Langara Journalism Review • Issue 25 • May 2021

SPRING 2021 – NO. 25

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25 LJR at

A quarter century of thoughtprovoking journalism in B.C. p.11

Battle for Victoria Can Capital Daily shake-up a stale media landscape? p.17

On Life Support Why health coverage came up short during Covid. p.6

Agent of Change CBC’s Angela Sterritt is on a mission to shift newsroom culture p.26

Jeani Read was The Province newspaper’s first full-time rock critic, a lifestyles columnist, and the author of 1986’s Endless Summers and Other Shared Hallucinations. Her husband, Michael Mercer, was an awardwinning playwright and script writer. Their legacy to young writers is Langara Journalism’s Read/Mercer Fellowship.

The spiritofofthoughtful, thoughtful, The spirit enquiring journalism lives enquiring journalism lives on.on.

FELLOWSHIPS ENDOWMENT PROVIDE CREATES FOOT-IN-THE-DOOR JOURNALISM FELLOWSHIPS

The Jeani Read-Michael Read-MichaelMercer MercerFellowship Fellowshipfor forJournalism Journalism The Jeani Students was established to encourage students continue Students was established to encourage students toto continue their pursuit of journalistic excellence through mentorship. their pursuit of journalistic excellence through mentorship.

This endowed fund provides four fellowships annually This endowed fund provides four fellowships annually worth $7,500 each. Successful applicants will receive worth $7,500 each. Successful applicants will receive support for approximately two months while they produce support for approximately two months while they produce a major work of journalism, such as an in-depth newspaper a major work of journalism, such as an in-depth newspaper story, or series of stories suitable for publication in a story, or series of stories suitable for publication in a newspaper, magazine, or on the web, or for broadcast on the newspaper, magazine, or on may the web, or for for broadcast radio.

Journalism students apply this awardon inthe their radio.

Journalism students may apply for this award in final term. Fellowships will be awarded in the Spring. their final term. Fellowships will be awarded in the Spring.

2021 FELLOWSHIP RECIPIENTS: 2017 FELLOWSHIP RECIPIENTS: Suzanne Baustad Sun): A series about police Melanie Green (CBC):(Vancouver A series on professional burnout and how training and accountability when it comes to their encounters it affects the physical, mental and emotional health of British with animals in B.C. Columbians.

Tyson Burrows (Vancouver Sun): a feature about accessibility within B.C. municipal governments—and how closed-captionloss matters, and the growing movement to reclaim the healthy ing at publicly broadcasted meetings affects democracy.

Clare Hennig (CBC): A series on the lost art of play, why this pursuit of play.

Fellowships awarded at other media outlets will be announced at a future date.

Bala Yogesh and Stu Neatby (Vancouver Sun): A series on international students and their growing financial importance to B.C. post-secondary institutions.

For more information visit www.langara.ca/journalism.

Bonnie Lee La Madeleine (Vancouver Sun): A series on noise in

For more information visit www.langara.ca/journalism.

our society and how the pitch of that noise is rising.

Contents // Spring 2021 /// THE LEAD BC MAGS

Turning the Page

How B.C.’s magazine industry is finding new ways of connecting with audiences during Covid.

Story by Ryan Ng p.5 HEALTH

Vital Signs

The hunger for health news has never been greater—but can hollowed-out newsrooms meet the need?

Story by Charlie Carey p.6 IN PERSON

Facing the Issue

In a socially distanced world, reporters conduct interviews in new— but not always better—ways.

Story by Rui Yang Xu p.8 COVID GRADS

P O RT RA I T S ( T O P T O BO T T O M ) : L A UR A BR O U G H AM ; R Y AN NG ; Y AN N I C K S H I E V E

2020 Visions

How last year’s j-school grads see the future of their industry.

Story by Kristian Trevena p.9 SOCIAL PURPOSE

Finding Purpose

Why good journalism can (and should) be infused with a reporter’s passions.

Story by Kristian Trevena p.10

/// FEATURES

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LJR at 25

We mark a quarter century of change in the world of journalism (and in this magazine).

Stories by Kristian Trevena and Safoura Rigi-Ladiz

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The Numbers Guy

How CBC’s Justin McElroy leveraged a data-based approach to journalism during Covid.

Story by Kristian Trevena

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A Capital Idea

Can a new investigative news site shake up the Victoria media market?

Story by Rui Yang Xu

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Paper Tigers

Several once-mighty print publications have gone digital-only in the past five years.

Story by Ryan Ng

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Both Sides Now

For print media to survive—especially post-Covid—publishers need to develop a reciprocal relationship with readers.

Story by Catherine Mwitta

/// LAST WORD IN CONVERSATION

Angela Sterritt

An Indigenous media star is changing the way we look at reporting in B.C. Interview by Safoura Rigi-Ladiz p.26

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Graphic Content

For a generation that has come to distrust traditional media, graphic non-fiction offers a way into important issue-based stories.

Story by Dee Farrugia

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Editor’s Note

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his edition of The Langara Journalism Review is unlike one ever produced before. For starters, it was done entirely remotely, during the worst global pandemic in recent history. It was also produced with a core team of five people— one of the smallest groups to ever work on the magazine.

It is also, serendipitously, a special anniversary issue. It seems fitting that in a special edition of a magazine which covers journalism, that so many challenges would be in the way. A good journalist enjoys a challenge; an even better one rises to the occasion to overcome it. Over these last few months, our team has worked hard to produce the stories you are about to read. In a time where journalism is in its most unpredictable, fragile state, where newsrooms are shrinking and the public is hesitant to trust the media, it’s more important than ever to be able to adapt to any situation the world throws your way.

The following pages are a culmination of countless Zoom meetings, socially- distanced interviews and photo shoots, endless technical difficulties, and a sense of pride. Pride in what we managed to create during such a strange time. The lessons learned will be carried with us for the remainder of our careers.

THE LJR TEAM PUBLISHER

Matt O’Grady C R E AT I V E D I R E C T O R

Catherine Mullaly EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Kristian Trevena MANAGING EDITOR

Rui Yang Xu A S S I S TA N T E D I T O R

Safoura Rigi-Ladiz ART DIRECTORS

Ryan Ng and Dee Farrugia PRODUCTION MANAGER

Ryan Ng D I G I TA L E D I T O R

Rui Yang Xu CHIEF COPY EDITOR

Safoura Rigi-Ladiz CONTRIBUTORS

Laura Brougham Tyson Burrows Charlie Carey Dee Farrugia Meg McLachlan Catherine Mwitta Ryan Ng Safoura Rigi-Ladiz Yannick Schieve Kristian Trevena Rui Yang Xu

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P hot o: S a f o u ra R i g i - L a d i z

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Turning the Page How B.C.’s magazine industry is finding new ways of connecting with audiences during Covid story by RYAN NG illustration by DEE FARRUGIA

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agazines have long relied on their physical presence to draw people in. It’s a tactile experience: holding a copy and flipping through the pages—perhaps at a bookstore, or waiting at a doctor’s office or sitting in the airport lounge. But when Covid hit, all those opportunities to discover magazines stopped.

While many B.C. magazines continue to struggle a year later, those that are surviving are finding new ways to reach their audiences virtually.

“We’re constantly pivoting,” LJR.CA

says Anicka Quin, editorial director at Vancouver magazine and Western Living, published

by Burnaby’s Canada Wide Media. “We’re constantly figuring out: what does our brand look like? How are we reaching our readers? How are we getting in touch with people and staying in contact with them?”

