Published: September 01, 2001
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An American Editor
An editor looks ahead in the heart of Silicon Valley
San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News editor Jerry Ceppos
finds innovation in covering news is part of covering innovation and believes
that credibility must be paramount
By Peter Bhatia
Jerry Ceppos, executive editor of the San Jose Mercury News, resides
in one of our country's most dynamic communities, Silicon Valley. As the
high-tech industry has remade the way we live, the Mercury News, under
the leadership of Ceppos and others, has been remaking itself, with an
eye to being the pre-eminent source for coverage of technology and the
industry for its readers. It seems to be working. Time magazine just recognized
the Mercury News as the nation's most tech-savvy.
Since Ceppos came to the paper, it has won two Pulitzer prizes. During
the past year, it has been at the center of controversy over its "Dark
Alliance" project.
The Mercury News is one of eight newspapers that are serving as test
sites for ASNE’s Journalism Credibility Project to address the erosion
of credibility in the profession.
Q. The Mercury News has gone from being a very average newspaper
to one of the most respected in the country over the past 20 years. How’d
that happen?
A. I heard Abe Rosenthal say at ASNE years ago that he tells young journalists
who are wondering where to work not to worry about the location or size
of a paper but to look instead at the publisher. Each of the four publishers
I’ve worked with here has added journalistic resources, recognizing that
our audience probably is the most well-educated in the country and demands
a deep and broad news report.
I’d like to think that we’ve used those resources well, to diversify
the staff and to strengthen that breadth and depth. But without the commitment
of the publishers and of Knight-Ridder, I don’t think that the most brilliant
editor could have turned the paper around.
Q. Your newspaper today finds itself in the heart of the nation’s
technology capital. Obviously that is a primary shaper of your approach
to news coverage. But how does that play out in the newsroom day in and
day out? How does that make your newspaper unique?
A. I like to talk about aspirations with the staff and then to set very
specific written goals. It was a staff committee that suggested more emphatically
than anyone else had that our primary goal should be supremacy in technology
coverage. After a great deal of discussion, we adopted that as a written
goal. That goal may sound obvious, but putting it in writing gives us a
sort of compass when we have to make tough resource decisions. Knight-Ridder
also moved us toward the goal by very much agreeing with it and encouraging
a large expansion of our business and technology staff.
Last year, it occurred to me that we also should do a much better job
covering the texture and fabric of this very unusual place, Silicon Valley.
So we reallocated resources and set up a five-person team to do just that
— reporting, for example, on software engineers who prefer to work in the
middle of the night because they’re not interrupted. Some of our most fascinating
stories are what I call these "texture and fabric" stories. In a way, it’s
just good local reporting. But we wouldn’t be doing it regularly if we
hadn’t shined a light on it by talking with the staff and then setting
up a specific team.
Q. How does that all play out every day?
A. Almost every staffer can tell you that technology coverage and "texture"
coverage of the valley are our highest priorities, and that is reflected
in story ideas, play and, most of the time, in technological literacy.
Many of the staffers were involved in the conversations, or even helped
come up with the concept, so these are not alien thoughts to anyone.
Q. Obviously, many of your readers are involved in the high-tech
industry. But how do you keep interested, say, the auto plant worker up
the road in Fremont? Is there a danger of being in the middle of such a
dominant industry that the paper loses sight of the broader audience? Or
maybe that isn’t a problem?
A. The technology story is just plain fascinating, not just to those
employed by the industry, as you can tell by looking at the cover of every
national magazine. Also, remember that the technology goal is a compass,
not an autopilot. We’re pretty good about reminding ourselves that many
readers still consider San Jose a small town. That’s one of the reasons
we started a Celebrations section last year in which readers write about
what’s important to them. The irony strikes me every Thursday when Celebrations
appears: A fairly large daily newspaper covering the most sophisticated
industry in the world also publishes a homespun section that gets incredible
reader reaction.
Q. How does a commitment to technology coverage and coverage of the
rapidly changing population of California and the Bay Area mix?
A. There’s no contradiction, in part because the high-tech work force
is quite diversified, as is our staff.
Q. Your competitive situation is intense, to say the least. The San
Francisco Chronicle and Examiner to the North, the Alameda Newspaper Group
in the East Bay. How does that play into your strategy?
A. To some extent, technology coverage is local news for the entire
region, so our strength helps us in all areas, not just in Santa Clara
County. In fact, some of our biggest growth, percentagewise, is coming
just outside our primary market, where the competition also is the toughest.
Of course, we also zone heavily for traditional local news in those areas.
Q. The Mercury News is a pioneer in newspapering online with Mercury
Center. How is that going? Is it sort of routine now? How has it changed
the newsroom?
A. People keep telling us that we’re ahead of other newspapers. But
the reality in online services is that the situation can change overnight.
Besides, the competition is more than just other newspapers — it’s also
sites run by other organizations, especially those trying to make a reputation
for technology coverage. The good news for us is that our strength in print,
coverage of Silicon Valley, is a huge and natural strength for readers
of Mercury Center, wherever they might be.
