RANDOM PIXELS

KOCT’s major project, to convert our mobile studio to a hi-definition production facility moved closer to completion today with the ordering of two additional hi-definition cameras. Thanks to Station Manager Jacob Rush and Chief Engineer Bill Peters for the extensive research and efforts on this important KOCT production tool.

KOCT is producing many more Newsbriefs on a variety of topics that you can look forward to seeing in the coming weeks with Editor Shawn Lennon, creating a new hi-definition opening. Editor and Producer Angela Wong has begun working on her most recent Newsbriefs: “El Corazon Recycling Center” and “Oceanside Museum of Art new Marketing Director and Artist”. Editor and Producer Peter Bonscher recently completed another Newsbrief on local sustainable grocer “Frazier Farms” and is currently working on a Newsbrief about an Adult Music program at the Museum of Making Music while also producing a Newsbrief on Oceanside’s LGBTQ Town Hall meeting on January 30^th, 2015. Thanks to this talented production team for helping to shoot, edit and share the many community events occurring in our North County community.

Shawn Lennon

Angela Wong

Peter Bonscher

You might have noticed on our most recent Journalist Roundtable a new graphic addition “Why This Matters”—KOCT will add this brief explanation to many of our programs in order to help you understand why we pick certain subjects, invite specific guests and ‘Why This Matters’.

KOCT could not produce the volume and quality of programs without  the efforts of a our many part-time employees AND our student interns and volunteers:

• Thanks to volunteer Maya Maravilla who edits our North County Talks program “Faith and the Common Good”. She has done a great job and spends many hours to not only edit this program but provide quality camera work in our studio.
• Palomar Community College Intern Damian Mickey has been working on our ongoing Archive project. KOCT has produced well over 6,000 programs and many of them are on older, obsolete video formats—S-VHS and U-Matic ¾. We are reviewing our older programs and transferring to digital DV cam and/or DVD.
• Finally KOCT welcomes our newest volunteer Board of Director Frank Gould who will help our other board members to raise funds, encourage viewers to join our Friends of KOCT and other behind the scenes efforts that have helped make KOCT Your Community Channel. 

     

Maya Maravilla

    

Damian Mickey

THE STORY OF YOUR COMMUNITY

This week in pictures:

Journalist Roundtable

       

        

       

Ribbon Cutting Encinitas Community Park

        

        

Oceanside Spectrum

       

       

Friend of KOCT Recording

                            

Attention Spans & Community Events

One of my first creative editing projects at KOCT occurred about 27 years ago and is reflective of today’s topic ‘Attention Spans & Community Events’. Matt Beck and I spent an early spring day videotaping the ‘beach opening’ event at the pier band shell, musical groups, jet ski’s, dancing and speeches. I edited a 12 minute highlight program and showed it to my boss, the late founder of KOCT, Bob Bowditch. He said he enjoyed the program but that KOCT normally didn’t spend that much time in the field, editing and not produce a 60 minute program.

Fast forward to the new monthly series of Newsbriefs that KOCT is now producing that average 2 minutes in length. There is a multitude of reasons (and media choices) that explain shorter programs and shorter attention spans including:

•     People with smartphones/tablets now spend an average of almost 3 hours each day on them
•     Viewers are watching less live television but spending more time in front of other media screens
•     On-line video viewing is increasing for all Americans

A article in the Brookings Institution, ‘The Bad News about the News’ stated it well “ Today’s young people skitter around the Internet like ice skaters, exercising their short attention spans by looking for fun and, occasionally, seeking out serious information. Audience taste seems to be changing, with the result that among young people particularly there is a declining appetite for the sort of information packages that great newspaper provided….”

Another article on the increasingly blurred line between advertising and ‘straight news’ puts this dilemma well:  “…audiences only have a fixed amount of attention, and that on the Web they’re only one cluck away from every piece of information on the planet, the challenge was not on  how to compete against other brands, it was how to compete with media-all of it”.*Columbia Journalism Review / Nov-Dec 2014 “The Wolf at the Door”

KOCT has done a good job meeting some of these challenges all of our programs are available as Video On Demand which means viewers can watch any program not just when it is scheduled on KOCT’s television channel 18 & 19 but wherever they are via their smart phone, tablet or computer.

However one dilemma both we the program producer and you the viewer face is the challenge of connecting with local information. Tonight’s Journalist Roundtable is a perfect example we have 4 great guests each of whom will be interviewed for about 12 minutes each, a reasonable amount of time to explore issues such as gang violence, our community hospital or hear what our Mayor believes are the important issues he will address in 2015.  But 12 minutes is about 10 times as long as the ‘average’ cable news interview and far longer than the average funny cat video.

The difference is that community issues do more than amuse, they inform. The topics involve your family, neighbors, co-workers and children. The topics may concern your neighborhood and for example, could affect your commute in the morning. Community issues often require an attention span and a little bit of time to learn about the various sides and issues.