Vancouver (founded in 1967) and Western Living (founded in 1971) have historically relied on controlled circulation—delivering copies free to select, high-income neighbourhoods—in order to reach those audiences. Consequently, each magazine’s revenue

is dependent on advertising— mostly from the sort of local businesses, from restaurants to retail, that have been hardest hit by the pandemic.

“We’re very closely connected to the economy. So, if a business is suffering during this time, then advertising and marketing is the first thing that they cut back on,” Quin says. “Back in March, we saw revenue drop off a cliff.”

One of the big revenue sources for both magazines is reader events. Quin and her team had to adapt in order to stay connected with readers and build audiences without those physical events, which include Vancouver magazine’s Restaurant Awards and Western Living’s Designers of the Year.

“We’ve been looking at different kinds of digital innovations,” Quin says. “We launched, initially for Western Living, Instagram Live—and then pivoted into Instagram TV, where we do interviews with designers. At

Vancouver magazine, a food editor does a weekly Instagram Live with (people in) the restaurant business.”

While print-focused publishers like Canada Wide have struggled to find their feet in a virtual world, other digital-first publishers found the transition relatively seamless.

National Observer, an online news site founded by Linda Solomon Wood in 2015, focuses on investigative reporting.

Solomon Wood, the Vancouver-based editor-in-chief, says that the remote-work reality has presented the Observer with several opportunities. “We found an energizing new direction with online streamed interviews via Zoom,” she says. “To combat isolation, we invited readers to engage with us more in this live virtual setting and ask questions.

This kept our team connected with our readers and helped us to thrive.”

She adds that the past two years has seen a steady increase in readership, with revenue from subscriptions jumping 20 per cent in the last year alone.

Even some of B.C.’s smallest magazine brands are seeing reason for hope.

“Last year, we saw about a 20 per cent increase in page views on our websites and a 25 per cent increase in our social media engagement compared to 2019,” says Jim Barr, founder of Seekers Media, based in Powell River, which publishes Western Canada focused online magazines SnowSeekers, covering winter sports, and ZenSeekers, covering transformative travel.

Barr believes that more print-only publications shifting to an online format will be an inevitable fallout of Covid. “Going digital is not just a requirement—it’s going to be mandatory in 2021.”

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Vital Signs The hunger for health news has never been greater—but can hollowed-out newsrooms meet the need? story and photos by CHARLIE CAREY

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ach day that the pandemic has dragged on—through 2020 and well into 2021— Canadians have turned to their local newspaper or broadcaster, looking for accurate information on Covid-19, vaccines, and any clues as to when it will all end. But as they search for answers, many are finding a shortage—the result of years of newsroom cutbacks that have affected beats like health.

Pamela Fayerman was one journalist whose beat disap-

peared after she took a buyout from Postmedia on Jan. 1, 2020. She was one of about a dozen reporters to leave the company at that time, with the publisher of The Vancouver Sun and The Province shedding another 44 positions in April of that year. With Fayerman gone, neither of Vancouver’s two dailies has a specialized health reporter.

Fayerman spent the majority of her career at the Sun, covering legal affairs before jumping to health in 1995. She was LJR.CA

public health, epidemiology and infectious diseases. She started the website because she wanted to write “explanatory articles I wasn’t seeing anywhere else,” says Fayerman, a graduate of Ryerson University’s journalism program. She sees gaps in the way some reporters covered the pandemic over the last 12 months—often through no fault of their own, given the lack of dedicated newsroom support.

“On a daily basis, there are numerous stories with gaping holes—probably because reporters don’t know what ques-

have shown an interest in beefing up their health coverage since Covid began, the challenge, says Neil, will be finding reporters to do the job: “Where are you going to find these people? As wonderful as our students are, they’re taking one course and they’re great reporters when they graduate, but they’re not specialists by any means.”

Some reporters, like Fayerman, have received some post-journalism training in health, medical issues or science. But others have used their

“A lot of journalists will tell you that they are very STEM-(Science Technology Engineering and Math) phobic.”

-Janice Neil, Ryerson University

Pamela Fayerman, outside the Bloedel Conservatory in Vancouver. Fayerman is a 25-year vetran of health and medical reporting.

five years into the beat when she won her first fellowship in neuroscience reporting at Columbia University; she also attended the Knight Science Journalism Bootcamp, Medical Evidence, at MIT in 2005. She says that having that sort of training and knowledge allowed her to “delve into issues deeply, to do more fact checking, to ask more—and better—questions.”

After leaving Postmedia, Fayerman started her own website, Medicine Matters, covering scientific research, LJR.CA

tions to ask and they are rushing to publish before getting all the answers.” To make her point, Fayerman highlights a recent press conference on B.C. vaccination outcomes led by the provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry: “No one asked if these potential vaccine harms were higher or lower than expected, whether the individual who got Bell’s Palsy recovered, (or) why one individual had to be hospitalized.”

Although the health reporting landscape has certainly changed since Covid hit, Ryerson University’s Janice Neil says that, historically, the health beat has never been one that attracts many journalists.

“A lot of journalists will tell you they are very math- or STEM- (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) phobic,” says Neil, chair of Ryerson’s journalism department.

“They are people who in high school, or in their first degree, tended to specialize in humanities and the arts.”

While some news outlets

keen interest in the subject matter to help hone their coverage of the beat.

Moira Wyton started as The Tyee’s health reporter in March 2020—just weeks before a pandemic was declared by the World Health Organization.

Wyton studied political science at UBC and started her career at the Edmonton Journal in 2019, reporting on provincial politics.

She came to The Tyee with a specific mandate to cover

the health beat, as it was an area that the Vancouver-based news site saw as underserved.

As events unfolded in 2020, it soon became apparent that the pandemic in particular would be the main focus of her beat.

Since Wyton didn’t have any specialized training in science, she decided to focus her reporting on the pressing public health issues surrounding Covid—and telling stories about racism in Covid health care, the intersection of Covid and the overdose crisis, and Covid-Zero analysis. “I’m not necessarily writing a story on every new study that comes out about how the virus acts or is transmitted or affects our bodies,” she notes.

As the world looks to the other end of the pandemic, Fayerman is hopeful that newsrooms will realize the importance of dedicated health reporters. While she notes that her own website isn’t a huge money-maker—”advertising revenue is growing, but it doesn’t replace a full salary”—she thinks that dedicating resources to health coverage remains a good investment.

“Newsroom leaders must realize that this pandemic isn’t the last we will see,” she says.

“Having designated health reporters is a no-brainer.”

The Tyee’s health reporter, Moira Wyton, whose beat is funded by the Local Journalism Initiative.

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Facing the Issue In a socially distanced world, reporters conduct interviews in new—but not always better—ways story by RUI YANG XU photo by YANNICK SCHIEVE

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eporting in the age of Covid has forced many journalists to rely on Zoom or socially distanced interviews, to get the job done. For the most part, journalists have adapted—and readers and viewers haven’t noticed any difference in coverage.

Still, for some reporters, there is an element of spontaneity and detail that has been lost in this distanced, digital world. Chris Cheung, a staff reporter at The Tyee, illustrates the issue with an anecdote from a pre-Covid assignment, in which he was interviewing the owner and staff of a Vancouver fireworks store shortly before the city’s fireworks ban.

After the interview, the staff gave him a tour of the cramped store. “They were able to physically show me which ones were their favourite (fireworks) from behind the counter,” Cheung says. “Having that interaction was really important.” When you’re not in the same space, it’s hard to paint a picture of what a person looks like, acts like—or describe their body language.

“Zoom, you can do that to a degree,” says Cheung. “But I think a lot of the spontaneity, you’d miss out on.”

