More than 50 people watched a panel discussion in the 10! Show studios featuring NBC 10 staff Vince Lattanzio, Tracey Davidson and weatherman Hurricane Swartz.

Local TV news is, perhaps even more than other in the media business, a ratings game.

That’s a distinct takeaway I had, leaving NBC Philadelphia headquarters on City Line Avenue after the latest local ONA meetup featured the affiliate’s web strategy and news direction. More than 50 journalists, NBC 10 representatives, bloggers, freelancers and other media representatives had Yuengling and pretzels before seating in the 10! Show studios. The event was well-planned, well-run and well-received — though this writer is one of the local group’s organizers, outside of promotion, this event was entirely organized by NBC 10 social media editor Lou DuBois.

The event featured video clips from the WCAU station’s long history, presentations on the affiliate’s web and mobile strategies and then a panel Q&A session featuring the station’s tech trends reporter Vince Lattanzio, its consumer reporter Tracey Davidson and its weatherman Hurricane Swartz, moderated by social media editor and event organizer DuBois, who did a smashing job. It was a distinctly different (and so thoroughly compelling) event than our group’s other two programmed events like this, one with the Philadelphia Media Network and the other with public media outfit WHYY.

While the latter is a nonprofit and NBC 10 partner, the former also has to operate as a business with investors in mind. So, it was interesting to hear the suits talk so differently about the work they do.

It’s no surprise that TV and newspaper-based news business is different. But what was interesting to me was how from its web team to its business development team to, yes, even its ‘talent,’ local TV news speaks in a manner of audience acquisition: engagement, text tools, story teases and, as the weatherman said, what happened to Demi Moore?

Let’s be clear, one of the most important topics of the night was the NBC 10 mobile strategist talking about revenue plans — sustainability is key — but it was so stark to me that in an event that also featured people whose business cards have ‘reporter’ on them, there was none of the high-minded chatter of journalism — of comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, of informing and engaging in civic discourse.

When the publisher of the Philadelphia Media Network addressed the ONA group last November, peppered throughout his pet project pining were the kind of Fourth Estate extolling that a man in his role is compelled to do but sometimes actually means.

There was none of that from NBC 10.

Understand: this is less criticism than recognition, and it certainly is no crime committed by only one local station. On the contrary, I’m trying to better understand why more substantive content isn’t generated by local TV news, and I’m getting closer to some answer. I rather like the NBC 10 crew, but maybe, as a friend said, the 10 o’clock news should be categorized more as entertainment than journalism.

Indeed, in the shallow pool of local TV news, NBC 10 does some genuinely compelling work — its Mayor Town Hall last year deserves an award and its FCC-mandated public affairs programming outlet ‘At Issue with Steve Highsmith‘ is consistently strong — but their competitive, inch-by-inch, Nielsen-obsessed business world is more different than I often realize.

Wednesday night after the event, I walked out into the mild, cool air through the dark station parking lot that straddles the border between Philadelphia and suburban Bala Cynwyd pleased with an interesting event. Still, in the pursuit of a smarter citizenry, the intractable issues at play may make it as likely to have NBC 10 cross City Line Avenue and move into higher-profile, more costly Center City offices as it would be to have that station, or any of its local competitors, ever offer much in the way of consistent public affairs journalism.

The trouble is that those residents that high-minded elites seem to suggest we most need to better educate, engage and empower are, for now at least, more likely watching local 6 o’clock news than reading an investigative story from the Inquirer. Or so we think.

Is that because they don’t care? Maybe, or even likely. But we have a few years yet before the solution leaves the local TV news studio, so it’s a good place to look.

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter gave an hour of his time this week to answer resident questions that came to host NBC 10 by way of email, Twitter and Facebook, as we reported on Technically Philly in sharing video of the event.

Nutter has already been praised for use of Twitter – a move we had asked him about during a Q&A in July 2010 , a few months before the city imported communications director Desiree Peterkin-Bell, who had helped transform Newark Mayor Cory Booker into an urban political social media star.

The Ask the Mayor event — prompted by NBC 10 social media hire Lou Dubois and Bell — was unique, interesting and compelling. NBC 10 deserves credit for only sharing a single softball question — about cheesesteaks, of course — and Nutter and his team deserve praise too for participating in something new and relatively open. It was clear and admirable that Nutter hadn’t been prepared for the questions.

