The death of journalism? What?

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

http://reason.com/archives/2012/04/08/when-losers-write-history/singlepage

Imagine for a moment that the hurly-burly history of American retail was chronicled not by reporters and academics but by life-long employees of A&P, a largely forgotten supermarket chain that enjoyed a 75 percent market share as recently as the 1950s. How do you suppose an A&P Organization Man might portray the rise of discount super-retailer Wal-Mart, or organic foods-popularizer Whole Foods, let alone such newfangled Internet ventures as Peapod.com? Life looks a hell of a lot different from the perspective of a dinosaur slowly leaking power than it does to a fickle consumer happily gobbling up innovation wherever it shoots up.

That is largely where we find ourselves in the journalism conversation of 2012, with a dreary roll call of depressive statistics invariably from the behemoth’s point of view: newspaper job losses, ad-spending cutbacks, shuttered bureaus, plummeting stock prices, major-media bankruptcies. Never has there been more journalism produced or consumed, never has it been easier to find or create or curate news items, and yet this moment is being portrayed by self-interested insiders as a tale of decline and despair.

It is no insult to the hard work and good faith of either newspaper reporters or media-beat writers (and I’ve been both) to acknowledge that their conflict of interest in this story far exceeds that of, say, academic researchers who occasionally take corporate money, or politicians who pocket campaign donations from entities they help regulate, to name two perennial targets of newspaper editorial boards. We should not expect anything like impartial analysis from people whose very livelihoods—and those of their close friends—are directly threatened by their subject matter.

This goes a long way toward explaining a persistent media-criticism dissonance that has been puzzling observers since at least the mid-1990s: Successful, established journalism insiders tend to be the most dour about the future of the craft, while marginalized and even unpaid aspirants are almost giddy about what might come next. More kids than ever go to journalism school; more commencement speeches than ever warn graduates that, sadly, there’s no more gold in them thar hills. Consumers are having palpable fun finding, sharing, packaging, supplementing, and dreaming up pieces of editorial content; newsroom veterans are consistently among the most depressed of all modern professionals.

So, it's like this, chaps.

Imagine that, out of the blue, there was this new technology that allowed the average joe to build a small scale solar energy farm in his backyard. Or wind mill, or something similar. In other words, imagine that there was this new electrical generator tech that was relatively open source in as to how and where people could get the parts to put it together, and it was in all ways equal to the old tech in efficiency, if not better. The details aren't necessary for this little thought experiment.

Now, what do you think the people in coal and gas and nuclear would do? They would bemoan the downfall of energy supply, of course! They would comment on just how many jobs will be lost, how depressing and bleak the future looks, how the government needs to subsidize their industry so they can keep doing business.

Meanwhile, we would be giddy on just how directly we could work with the supply for our electrical power.

Likewise for journalism. When I look at newsprint science journalism, for example, and compare it to the spectacular pieces I find from all over on the Internet, I feel good about the way science reporting is going. I could bemoan the declining science reporting in newspapers, but why bother? Ed Yong supplies me with amazing discoveries every day. I get stories that friends and family send to me, I get news straight from the article authors on their blogs, writing their own press releases. It's EXCITING.

If the traditional journalists can't adapt, I think selection should take its course and slowly drive them to extinction, maybe putting a few in reserves so we can go look at them through the bars now and again.

[Queen Gogira Pennyworth, BSW]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

[navkat: navkat of...navkat!]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

We're all fucked. The law goes: you don't have to tell the truth to call it news. Fox aside, there's a legal precedent in the US that states I can get on tv and "remind" people of how Obama created thefinancial crisis from his first day in office and signed the "Bail Out" bill. I can comment about how the operation set in motion under the Presidency of George W Bush that led to the capture and death of Bin Laden makes him a Hero. I can nudge the audience into recalling with outrage the "Occupy terrorists" who "rioted in th streets" to push the now-defeated, illegal Obamacare bill in 2011. I can do all these things and be successful at deceiving my viewers. I can do this a mere single-digit number of years from the actual events and call it news and there ain't a goddamned thing you can do about it.