Mike Howell, a long-time municipal affairs columnist and 8

reporter for Glacier Media, says that covering Vancouver City Hall has been made difficult by not being physically present.

“What I really miss now is the daily interaction with people, which is a big part of the rhythm of the job,” says Howell. “I miss the scrums because I would get a lot of other stories outside the council chamber that way.”

Howell says that, through those interactions, he was able to improve his stories by being able to observe a scene or situation. “It’s really difficult to cover

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stories about homelessness and drug addiction if you’re not actually talking to people, oneon-one, who are going through a crisis.”

On top of that, Howell says that getting in touch with government officials for more information has become increasingly hard in the Covid era. “When you’re covering a city budget, and there’s all these numbers flying around, and you want to clarify stuff, I always found it easier if I could talk to some of the head finance people right after the mini-meeting, in the lobby, to clarify things.”

While some of the loss to reporters is spontaneous— such as not being able to chase down an official at City Hall—some of it is seen in how the balance of control has shifted from reporters to government officials.

Penny Daflos, a reporter for CTV Vancouver and host of the “BTS with CTV Vancouver” podcast, notes how Covid press

conferences, held by B.C.’s ministry of health, happen only twice a week now—and because they’re entirely remote, with reporters queued up on the phone, the government can direct the flow of information.

“You only get one question, plus a follow up, per outlet—and they can mute you,” says Daflos.

While reporters used to be able to ask an organic follow-up question in the pre-Covid era, she adds, “now it’s much more structured and the government has much more control than they did before.”

Daflos thinks that this new format—and the loss of accountability it encourages—seems likely to stay, post-Covid. “My impression is they’re satisfied with how things are right now,” she says. “If anything, what we’ve seen (in early January) is that they’re dialing back access even more, rather than improving access and the ability to ask questions.”

Chris Cheung, a reporter for The Tyee, at Gaston Park in East Vancouver.

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Indigenous identity through a Métis lens.

KRISTEN HOLLIDAY Langara College Employment: Castanet Media Location: Kamloops

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2020 Visions How last year’s j-school grads see the future of their industry

by KRISTIAN TREVENA illustration by DEE FARRUGIA

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deadly global pandemic impeachment, historic civil rights movement, and social upheaval.

2020 was an eventful year, with a news cycle that never seemed to quit. In theory, it was an ideal time to be a graduating journalism student, with stories to tell and a rapt audience to hear, read and see those stories.

But when the economy shut down—just as the Class of 2020 was graduating—many of those would-be employers were put on life support. Layoffs spread like wildfire throughout the media landscape, and whatever newsrooms remained went remote.

Still, it wasn’t all doom and gloom, as the following three 2020 grads tell LJR: MISSY JOHNSON Langara College Employment: CBC British Columbia Location: Vancouver Missy Johnson, a diploma P h o t o : C ou rte sy K ri ste n H olliday

graduate of the Langara journalism program, had originally planned to intern at The Tyee.

A few days into the internship, she got the call that the newsroom would be working from home.

“I felt almost hopeless, watching the world go up in flames. It was probably the most important time to be a journalist—and yet to see newsrooms getting shut down and seeing all these layoffs, it was genuinely heart-breaking.”

After balancing her internship with her part-time job at Shoppers Drug Mart, Johnson was able to get a fellowship with The Tyee over the summer through Journalism for Human Rights—a fellowship for Indigenous journalists—which allowed Johnson to work for the online news site for three months.

Johnson now works at CBC British Columbia, assisting with radio shows such as The Early Edition and On the Coast. She was also an associate producer for the podcast Pieces, a five-part series which explored

Kristen Holliday, a graduate of the certificate journalism program at Langara, says that she had been taking note of potential job opportunities long before graduating, talking to instructors about getting good words put in, and even considered the possibility of moving to Victoria. She and a classmate had been shortlisted for a fellowship with The Globe and Mail.

As the months progressed and she wasn’t hearing back from internships or job applications, she began to worry.

Luckily, Holliday was able to secure fellowships with both Black Press and the Vancouver Sun over the summer and fall of 2020, which allowed her to earn an income while getting valuable journalism experience.

One of the jobs Holliday applied for last fall was with Castanet Media in Kelowna. She had discussed the possibility of moving away from Vancouver with her husband, Andrew— something the two had agreed on if she were to get hired. In

January of this year, she started work at the online news site as a reporter, covering Kelowna city hall and the municipalities beat.

EMILY FAGAN University of Victoria Employment: Freelancer Location: Victoria Emily Fagan, a graduate of the University of Victoria with a master’s degree in writing and minor in history, spent most of her time at school working at the school newspaper, first as a volunteer and later becoming editor-in-chief of The Martlet.

Fagan says that she had originally planned to get a job in journalism after school, but Covid-induced job cuts put a halt in that plan. “I wanted to and still intend to pursue a job in journalism, but a lot of the journalism jobs that existed had disappeared,” she says.

Once she realized the lack of staff jobs, Fagan decided to start freelancing for the first time—a challenge given reduced editorial budgets, though she says it’s become easier as she’s made connections and started getting some bylines. Along with freelancing, Fagan also acted as an executive director for the B.C. Humanist Association.

She is also the newsletter editor for Capital Daily.

Kristen Holliday, a Langara journalism graduate.

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Finding Purpose Why good journalism can (and should) be infused with a reporter’s passions

by KRISTIAN TREVENA photos BY MEG McLACHLAN

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eing knowledgeable about a subject, and doggedly determined in your reporting, are critical to the success of any journalist. But expertise is only half of the battle. It’s passion for a particular issue that makes you the perfect person to tell that story, according to News1130 reporter Ash Kelly.

“As cliché as it sounds, curiosity is all it takes—that little spark that pushes you to do the extra work and put those passion hours in,” says Kelly, a 2015 Langara journalism graduate.

Kelly started working at The Discourse—an independent publication covering social issues in underserved communities—in 2013. She says the experience taught her the importance of writing on the social justice issues she cared most deeply about.

She recalls her first assignment for The Discourse: a story about the Pacific Northwest LNG and the effects it would have on the salmon population in the area. Reporting on stories that were meaningful to her translated into a deeper, richer level of reporting. “If you’re a good journalist, you work harder,” says Kelly. “Your biases are never put aside; you work within them. That’s what my time at The Discourse taught me.”

Kelly argues that the presence of journalists on social 10

media is also allowing for a more intimate relationship between journalists and their audiences—and for readers and viewers to understand a journalist’s passions. “It’s no longer just a name on a byline. That’s not how the news works anymore,” she says. “It’s okay to feel. It’s okay to care.”

Catherine Lafferty, a journalist with Indiginews, and author of Northern Wildflower, says that it is important for new reporters to not underestimate the power of their own

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voices. “That is the only way that media is going to change— if we make it so the people who are reading this need to hear what is being said and are captivated by it,” she says.

Still, she adds, reporters need to ensure that they get both sides of every story. “For me, there were a few stories I wanted to do that I needed to stop and make sure I had that neutral bias.”

Daphne Bramham, a columnist with the Vancouver Sun who writes regularly about social issues, thinks the obstacle that prevents journalists from indulging their passions is a simple one: Money.

“The problem is that nobody wants to pay us,” says Bramham. “For most journalists, if they want to follow their passions, they’re going to have to do it outside the

newsroom.”

Though Bramham thinks it’s important for new journalists to cover issues they care about, they must first understand the basics of a newsroom environment. Delivering what your editors ask of you, and covering the daily news cycle, is critical for any reporter.

Bramham is generally critical of how newsrooms operate— with “editors who are still, in many ways, caught in the old-fashioned beat system, where we cover cops and crime but not these types of issues.”

