “The professionals had to facilitate rather than regulate,” she said. They also benefitted from the crowd sourcing – collecting information and people to interview from all this work for their own stories.
We ended after a great round of questions from the students that ranged from specific journalism questions to master’s programs in Europe. They made us proud!
We scattered around this beautiful city for the rest of the day. Jan, Bob and I took the ferry over to the new Eye museum, focused on film, and took a break there for some coffee and conversation in the ultra modern café. We made our way to Humphrey’s, a great restaurant, for dinner and scoped out some possible areas to visit the next three days. And we’re proud of ourselves for mastering the tram to get ourselves back the hotel.
Update on the Netherlands Media
We all needed a good night’s sleep after a long but enriching day yesterday. It might be a holiday for Amsterdam residents (Whit Monday, the second day of Pentecost) but not for us. We headed to Vrije University to hear from Dr. Jolien Arendsen, a professor in the Department of Communication Science.
She researches pornography, journalism and Harry Potter (an interesting mix!) as well as how fear is used in marketing and advertising. Today she was giving us an overview of the Netherlands media, something we normally do for all of us on all of these trips. I look up as much information on the media as possible and having former graduate assistant and now Ball State professor Dr. Robin Blom, a native of Holland come for a visit gave us some of the basics (although to my chagrin my students couldn’t recall learning much about it …..). I am always concerned that we don’t uncover the most recent of statistics.
Jolien’s numbers and information was a bit more recent than mine, from 2014-15 rather than the two years prior that I had found in my research. She started off explaining that press freedom is guaranteed here, although it can be found in Article 7 of her country’s constitution unlike our No. 1 status among the Bill of Rights. Dutch TV has had laws and regulations as well, including a prior ban on ads on public broadcasting, an insistence on diversity and information for groups – religious and political. Now the stations can not only sell ads but also they can sell memberships. The diversity stipulation remains, and the broadcasters must assure there is balance and programming is “”pluralistic, varied, high quality and diverse.”
Her research has shown that despite some concerns, there is no right wing agenda on newscasts and programming. In fact most news shows “offer a lot of the same,” including agenda journalism.
Media law changes are still being debated in 2016, she said, but what is upcoming are major budget cuts (probably about 200 million euros), stricter task descriptions and fewer broadcasters (prediction—drop from 21 to eight).
She mirrored a great deal of what I found: the Dutch consume a great deal of media (about 3.36 hours per day) and rely on television for news and information. They never did get Tivo but rather “crappy DVRs,” she said.
As of 2013 more than 93 percent of all Dutch have been online and using all types of devices, from traditional desktop and laptop computers to mobile devices. The buy lots of goods online, Jolien said. Social media is very big as well, although Facebook use is declining.
The big online news site is NU.nl, started in 1999 and now boasting 2.5 million users. (Not bad for a country o f17 million.)Those users read 300 articles per day and log 1 billion page views each month.
Young people in the Netherlands, much like the U.S. and other countries, don’t read newspapers much and don’t watch serious TV news. They prefer online sites, more soft rather than hard news – in fact they have an ambivalent attitude toward news, she said. Jolien called them “news snackers.”
Two fun notes: Whatsapp is big in this country, and Android users outnumber iPhone users.
She reviewed very similar declining newspaper numbers, ad revenue and circulation numbers to what I had found. Digital revenue is still low but slowly climbing. Slight upticks in subscription revenue comes from selling digital subscriptions and soft pay walls.
Jolien reviewed two new media ventures: The Correspondent’s 60 euro one-year subscription for a completely ad-free digital subscription and a focus on community news, relevance instead of breaking news, and more research journalism and fact checking. Blendle, a new online site that The New York Times invested 3 million euros in it in 2014, has a digital news kiosk approach. The idea – readers can pick just one article and pay an average .20 euros to access it. The business model is different, too – 70 percent of the revenue goes to the publisher, and it’s attracting that elusive younger reader with 60 percent of them making up its subscriber base.
Blendle has the same approach as Spotify, she told us. And it now has 650,000 users in the Netherlands. There are some click bait accusations, but she sees it more as catering to interests and the need for background articles.
Jolien participated in an interesting television citizen journalism project with two “bad” Amsterdam neighborhoods – Kanaleneiland and Wittlevrouwen. Most journalists report on these neighborhoods from afar, only when there is trouble or crime stories there, and they rarely cover them in person. Local residents aren’t interviewed but just officials. Called UindeWijk, it involved city council, a housing corporation and a regional news council. Professionals were called in to help show the residents how to report, use camera equipment and edit their work. The goal: offer a new news source.