I had to turn it off, Queen G. I had to shut it off entirely because (as Cain can confirm) it was leaking into my brain.

We have a predisposed bias against word-of-mouth and in favor of "they have a lot of money. They must be legit" authority. Sometmes you can say something so transparent as "Scientists have proven Haley Joel Osment acted alone in the assasination of JFK." and only 33% would think to see anything wrong with that sentence, of those, 80% would point out the error in the sentence structure and not even question the intended idea.

I have also found if I throw some official sounding statistics I pulled out of my ass around, even if it's obvious, 90% of the time, it makes my argument sound more compelling.

You can't trust the rumor mill. You also can't ever, ever, ever  trust an entity who is in a position to gain by your belief in lies.

[Alty]

Thanks for posting this! This is something I've had on my mind recently.

Most people that I talk to day-to-day share that vision of a crumbling and dying industry. And in a world where people, rightfully, panic about finding work that will sustain their lives in a very material way over that which sustains anything deeper. And looking for a straight up job right out of journalism school is sort of a silly, grueling experience from what I can tell.

But the important part for me, the part that works its way through my brain and tells me to rush through IT school and the take some journalism/communication classes is the idea of that multifaceted, cheap, powerful technology. Could we use some fact checking, editing, etc etc? Absolutely.

But in my mind the idea of free information and people searching through whatever facet of life makes them sing or cry or burst a coronary through pure rage is more important than the pathetic death throes of an inept and corrupted institution. I had to be at a meeting, along with thousands of others, at 8am this morning because of tenacious bloggers. I would love to be at the other end of that.

I am super excited and terrified about all of this, which is nice because I don't get that way about much.

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

Well, the quality of legacy media is decreasing. That is clear to anyone with an ounce of sense within a few minutes of turning on the evening 'news'.

Conversely, the quality of new media, via Internet, is increasing. As for many blogs being unqualified, how is that different than any other random newscaster's opinion? They're all so broad in their coverage that they have no expertise. Bloggers are often far more qualified than any legacy journalist specifically because they have expertise.

And as for opinion in general, I for one would rather see it up front than have it be smothered in talk about "fair and balanced".

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

Thanks for posting this! This is something I've had on my mind recently.

Most people that I talk to day-to-day share that vision of a crumbling and dying industry. And in a world where people, rightfully, panic about finding work that will sustain their lives in a very material way over that which sustains anything deeper. And looking for a straight up job right out of journalism school is sort of a silly, grueling experience from what I can tell.

But the important part for me, the part that works its way through my brain and tells me to rush through IT school and the take some journalism/communication classes is the idea of that multifaceted, cheap, powerful technology. Could we use some fact checking, editing, etc etc? Absolutely.

But in my mind the idea of free information and people searching through whatever facet of life makes them sing or cry or burst a coronary through pure rage is more important than the pathetic death throes of an inept and corrupted institution. I had to be at a meeting, along with thousands of others, at 8am this morning because of tenacious bloggers. I would love to be at the other end of that.

I am super excited and terrified about all of this, which is nice because I don't get that way about much.

You nailed it, Alty.

[Queen Gogira Pennyworth, BSW]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

Well, the quality of legacy media is decreasing. That is clear to anyone with an ounce of sense within a few minutes of turning on the evening 'news'.

Conversely, the quality of new media, via Internet, is increasing. As for many blogs being unqualified, how is that different than any other random newscaster's opinion? They're all so broad in their coverage that they have no expertise. Bloggers are often far more qualified than any legacy journalist specifically because they have expertise.

And as for opinion in general, I for one would rather see it up front than have it be smothered in talk about "fair and balanced".

The main difference, in my mind, is that the idiot newscaster only gets a couple of minutes in front of the camera to spew whatever half-baked garbage they've thrown together, whereas someone with a blog or a dedicated radio hour or opinion program can really get a lot of worthless content out there.