Q. As many papers have experimented with different organizational
structures you’ve chosen a hybrid approach with a traditional newsroom
with a big team in the middle. Could you describe how that works and its
impact?
A. Every newsroom has a different history and different problems. Given
our unique needs, we thought that teams could improve our coverage of some
subject areas. But we didn’t see a need to toss the entire newsroom structure
up in the air and scramble it. Frankly, I worry a little about looking
too much at the structure of other newspapers. Each is unique.
Q. You talk about wanting a newsroom that understands it goals and
is lined up behind that. Have you achieved that level of understanding?
A. Leaders always think they’re more understood than they really are.
That said, I really do think that almost every staff member could sketch
out our broad goals. They’ve been discussed again and again in large groups
and small. Besides, they’re posted all over the newsroom!
Q. Let’s talk about Dark Alliance, the controversial project. Was
it flawed?
A. As I wrote in a column in May, I decided after a lengthy re-examination
that it didn’t meet my standards. If we were doing it all over, we’d state
fewer conclusions as certainties and be clearer in explaining why we drew
the conclusions we did.
Q. Hindsight being 20/20, what emotions does it raise for you now
as it fades into journalistic history? What was the impact of the series
on your newsroom?
A. It’s a searing reminder that almost everything about life is gray,
not distinctly black and white. Probably our greatest sin was portraying
a distinctly black-and-white picture of a complex situation. One of the
few positive things to come out of the experience for most of the newsroom
was a deep understanding of that, an understanding that will last for almost
everyone’s entire career. Before this experience, I had been preaching
that readers relish candor, and their reaction to my column proved that.
But it was a tough way to learn lessons or verify feelings.
Q. You are an editor with the unique perspective of having journalism
done to you. How did that feel? How do you react to it now? Has the experience
hardened you in some way?
A. Oh, it really just confirmed what we all know in our guts: That there
are careful and not-so-careful reporters. That, once published, an error
is almost impossible to correct because it keeps getting picked up. That
some reporters are open to hearing about their work and some aren’t. I
hate to say this, but I now think much more carefully about whether to
grant an interview, whatever the subject. As a sidelight, I found it interesting
that coverage of my column emphasized how unusual it is for a newspaper
to admit errors. That’s a serious problem for our entire industry.
Q. If Dark Alliance was the low spot, what do you look on as the
paper’s greatest successes? The coverage of the quake of ’89?
A. As proud as I am of that coverage, it was spot news that cried out
to be covered well. In a way, I’m even prouder that we’ve reinvented and
focused ourselves and are covering people who aren’t much like us, engineers
and venture capitalists and also the folks who are being skipped in the
technological revolution. Not many staffs can talk about bits and random
access memory and other once-esoteric items. Ours can.
Q. You have been a leader in building ties between journalism educators
and the journalism community. Why is that so important to you?
A. It’s strictly selfish. The easiest, quickest way to change and improve
the profession is to help educators and journalism students. Besides, it’s
fun.
Q. You are signed up for the ASNE work on credibility. You speak
a great deal on the topic, too. What’s that about for you? What do you
say to our colleagues who say we don’t have a credibility problem that
can’t be solved by good, honest reporting?
A. It isn’t TV that will kill newspapers. It isn’t the Internet. It’s
the community’s lack of confidence in what we write.
Q. How does that commitment manifest itself in the paper? Does the
staff understand the problem and the need to address it?
A. Another one of those goals for the year is to raise our standards
for fairness and accuracy. We’ve had brown-bag-lunch discussions about
the possible flaws in what we do — for example, one of our best editors
asked if newspapers’ increasing emphasis on analysis has led to a diminution
in traditional fairness standards. I don’t know the answer but we’ll talk
about it candidly, with examples from the Mercury News, and probably do
more than just talk. The staff also knows that we have one of the most
liberal corrections policies in the country. They’ve heard me say that
I worry when we don’t run four or five corrections, because I know we’ve
made at least that many mistakes in the previous day’s paper. We’ve also
done a few other unusual things to open up the pages of the paper. Again,
setting clear goals and talking openly with the staff really does let you
shine a light on a few key issues.
Q. At 51, you’ve come through a personal battle with prostate cancer.
T-minus 15 years or so and counting on your career, what are your personal
goals?
A. Probably as a result of the medical experience, I’d like to be more
a part of my children’s lives. I hear too many editors say they missed
out on their kids’ best years. I’d also like to make a contribution to
improving the credibility of newspapers.
Q. You have two beautiful children, 8 and 6. If they want to follow
in dad’s footsteps into a journalism career, what would you say to them
(other than no)?
A. I’d tell them it’s the most fun they can have with their clothes
on. But I’d also tell them to forget about journalism unless they are absolutely
dedicated to it.
Bhatia is executive editor of The Oregonian, Portland.