Still, she cautions young journalists against thinking they can walk into a newsroom and change an editor’s mind about what’s important.

“You’ve got to give them what they want—and then give them the better story, which is your story.”

News1130 reporter, Ash Kelly, at Londsdale Quay in North Vancouver.

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25 LJR at

How the world of journalism—and the pages of this magazine—have changed in the past quarter century

by Kristian Trevena and Safoura Rigi-Ladiz

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wenty-five years ago, the Langara journalism department decided to launch a product that would soon become a staple of the journalism program, The Langara Journalism Review. In the quarter century since its inception, the magazine, like the industry, has had to evolve and adapt with the ever-changing media landscape. From changes in technology to the types of issues covered to the constantly changing amount of students who produced it every year.

Started by former program chair Rob Dykstra, the magazine was inspired by Ryerson University’s journalism publication, The Ryerson Review of Journalism.

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The front cover of the 1999 edition of LJR. S P RI N G 2021 L ANG AR A JOUR NAL I S M R EV I E W

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The goal, says Dykstra, was to teach students how to produce long-form journalism, while also allowing them the opportunity to broaden their portfolios before looking for work.

Before the LJR was launched, students got their industry experience from one magazine production course in the program. The final project of the course allowed students to contribute to magazines from nonprofits and volunteer organizations across B.C..

“I thought, why not produce an annual magazine, a regular product?” Dykstra recalls. “I came up with the idea of producing an annual review covering media and journalism in Western Canada.”

Throughout its evolution, the mandate of the Langara Journalism Review has remained more or less the same. To provide essential coverage of the issues, trends, events and personalities that are changing the face of B.C. media.

But as a review of four past issues show, things have changed quite a bit.

IN THE BEGINNING: 1997 The premier issue of the LJR showcases just how much the magazine, as well as media in B.C, has evolved.

At first glance, one noticeable difference is that black and white is what dominates the pages. Aside from the cover page, the first issue consists only of black

A story on the new relationship between the internet and journalism from the 1998 edition of LJR.

and blue print, with no photos in colour.

The first few pages consist of a feature spread regarding the upcoming UBC journalism program, which launched that year. Construction was underway

for what would be “Western Canada’s only graduate school of journalism”at the time.

In the last few pages, there is discussion of the “information superhighway”, the (then) new phenomenon of the internet, and its early-stage relationship with media outlets and journalists. In 1997, approximately six of The Sun’s reporters were frequent users of the internet, according to William Boei, then Vancouver Sun business reporter.

Since the first issue, the internet revolution was one of the biggest changes the magazine has experienced, says Dykstra.

“Everything became much more instant at that point. I don’t think the process of producing a magazine changed much, but certainly the delivery and execution of it.”

A DECADE OF CHANGE: 2006 2006 marked the 10th anniversary of the magazine. A story about the relationship between Christianity and journalism

(From left to right) The cover of the first edition in 1997, the 10th anniversary 2006 edition and the 2019 edition of LJR.

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dominated the front cover, the full story was on page 17. A large “numbers” column takes up half of page one. $739.90 was the average weekly earning of a newspaper reporter in B.C. John MacDermid acted as the photo editor for the magazine's 10th edition. “It was an important component in understanding the media landscape, and how magazines are different from newspapers,’’ says MacDermid, who is now a city councillor in Frederiction.

One of the stories both written and shot by MacDermid dove into the increasing presence of internet media.

“The LJR, to me, was an excellent example of journalism. The stories in it,[were] really good. There was some insightful information that came out of that issue," he says.

to aquire even more skills.

Jesse Winter who is currently a freelance visual journalist in Vancouver, was the chief photographer of the edition. He says that working on the LJR broadened his approach on the possibilities of telling stories within a journalism framework.

“It really helped sort of show me that, even though now I still work predominantly in a news photography oriented kind of approach, there’s still a lot more that can be done outside of that model, as well.”

Capturing the cover photo was a memorable THE LENS OF HISTORY: 2012 experience of the LJR beThroughout the 2012 edition, the creative cause Winter said he got aspect of photojournalism and visual-sto- more creative direction rytelling were key themes of the cover while still telling a story. Of and interior photos of the issue. One of a young girl, the photo rep- A story on the dangers of tabloid entertainment news shows these stories covered the shrinking news- resented the future of what from America in the 1999 edition of LJR. room budgets, despite journalists having it might mean to be a journalist for young people. journalists.

“It was sort of about The front page represents a feature the future of journalism story on the importance of investigative and taking a look at what reporting in smaller communities in B.C.. it might mean for new Photographed and written by then crejournalists.” ative director, Cameron Thomson. The Throughout his expe- story speaks on different rural commurience as chief photogra- nity-based media coverage, as well as aspher, Winter says he re- pects on how to keep investigative reportalized the potential for ing alive in rural communities and why visual storytelling. it’s important.

“The possibility to tell In regards to the LJR experience, stories with images within Thomson was able to better understand a journalism framework the layout of the long-form structure, he is a lot more broad than I said. think I had realized.”

“You pour so much of your time into it, which is so different compared to The COMMUNITIES OF Voice and newspapers in general” INTEREST: 2019 Cloe Logan was the managing editor 2019 featured some more of the 2019 edition of the magazine. For modern issues and themes her, being able to see what her classmates in journalism. This edi- wrote about important issues during the tion covered topics such editing process was a memory that stuck as the evolution of small- with her town storytelling, the ef“It was the experience of feeling so fort to decolonize journal- amazed at what my classmates were doA story on the impact of smartphones in photojournalism in ism, and the importance ing, and feeling like they chose some good the 2012 edition of LJR. of objectivity amongst topics to dive into.”

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/// FEATURE STORY

The Numbers Guy How the CBC’s Justin McElroy has leveraged a data-based approach to journalism to keep audiences engaged during Covid

by KRISTIAN TREVENA portrait by TYSON BURROWS

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t’s 3:30 p.m. on a Tuesday afternoon and Justin McElroy has just gotten an email. He has to put a short pause on our Zoom interview to do the thing that he has been doing for nearly 11 months: update Covid-19 numbers for British Columbians on Twitter and send that info back to the CBC newsroom.

As he glances over to the second monitor above his computer, he quickly reads through information and explains the process to me. Every weekday, he receives a government email filled with the Covid statistics for the day. These numbers include daily case totals, deaths, hospitalizations, and, more recently, the number of people who have been vaccinated. As soon as this information is received, McElroy begins to punch them into a large spreadsheet.

The information then gets put into several charts, and sent back to the newsroom for use in other Covid-related stories. The entire process typically takes about 20 minutes. “I always want to see what’s new and noteworthy right now, where are the trends continuing,” says McElroy. ”You never want to put too much information—you need to try and contextualize it.”

Since the pandemic was declared by the

World Health Organization in March of 2020, people have been glued to the news.

The need to understand something so unprecedented led many people to reporters like McElroy, who uses a data-based approach to report and share his stories, much to the delight of his 40,000-plus Twitter followers.

The day we talk is, by all accounts, a fairly average day for Covid statistics. But even the average days cause a big response on social media, he notes. “Some people may say, ‘Good, things aren’t getting worse,’ but other people are going to be sad, wondering why we’re not getting the numbers down.

So much of this is people’s psychology and expectations.”

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CBC reporter Justin McElroy at Andy Livingstone Park in Vancouver

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efore the pandemic struck, McElroy had a cubicle in the CBC Vancouver studio on Hamilton Street where he worked in each day.

He’s had to adjust to his new workspace in his downtown Vancouver condo.

