>> the vast majority of people what they want from pop culture is comfort food. they want to be relaxed. they want to turn off their brains. the side of effect of big data in the music industry has been i think to make the product more repetitious. >> woodruff: plus, montana is home to great fishing, but illegal dumping of non-native fish is threatening the fragile ecosystem, even as it baits the lucrative sports fishing tourist. those are some of the stories we're covering on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> thanks for my first car. thanks for giving me your smile, your motivation, and your belief that loved ones always come first. we wouldn't be where we are if it were not for the people that helped get us here. don't forget to thank those who helped you to take charge of your future and got you where you are today. the boss of your life. the chief life officer. lincoln financial. you're in charge. >> supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: americans at home and abroad celebrated this thanksgiving holiday. the annual macy's thanksgiving day parade passed through the streets of manhattan. other cities across the country hosted their own festive processions. meanwhile, u.s. forces stationed in afghanistan enjoyed a feast with turkey and all the trimmings even as attacks on british forces rocked other parts of the capital city. the bulk of u.s. combat troops are preparing to leave the country by year's end. >> you know any thanksgiving that you are on god's green earth is a good thanksgiving to celebrate. i couldn't have found any better people to celebrate it with here. obviously, i would rather be with a little bit more good looking of a person, but my wife can't be here unfortunately and i could not be home, so this is a good replacement and i am not complaining at all. >> woodruff: but back in the northeastern u.s., many were forced to celebrate this thanksgiving in the dark. hundreds of thousands of people were still without power after the first major snowstorm of the season. ferguson, missouri seemed to take a pause from protesting to observe thanksgiving, but elsewhere around the country there were vocal demonstrations about the grand jury's decision earlier in the week not to convict officer darren wilson for killing 18-year-old michael brown. >> no justice no peace, no racist police. chants filled the air as the protesters made their way towards new york city's macy's thanksgiving day parade this morning. their goal: disrupt the event and bring attention to the grand jury decision to indict the police officer who shot and killed 18-year-old michael brown in august. but police pushed back, and eventually, at least seven people were taken away in handcuffs. and in ferguson, missouri this morning, residents hoped a thanksgiving day calm would last. >> i think a lot of people have seen a lot of the destruction and the rough parts of this week and the past few months. but, there's been a lot of people out here really centered on love and peace and community. >> woodruff: streets were noticeably quieter last evening than in recent days, in part because of winter weather. some honked car horns during a caravan protest, while others gathered for a vigil at a makeshift memorial for michael brown. meanwhile, scattered protests continued around the nation overnight. in los angeles, hundreds of demonstrators criss-crossed downtown streets overnight, blocking traffic and disrupting many. >> i don't know what point they're proving, i think they're more wasting their own time and our time. >> woodruff: after more than five hours, police declared the assembly unlawful. >> they're running in front of traffic, and they have no idea what's going on and its a very dangerous situation both for these demonstrators as well as the motorists. >> woodruff: at least 145 protesters were taken into custody for refusing to disperse. >> apparently i'm getting arrested for walking down the street and voicing my frustration with our justice system. >> woodruff: but in oakland, california, demonstrations turned destructive once again. >> woodruff: later on in the program, we'll have more about how teachers, parents and students are dealing with the difficult conversations raised by the events in ferguson. 600 migrants fleeing violence in syria and iraq made it to shore on the greek island of crete today. they'd been adrift on a crippled freighter in international waters, after it lost engine power on tuesday. many of the migrants said they were from syria and iraq and were running from islamic state militants. greek officials said most on board the ship were in good health and will receive refugee status. >> ( translated ): they have been identified by police as being syrians. they are refugees, and based on the regulations of the world health organization and the united nations. they are not under arrest, they are free. they will be able to go where they want. >> woodruff: more than 99% of syrians who reach greece will eventually gain refugee status. this was one of the largest single crossings of its kind in recent years. britain gave more powers to scotland today, two months after voters narrowly defeated an effort to split from britain and seek total independence. today's political deal gives scotland the power to set income tax rates, influence welfare spending and decide how the scottish parliament is run. lord smith of kelvin led the effort to reach the compromise >> this gives the parliament more tools to pursue its own vision, goals and objectives whatever they might be at any particular time. the recommendations set out in the agreement will result in the biggest transfer of power to the scottish parliament since its establishment. >> woodruff: politicians from scotland's pro-independence administration welcomed the new powers but said they don't go far enough. >> many voices in civic scotland demanded the devolution of the welfare system, the minimum wage and control over equalities to fulfil the promise of substantial new powers that were so pivotal in the outcome of the referendum. i regret that these powers have not been delivered. >> woodruff: the proposals will be introduced as legislation