It started with 10-minute programs per week, some different and original content. Professionals call it “clumsy” and “not objective,” she said. At times there has been stress and tension between the citizen journalists and the professionals, who want the residents to rework and reshoot their stories. But she said it really did work, and residents had their chance to tell their stories (she cited a good human interest story on residents who live in trailer parks as an example), and the professionals provided producers and cameraman to help the project. The big difference: “The professionals had to facilitate rather than regulate,” she said. They also benefitted from the crowd sourcing – collecting information and people to interview from all this work for their own stories.
We ended after a great round of questions from the students that ranged from specific journalism questions to master’s programs in Europe. They made us proud!
We scattered around this beautiful city for the rest of the day. Jan, Bob and I took the ferry over to the new Eye museum, focused on film, and took a break there for some coffee and conversation in the ultra modern café. We made our way to Humphrey’s, a great restaurant, for dinner and scoped out some possible areas to visit the next three days. And we’re proud of ourselves for mastering the tram to get ourselves back the hotel.
attracting that elusive younger reader with 60 percent of them making up its subscriber base.
Newspaper day today
We have been so fortunate in all of our trips to meet journalists passionate about their work despite trying economic times. Our visits to Het Parool and deVolkskrant continued that tradition. The two newspapers, owned by Belgian media group De Persegroep , share a building as well as IT and HR departments and a printing plant.
Chief Editor of News Vincent Smits noted is his opening the deep history of Het Parool, which celebrated its 75th anniversary this year. The paper started as a resistance effort during World War II, and its founders wanted to ensure their Dutch countrymen had a true depiction of the war’s events. They did this at great peril as the paper grew to a circulation of 100,000, and many of those involved in its publication were executed and died in imprisonment.
Vincent said this history remains first and foremost for this paper, with its staff of about 100 – 30 of whom are freelancers. The anniversary was noted with a new design, new logo and a renewed commitment to be the main news source for Amsterdam. It also updated its website, which has a free side and a plus section for subscribers.
“We’ve always been a city paper, a bit more up market, a bit more classy without being old fashioned,” Vincent said.
The paper has no photojournalists on staff, but instead it relies on freelancers and the services provided by Reuters, Associated Press and the Dutch news service. It’s difficult for young journalists as few spots come available on it staff. Vincent said the paper does hire interns for three-month periods. If they’re good, he said, and stand out, they can get hired as freelancers and will be considered for openings.
Vincent didn’t start off in journalism but rather went to law school. He is part British and after traveling around he decided he wanted o cover international news. So he completed an internship with The Independent in London, a paper that no longer exists, after obtaining a post-bachelor’s degree in journalism in Belgium. He came to Amsterdam to work on the foreign desk 10 years ago and never left. He covered President Obama’s re-election, traveling to Ohio – where he went hunting with Iraqi veterans – and Florida. The paper has a correspondent in New York City who will cover the upcoming presidential election for it, although Vincent said perhaps they already probably have too much information about America and its election.
Today he runs all the news operations and keeps track of all the news reporters. It sounded as if it has been difficult to keep up with providing all that its 80,000 readers (62,000 home subscribers and the rest news stand sales) need to know. Het Parool shares some copy with the newspapers in the group, participates in a joint political desk at The Hague. The paper has a separate digital desk, but the two sides of the paper are working more together.
One big recent scoop: Vincent said his small paper just broke a major story when the Amsterdam mayor announced Sunday that the city would repay the families of Jews who were forced to pay taxes and rent on their properties during their concentration camp stays in World War II.
He admires Blendle’s efforts and believes Holland is too small for what it is planning to do, noting its pending move to the U.S. and Germany. He’s not sure about how Het Parool will handle payment for articles, explaining the paper has been successful with paid supplements.
For now, De Persgroep’s owner has had a hands-off policy with the daily operations of the paper, and said the owner comes from a newspaper family. The newsroom itself still participates in big decisions, voting recently on a new editor.
We toured the newsroom with him. Some fun facts: The newspaper has just one company car. Editorial employees mostly use public transportation or bike to assignments. The food reviewer is one of the most popular staffers with readers.
We had a wonderful addition to our scheduled speaker at de Volkskrant – assistant to the editor-in-chief Melle Dremthe. He has so much enthusiasm and was such fun to listen to during our visit along with sports editor Mark Miserus. Melle came to the paper in 1999 to take a job answering phones and just never left, moving from one position to another in the Netherland’s third largest national paper.
He explained the literal translation of the newspaper’s name is the people’s newspaper, although its origins aligned it with the country’s Catholics upon its founding in 1891. This was typical, he explained as the county was divided by religion and politics. Catholics, for example, would never buy meat from a Protestant butcher. Ethnic groups wouldn’t mix.