McElroy’s home office is equipped with equipment to make working from home easier, including a ring light for broadcast hits. It also features a large calendar, with a date displayed in large letters: March 11.

The calendar used to sit on his desk in the CBC newsroom; March 11 was the day last year when McElroy was sent home, as a precaution due to a possible contact with Covid. “I thought, OK, I’ll be away for a couple of weeks. And it’s been 11 months now,” LJR.CA

he says.

McElroy, 34, was born in Victoria and had originally planned to pursue an undergraduate in political science at the University of British Columbia. But he found the program boring so instead decided to pursue journalism. McElroy says his interest in journalism piqued after getting some experience writing for The Ubyssey, UBC’s student newspaper. “I entered the newsroom and I fell in love with it. I thought, ‘this is what I want to spend the rest of my life doing’,” he says.

After doing an internship at The Province newspaper, McElroy became an overnight writer for Global BC, followed by a stint as a web writer for Global. He joined

CBC in 2016.

Along with providing the daily Covid statistics, McElroy also does longer-form stories for CBC about the pandemic, talking to health officials, psychologists, or other figures who can help make sense of the numbers as a whole. But prior to Covid, McElroy was better known for bringing his analytical skills to the municipal affairs beat.

It was McElroy who pitched the idea of a municipal politics beat to the CBC after getting some experience covering political news at Global. He was given the chance to try out the concept for four months in 2017, and permanently given the beat in 2019. He still writes regularly on municipal politics S P RI N G 2021 L ANG AR A JOUR NAL I S M R E V I E W

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McElroy is the Municipal Affairs Reporter for CBC Vancouver, covering local political stories in B.C.

and makes a regular appearance on CBC Radio’s The Early Edition each Wednesday morning—though Covid has consumed most of his recent reporting.

Treena Wood, news director for CBC British Columbia, says that it is McElroy’s passion and dedication to municipal reporting that makes him a standout in the newsroom.

“He really believes in how important municipal affairs is to our audience, and because of that, he finds a way to make the most mundane subject matter incredibly interesting—because he finds it incredibly interesting,” Wood says.

One of the things that allows McElroy to stand out as a reporter is his dedication to some of the simplest community stories, such as ranking every park in Vancouver— which also turn out to be some of the most compelling for readers.

McElroy’s municipal reporting covers everything from deeper and more serious stories, to lighter and quirkier pieces. One of the more memorable examples, McElroy recalls, was his 2020 story of an attempted pet pigeon ban in North Vancouver, which later turned out to be instigated by a city councillor who lived next to the only pigeon owner in the city.

It’s this type of storytelling that makes journalists such as Frances Bula, a munici16

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“He really believes in how important municipals affairs is to our audience, and because of that, he finds a way to make the most mundane subject matter interesting.”

-Treena Wood, news director, CBC British Columbia pal affairs journalist who contributes to The Globe and Mail, admire McElroy’s reporting.

“When you see stories like that, they seem so surface level but it really is an abuse of power,” says Bula about the pigeon ban. “He’s incredibly dedicated to covering suburban council stories, and bringing attention to stories that may have only gotten coverage in local papers.”

When Covid struck and local council meetings were cancelled, McElroy began to look for things to do that would both provide value to the public and allow him to use his skills as a reporter. That is when he began creating charts about where B.C. stood in the pandemic—and by early 2021, reporting on the pandemic accounted for

60 to 70 percent of his reporting.

Data journalism is not a new concept, but it is one that newsrooms, like the CBC’s, have been focusing more attention on in recent years, says Treena Wood. She adds that McElroy’s skills of taking large amounts of data and translating it into digestible titbits and thoughtful analysis is what makes his reporting such a standout: “He’s able to take these complex data sets and make them into something that is understandable for the audience.”

Alex Migdal, a social editor and reporter for CBC British Columbia, says that data journalism can be a challenging concept, and it’s a skill that not many journalists have.

“Being able to understand data, and build charts and graphs in a way your audience can understand, that takes a level of skill and practice,” says Midgal. “Justin has really illustrated the value of data in a time of Covid.”

“I would hope that his work is actually a case study for journalists and future journalists that if you want to get into journalism, this is the kind of stuff that people are turning to and people really need to see.”

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ooking back at the year that was, McElroy says that being able to provide British Columbians with important coverage of the pandemic has been a challenging learning experience for him.

“I wouldn’t use a word like “memorable”, especially when it involves policies of life and death,” he says. “But I’m grateful I have the opportunity to help people make smart and informed decisions to keep them safe.”

He says that, whatever beat he’s covering, his goal is the same: “You try to rise to the moment and do your best to provide people with the information that (they need).” And despite the fact that he’s best known as “the numbers guy,” he tries to put a very human face to everything he does.

“People are feeling a lot of things right now, and if you can give light to that and say ‘what you’re feeling, other people are feeling too’—it’s important, and it makes people trust the reporter more when they know that there is an actual human face behind this.”

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/// FEATURE STORY

Jimmy Thomson, managing editor of Capital Daily at Bastion Square in Victoria.

A Capital Idea Can a new investigative news site shake up the Victoria media market?

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by RUI YANG XU

photo by LAURA BROUGHAM

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Over the past six years, venture capitalist Andrew Wilkinson has made a name for himself investing in a variety of tech companies through the Victoria-based holding company, Tiny Capital, run by himself and business partner, Chris Sparling.

On an episode of the podcast My First Million, which aired July 31, 2020, Wilkinson told hosts Shaan Puri and Sam Parr that Tiny Capital had about 30 companies they were invested in—“and we’ve invested in another 80 business in a minority capacity.” (Wilkinson declined to be interviewed

by Langara Journalism Review.)

“One of the ones I’m really loving is local news,” said Wilkinson in the podcast.

“I pick up all the big papers, like the New York Times, Washington Post—physically or on my iPad. I realized that there was this

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incredible revolution happening in journalism in the States, but in Canada, where I live, we just had a shitty local paper. And it was slowly dying, to the point where it was owned by a big media company. They fired all the journalists. They just have wire service articles. And I was really bummed.”

Wilkinson said that he decided, with a friend, to launch a newsletter called Capital Daily, “where we summarize everything that’s happening in Victoria, every single day. Kind of inspired by The Hustle: super simple, here’s a cleverly written summary of what’s up.” On September 14, 2019, Capital Daily sent out its first edition via a controlled email circulation list.

“Before we knew it, we had crazy numbers of subscribers,” said Wilkinson.

“We’re now at about 40,000 subscribers in a city of 200,000. We’ve got 25 percent of the population. We’re now bigger than the local paper—and we did it all for a couple hundred grand.”

In the podcast—where he revealed that Tiny Capital considered making a bid for The Toronto Star when it was for sale last year—he said that his original goal was just to be able to open his inbox and know what was going on in his city—what events, what news stories. “And now, we’ve actually started hiring journalists. We now have an actual news team of journalists who are out there doing original reporting and pulling

on threads—investigative stuff.”

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immy Thomson, managing editor of Capital Daily, is one of those tasked with producing the “investigative stuff”—hired in November 2020 to replace Tristin Hopper, the outlet’s original editor. Thomson says that the website is filling a niche that has been left vacant by other outlets on Vancouver Island.

“There’s great news media here. And they do an excellent job of covering the news,” says Thomson. “But they don’t often have a lot of resources to do long-form investigations and so that’s the niche that Capital Daily fills.”

“We’re writing about communities that are under covered. We’re writing profiles of people that that are active in their communities. And that’s one other way to reach people,” Thomson says, “because those people have profiles and they don’t necessarily all high profile people, but there are people who other people want to know what they’re doing.”