KOCT’s disadvantage is we are in a world-wide-web competition for your attention. Our advantage is we are the only one of those media choices whose sole focus is the issues and events of North San Diego County. KOCT doesn’t expect we are your only choice, but we should be one of them. Because you can stay connected to your community by tuning to KOCT-Your Community Channel.

MEDIA PARTNERSHIP

KOCT mission, goal and purpose is to inform our north county community about people, places and events in north county. It was easier to do when television and traditional daily newspapers were the main source of news and information. But oh how times have changed! Todays residents now receive their entertainment and information from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, smart phones, I pads and the Internet, on a minute by minute information tsunami!

Fortunately KOCT is not alone in our quest to inform north county residents. KOCT is teaming up with other media professionals in north county so it is easier to watch KOCT’s many programs.

Today, for example, Osidenews.com added KOCT to its front page mast head to make it easy to see the latest KOCT News Brief. Steve Marcotte is the managing editor for this on-line newspaper and he is already registering 30,000 views per month!  Osidenews.com, in addition to up to the minute news coverage, provides human interest stories, business, sports, health and more.

I first heard about this new media resource when he added former KOCT Board member, Tom Morrow, as a regular columnist. Tom is well known throughout north county and his column was greatly missed by many readers after the demise of the North County Times. It is great to be in partnership again with old friend Tom Morrow and with new friend, Steve Marcotte and the Osidenews.com!

(Steve will be one of our guests in our new season of Journalist Roundtable on  January 8^th  2015-stay tuned)

Election Programming and KOCT FUNdraiser

In the beginning KOCT began covering candidate forums and ballot proposition with volunteers because KOCT Founder Bob Bowditch felt it was a service to our community. You might say KOCT’s independent status was born out of election programming because that was the impetus for KOCT to become a 501 3 c non-profit over 30 years ago. 

When the City of Oceanside provided general fund support for KOCT they included in our contract of needed services election programs, but then in 2011 cut all of KOCT’s general fund dollars and the requirement to produce election programs.

However KOCT’s staff and volunteer Board of Directors felt, like Founder Bob Bowditch, that this was an important service to our community and that is why in 2014 KOCT continues to produce more local election programming than any television station in San Diego County !

How can we continue to produce programs about City Council, MiraCosta College, Oceanside School District and Hospital candidates?  Because of community support for KOCT and events like our upcoming 13^th Annual Outback FUNdraiser!

Without this FUNdraiser, grants and production income KOCT would not have the staff or resources to produce informative Election programs. So help us out and attend this years FUNdraiser.

The event will be at the Outback Steakhouse in Oceanside on Thursday, October 23^rd with seating’s at 11:30 am and 1:00 pm. There will also be an opportunity drawing and silent auction.

If you can’t attend you can still support KOCT by sponsoring an active duty military family in our “meals for military” program on Saturday, October 25^th.

Tickets are only $20 for adults and $10 for children 10 and under.

For more information or to purchase tickets contact any member of the KOCT Board of Directors or call KOCT at 722-4433!

Support KOCT election programming, an informed electorate and our local military families by attending this years 13^th annual Outback Steakhouse because KOCT is Your Community Channel!

KOCT’s Election Programming Season Has Begun!

Hope you caught last weeks engaging Journalist Roundtable featuring the Candidates for the Oceanside City Council, if not you will not want to miss it. You can watch this special Journalist Roundtable and be an informed voter by viewing this episode on Channel 18 Monday thru Friday at 7:00AM and 6:00PM as well as Sundays at 7:00AM and 10:00AM.

One of our two Journalist, Logan Jenkins has written an insightful column about the show:

Thursday night on KOCT, Oceanside’s community TV station, Kent Davy (former editor of the North County Times) and I asked questions to the four principal candidates for two City Council seats. Incumbents Jerry Kern and Gary Felien are challenged by former Councilman Chuck Lowery and community activist Dana Corso. These were my take-aways from the spirited back-and-forth:

Click here to read the rest of the column.

JRT Guests Included:

Candidate Dana Corso, president of Alliance of Citizens To Improve Oceanside Neighborhoods (ACTION), says that she was a leading voice in speaking against Proposition E, which threatened to end rent control in mobile home parks.  She commented that as a councilwoman she will have a greater opportunity to serve the people and neighborhoods of Oceanside as a voice for the people that is currently absent in the City Council majority decision-making. 

Gary Felien, a current council member, is seeking re-election and he says he will continue to keep improving Oceanside. He says that as a result of his election in Nov 2010, a new council majority based on fiscal responsibility was formed and they immediately set to work to turn the city around from the dire straights the past majority had placed the city in. 