Today it’s a national daily newspaper, the third largest with about 250,000 subscribers, jumping to about 300,000 on Saturdays. Melle likened its coverage to The New York Times. The Saturday newspaper is the most important of the week, complete with a pullout guide called Vonk and magazine sections, one named Sir Edmund for the famous explorer (all about discovery, Melle said.
Sir Edmund is interesting as it is the new section that combined 27 distinct sections the paper had before. It forces people to read the entire magazine, Melle said, which is a good thing although there was pushback to the changes. Vonk borrows from American journalism, mixing objective feature articles with first-person or narrative stories by staff members.
He was proud to point out that the newspaper circulation has been growing, albeit slowly, over the past five years. The staff is working on more interactive and even films. Anything, he said, to get people interested. “Many people don’t want to read a print newspaper, but they re always on their phones,” he said.
The paper’s strategy is to give people content for free “so people can see what we do,” Melle said. “We’re trying to find a way to bring the newspaper into the digital age.
It is doing that already with all the regular social media plus Whatsapp. Facebook is its largest platform.
This paper has plenty of journalists to choose from, but it is having difficulty finding photojournalists. It hires about two to three people a year, as they look for specialists. We learned on our tour of the facility that the paper has 15 correspondents around the world. Two Web employees still help keep the website running 24/7 from their new locations in Canada and New Zealand.
Mark said the sports department will send three reporters to the Olympics, covering the main sports where the Dutch compete – soccer, cycling, field and track, and field hockey. Another three people will be in Buenos Aires to handle copy and send it back.
After lots of good questions from the students, we ended with a tour of the paper’s busy newsroom, running into the editor-in-chief as we did and talking to the foreign editor and photo editor among others. Melle told us most people don’t want to leave even at 66, the retirement age.”They just won’t do it. It’s something in our blood,” he said.
What struck me at both places was the number of young people on both staffs. Very heartening. And at both papers people stopped work at various points to explain their work – page design, infographics, photo selection and more – to us. Very welcoming places.
We ended the day with a bit of shopping and a delicious Dutch meal (although some of us had beef stroganoff …) the included sharing some delicious pancakes. The café even had two cats to entertain us, brothers Nicki and Micki. By chance we ran into three more of our students, and we all headed back together, ready for a quiet evening and sleep before an early morning call to head to our final media visits.
Two P’s – public relations and photography
We ended our media visits today at Ketchum PR and the World Press Photo. We have visited Ketchum offices in nearly every European trip we have taken and have been treated wonderfully at each one. Today’s was no exception. The World Press Photo, celebrating its 50th anniversary this past year, lived up to its reputation for compelling, stunning, riveting – I can’t come up with enough adjectives to describe the 2015 contest winners we saw today.
Ketchum CEO Tim de Boer and Yuting Pan made us feel welcome as they explained the agency and how it operates. Ketchum, part of Omnicom, is one of the top five agencies in the world. Tim reports to his boss based in London, and he in turn reports to NYC. All the offices work through Ketchum Pittsburgh, where the agency was founded, for much of its administrative work.
The main operations for clients include growing their market shares, getting their brands recognized as the best, and dealing with government regulators and other officials. Within this Ketchum helps clients with corporate communications, public affairs, crisis communication and much more.
Tim used a recent case to illustrate their work – Nescafe, which has been accused of manufacturing capsules for its coffee that is dangerous to the environment and users’ health. The company wants to recycle them (customers can take them back to where they have been purchased, or if you order them online, customers can mail them back) and Tim said they have been reluctant to counter the claims published in Germany. The problem is the media in other countries, such as Amsterdam, can pick up the story and cause further damage to the product. “Most crises are self-generated,” Tim said.
Nescafe spokesman George Clooney isn’t interested in helping with the issue, so we worked through the case with Tim and Yuting. It came down to education, of course, and an awareness of how the capsules can be recycled and how aluminum is one of the most sustainable materials. Ketchum created an awareness campaign, complete with newspaper ads and a website.
In between case studies Tim explained how Ketchum hires and structures its agency work. Interns stay for a year, and the agency hires those who do a good job monitoring media for its clients, writing background briefs and other traditional research work. “They are the eyes and ears of the agency,” he said, “and something we sell.”
Once the junior employees master all of that, they move on to the next level where they work on projects and take care of organization’s and client’s needs. That means writing press releases, helping with special events and conferences, and more.
The next level is brand strategy, which is where Tim and more of the office’s 20 employees get involved. They work in teams across practices. They rely on advertising work from a large and well-respected ad agency, located in the same building, while Ketchum does the PR work. “Media training is the most fun of all the work,” Tim said.