All told, I still prefer getting my news from online sources to older media, even with my inherent distrust for the medium.

[Alty]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

Well, the quality of legacy media is decreasing. That is clear to anyone with an ounce of sense within a few minutes of turning on the evening 'news'.

Conversely, the quality of new media, via Internet, is increasing. As for many blogs being unqualified, how is that different than any other random newscaster's opinion? They're all so broad in their coverage that they have no expertise. Bloggers are often far more qualified than any legacy journalist specifically because they have expertise.

And as for opinion in general, I for one would rather see it up front than have it be smothered in talk about "fair and balanced".

The main difference, in my mind, is that the idiot newscaster only gets a couple of minutes in front of the camera to spew whatever half-baked garbage they've thrown together, whereas someone with a blog or a dedicated radio hour or opinion program can really get a lot of worthless content out there.

All told, I still prefer getting my news from online sources to older media, even with my inherent distrust for the medium.

While blogs and radio are capable of spewing out tons of garbage, I can't see how the harm they do is in any way worse than the talking heads. Sure, they're only on for a few minutes at a time, but those minutes are on TEEVEE and that's all that matters. Most people who consume that crap without thinking do so for the simple fact that Bill O'Reilly or Olberman are on TEEVEE and thus MUST know what they're talking about otherwise they would not have gotten that far. TV is such a powerful thing for people.

As for this topic in general:

It's not surprising that news has turned out this way. We've been running on the idea that what's good for business is good for us all, new included. But when shareholder profits are more important than, you know, everything else the idea of journalism as public service becomes a very unfunny joke. And why do we need those shareholders? I can't say for certain, but to get the stories that matter to people who need them it has taken a lot of machinery. And as people are won't to do we fuck that machinery up in such a way that it extracts maximum benefit for anything but the quality and impact of those stories.

But now, any idiot can do it.

And that bothers people because we don't want to depend on idiots for news. Well, it bothers some people. And those people are the one's who are going to tell when something is crap, at least, most of the time. I don't have much faith in anything, but I anticipate that the people who need and want real stories that really matter will weed through the crap, will seek out with some force anything that is genuine and important. People will lie and waste time on things that don't matter and try to cause trouble where none is. People will fabricate and troll and fuck up. People will share things with one another that fucking MATTER, that HAVE MATTER, that have WEIGHT. Words with weight.

I want to find some and show you, I'm surely not the only one, and the best part is I absolutely can.

[Alty]

I saw this cartoon once.

It was a circus lion and tiger on little stands. Below the former said "TV", below the latter "Newpapers".
The lion says to the tiger "Don't complain to me, at least you have your memories."

These two were once powerful forces, no? Yes, sometimes anyway. They had, and arguably still do have, the power to expose corruption, oppression, deceit by those sworn to protect us little people. But they stopped using it for some time now.

And just look at what happened to SOPA. Not that we now have complete peace and freedom or anything, but some people reacted and it ground to a halt. And papers and TV had precisely FUCK ALL to do with that.

If the lion and the tiger no longer have their teeth, and their roars are only for show, I can see an army of small, intelligent rodents with no need for teeth to rip bodies apart in one go. Instead they slowly, silently work away until they get what they want, and they can't be stopped.

I'm certainly being overly optimistic, but that's kinda rare for me so I'll let it pass.

[stelz]

I think there's a lot of very appropriate concern about the quality of journalism moving forward. While twitter may "break stories," it's also a vast rumor mill full of trolls, inarticulate kids, gullible people, and self-promoting fuckwits. Blogs are generally more than 90% opinion, most of it unqualified. And the echo chamber effect can't be ignored either.

That said, I'm not pining for the days of three networks and a 10pm shut off. There's a lot of potential, and I think the best and brightest minds in journalism should be concentrating on the question of "how do we create an environment where people can trust what's being reported online?" instead of "how do we save the newspaper?"