One example of this is Capital Daily’s story on Quadra Village Community Centre’s youth program called “the CREW,” a leadership program that trains the youths of one of the island’s most impoverished neighbourhoods to have the skills needed for employment and success in adulthood.

He also says that one of his goals as editor “is to find readers who want to support us.”

He sees that support in readers sharing their content, across social media platforms, and also sending tips to the newsroom. “And part of that support eventually will be financial,” he adds. However, Thomson says that before they’re able to ask for donations, Capital Daily needs to show that their outlet is worth An archived scan of the Times Colonist, formerly known as the Daily supporting in the Colonist, from 1980.

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first place.

Figuring out how to make money from this community-driven, long-form niche is the job of Tom Gierasimczuk, Capital Daily’s vice-president of partnerships and monetization. Gierasimczuk was hired in November 2020 by Wilkinson to build a larger audience within the Victoria community.

The Capital Daily newsletter continues to grow at about 500 subscribers a week.

Currently, the website’s content remains free for readers, with Capital Daily’s costs supported by partnered content— advertising, in essence—that promotes local businesses on its social media and in its newsletters.

“I think we’ve come across a really good way to give [readers] a magnifying glass on their local community—in a way that hasn’t been done before—and a kind of convenience that hasn’t been done before,” Gierasimczuk says. The focus on community was clearly a great area to start for Capital Daily as it attracted readers quickly, he adds.

“Anecdotally, we’re hearing they’ve used us to replace their legacy media—citing things like, ‘It’s just very convenient’ and ‘You guys go deeper and pursue stories that legacy media typically can’t afford to or doesn’t really bother with because it’s not their core business model.’ So that validation is great to hear.”

One of the legacy media Gierasimczuk is referring to is Victoria’s Times Colonist newspaper, which traces its history back to 1858. Then known as the Daily British Colonist, the newspaper, set up by Amor de Cosmos, a future premier of British Columbia, is considered the first newspaper to be published in the province.

Dave Obee is editor-in-chief and publisher of the Times Colonist—and while he thinks there’s great potential for another online news operation in Victoria, he’s not convinced that Capital Daily is much of a threat. “I’m not seeing a whole lot of competition from them at this point,” Obee says. “If anything, I’m quite disappointed in what I see. They could be doing a lot more than they’re doing. It’s not having any real meaningful impact on us.”

Obee notes that a lot of the content on the Capital Daily website is, in fact, a rehash of work that has been published by P hot o: C our t e s y Br i t i s h C o l o n i s t Arc h i v e s

the likes of the Times Colonist. “For a while, they were going through a whole phase where they were running historical stuff and saying, Wow, our investigation has revealed this, and they revealed something that we covered in the 1970s,” Obee says. “That’s hardly a scoop. Digging something out of the files is not a scoop.”

Thomson acknowledges that Capital Daily relies heavily on establishment media like the Times Colonist to fill its newsletter pipeline: “Probably about half of our newsletter comes from the news media directly…

We don’t want to take their place and we don’t want to attack what they’re doing.”

Obee says that, ultimately, Victoria res-

“We really want to establish the fact that journalism has never mattered more-it’s utility and place in our community has never mattered more.”

- Tom Gierasimczuk, Capital Daily idents want and need to get their news and information from “three or four sources.”

And while he doesn’t necessarily think Capital Daily is that source quite yet, he does hold out hope. “I think there’s actually great potential there. I just would love to see it come together at some point.”

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hile the broader media industry has taken a hit in recent years, where there has been a ray of light is in small, community-centric startups. Alfred Hermida, a UBC journalism professor, has been researching media startups in Canada for the last 20 years. From his research, he’s identified 70 digital startups launched during that timeframe—news websites that aren’t related to any established media outlets.

“The key thing with these startups is mostly they’re quite small,” says Hermida.

“They’re usually doing local news. They are usually run by the founder, and maybe a couple of other people. Most of them—because until recently, it was really hard to

get charitable status as a startup—had been for-profit commercial enterprises, relying on a mix of advertising, sponsorship, and some reader funding.”

As much as Capital Daily might hope to shake up the media landscape, says Hermida, legacy outlets like the Times Colonist have certain built-in advantages. “Media institutions are remarkably resilient because they have institutional power,” he says, adding that for new outlets like Capital Daily to survive, their goal should be to fill in the local gaps that traditional media miss. “Provide the kind of relevant local information that resonates with the people there.”

The challenge, as Hermida observes, will be getting audiences to pay for that information. “Only a small percentage of Canadians are willing to pay for ‘the deeds,’” he says. (A report in 2011 by Hermida and his colleagues revealed that only four percent of Canadians were willing to pay for their news online.) “So if you have a local outlet, like The Tyee, encouraging its readers to donate, they may find enough to sustain operations up to a certain scale, but then it’s hard to get any bigger.”

Currently, the team at Capital Daily includes six people, all based in Victoria.

Gierasimczuk says that there are plans to grow the team—and even expand the operation’s focus beyond Victoria, to other cities across Canada. “We really want to reverse that course of, ‘Media is dead, journalism’s threatened. It’s not useful. It’s extinct.’ All this stuff is just ridiculous,” he says. “We really want to establish the fact that journalism has never mattered more—its utility and its place in our community has never mattered more.”

As for Capital Daily’s editor, his goals are more modest: “We want to do better work. We want to do more work,” says Thomson. “And we want to redouble that focus on long-form stuff, and not get caught up in the desire to just always be publishing as soon as things come out—following the bouncing ball.”

“We’re funded for the next couple of years and after that, we are expected to spread our wings and do our own thing,” he adds. “So if we haven’t been able to do that by then, maybe we won’t exist in five years.

I hope we will. Because I think that we’re doing something valuable.”

S ou r c es (si d e b a r): N u m e ri s , Alliance fo r Audit ed Media, Similar We b

Top News Players in the Victoria Media Market On Radio

CBC Radio One: 20.4 per cent share with 81,400 weekly listeners CFAX: 12 per cent share with 59,300 weekly listeners

In Print and Online

Times Colonist: Daily print circulation of under 31,000 Victoria Buzz: Average daily online readers of 30,000

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Allan Cho, executive editor of Ricepaper Magazine, outside of his home in Vancouver where the Ricepaper team have met during Covid.

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/// THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION

Paper Tigers Several once-mighty print publications have gone digital-only in the past five years. But according to one prominent B.C. publisher, it’s too soon to count out print

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story and portrait by RYAN NG icepaper magazine was launched by Jim Wong-Chu as a small newsletter for the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop in 1994. Within two years, Wong-Chu had turned Ricepaper into a full-fledged magazine—and 25 years later, it counts as the longest-running literary publication focused on Asian-Canadian literature. The magazine features creative writing, such as fiction and poetry, along with feature stories, reviews and art from Asian writers from across Canada.

But with its February 2016 issue, Ricepaper made the difficult decision to go digital-only. “Ricepaper had a 20-year run as a print magazine,” says Allan Cho, the magazine’s executive editor, who took over from Wong-Chu after his death in 2017. “That is an eternity in the publishing world.”

Ricepaper is one of several former print publications that made the switch to digital-only in recent years. Others have introduced digital products while maintaining a print presence—with the hope of finding appeal with multiple audiences.

According to a 2020 study by Vividata, Millennials and Generation Xers are more likely to read a magazine’s digital content than are Baby Boomers. A report in 2019 by News Media Canada found that 90 per cent of all print readers also use digital platforms.