Ketchum uses a RISC approach, which stands for research, insight, strategy and creative. Research is key, and it has to be done quickly and thoroughly. Only after his staff does this, Tim says, can you have insight and then start the creative process.
Tim actually studied computer science. (“I was a nerd. I am still a nerd.”) and was an engineer before he moved into public relations. He was on the client side and became responsible for marketing, so he went back to school to learn more as well as people management. Now he’s also taking law school classes to learn more about the legal side of the business.
Yuting came to Amsterdam to study communications in a master’s program after graduating from college in China. She interned at Phillips, helping with research into expanding into Chinese markets. She joined Ketchum and enjoys getting more involved in project and strategy.
She led the students in an excellent case study for International Baccalaureate Schools, an actual Ketchum client. The company will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2018, and Ketchum is pitching to win its business to promote not just the anniversary but also its core businesses, which serve students from 3 to 19.
We reacted to the three possible themes, and Hannah Altman came up with a modified version, incorporating all three: Empowering the work for 50 years and onward. We also worked through strategies and messages for core stakeholders. Really good work and great questions from everyone! Yuting collected all of our work and gave me her card. I’ll see if the agency does indeed win that business and report to the students.
Tim treated us to a very nice lunch and took us on a quick tour of the building before we left to our final visit at the World Press Photo exhibit.
Paul Ruseler, multimedia exhibition manager, met us at the cathedral that houses World Press Photo (the same cathedral where the Netherlands king and queen were married and where coronations take place … gorgeous place!) near Dam Square. The incredible striking images and multimedia presentations stretched along the large open spaces, and we stopped with Paul to look at most of them. Prime among them, of course, the ravages of the Syrian war and the migration of refugees from that and other oppressed countries. Other categories included sports and nature, as well as breaking news photography and long form work.
He pointed out what made the photographs winners, explaining the great care taken in the judging process. The jury starts with 100,000 images, whittling them down to a more manageable number and two rounds of blind judging. Much discussion—even arguing –comes with the selection process. Some of the jurors are repeats to keep the jury pool informed. He was pleased to learn that one of the Post-Gazette’s former interns, Vaughn Wallace, was on the jury – a Pittsburgh connection.
Paul’s job is to increase the multimedia aspect of the place, and visitors can see that easily, from the streets of the world project to the video entries and multimedia packages to the virtual reality section. I sat and watched part of Time magazine’s wonderful piece on Scott Kelly, the astronaut and twin brother of Mark Kelly (husband of former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords). These videos are behind a gold section of the cathedral’s altar. In a way it was like attending church.
The major goal of the World Press Photo is to offer a place for people to see the world and express themselves freely. Photojournalists struggle in some of the toughest situations – help others in extreme times of need and survival or document it for history. These images in my mind really do both. I know I will be haunted for some time with the refugee photographs and the stories of young African women who were sexually assaulted and turned into soldiers in one awful war there. And the video story of the refugee children who are experiencing such great turmoil as their families leave their homelands in search of a better life. May they find it. And soon.
Bob, Jan and I left this visit in search of Rembrandt’s house, accompanied by Emily Kolek, Colleen Loverde and Jessica Federkeil. We found it and earned a 3 euro discount because two exhibitions are under construction. What a house and what a story! I knew some of it, but know I know about his life in detail. We saw many of his paintings in London, and tomorrow we’ll visit several other museums to see more. So glad we found it.
The day ended with another great dinner at a café we found near Rembrandt Square, of course. Then back to hotel to rest, write and pack a bit before our final day. Can this trip really be ending so soon?
Final days in Amsterdam
We all had a free day in Amsterdam to end our trip, topped off with a dinner cruise through the canals of this lovely city. The weather cooperated – finally! – to give us our best day weather-wise in some time.
Bob and I headed off early to visit the Rijksmuseum, home to wonderful Rembrandt and other Dutch masters. We were so pleased to see so many of our student doing exactly the same thing and cramming in as much as possible. And we managed to handle the tram by ourselves – another victory! (Don’t judge us … just try the language first, and you will see that it takes some time to beginning to understand it.)
I have been fortunate to travel to major cities to see some of these works on exhibition, but nothing compares to seeing them in a group, side by side with other great works. We started with Rembrandt’s gallery, starting with “The Night Watch,” his largest and most famous painting. Stunning. After visiting his home, though, I had been intrigued by “The Jewish Bride,” a truly beautiful portrait of the young bride and her husband. The BBC documentary (very long if you visit, so leave time or watch it at home) explained it in exquisite detail. Seeing it for myself illustrated for me just how vibrant it is … gorgeous!