Granted, none of those questions amounted to public affairs journalism, but many did seem to represent the perspective of Philadelphians. Watch the five video segments of the event here or watch the first below and see what I learned about Nutter watching them.

What was most interesting to me though was the opportunity to watch some 40 minutes of Nutter speaking without a speech. I came away with a few takeaways about him:

1. He knows governance — Throughout the several dozen questions, Nutter offered very practical, straightforward answers. He seemed like a smart, practiced man of governance. And that has largely been the most accurate swipe against him: he’s been just a competent caretaker. Any high-minded rhetoric we heard from him was — get ready for the surprise — while campaigning. Remember Nutter the tax man? That said, I was impressed to see the inspiration set aside for directness. One thing that hasn’t changed — from his days on City Council — is that he is good in the wonkish detailed corners of government.
2. He hasn’t fully grasped the public-private partnerships his administration has embraced — I’m interested in being able to separate what decisions a leader OKs and what decisions a leader seems to lead, if not conceive of himself. The city is full of examples of cost-cutting private partnerships — something I’ve seen with a growing frequency — but I didn’t catch any highlight of that at all. Nutter quickly mentioned PhillyRising, but not its use of community groups. When asked about the need for trash cans in South Philly, I expected a call for civic action. He didn’t, nor did he talk about any of the other initiatives in that vein. He had a traditional top-down perspective on governance.
3. He hasn’t lost that ‘dry wit’  — When first running for mayor in 2007, every profile that came out mentioned Nutter’s ‘dry wit,’ his deadpan demeanor. If you catch it, he’ll make you laugh. At one Nutter press conference I was in, I asked what differentiated Philadelphia enough to earn a grant from IBM, he looked at me and said, “we’re just better,” and, for a moment, looked for another question, before a trickle of laughter brought him to dive a little deeper. Yes, I remember that Michael Nutter. In the fifth segment of the NBC 10 piece, Nutter answered with exaggerated disbelief at a resident’s request for the city to shake down people who rummage through recycling. “Of all our problems, I am not going to send people after someone with a cart to get a few aluminum cans,” he said. He was funny: “I was feeling some kind of way,” he went on earlier. He can be fun — and, well, he can even do so while acting black — but it’s not something he has always succeeded at sharing, like the legendary Ed Rendell.
   
4. He still doesn’t have a central issue – This is not news (and Patrick Kerkstra has argued it’s an asset) but it seemed as clear on this night as I had ever recognized before. I remembered candidate Nutter talking tough on crime because he needed to do so and really seeming to dive into the ethics and efficiency of a new Philadelphia government. Yet, in an hour of question answering, I heard no talking points on making City Hall cleaner, leaner and greener, though he does have progress to point to. Early on, I had thought technology would be of interest to Nutter — its ability to cut costs, offer transparency and improve systems seems to fit — but nothing has emerged. He was even fed a question about the city’s Wireless Philadelphia initiative and had no real answer. The public-private partnerships mentioned above or the green movement abounding citywide could be subjects to grab hold onto, but I didn’t see it. He got handed a crappy economy — I buy into that — but nobody’s central issue should be a recession.
5. He thinks his central issue is education — He was given a great question: what was the city’s most important problem and how he and others were facing it. He went hard on education and was suddenly where he got the most rhythm of the night. “It should be the centerpiece of everything we do.” He called for volunteerism and for parents to demand more of their kids. With Arlene out — even if she was the victim — maybe that is a subject he can run with in a second term.

It’s a small, though clever, effort, and I appreciate being called among a select group of people locally highlighted as worth following on Twitter.

It’s a diverse group that is still changing, but the list is an interesting way to curate a list of people following, sharing and commenting on the goings-on of the city. I’ve always hoped to offer real value online and plan to keep doing just that.

It also helps that it’s a built-in community of people with communities online to share and drive traffic, audience and, perhaps, action.

On the 20 portion of its site, NBC 10 will use tweets from the list members to add perspective to local events, yes, like my amusement at the national conference of the International Cat Association. I’ll strive to offer some relatively more valuable information too.

I appreciate greatly the notoriety and impressive company.

As part of its agreement with FCC to take over majority stake in NBC Universal, Comcast pledged to, among other things, bolster local news.

A half dozen NBC local affiliates, including Philadelphia, announcing a request for proposals to partner with nonprofit news organizations is just that.

I’d sure hope attention is being paid by WHYY and its NewsWorks initiative and the Philadelphia Public Interest Information Network, both of which could create some dynamic, interesting partnerships with a broadcast outlet with a large online audience to boot.