in the u.k. parliament in january. comedian bill cosby gave an exclusive interview refuting sex assault allegations to a tabloid nine years ago in exchange for spiking another accuser's story. court documents from cosby's 2005 deposition were unsealed yesterday in philadelphia. he made the arrangement with the "national enquirer" during an ongoing lawsuit with a canadian woman. he said he feared the public would believe her if another accusation came to light. cosby has refused to discuss allegations of sexual assault raised by more than a dozen women in recent weeks. the cricket world mourned the loss of one its young players today. australian cricketer phillip hughes died after being hit on the head by a cricket ball during a match two days ago. he was wearing a helmet but the ball slipped through a small gap between his shoulder and the base of the hat. doctors said his injury was a freakish accident. hughes was 25-years-old. best-selling british crime writer p.d. james died today at her home in oxford, england. james was the author of 20 novels, including "the children of men", "death comes to pemberley," and "the murder room." more than a dozen of her works featured one of her most beloved characters, scotland yard detective adam dalgliesh. many of her best-sellers have also been adapted for film or television in britain and the u.s. p.d. james was 94-years-old. still to come on the newshour: suicide bomb attacks rock kabul, afghanistan. promising results from early trials of an ebola vaccine. how to explain what's happened in ferguson, missouri to young people. how the music industry uses big data to predict the next billboard hit. a pitch to break partisan gridlock with math and reason. and, the hunt for those responsible for invasive species being dumped in montana's rivers and lakes. >> woodruff: the taliban carried out a series of attacks in the afghan capital of kabul today. the insurgent group has stepped up violence in recent weeks, as the u.s. prepares to draw down its military presence there. it started with a taliban suicide bombing against a british embassy vehicle, killing five, including a british national. more than thirty people were hurt. >> ( translated ): people are wounded, even children, someone's eye was wounded, another ear was missing. wounded victims were everywhere. >> woodruff: then, later in the evening, another explosion. this one targeted the headquarters of an american relief agency. it was followed by more than an hour of heavy gunfire echoing through the usually quiet diplomatic quarter. no one was killed in this second round of fighting, but a third attack, with reports of gunfire and explosions continued late today. all this caps a violent week in afghanistan. on monday, two american soldiers were killed when their convoy was bombed by the taliban. on sunday, a suicide bomber targeted afghan police officials at a volleyball tournament in eastern afghanistan. 61 were killed, mostly civilians. the attacks come as the future u.s. military role in afghanistan becomes clearer. also on sunday, the parliament approved an agreement with the u.s. and nato, agreeing that 12,000 foreign soldiers could stay in the country through next year. parliament member shukria barekzai voted for the deal. >> i believe this is very important for the future of afghanistan. if i want my kids and millions of other children to live in prosperity, we need a strong partnership between afghanistan and the u.s. last week "the new york times" reported that the new afghan government, led by ashraf ghani, will allow u.s. special forces to assist afghan security forces in carrying out controversial nighttime raids. because of the high number of civilian casualties during such missions in the past, ghani's predeccesor, hamid karzai, had banned them. as their mission continues, u.s. soldiers in afghanistan were able to take part in thanksgiving day celebrations. >> i am definitely going to try and be home next year for thanksgiving. >> woodruff: it is the 14th thanksgiving that u.s. soldiers have marked in afghanistan. for more on today's attacks and other developments we turn to new york times correspondent rod nordland in kabul. i spoke to him a short while ago by skype. rod nordland, welcome. so it's been a day of attacks by the taliban, the latest in a series of attacks that they have been making. >> that's right. we had four attacks altogether today. most were pretty minor. one was quite serious, killed five people including a british body guard, i think working for the british embassy. and the frequency, although most weren't very successful, the frequency of the attacks is something we haven't seen in kabul before for quite a long time. >> woodruff: how unusual for them to be going after the diplomatic quarter in kabul? >> pretty unusual. this is a pretty heavily unguarded area. in the beginning of the year, there were horrendous attacks, one in a restaurant a couple blocks away from today's attack and killed 21 people, many foreign aid work withers and diplomats. then another attack on the same street in which a journalist was assassinated. but it is probably the most heavily guarded part of the city full of diplomats, journalists, aide groups and so on. so it's quite worrisome. it took a long time to subdue it. it went on pretty much for five hours, three attackers, before they finally caught the last one just about an hour ago, actually. >> woodruff: rod, we reported on the decision by the new president, president ghani, to permit u.s. special forces to work with the afghan forces in nighttime raids. how significant a move into? -- how significant a move is that? >> i think it's very significant. it changes a couple of years of contention between the united states and it's allies. president karzai was opposed to it. a lot of the attacks took place long after he ordered them to stop taking place, and it's a huge bone of contention between the two countries. the taliban are very concerned about it. according to the americans, it's the most effective weapon they have against taliban leadership, hunting them down in their homes at night when they're most vulnerable. it also has led to some really serious accidents and mishaps that have had a lot of blow-back publicly. karzai responded to that and president ghani seems to be more concerned about restoring a tool that's very effective. >> woodruff: and, rod, we reported in the last few days about the decision of the obama administration to have a larger number of u.s. troops in afghanistan into 2015. how much difference is that expected to make? >> there's still pretty small numbers we're talking about. still nobody thinks it's going to be more than 12,500, including european and n.a.t.o. troops. 