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The decision to switch Ricepaper to an online format stemmed from rising costs and declining advertising and grant revenues, says Cho, who, along with his work at Ricepaper, serves as the executive director of the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop, co-founder of the LiterAsian Festival and an academic librarian at the University of British Columbia. “It is a constant juggling act for a non-profit to balance the costs of printing, staff, rent, distribution, and writers’ fees.”

That said, Cho has also seen positives since the switch five years ago from a quarterly magazine. “The digital format has become quite liberating in some ways, as Ricepaper is not restricted to a number of pages,” he notes. “In the past, we had to turn away quality writing because we simply could not fit them all into one issue … It felt demoralizing at times at just how much we had to let go in the print world.”

Getting out of the quarterly publishing cycle has also allowed Ricepaper to focus on other projects, including a print anthology of some of the best writing from their website. Ricepaper is also now sharing stories through podcasting, YouTube and social media.

“Within the digital paradigm, we (are able to) reach a more global audience — one that we probably could not have done with the print edition.” Cho says he has received submissions from as far away as India and Japan.

“In the end, our goal is still the spotlight on Asian Canadian arts and culture,” says Cho, who studied modern Chinese history at UBC. “So whether it’s in print or in digital, we want to ensure it continues and flourishes. If we are reaching beyond Canada, then it’s a bonus.”

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imilar to Ricepaper, Dance International made the leap to digital in recent years—this time after over four decades of publishing. The last issue of the quarterly magazine was published in the winter of 2019.

“I feel that we were very lucky that we went online, just before Covid started creating an even harder environment for print publications,” says Kaija Pepper, editor of Dance International, a non-profit magazine, based in Vancouver, that covers contemporary and classical dance from Canada and around the world. “It was extremely hard to make the decision. I loved working with my designer and working with wonderful professional design programs that make the magazine and the stories so beautiful and lively.”

The decision to go digital, says Pepper, was a result of several factors. While the magazine had a strong international subscription base, newsstands started cutting smaller titles from their stock, including Dance International. Along with distribution problems, printing and mailing costs were constantly increasing. And revenues were shrinking.

“Slowly the advertisers were moving online,” Pepper says. “That was becoming really difficult for us because we did really rely on our advertisers for a lot of our budgets.”

Looking back, there are things Pepper doesn’t miss about being print-focused—especially the distribution problems. “Sometimes issues that would go to places like Singapore or Thailand, where we S P RI N G 2021 L ANG AR A JOUR NAL I S M R E V I E W

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had subscribers, would take two months to arrive. It was very stressful because we would get letters saying, ‘Where’s my copy?’ And because we’re a small arts publication, a lot of that fell on me to deal with.”

Still, with paying subscribers came established revenues; with its online magazine, Dance International does not charge readers to access the website or read its articles—relying instead on grant money and donations.

Pepper is unsure at this point whether the current model is sustainable as a business—or whether the Dance International reader of today will be with them tomorrow.

“I miss having that established subscriber base—people who want that quarterly magazine,” says Pepper. “And maybe some issues interest them more than others, but they’re happy to get it four times a year, as opposed to constantly having to drive people to the website based on the Google algorithms.”

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lack Press—a Victoria-based publisher with both digital-only and print-first titles—is an example of a media company that’s hoping to have it both ways. With over 170 publications across Canada and in parts of the United States, Black Press uses both platforms to reach the widest possible audience.

“People have been predicting the end of print for a couple of dec-

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ades at least, and it hasn’t happened,” says Andrew Holota, editorial director for Black Press Media BC. “There’s been a tightening of the market—there’s certainly been shifts in business models—but for us, in terms of a community newspaper (publisher), that hasn’t changed dramatically.”

He sees print and digital working together, with one feeding the other—not replacing it. “We use the print product and refer to our digital sites—inviting the audience from one platform to the other platform.”

According to Holota, having a digital format has allowed Black Press newspapers to have immediacy and connection to a readership that was not accessing print, or just preferred having news delivered digitally. And the immediacy and connection goes both ways: online stories are easier to monitor, in terms of activity and revenue potential. Holota notes that Black Press tracks, in real time, how the market is responding to its content, through its websites and social media platforms. “You can see—very, very quickly—what is being accessed and what is being consumed and at what rate.”

Beyond what’s getting clicks and views, however, Holota sees a tremendous opportunity for community newspapers, like the ones Black Press publishes, to succeed online by covering news that big online portals aren’t interested in.

“Community newspapers can be extremely successful and competitive in the digital market because we are still doing something that no other news agency does,” he says. “And that is providing hyperlocal coverage of communities. We’ll get it first—and when you get it first, you start the digital conversation. You’ll own the story.”

This digital-first advantage allows Black Press to turn its online readers toward their print products, where additional information and details are rolled into the story by the time the newspaper is published.

“The market has become far more sophisticated than it was before,” Holota says. “And the market now has so many more choices.”

For print media to survive—especially in the age of Covid—publishers need to embrace digital platforms and develop a reciprocal relationship with readers

by Catherine Mwitta

W

alking down the streets of Vancouver, you used to be able to spot the vendors for Megaphone—a magazine by and for the city’s homeless and low-income populations. Vendors would sell the monthly magazine for $2, keeping $1.25 from each sale as profit. But today, thanks to the pandemic, the streets of the city are mostly empty—and distribution of Megaphone has decreased dramatically due to safety concerns from readers and vendors alike.

The harsh reality of Covid has forced Megaphone to pursue a hybrid publishing model over the past year: vendors still exist, but readers are increasingly choosing to purchase a replica of the magazine online.

LJR.CA

Julia Aoki is executive director of the digital-only was a big thing. ” Street Corner Media Foundation, which pubMohamed says that the biggest benefit of lishes Megaphone, as well as the Voices of being digital-first is the open line of commuthe Street literary magazine and “Hope and nication that editors and writers have with Shadows” calendar. She says Megaphone their audience. “You have to build a commumade the switch to its hybrid model in March nity with your readers today, more than ever 2020, with its first online issue coming out in before,” he says. “There’s so much competiJune 2020, shortly after the first lockdown. tion out there today. You can’t just expect to At the time, the primary concern was put information out there: You have to listen, around transmission. “Handling of cash you have to talk to [readers] and open up was a potential vector for transmission, po- those places of dialogue.” tentially even the magazine itself would be a While living in the digital realm presents vector for transmission,” she many opportunities for onsays, describing the organiline publications like Daily zation’s earliest concerns.

Hive—and even print-first The digital replica was a publications, like Megaway to continue to support phone, that are trying to customers and vendors who build an online presence—it were experiencing a loss of also presents some probincome from diminished lems. First among them: a print sales. The magazine loss of control. has introduced grant appliOri Tenenboim is an cations for vendors who have assistant professor at the lost income, with 100 school of journalism, writper cent of the proceeds from ing, and media at the Unithe digital sales going to venversity of British Columbia, dors. whose doctoral research has While Megaphone focused on audience engagereturned to selling physical ment, political communicacopies of the magazine in tion, and media economics. early 2021, Aoki sees potenHe says that in the digital tial in continuing to foster age, magazines or newspaan audience online—and pers are forced to distribute hopefully providing anoththeir content on popular er stream of revenues going platforms such as Twitter, forward.