Applications are due next Friday, July 22. Details and applications here.

Four years later, I’m finishing this piece of archiving business.

A couple months ago, I announced I had moved my honors thesis to a subdomain of this site for the sake of organization and archiving. Following up on that resolution to make more tidy a rambling online portfolio, I have brought another dated, collection of work of which I am proud under this house.

I spent the better chunk of 2006 in Tokyo video podcasting, writing, traveling and learning on behalf of NBC Universal Digital Studios. Now all of that work can be found at japan.christopherwink.com.

See all the Episodes here and all the Archives here. Go and explore.

A few things interested me from my work in 2006:

• Short, bad titles — The post headlines were all short and sometimes not even descriptive. I didn’t recognize then the importance.
• I wrote a lot — I far outpaced all of my fellow castmembers in output, which is great, but I could have made much of the content terser and more straightforward.
• I actually had comments — On many posts, I had a handful of comments. I haven’t transferred them… yet.
• I never linked – I didn’t have a single link to a past post.
• Photo albums, not in posts – Photos and the video episodes were never embedded. This is the one major change I’ve made, by incorporating them.
• Yes, I called posts ‘blogs’ — But that was 2006. What’s the excuse today?
• I learned and experienced so damn much — I interacted with an audience and explored and created multimedia, but ultimately, I was just a young kid learning. ..And what a clear stepping stone toward the WDSTL podcast I did while in Western Europe.

UPDATE Feb. 12, 2011: All my NBCU JYA writing, video and photo work has been transferred to subdomain japan.christopherwink.com.

I sent in a two minute video to NBC’s Manhattan headquarters in June 2006. It was an altogether last minute decision. I saw the promotion of the pilot season of an NBC show called ‘Junior Year Abroad’ in an email that came from the communications department of Temple University. I decided there wasn’t anything to be lost.

Not a month later I heard back. After a brief interview and legal semantics, I was offered a spot on the show. I was driven to New York City for an introduction and training, given several hundred dollars worth of equipment and had my semester studying in Japan essentially paid for by a corporation. During my five month stay, I filmed 10 hours video, took more than 1,300 photographs and wrote nearly 60,000 words on my experience in Asia. It offered me a world of knowledge, the only cost being a more passionate desire to see and explore more while I was abroad.

Ten, in all, young college students from across the country, traveling to different parts of the world were selected, as seen above, the only time we met.

The NBC crew used my footage to produce five show-specific pieces, which you can see below, in addition to another seven podcasted videos while I was living in Tokyo, which you can see here.

Premiere JYA Video

My Audition Tape

My First JYA Video

See additional videos during my time in Japan here.

My Last JYA Video

Concluding JYA Episode

UPDATE Feb. 12, 2011: All my NBCU JYA writing, video and photo work has been transferred to subdomain japan.christopherwink.com.

During the fall semester of my junior year in 2006, I studied in Tokyo, Japan, using photographs, video and a blog to chronicle my nearly six months there. I was prompted to take 1,300 photos, capture almost 10 hours of video and write nearly 60,000 words because I was a cast member on the pilot season of an online-only show produced by NBC. Since the show was never picked up or continued and its Web site has since been taken offline, follow my exploits here, below.

Read the first post I wrote for NBC after arriving in Tokyo here, and my final reflections I wrote while in Tokyo, days before I returned to the United States, here. I also wrote a reflection about study abroad experience in Japan.

Watch the strictly NBC episode specific videos here, or watch the ones produced while I was traveling below.

Disorientation – I welcome you to Japan and manage to get lost in the first days of my semester abroad.

Read the first blog post I wrote, just hours after arriving in Tokyo, here.

Mount Fuji – I climb Japan’s tallest peak, a 13,000-foot dormant volcano. This was easily my most popular video.

Donald Richie – I interview the acclaimed American-born author who is considered the authority on Japanese art, culture and film.

Japan Culure – I try to find real traditional Japanese culture in a modern world.

Japanese Food – I explore lots of Japanese food options, some of which I share.

Trips – I visit the fall colors of Nikko, the history of Kyoto and the deer of Narra.

Scavenger Hunt – I tour Tokyo one last time in a hunt for a handful of items my mother thought I wouldn’t be able to find.

Read the last blog post I wrote, just days after I returned to the United States, here.

The above videos are those that regard my adventures in Japan. For additional JYA material, including my audition tape and reflections, go here.