9,800 americans. even if it bumps up a little bit from that, it's still a small amount compared to two years ago when there were 100,000 nerns and 140,000 total n.a.t.o. >> woodruff: i don't know how often you're able to spend time with troops, but how do you read their morale these days? do you think they're accomplishing what they were sent there to accomplish? >> i think there's a lot of confusion, and, you know, i think a lot of people -- a few months ago, we were really -- and even now to some extent, really in the kind of let's get out of here and put this behind us mode, and we steel feel a lot of that. although a lot of the troops that are here now will be gone by the end of the year and rapidly drawing it down, but there are some whose tours have just begin and will be going into next year and i think there's a feeling that this is really kind of america's forgotten war. i feel that way as a journalist that it's kind of the forgotten war, even though we're here covering it. people back home are not really interested anymore. we do it as a duty to keep people informed, but i don't feel this great, overwhelming interest and concern about it that we used to have. >> well, i hear what you're saying and on a day when we with turn to the story because of the taliban attacks in kabul, that's what caught everyone's attention, and unfortunately it's bad any way, but on thanksgiving day, it certainly gets our attention. rod nordland reporting for us from kabul, afghanistan. rod, we thank you. >> pleasure. >> woodruff: now to promising news in the search for an ebola vaccine. researchers from the national institutes of health and the pharmaceutical company glaxosmithkline report that an experimental vaccine has been shown to be safe and, for the first time, to be successful in stimulating an immune response against ebola. the trial involved 20 healthy volunteers in bethesda, maryland. it was conducted by the national institute of allergy and infectious diseases at n.i.h. and its director, dr. anthony fauci, joins me now. welcome, dr. anthony fauci. >> thank you. good to be with you. >> woodruff: on this thanksgiving day, we appreciate your coming in. so only 20 people involved in this study. it's only been underway a lit morning tha two months. how is it possible to know already that it may be successful. >> when we say successful, we mean we've answered successfully two questions that a phase one early trial like this asks. a, is it safe? and b, does it induce the kind of response in volunteers that you predict would be protective? the answer is yes. it was safe in the sense of really no prohibitive adverse events among 20 volunteers, and when we measured the response in them, it was commensurate with the good response wes saw in the animal model that actually protected the animal from challenge. the proof of the pudding now is to find out if, in reality, it protects. the first phases are successful and that's where we are now. >> woodruff: we know there's no ebola in this so it's not dangerous in that regard. >> right. >> woodruff: how does it work? hat happens is you take the gene of one particular protein of ebola, a glyco protein, and you stick it in a vaccine and give it to a person and the body gives the response to the protein. so the whole ebola virus is not in the vaccine so there's no chance of a danger of the vaccine giving any ebola. what you want it to do is make a good response against a part of ebola that would then protect you if you were exposed to ebola. >> woodruff: i read this involves a high dose of ebola. the ebola vaccine. how much does that comple wait -- complicate what you're trying to do? >> not a lot. what it means is that the company will have to make more for the number of people you will ultimately vaccinate. for example, the next phase which is planned to start sometime in mid january in west africa to answer the bottom line question does it work, that will involve thousands of people, so you're going to have the make a lot -- you're going to have to make a lot of product. it would be nice to have a low dosage but you don't get that advantage so you have to go with the dose you know works. >> woodruff: the question other question is i read it doesn't protect indefinitely and may not protect for very long. what do we know about that? >> the main, immediate goal now is to see if we can have an impact on the epidemic. so the amount of time you need, the duration of the protection is okay for the immediate. if you want it to be a longer range, we're already planning to test what we call a booster so that you give them the first prime, protect them for a period of time. if you want more long-range protection, then you come in with a booster. what we're looking at now is just that prime, as we call it, which would give protection enough to get us through several months to have the epidemic. >> but that makes it more complicated. >> it does, but when you're dealing with an emergent situation where you really have to move quickly, you want to get the product out there as quickly as you can. >> woodruff: you referred to the next step being a larger trial, thousands of people in west africa. how quickly can you move to that stuff? >> we're planning now. we have been to liberia a few times to look at the infrastructure there. hopefully, if things go well, by mid january, we'll be able to get the first doses into people for the trial. >> reportertrial. >> woodruff: we know there are a number of other trials underway around the world, in west africa and canada. >> right. >> woodruff: do those trials continue when you find one like this? >> absolutely. >> woodruff: how