Harvey Levin: Sensationalist or Soothsayer?

“Leave the heavy stuff. Just go.”

That’s what the voice inside my head said when I read in The Washington Post (WP) that TMZ founder and celebrity gossip peddler Harvey Levin recently addressed journalists at the National Press Club about the future of news media.

It wasn’t the first time I’d considered hightailing it. I all but booked passage to Canada after FOX’s coverage of the Casey Anthony trial. Then came the Tea Party. Real Housewives. The economy. Bailouts. LiLo. Kate Freaking Gosselin. I packed a duffle bag on Kim Kardashian’s Big Day. (See: I told you so.)

But each time something stopped me. This was America, I thought—cooler heads and all that. I looked to the news media for solace. I read magazine and newspaper articles. I formed opinions. And I convinced myself that the vast majority of people in this country, whether we agreed or not, still could discern between unbiased, objective news coverage and overt sensationalism. As someone who makes his living in media, I needed to believe that.

And I was doing OK—for a while. Until Harvey Levin showed up.  

Who Does Harvey Levin Think He Is?

TMZ’s knack for catching stars (often on tape) in train-wreck moments is the stuff of legend.

But the fact that the Washington establishment, perhaps among the last strongholds of serious newsmen and women, would humor Levin, whose flagship product currently features a poll about Lindsay Lohan in the buff and a live stream of the Conrad Murray (the doctor accused of killing Michael Jackson) trial, illustrates a progressive streak with serious implications for the future of media and content.

It’s not as if Levin entirely lacks credibility. As the WP’s Paul Farhi pointed out, the gossip peddler’s growing empire, backed by a partnership with AOL, now features a web site with more than 20 million monthly unique visitors, a television spinoff, and a radio show. That’s better than your local newspaper or television network can claim.

Levin has his share of detractors. His company and its content are constantly under fire for feeding the nation’s seemingly insatiable appetite for celebrity misfortune. His news reports, which often feature journalists wielding hand-held cameras or sticking microphones in famous faces as they duck into waiting limousines, have emboldened a brazen paparazzi culture that some say borders on harassment. He’s been accused of (and unequivocally denied) paying for scoops. And his rush to publish, sometimes at the expense of truth, has led to questions about his ethics.

Like Levin or loathe him, it’s hard to argue with his success. And, given the fact that my Passport was not in my sock drawer (where I know I left it), I decided to delay my self-imposed exile long enough to hear what the guy had to say.

As the WP’s Farhi reported, and as you could expect, Levin jumped all over the traditional news media. He blasted newspapers and magazines for being arcane and slow to change. It’s nothing we haven’t heard before. But, considering the source, it stung, especially when WP quoted Levin asking, “What is the magic of holding a piece of paper in the air when you read? You [in the news media] think you have to preserve this. Why?”

Like most magazine purists, I’m wont to bristle at such questions. Is Levin not privy to recent research? Despite modest declines at the largest newspapers, several sources have indicated that print readership is on the rise, particularly at niche and custom publications. A 2010 poll of magazine readers by the Chief Marketing Officer Council found that 90 percent of adult magazine subscribers still prefer to receive information in print, with just 24 percent of respondents saying they plan to eventually switch to an e-reader for personal magazine consumption.

A coalition of five major magazine publishers, including Hearst, Conde Nast, Time, and other heavyweights, has cited statistics from industry research firm Mediamark Research & Intelligence that indicates a 4.3 percent spike in magazine readership in the past five years.

Given those figures, it would be easy dismiss Levin’s abject prognosis of print as the ravings of a self-professed internet sensationalist. It still doesn’t explain why so many of us in print (a) go on the defensive; or (b) freak out every time our critics challenge us to look to the future—or, in our case, to youth.

Levin, an ex lawyer, had an answer for that, too. “Young people aren’t interested in traditional media,” the WP reported him as saying last week. “It doesn’t speak to them.”

It’s hard to imagine anyone pulling the Band-Aid off any slower than that. But he’s right. Though print readership is strong now, the content industry stands to look far different a decade from now.

Publishing consultant Bo Sacks considered that inescapable reality when he wrote last year in Publishing Executive about a study conducted by his research firm, Media-Ideas. He quoted report author David Rendard: “Over the next 10 years, the magazine industry will experience deep-rooted change from primarily a print-oriented business to one where digital products will represent the largest share of a smaller periodical industry.”

Sacks said researchers expect digital to be the primary source of revenue for magazines past 2016-17. Thanks to the proliferation of Apple’s iPad and the emergence of e-readers, the report projects that digital content consumption will skyrocket from 10 percent of total magazine market share in 2009 to 58 percent by 2020.

Does that mean we will all be out of a job in ten years? Hardly. The beauty of content, whether you’re talking straight news, celebrity gossip, or special interest features for custom-created magazines, is that it succeeds or fails independent of the medium on which it is delivered.

But, and maybe this is what TMZ’s Levin hoped to impress upon folks during his recent visit to Washington, it does mean that newspaper and magazine publishers, and anyone who creates content for a living, need to evolve alongside their readers.

Do yourself a favor: Take Levin’s advice with a grain of salt. Nobody is telling anybody to ditch their print magazine. Print does and will always have its place. So too will web sites and video and smart phone readers for people on the go. The challenge isn’t to choose one method of content delivery over another, but to offer a complementary suite of tools that enlivens, extends, and enriches the reader experience.

That’s exciting. And, at least for me, reason enough to stick around a while longer.

[Image: shironekoeuro]