Well, the quality of legacy media is decreasing. That is clear to anyone with an ounce of sense within a few minutes of turning on the evening 'news'.

Conversely, the quality of new media, via Internet, is increasing. As for many blogs being unqualified, how is that different than any other random newscaster's opinion? They're all so broad in their coverage that they have no expertise. Bloggers are often far more qualified than any legacy journalist specifically because they have expertise.

And as for opinion in general, I for one would rather see it up front than have it be smothered in talk about "fair and balanced".

The main difference, in my mind, is that the idiot newscaster only gets a couple of minutes in front of the camera to spew whatever half-baked garbage they've thrown together, whereas someone with a blog or a dedicated radio hour or opinion program can really get a lot of worthless content out there.

All told, I still prefer getting my news from online sources to older media, even with my inherent distrust for the medium.

This and the fact the older media just talks AT you, like they're Moses coming down from the mountain. You MIGHT be able to write or call them, but that's a pain in the ass and too slow.

Online you can pull the story up from different sources, cross-check, fact-check, google background info, and if that fails, post the link here and say "WTF is this???" 

[Cain]

I think it's definitely worth considering the difference between the media industry, and journalism as two distinctive practices which are sometimes, but not always linked.

However, I will say this: the vast majority of what is discussed on blogs still comes from traditional media outlets.  Traditional media outlets have the funding to allow them to have foreign correspondents, to undertake investigative journalism and to expose newstories to far greater attention than independent bloggers do.

And the problem is that business model is collapsing, and when it does, bloggers are not going to be able to jump in the breach and perform the same kind of service.

Blogs seem to perform best as op-ed mills for their respective author(s).  Which is all fine and well, so long as the respective authors know what they are talking about.  But guess what?  Many of them don't.  The most popular political blogs in the US are not run by political scientists, talented analysts and former strategists - they're run by rabid partisans with too much time on their hands.  Poli Sci blogging is a niche interest, and a frequently underrepresented niche at that.  You know who is overrepresented in political blogging?  Office workers and academic lawyers...and most of the latter never even discuss law!  People who've mastered the art of being verbose and obsessive about news stories, but not necessarily people who have any relevant knowledge on the topic at hand.

Science blogging is in a good place, I agree, and that's because the sciences themselves are in a far healthier position than most of the rest of what is considered news.  And that the people who are running science blogs know what they are talking about, because if they do not, other science bloggers descend on them like a swarm of locusts and leave no-one in any doubt that they do not know what they are talking about.

Political blogging isn't like that.  If a blogger is wrong, and you try to tell them that, you'll end up being blocked most likely.  If they even take notice of you, which they probably wont since the influential blogs get a couple of hundred comments per entry.  And if you tell them they're wrong and you're from an opposing political team, or perceived to be, well, prepare to be eviscerated.  This is because Politics Is The Mind-Killer, as we all know too well.  Political Scientists can resist this (partially at least) through use of statistical wards, but everyone else is screwed.

Professional journalists are likely depressed by the state of the media industry, and every metric says that is pretty much the right position to take.  The media industry is depressing.  New journalists are likely to be excited by the potential of blogging, Twitter, social media etc.  And the potential for it to be very powerful is there.  But at the same time, the potentials of those tools are going to require money for anything more than a cursory analysis.  And that's where journalism and the traditional media meet.  Those independent websites who do try to do proper investigative journalism without the backing of the media are few, and tend to be in a constant state of fundraising, for emergencies.

That's the reality of the situation, as it currently stands.  Potential, but without funds.  People prefer free news, and blogs allow for that, but the news has to come from somewhere, and eventually there is a cost involved, which is what is undermining the traditional media.  It's an untenable situation in the long-term.  Something will have to give.

[Queen Gogira Pennyworth, BSW]

If things work themselves out properly, we won't need foreign correspondents, we'll just read firsthand accounts from locals anywhere in the world. As far as investigative journalism, I've seen a number of online groups engaged in serious investigative work, and sifting through their data to find the relevant information. It's time-consuming, dangerous work, but there are people already doing it even when they can't depend on press protections for what they're doing.