does that work? >> when we start the trial in west africa, we're not only going to test this particular vaccine we're talking about today but there is another vaccine made by a company called new link and produced together with the public health agency of canada, and we're going to test that vaccine at the same time as that we test the one we're talking about nowvment this isn't the only product. there were more than one. >> woodruff: what is the earlier time that a successful vaccine, do you think, could be available? >> i think if things go really well and the infection rate is high -- of course, the higher the infection rate, the quicker you get the answer, i think the earliest we'll know is sometime in the mid summer of 2015. >> woodruff: months aday. months away. phot a quick process. >> woodruff: dr. anthony fauci. we thank you. >> quite welcome. >> woodruff: as we saw earlier in today's protests around the country, the fallout from the ferguson decision continues to reverberate. the shooting, the grand jury's decision not to indict officer darren wilson and the subsequent protests have led to difficult discussions in many homes and communities, including among teachers and students in schools. jeffrey brown talked to two people with advice for how to handle these talks. >> brown: back in august, marsha chatline, a history professor at georgetown university started a conversation on twit were the hash tag ferguson syllabus. it quickly grew into a way for teachers across the country to share thoughts, resources around strategies to address the events of ferguson in their classrooms. in the last few days the conversation has taken off with several thousand contributors. marsha joins me and liz cohen, one of the teachers at the english latin public charter school in washington dee see. welcome to both of you. mar sharks what did you see happening? >> i was watching television every day and looking at the unrest in ferguson unfold and i was thinking about all the kids who weren't going to be at school the first day because of what happened. initially i started the conversation on twitter to get other college professors to dedicate the first day of classes to talk about ferguson. as i communicated on twitter, people across the opportunity at all grade levels wanted in on the conversation. >> there was a hunger for it. absolutely. >> brown: what kind of conversation among teachers did it lead to? >> initially, the conversation was what do i teach. then it grew into what do i say. how do i talk to students about issues that are contentious. how do i make sure we reduce conflict in the classroom and focus on what's important. what ferguson syllabus has provided is an opportunity for teachers not to feel isolated or alone in the process. >> brown: before we get into your classroom, tell us about the conversation among teachers who you know on how to deal with this. >> i was lucky in that it was organized at my school. we had faculty meetings set up to discuss it, where groups of us talk about how we felt and how we were going to teach it. different disciplines had different approaches and i started using this ferguson syllabus twitter account to get ideas about what to do in my classroom. i was lucky that as a faculty we shared ideas on what theo do and how to approach this. >> so first is how do well feel and then how do we teach it. >> yes. and then using the resources, what unfolded in the classroom, what kinds of things were you able to do? >> one thing that really interested me from the twitter account was compromise, how did that effect what was going on? how did history change the context of what we're looking at. i talked to an american history teacher on perspective of how to news that in my classroom. i teach english so i was focused on text, media, facts, interpretation and how can we discuss these things and determine what the truth is, if that's possible to term, and the different perspectives, how do the professors feel, the police feel, different views in the classroom. >> brown: what other kinds overthings? that's history, contemporary media. what other kinds of things were being asked around? >> i think what was most exciting is teachers in all disciplines wanted in on the conversations. some science teachers talked about tear gas and the health effects of using tear gas on sens. i heard from a professor of fashion design to talk about the way protest styles have influenced the shape of american fashion. >> brown: really? yes. i heard from music teachers who said we'll spend time looking at elements of protest music and songs for different movements. i think what was most inspiring about ferguson syllabus is it wasn't the usual cast of characters having a conversation about race and conflict and policing, but people across all fields wanted to engage students thoughtfully. >> brown: liz collins, you said something a minute ago about determining the truth. when information is coming at us so quickly especially in social media, there's misinformation, right? how have you dealt with that? >> that's so tricky and something teenagers deal with all the time because they love twitter, facebook, instagram and the information moves faster than the fact checking. i think that's important for them to learn across the board. just because you're getting this information, who's the source, how trustworthy is it, what's that person and what's the organization bias, what do they want you to think and why. thinking about that goes beyond this issue but gives them a lens with which to approach the issue. every day we're learning more about what happened and having to sift through the facts and teaching in that skill is valuable in any subject and easily transferable. >> brown: what about differences in ages? teachers obviously have to deal with that, right? >> right. >> brown: how do you deal with age-specific type of lessons? >> one of the things that was important for me to do in this situation is to say some information is age appropriate and also climate appropriate. every school isn't the same, every school doesn't want to delve into this issue in the same way. for yinger kids, i think we need to focus on feelings. what