Julia Aoki, executive WordPress, Facebook, which “Obviously we’re all director of Megaphone, and are controlled by tech comprimed today to buy things Farhan Mohamad, former panies that have a global digitally and read things dig- editor-in-chief of Daily Hive. reach in audiences and curate itally,” she says. “We’re startcontent flow. ing to think about how we “Social media platforms continue to do digital sales or provide digital have had a major impact on journalism,” content without undercutting the vendors.” says Tenenboim. “News organizations no Vancouver’s Daily Hive—as an online-on- longer control the distribution of their conly publication from the start—has figured out tent, and don’t have a monopoly over the disboth how to develop its audience, and build tribution of their content.” a robust business, ever since launching in Tenenboim argues that the answer for 2008. The site covers a wide variety of top- print publications is not to shun the online ics, from news and events to activities, travel world, “but to own their little corner of it.” and pop culture.

They should create their own apps, build For eight years, Farhan Mohamed served robust digital channels—but keep a strong as editor-in-chief and online editor for Daily print product as an anchor.

Hive. “It started out trying to fill the gap in “I think it is important for them to still the market between traditional media and keep their own outlets and try to find ways to blogging,” says Mohamed. “When Daily engage the community. Not put all their eggs Hive started, being able to say that you were in the technology company’s baskets.”

P h o t o s: (a b ove ) C a th e ri n e Mwit t a; Illust r at io ns: D ee F ar r ug ia

LJR.ca Exclusive @ljreview

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/// FEATURE STORY

For a generation that has come to distrust traditional media, graphic non-fiction offers a way into important, issue-based stories

by DEE FARRUGIA

Graphic Content

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earching for Home: Nasrin’s Journey, tells the story of a fictional Yazidi family, who are fleeing their war-torn home of Sinjar to come to Canada and reunite with the rest of their family. The three-page graphic zine tells the story of Nasrin, her brother Diyari, and their mother and the struggles they face as they undergo the refugee process.

Though the story is fictional, it gets its real life inspiration from the refugee experiences of students from Byrne Creek Secondary School in Burnaby. Anat Rabkin, the author of the story, was approached through email by the B.C. Teachers Federation (BCTF) to write the story.

Rabkin was given the country students originated from, and where they travelled to. The rest came from internet research to understand the different cultures more.

In a day and age where news outlets have

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had to adapt to appeal to younger generations, some media outlets have turned to graphic arts to speak to their younger readers. Some journalists like Brooke Gladstone, have paired up with illustrators to tell their stories.

Gladstone’s book Influencing Machine is a nonfiction graphic novel which tells the history of the relationship between society and the press.

This type of reporting isn’t to be confused with typical cartoons found in publications, which often are satirical in nature. Instead, this graphic journalism is using a more accessible art form to tell its stories.

Rabkin says this type of journalism can also be a more accessible option for journalists who are looking for more artistic alternatives to reporting.

“The cost is lower than any sort of visual media like video or animation. Recording video can

Pages of Anat Rabkin’s comic Searching for Home: Nasrin’s Journey.

be time consuming, not that comics aren’t time consuming but it’s not expensive,” she says.

Rabkin explains she doesn’t often illustrate stories inspired by current events. Nasrin’s Journey is her second story about immigration and refugees. Her first story, Over the Fence, a project run by the Cloudscape Comics Society, also told a story of the refugee experience, with the intention to fit on the side of a bus shelter, as a part of the Comics in Transit project with the City of Vancouver.

Nasrin’s Journey is currently being used in both elementary and secondary classrooms with the intention to teach students about the struggles refugees and immigrants face when coming to Canada. The zine can be found on the BCTF’s website, along with lesson plans for teachers to use when teaching students about the refugee experience through the comic. AdLJR.CA

ditional information is also available for teachers who are working directly with students from refugee backgrounds.

Rabkin’s comic came at a perfect time to shed a light on the current Syrian refugee crisis. According to the Government of Canada website as of 2020, 30,000 people have seeked refuge in Canada. With protests that resulted in war, thousands of people have died as a consequence and those who haven’t have fled to Canada, sometimes leaving loved ones behind.

Rabkin herself is not unfamiliar with the immigrant experience. She was born in Israel and immigrated to Canada when she was 21. Now at almost 39, she says she relates to Nasrin’s fear and stress of moving to an unfamiliar country.

“It was scary,” Rabkin says “in that first year or two that I was in Canada, I had so much more here than I ever had at home- in terms of hope

and fulfillment and who I am. The idea that this faceless government bureaucrat could take all that away from me ... was difficult to accept” Rabkin says she left everything behind to come to Canada. Her family lives in Israel and the United States, so most communication is done virtually. Rabkin’s father passed away of a heart attack in 2020, making the distance that much more difficult.

Rabkin now works with a variety of genres.

Her other work includes It Rained Then Too, and Forbidden Fruit, two stories published in Pulp Literature magazine. Despite her wide range of work, Rabkin says she is proud of the work she did to tell stories of refugees.

“I’m proud that I can tell a serious story ... and hopefully impact people. It made me feel like this hobby of mine is more than just doodling, I can affect meaningful stories as well.”

S P RI N G 2021 L ANG AR A JOUR NAL I S M R E V I E W

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/// THE LAST WORD

In Conversation with Angela Sterritt How an Indigenous media star changed the way we look at reporting in B.C.

by SAFOURA RIGI-LADIZ photo by YANNICK SCHIEVE

F

rom the time she was young, Angela Sterritt says she was made to tell stories. Born and raised in Vancouver, B.C., she got her start in journalism in the 1990s, working at Vancouver’s Co-op Radio before joining the CBC in 2003. While she covers a broad range of stories for the CBC—both radio and television—her reporting has allowed Sterritt to become an advocate for amplifying Indigenous voices, as well as creating dialogue around the importance of inclusion in newsrooms.

fun interviewing and learning about people.

When you were starting out, did you know any other Indigenous journalists?

At the very beginning, I was part of a magazine called Red Wire. That was critical for me as a native youth—to see people publishing and editing a magazine for you, by you. That was one of my anchors as well.

A lot of the stuff I did early on was not mainstream, because I found there was not an appetite early on in my career.

Mainstream just wasn’t interested in Indigenous stories.

What more should newsrooms do to make sure Indigenous voices are being heard?

For one, cultures need to shift.

We need to stop using terms like “diversity hiring.” We need to reflect on why our newsrooms are 80 per cent white.

When we’re talking about diversity and inclusion, what does that look like? Sometimes it’s uncomfortable when you have a person who has a very different experience than a white man—and you need to be ready for that change.

What changes have you seen in the field compared to when you first started?

The Truth and Reconciliation act changed everything. Also, the RCMP report on murdered and missing Indigenous women also changed everything, because it validated the importance of stories about missing

and murdered Indigenous women. Also, the inability for anti-Indigenous racist people to feel comfortable to constantly push indigenous people out. In mainstream media now, it’s not acceptable to be racist. A few years ago, it was ok.

On a personal level, how do you manage covering heavier topics?

We need to talk about this more as journalists, because almost any story we work on can be traumatizing. I think, as journalists, we don’t often take breaks—but you have to find a way to push yourself away from work for a while.

What I’ve shared with BIPOC youth is that we need to make space in our lives to be joyful and celebrate. I heard a young Bella Bella man say, “It’s not just thinking of my intersections as oppressions, but my intersections as pieces of joy.”

I’ve been trying to do that.

Angela Sterritt, CBC reporter,

What influenced your decision to go into journalism?

My stepdad and mom always just say that it was in my DNA that I was a storyteller. They would come into my daycare and would see a gaggle of children around me and I’d be reading a book upside down.

When I first got into journalism, I was actually a street youth. I was trying to get my Grade 12 and going to a learning centre called the Gathering Place. One of the teachers there, Donna Brock, mentioned “there’s this posting you should come check it out.” And I went and it was for Indigenous youth and people of colour. I interviewed all kinds of people—it was just always 26

outside of Vancouver General Hospital.

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