Candidate Chuck Lowery, an active Board Member of the Oceanside Charitable Foundation, says he wants to create jobs, and that he has the experience and expertise necessary to cultivate a thriving economic environment. According to comments he has made he will cut spending as he will fight tirelessly for balanced budgets. He said he cares deeply for the City of Oceanside and its residents.

Jerome Kern, an incumbent, is seeking re-election after a 6 year term. He indicates he has worked hard to bring positive change to Oceanside by championing issues that can make our city a better place to live, do business and enjoy our unique recreational opportunities.

Robert Tran was invited but did not attend.

Election Programming and The FCC

Tune to KOCT - Channel 18, Thursday September 4th at 6 pm for a one-hour “live” Journalist Roundtable program. KOCT’s election season programming begins featuring a special Journalist Roundtable questioning Oceanside City Council Candidates. You’ll want to watch this special Journalist Roundtable and be an informed voter.

Our Guests will include:

Candidate Dana Corso, president of Alliance of Citizens To Improve Oceanside Neighborhoods (ACTION), says that she was a leading voice in speaking against Proposition E, which threatened to end rent control in mobile home parks.  She commented that as a councilwoman she will have a greater opportunity to serve the people and neighborhoods of Oceanside as a voice for the people that is currently absent in the City Council majority decision-making. 

          

                                           Dana Corso                                                 Gary Felien

Gary Felien, a current council member, is seeking re-election and he says he will continue to keep improving Oceanside. He says that as a result of his election in Nov 2010, a new council majority based on fiscal responsibility was formed and they immediately set to work to turn the city around from the dire straights the past majority had placed the city in. 

Candidate Chuck Lowery, an active Board Member of the Oceanside Charitable Foundation, says he wants to create jobs, and that he has the experience and expertise necessary to cultivate a thriving economic environment. According to comments he has made he will cut spending as he will fight tirelessly for balanced budgets. He said he cares deeply for the City of Oceanside and its residents.

          

                                       Chuck Lowery                                             Jerome Kern

Jerome Kern, an incumbent, is seeking re-election after a 6 year term. He indicates he has worked hard to bring positive change to Oceanside by championing issues that can make our city a better place to live, do business and enjoy our unique recreational opportunities.

Robert Tran is a first time candidate and an Oceanside native. He was born, raised and currently resides in Oceanside and said he is running for City Council to ensure that Oceanside continues to grow in all economic ownership sectors and that all taxpayers of Oceanside deserve a city that is fiscally responsible and is not in the hand of special interest groups or of personal interest. (Photo not available)

The host for Journalist Roundtable is veteran journalist Kent Davy and he will be joined on Columnist Logan Jenkins from the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Currently the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is considering Comcast’s acquisition of Time Warner Cable. Public, Education and Government (PEG) advocates have submitted a number of comments they hope the FCC will consider before they allow for further consolidation of big media entities. For example, American Community Television believes this potential merger will put PEG TV stations at risk saying “We request that the FCC protect PEG access television by rejecting the proposed transaction or conditioning the proposed merger on curing the various problems we have outlined”—Example cited included loss of channels, PEG closures in many states, lack of programming guide description and charging governments to provide PEG programming.

Access Humboldt has also filed FCC comments and they suggest that if the transfer were to occur the FCC should prohibit discrimination against PEG channels and ensure that PEG channels have the same features and functionality and signal quality as they do for local broadcasters as well as requiring PEG channels to be distributed on the HD tiers.

KOCT is and has faced many of the issues cited above: Cox Cable & AT&T will not post our program schedule which makes recording KOCT programs via their DVR’s time consuming and complicated. And AT&T’s DVR won’t even record the PEG channels manually!

Over the past 20 years there have been more & more media  mergers and less requirements for public interest programming—this despite the fact that these communications giants use the public right of ways to conduct private business for a profit. It is not to much to ask that out of the thousands of channels they provide that they not only allow a few channels to be dedicated to the communities they do business in but to actually support those entities by treating them with the same level of support they do for the commercial channels. And in fact, according to grandfathered local franchises and the new state franchise they should already be doing so!

I am hopeful the FCC will not agree to the merger of these two communications giants without an agreement of better support for the many small community PEG channels across the country like KOCT-YOUR community channel. 

KOCT’s partnerships with schools, the faith community and The Coast News:

At KOCT’s recent Open House we met parents and teenagers interested in KOCT and our Internship program.  Many of our local schools, such as Rancho Buena Vista, have excellent student internship programs and KOCT has trained many of their students and utilized their skills to produce community programming.

KOCT continues to produce a wide variety of programs—documentaries and topical talk shows such as North County Talks: Faith & the Common Good. The program is hosted by the Pastor of North Coast United Methodist Church, Pastor TS Harris. They have tackled many challenging and topical subjects such as the Minimum Wage, Human Slavery and Affordable Housing. Check out their most recent show.