is it like when people are anxious or afraid or scared and a lot of resources on children's that talk about emotions during times that are overwhelming. for slightly older kids, i think the paradigm of fairness, what happens when people feel like there's something under, what happens when people feel like their rights aren't being respected, you can engage in that conversation. so older kids, this is an amazing civic lesson about the various responsibilities that happened in a community and what happens when the trust is broken. >> woodruff:. >> brown: every school, it's how much do the children want to know. in your school, no question it was brought in as a conversation because it was there. >> there was no question at our school. some schools have been nervous about talking about it, but we have a strong foundation in talking about justice. that's really important in our school. we go from 5 to 12. so there's a whole range of different levels, what do kids know, what can they handle. in my classroom they started with the kwl chart. what do you want to know, what did you know and what do you want to learn. you get a lot of misinformation but you also get their feelings out. kids correct each other -- no, i heard that wasn't true, no, i don't know. and then you read articles and learn more and they can correct the idea they originally had. >> brown: what do you see is the role of parents? >> i would tell parents talk to your child but especially listen more than talk. how do they feel? what do they think is going on? listen to them as much as they can and get a sense of what they're seeing and feeling. in d.c., in our school population, we mix the different races and some students are taking this more personally than the others and feel frightened or upset, and i think they need to be heard, they need a place to express the feelings and it should happen at school and at home. their parents should give them an audience to talk about any feelings they have about this situation. >> brown: finally, marsha, to the extent it's a teaching moment, you use the cliche that literally it's a teaching moment. what do you hope comes out? >> i hope what comes out is nothing bad happens when we're honest and we talk to each other. nothing terrible happens because we've had an open conversation about race and communities and policing. and i also want to understand that we keep teaching because ferguson is continually in the struggle and that by bringing attention to what's happening in ferguson, we give more power to our own communities to make the change that we want to see. >> marsha, liz, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: the digital revolution has rocked the music business for more than a decade, changing the way we buy, play and discover new music. but it turns out digital technology has done more than just change the business model. increasingly, the data that is created by all of this music streaming, buying and sharing, is influencing the music that being created. it's all the subject of an article in this month's issue of "the atlantic" and as part of a partnership between the news hour and the atlantic, we took a closer look. ♪ >> woodruff: i traveled to new york city, which as loud as ever, is still an important center of the music business. ♪ drummer zach of the band mr. barrington has played for some of the greatest names of pop including u2 and mariah careyy. he now finds like many consumers there is almost too much choice in music. >> the sheer masses of choices make it hard to actually sometimes dig in and get behind, like, a particular artist because you're, like, oh, i like that but i want to hear these other 50. >> woodruff: writer derek thompson spent the last six months researching the big data behind the music. so the title of the piece you've written is the shazam effect. what does that mean? >> shazam is this imaginicle app that allows people to identify up to 30 million songs in the world. essentially you hear a song in a bar, restaurant, or on your television, you pick up your smartphone and press a button and within seconds the phone has identified the piece of music. >> woodruff: more than 12 years old, this app is ancient in digital terms, predating the smartphone, streaming services and most of online social media. shazam was somewhat of an accidental pioneer. shazam! >> so this tool that we use just to discover new music has become a tool that the music industry uses to shape the future pop music. so that is the shazam effect. >> woodruff: the company just celebrated its 15 billionth shazam, i met with its c.e.o. rich riley. >> if you were to talk to the record lately, standard procedure is to attach shazam charts to your proposals, because we can really help show when an artist is connecting with the audience implete you're in a position to predict what's going to move ahead? >> if it moves up the charts, it's a strong signal they will be a hit. >> what they have been building around the world is a size ma graph of public opinion about music. every time someone in brooklyn or atlanta or india hears a song they want to know more about, they press the button and say, shazam, tell me what this song is. >> it's a strong signal of love and intent and i want to know what that is. >> that tells the music industry here are the songs people are most interested in. >> i'm zooming in to shazam's hyperlocal charts. this shows where we are in mi midtown manhattan. when you click on the icon, there's the manhattan chart for right now. >> woodruff: in the process of all the shazamming, it seems the music we once listened to is now listening to us. you're saying consumers of music don't really understand? >> they're not thinking to themselves, this piece of information is going to fly up into the sky, into the cloud and the music industry is going to use it to determine the next big hit. >> woodruff: alex white is doing just that. at his company, next big sound. >> we've built up this enormous data set to understand the trajectory that artists go through from complete obscurity to global superstardom. >> woodruff: the company develops algorithm which literally evaluate every online move fans take, a