Very few of Vincent van Gogh’s work here, but we’d make up for that shortly with a visit to his museum. I love Johannes Vermeer’s work and found a new favorite on George Hendrik Breitner. We browsed every floor until it was time to meet Jan and move on to the Van Gogh Museum.
I love van Gogh’s work, particularly “Sunflowers” and “Starry Night,” and I became more intrigued with his work after a visit to Paris with students two years ago. Amid our stay in the Montmarte district, we found his brother Theo’s house and learned more about their close relationship, which alas, could not save the troubled and illness-plagued master painter. He painted some of his best work while a patient at various mental asylums, looking at times just out his window to work on and create some of his most beautiful paintings. At his museum (created largely because of Theo and his wife) we looked through his sketchbooks, notebooks and initial drawings and listened to recordings from his letters to his brother and parents to learn more. (And I learned how amazing the French postal system was in the late 1880s. Letters could be mailed in the morning and in short distances delivered that same day or the next day. The van Gogh family wrote tons of letters to each other, illuminating the master’s life and struggles.) A major find – Van Gogh was self-taught and worked on drawing and copying other’s magnificent work to learn. As mentally unstable as his own life was, he was incredibly disciplined with his art.
We ended the visit with a quick look at the “Easy Virtue, Prostitution in French Art 1850-1910,” a collection of works from him and artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Pablo Picasso, Edgar Degas and others who depicted prostitution and courtesans. The reality was these women were their models and inspiration, and often their lovers, during these times when it was considered acceptable and even healthy for men to visit and frequent brothels.
A much-needed rest and lunch followed at a cute café on, appropriately, Rembrandt Square. We perused Jan’s Rick Steves’ travel book and settled upon visiting Museum Ons Lieve Her op Solder, translated as Our Lord in the Attic. Following the Alteration and the closing of all Catholic churches in 1578, Catholics had to find a way to practice their religion in secret. Between 1661 and 16663, wealthy Catholic merchant Jan Hartman bought a gorgeous town house and two others behind it, and he converted all three attics into a Catholic church. Worshippers entered through a side street and climbed narrow stairs (which we can attest to after tackling those ourselves!) to worship. The two galleries and main floor could accommodate 150 congregants. Just beautiful! The altar, the paintings, an organ and so much more. Just renovated in 2012, it has a wonderful audio tour to lead visitors up and down all those stairs. So glad we did this!
In the irony of ironies, the church is located next to one of Amsterdam’s infamous Coffee Shops and right near the Red Light District. As we decided which way to visit next, I pointed to a side street where many people were coming and going from and we decided to try it. Of course, prostitutes on display there! All shapes and sizes, and a number of closed curtains, signifying sales had been made.
As our tour guide Joost pointed out later, the Red Light District sprung up right where ships sailed up the Amstel to bring their wares and shipments, making all sorts of commerce convenient.
We rested for a bit at a café before heading to our final event, a dinner cruise on the canals. As we people watched we noticed again two things: very few overweight people, as all the walking and biking they do (you would all love the women dressed up and wearing high heels making their way around town) keep them slimmer than those of us in the U.S,; and the number of people smoking, both natives and visitors. Hard to sit outside to enjoy a quick drink!
The beautiful night made our final event even better. We enjoyed a delicious meal, gorgeous sunset and great company. This has been a trip with some of the most engaged students to date. And for the most part, they all handled the rigors and challenges of international travel well. I think we all wanted that ride to go on even longer as we relished our last night in Amsterdam.
We all had to get up early for our ride to Schiphol, Amsterdam’s modern airport. We maneuvered ourselves through its security and ticketing areas (self-service luggage check, something I had never seen!), and our flight was ready for takeoff on time. I watched four movies (“The Room,” “Carol,” “Joy” and “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl”) during the nine-hour flight, determined not to sleep so I could adjust my body clock upon our return. We had lots to eat and drink to keep us going, and arrived right on schedule in Atlanta. For some reason Delta switched our flights to later in the afternoon, but we needed that with a slow passport control line despite the new self-check machines and TSA security check (One line open for all the busy airport’s international flights at first! Horrible!). Easy trip home and ahead of schedule, thanks to a strong tail wind.
We all lingered at the baggage claim area, perhaps hesitant to leave the aura of traveling well done. I appreciated the hugs and thank yous more than the students probably realize, as working on these trips and this course is intense. And this year having Bob around, who is always a pleasure to travel with, made the trip even more special. Jan and I have already talked about next year (Iceland-Ireland maybe?) and will start discussing possibilities soon. But for now, time to rest and recuperate.