I would also like to announce a new KOCT partnership with another local media resource, The Coast News.  Now, in every addition of this weekly newspaper  you can find a weekly listing of KOCT latest programs and the date and time they will be airing. Thank you to Chris Kidd, the Advertising Manager and Associate Publisher for the Coast News Group for his support of KOCT.  The Coast News is also expanding and starting this month they will be publishing an inland addition of their popular newspaper. KOCT wishes them well in their new endeavor. We also appreciate that The Coast News Managing Editor, Tony Cabala, has been offering his expertise as one of the journalists on our popular Journalist Roundtable program.

This Week's "Live" JRT Plus Upcoming "Open House"

Watch tonights’ Journalist Roundtable on KOCT’s Community Channel 18 “LIVE” at 6pm—Guests include Francine Busby the Chair of the San Diego County Democratic Party,  Gary Felien of The Republican Party of San Diego County, Chris Van Gorde, President & CEO- Scripps Health and  Councilmember Jerry Kern, of the San Onofre Community Engagement Panel .  Watch on Cox Cable in Oceanside, AT&T U-Verse Ch 99-county wide or watch on your Smart Phone, Tablet or Computer by clicking here.

KOCT Open House-Celebrating 30 years! One week from now KOCT will host its annual Open House & Forum. This free event will be on Thursday, June 12 from 4 pm to 6:30 pm.

Attendees can take a studio tour and see how television programs are recorded, edited and televised. You can experience green screen magic and drivers of any age can take a drive around Oceanside without leaving the KOCT studio. Find out how your non-profit can appear on Oceanside Spectrum and KOCT Board members will be on hand to answer any questions. We will also have a KOCT swag raffle and tell you how you can become a Friend of KOCT to support your community channel in producing more programs for, by and about the community we live our lives in.  RSVP by calling 760-722-4433 or koct@koct.org.

THIS WEEKS COMMUNITY CONNECTION NEWS

The Bob Bowditch Scholarship fund was established by Ida Bowditch upon the passing of KOCT’s founder, Bob Bowditch in 1989. Every year annually KOCT awards a small scholarship to Oceanside or El Camino High School graduates whose intent is to have a college major in communications or media studies. Our 2014 Scholarship Recipient is Joshua Montiel from El Camino High School. In his application he wrote “A good film takes you into the story and lets you become a character; you begin to feel the emotions as if you are part of the film itself. It distracts you from everyday stress and worries. For the length of the film nothing else exists but the story you are taking part in”. Watch for Joshua’s appearance on a future Oceanside Spectrum when he will be interviewed by Spectrum Host: Elaine Swann!

Congratulations Joshua!

KOCT’s founder, Bob Bowditch

Speaking of Elaine Swann her latest book “LET CRAZY BE CRAZY” (you can order her book on her website) has just been published and it contains practical examples, tips and advice on the perils of what she calls “Crazy Folk.” Whether in our professional environments or family and personal relationships, they exist. Swann gives sensible guidance on:

How to identify Crazy Folk, How to get rid of toxic Crazy Folk and How to deal with the Crazy Folk in situations where we have no choice, such as work, in volunteer organizations and with family members. Elaine is currently on a coast to coast tour including appearances on television stations all across the county. As you can tell we are Crazy about Elaine who, by the way, will be our host at our June 12^th Open House and Forum.

Host, Elaine Swann

•  Next week, Tuesday June 3rd is Primary Election Day. What will the results mean? Will incumbents lose and be forced to fight for their office in the November election or did they slide to victory over their aspiring challengers? For insightful analysis you’ll want to tune to next Thursday Nights (June 5^th- 6 pm / Channel 18) Journalist Roundtable where our first two guests will help in our Election Dissection. Our first guest will be Francine Busby-the Chair of the San Diego County Democratic Party and our second guest will be  the Treasurer of The Republican Party of San Diego County. Both will discuss the outcome of the June primary at both the local and regional level.

Our other two guests will discuss two important subjects in the news: Health Care and the decommissioning of San Onofre Power Plant.

Chris Van Gorder is the President & CEO of Scripps Health—his path to CEO is an unusual journey and Scripps has many health facilities in North County. He’ll discuss changes in health care since the passage of the Affordable Care Act and Scripps plans for health care in North County.

Our last guest will be Councilmember Jerry Kern who is a member of the newly formed Community Engagement Panel which is looking into issues related to the decommissioning of the San Onofre Power Plant.

Our Journalist for next week JRT will be Host Kent Davy, KPBS’s Alison St. John and the Managing Editor for The Coast News, Tony Cagala. Don’t miss JRT- “It’s Good TV”!

• Finally don’t forget to mark your calendar for Thursday, June 12^th from 4pm to 6:30 pm. KOCT is inviting everyone interested in touring your community channel to our annual Open House and Forum! (more in next week’s Community Connection)

          Save the Date-June 12^th Open House