gold mine for talent scouts and artists themselves. >> within each site, there is eight different methods you can track. you should pay more attention to this metric or this source because it's a strong leading indicator of your sales. >> on our little scale, we're doing a similar thing. ♪ we look at where people are buying what we're doing and it does inform us as to, you know, what our next moves might be. >> never has there been more of a consumer influence in how our charts reflect popular music. >> woodruff: silvio is vice president of charts and data development for billboard, the original top 40 specialists. >> we used to create our chart based on reports that were called in, but it was really just reported information from retailers and radio programmers as to what they claim were their biggest songs and albums. >> the deejays, the record store owners, had every reason to lie because they were often being paid by the music industry to pitch newer and newer songs. >> woodruff: in 1991, the billboard top 100 transitioned from call-in to point-of-sale a data. >> almost overnight, hip-hop and country just soared off the charts, and it became very clear that the hit men on the coast trying to predict the future of pop music were missing this urban music and the southern sound. >> woodruff: another effect of the digital revolution is that an industry once based on turnover has now become more focused on the familiar. >> and it's also made the quality of music, the chord progressions inside of music more derivative. so the side effect of big data in the music industry has been, i think, to make the product more repetitious. >> so how do you explain that, that people want to hear what they already know, rather than having any desire to explore something different? >> evolutionary psychologists' explanation for this is if i recognize it, it hasn't killed me yet. the vast majority of people what they want from cop culture is comfort food. they want to be relaxed. they want to turn off their brains. ♪ >> woodruff: some believe all this big data is creating pressure that undermines creativity. drummer zach danziger isn't convinced it does. >> i don't buy into the thing that now everything sounds the same because i think with any genre, it was always that thing of i want somebody who sounds like that, get me the next michael jackson. >> the power of a number one hit has just exploded. the top 1% of artists now command 77% of all recorded revenue. >> it's only in the last year or so that major labels have started hiring research guys, someone whose whole job is to identify promising new talent based on data. >> what music can do uniquely is cut through the clutter. >> rich riley is growing shazam, moving the app into everything from movies to tv shows, even commercials. >> we can show them 100,000 people shazammed your ad and people love the music and it's a chance to deepen the engagement with the consumer. >> woodruff: with the customizable search tool find, it's become closer to predicting the next big hit. >> it's a credit score for your professional career. >> woodruff: like credit scores the new ratings by big data music companies can be painful to hear. >> i don't even want to hear the yurms. >> woodruff: of course, taylor swift comes up in the epic category, but even after 20 years playing with leading musicians, zach danziger still rates as undiscovered. >> the numbers were always driving the record business, and that won't change, but hopefully creative music making will have an honesty to it despite all that and i think we're still in a very good place with that. >> woodruff: republicans and d.p.s. are as far apart as ever these cases special after the midterm elections but some are trying to change that. a bipartisan group of authors has written a new book, "moneyball for government," a data-driven approach to policy making endorsed by key players on both sides of the aisle including two counteru.s. senators, former white house staffers and policy experts. gwen ifill recently spoke to two of the book's contributors john bridgeland, a former domestic policy adviser for president george w. bush, and gene sperling, the director of the national economic council under presidents obama and clinton. >> ifill: gene sperling, john bidgeland, republicans and democrats sitting next to each other talking about thousand to fix. go one of the things in the "moneyball for government," you describe as playing ball in a sandlot, everybody gets a trophy, nobody keeping score. how is government policy like that? >> remarkably. less than one dollar out of a hundred of federal domestic spending is backed by most basic evidence. government managers across federal government, only 37% tell us they have significant evaluations over the last five years for their programs. so government is basically flying blind when it comes to government spending and gene and i and a bipartisan group of domestic, economic and budget policy advisors across three administrations want to bring a culture of evidence-based policy making to our federal departments and agencies in the congress. >> ifill: this reminds me of covering the clinton administration of which you were a part and al gore was tags binged with reinventing government which seems like a big thing to bite off and now we're calling to reinvent government again, aren't we? >> i think there's a special focus here. i think there is a lot of different ways to reinvent government and there's focus on being more customer friendly, customer oriented. i think what this is trying to say is to create a culture that you are always trying to, when you're making policy, ask where is the best evidence, make sure you are doing those evaluations. most people are doing very good things in public service and programs are doing -- a lot of programs are doing very well. just because there's not evidence base doesn't mean we're not doing the things. but it does mean we may not be learning the most or doing the most effective things. >> the term money ball you explained came from michael lewis and the pitt in which the oakland a's remade their team by looking dispassionately at numbers rather than adding talent or any of the kind of things they couldn't measure. >> right. >> ifill: but it seems in washington measurables are used to stop things, depending on whose measurable you use. >> gene makes a good point, out of the new market initiative and the clinton administration they created youth grants to deal with 167-24-year-olds who cost taxpayers $93 billion if they don't reconnect to school and employment every year, and this program didn't have any evaluation at the time, but it was a very innovative program and in the next few years, it was cut by the congress, completely eliminated and a few years later, there was an independent evaluation showing it had extraordinary outcomes in boosting employment, reconnection to school and work for the most vulnerable young team on tribal lands, rural areas and in cities. so that was a good example of gene's point, we can't just have an on/off switch. we're building an environment of continuous learning, building up the evidence base and then to support the efforts that are effective. >> ifill: in this political environment how do you stop everyone from lungeing from the off switch? i have evidence that proves this should not happen, end of discussion? >> well, i think that does happen and i think that's unfortunate. and i think in that case what's happening is people are really staying with an ideological true and they're -- ideological view and they're trying to use a piece of evidence to say we shouldn't make that area a mission of ours. i think what people like john and i think is there are things that are important we as a country should be doing on youth poverty, early childhood, working training and we're not looking for an on or off switch to say if one study doesn't work you give up the mission, but to learn. i think the example -- you know, my sister is a professor of immunology in chicago. when they're doing experiments they don't say, oh, that didn't work, let's give up as a country on finding a cure for cancer or aids, but they learn from it. it needs to be a tool for getting smarter and wiser in things we should have a shared mission of accomplishing. >> ifill: let me cite a timely example. so the tea party movement said they want a more efficient government, which sounds like what you're saying, but their interpretation of efficient might be the government should stay out of immigration reform, for instance. >> there are examples, like the even start family literacy program that multiple evaluations over time showed actually had no positive effect on the young people they were tryintrying to boost the literay rates for. so congress went on to spend more than a billion dollars over the next eight years on this program and we think about the opportunity costs -- >> ifill: so sometimes government should stay out of it? >> those funds should have been redirected. eventually the program was eliminated. it should have been eliminated eight years ago. so there are good examples when there's clear evidence that a program should be shut down. on immigration, i think we're having, you know, a process and a substantive debate. i'll leave the process debate aside, but on the substantive side, "moneyball for government" would cause us to think about not only how to secure our border and enforce the immigration laws in a more cost-effective way, but also how do we bring the millions of peel out of the shadows working hard in this country doing other jobs many others wouldn't do, do it law abiegd and in a way that brings evidence of what's the effect on the economy, local communities, our culture and our heritage, and i think that kind of approach could re invigorate a debate on the substance of immigration policy. >> ifill: you're optimistic you can talk about the substance rather than the process of the issues that so tie us up? >> i think evidence is best when, unlike the program he's talking about, if that's used that one's program didn't work to say, well, let's not worry about, you know, helping children who are poor, making sure they get a fair start. but if it's used to say, that's a worthy mission, but there are other interventions that were better, then i think that is the right way to use things. where, in the immigration debate, i think it's been very helpful, is there were a lot of assumptions made that immigrants were going to displace american workers, that immigrants were going to put downward pressure on jobs. the overwhelming amount of evidence shows that's not the case, but there are a couple of studies that say maybe it does effect people who don't have a high school education. well, that wouldn't necessarily mean you would be against immigration, but you might say as you're doing immigration that you might want to complement that with increasing earned income tax credit or something that might deal with some of the people who are -- who might bear negative consequences. >> ifill: well at a time when most americans are pretty pes mismystic of what government can and can't get done, here optimistic continue musicians. "moneyball for government." john bidgeland and gene sperling, thank you. >> thank you, nice to be with you. >> woodruff: now a story that comes to us via our network of student reporting labs around the country. meri demarois of the university of montana and her mentor anna rau of montana pbs look at the dangers of illegal fish dumping in the region's rivers and what is being done to protect montana's celebrated fishing traditions. >> montana's a special place. with these rivers, trout fishing is part of our heritage, and especially, you know, native trout, the westslope, cutthroat, or bulltrout, i think catching those fish is just really special, it really connects you to the river and to the, to, you know, a part of montana's past. >> reporter: carey schmidt began fishing in montana as a child. today he is a busy lawyer and father, but he tries to get on the river as much as possible to enjoy native fish species. >> i think trout are just a really charismatic species that people want to come to montana to catch. and if they don't find trout they're not going to come here. >> reporter: schmidt has reason to be concerned because beneath the surface there's more going on that could affect fishing in the state. people are illegally dumping new fish species like northern pike, walleye, and lake trout into montana's waters. >> what's happening now with the illegal introductions, is we have people who aren't professional biologists, who are people who are going out there at night thinking they know better. >> reporter: bruce farling is the executive director of montana trout unlimited, a nonprofit conservation organization. he says professional biologists introduce fish that will hopefully restore and maintain biologists are dumping in ecosystems while bucket biologists are dumping in species they would like to fish for. >> those are professional fishery biologists, and so they understand the biological implications of putting something in a particular place. there are certain laws they have to follow, um, they just don't do it at 2:00 a.m. in the morning when it's dark with a bucket and not tell anybody. >> it's not good for maintaining sort of species diversity, it can have impacts on the whole aquatic ecosystem. >> reporter: university of montana associate professor of wildlife biology lisa eby uses the example of lake trout that were illegally dumped into yellowstone lake in the nineties. the new fish ate the native cutthroat trout. yellowstone park managers discovered a precipitous drop in the number of spawning native cutthroats from 18,000 in 1998 to just 241 in 2008. >> the fact that the cutthroat populations are very low now, that they don't move upstream to spawn, it's changed the distribution of osprey and other fish-eating birds, it's changed the distribution of how and where grizzly bears can feed in the system. so certainly you have a lot of effects of just a single introduction. >> this, in my view, is one of the most serious problems we have in the state of montana right now from a fishery's perspective, and how fisheries relate to our economy. >> reporter: according to farling, recreational angling in montana generates about three hundred million dollars per year. anglers spend about $40 million annually on gear. >> there's more anglers per capita in montana than any other state in the country, it's what we do here. >> reporter: farling and montana trout unlimited are hoping a $10,000 reward will snag some of these culprits. they would also like to see stiffer penalties because often times the damage is permanent. >> you gotta be really early enough to do anything about it. and quite often by the time we learn about it it's too late. >> reporter: fish, wildlife and parks regional fisheries manager pat saffel says they have been doing all they can to prevent illegal introductions, including boat check stations to make sure people aren't bringing in any invasive organisms, and educating the public about the issue. eby says there are ways to try and get rid of invasive species once they are in the water. >> there's certainly a lot of eradication whether it's chemical or mechanical or physical removal of fish, but it's always very difficult. >> reporter: it's not just montana and its trout, though. eby says invasive species of all kinds are a very large problem across the globe, whether the introduction is accidental or on purpose. >> i would argue from disease to mussels to fish to plants, it's something that every state in every country is dealing with. >> it's a really hard thing to get a handle on, and everybody is essentially scrambling the way we are here. >> reporter: farling believes it's important to look for solutions so the fishing tradition can continue to be passed down from one generation to another. >> they show up one day and those trout that they caught from when they were kids have been eaten, or you know, some other species that they always had expectations would be there are gone. >> you know, it makes me sad. i would like to, you know, share experiences, you know, with my kids. having those shared experiences talking about trout, it's important. i want them to be able to go to some of the places that i've fished. >> reporter: this has been meri demarois reporting for the pbs newshour and montana pbs. >> woodruff: again, the major developments of the day. the taliban killed five people in multiple attacks around afghanistan's capital city, kabul. suicide bombers targeted a british embassy car and a foreign compound. ferguson, missouri, seemed to take a pause from protesting to observe thanksgiving, but elsewhere around the country vocal demonstrations continued over the police's killing of unarmed teenager michael brown. on the newshour online right now, new yorkers are thankful for their apartments. hawaiians are thankful for rainbows. the residents of north dakota, nebraska and missouri are thankful for thunderstorms. that's according to what they posted on their facebook pages. the social media company analyzed what its users said they were thankful for this holiday. we have a map with those results and more on our web site, pbs.org/newshour. and that's the newshour for this thursday. on friday, we'll talk with actor benedict cumberbatch. i'm judy woodruff. join us on-line and again here tomorrow evening, for all of us here at the pbs newshour, thank you and we hope you have a wonderful thanksgiving. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> lincoln financial-- committed to helping you take charge of your life and become you're own chief life officer. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org . this is "nightly business report" with tyler mathisen and susie gharib fund in part by. >> thestreet.com and action alerts plus where jim cramer and fellow portfolio manager stephanie link share market insight. you can learn more thestreet.com/nbr. good evening, everyone. happy thanksgiving and welcome to this special holiday edition of "nightly business report." you know, thanksgiving as we all know is a time of refraction to look back at what we've have, how far we've come to be grateful for friends and family. >> for investors it's a good time to take stock, maybe do looking ahead and tonight we're looking very far ahead to see what wall street, housing, retail, energy

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