Proper crowdsourcing of news gathering and processing has a whole lot of potential, but the trick is convincing people that it's a goal worth working towards. There are more than enough people out there who are legitimate experts in their fields who can contribute greatly to public understanding of everything from astrobiology to the entertainment industry, and people who want to make a name for themselves, so they've got motivation to pitch in. Politics is kind of a different thing, because there's not a lot of room for people who actually care about facts instead of making sure their team looks good, and I don't know if there's any remedy for that.

[M. Nigel Salt]

I think it's something to keep in mind that most of the people we associate with are a type of informational elite, who have not only the resources but the knowledge to seek accurate information from alternative sources. Most people, particularly the poor and less-educated, operate under resource constraints which have the effect of limiting their information sources to those which are "free", not necessarily in terms of financial cost but in terms of time and energy output cost. Furthermore they do (as we have been discussing in threads about education and indoctrination) tend to trust "authoritative" sources such as major media companies.

This is one of the many reasons the media monopoly is a bad, bad thing.

[Cain]

If things work themselves out properly, we won't need foreign correspondents, we'll just read firsthand accounts from locals anywhere in the world. As far as investigative journalism, I've seen a number of online groups engaged in serious investigative work, and sifting through their data to find the relevant information. It's time-consuming, dangerous work, but there are people already doing it even when they can't depend on press protections for what they're doing.

Proper crowdsourcing of news gathering and processing has a whole lot of potential, but the trick is convincing people that it's a goal worth working towards. There are more than enough people out there who are legitimate experts in their fields who can contribute greatly to public understanding of everything from astrobiology to the entertainment industry, and people who want to make a name for themselves, so they've got motivation to pitch in. Politics is kind of a different thing, because there's not a lot of room for people who actually care about facts instead of making sure their team looks good, and I don't know if there's any remedy for that.

Assuming you can read foreign reports.  Or trust in the translations made of them.  All of which assumes their internet is open and working in the first place, which cannot be guaranteed (even European nations have laws in place that will allow them to shut down parts of the internet in case of national emergencies).

And how did these groups get that data?  Where did that access come from?  I've yet to see an online group with the same kind of access as, lets say, Seymour Hersh.  Even Wikileaks had to team up several dozen media outfits, to analyze and release the data it had, on the embassy cables.  As a whistleblower, I wouldn't want to give my valuable, possibly explosive information, to some tard on the net.  I want anonymity, and I want legal protection.  I wouldn't trust half the people running political sites to tie their shoelaces or handle sharp implements without assistance, let alone with something that could land me in prison.

There is no problem that exists in the media that cannot and will not be equally replicated by blogging and crowdsourcing, and there will be several additional downsides that will exist due to the lack of legal status and funds that will arise from it.  I've watched newspapers over here try to implement blogging platforms, have more "user-based interaction" and more "crowd-sourced stories".  All this has led to is an endless parade of infotainment, shallow analysis, shrill partisan shrieking, pantomime displays of outrage and hypocritical moralizing.  Which is a pretty good summation of the blogosphere, to be honest. 

Bloggers care about hits, care about making their stories count, about being read.  And if that's not happening because everyone is off reading the latest manufactured scandal, then eventually, they're going to give up.

I know, I used to blog.  In fact, I blogged for a damn sight longer than anyone else on this thread, and more than a tad successfully, too.  I might just be speaking from a position of experience here.

[ZL 'Kai' Burington, M.S.]

I think it's definitely worth considering the difference between the media industry, and journalism as two distinctive practices which are sometimes, but not always linked.

However, I will say this: the vast majority of what is discussed on blogs still comes from traditional media outlets.  Traditional media outlets have the funding to allow them to have foreign correspondents, to undertake investigative journalism and to expose newstories to far greater attention than independent bloggers do.

And the problem is that business model is collapsing, and when it does, bloggers are not going to be able to jump in the breach and perform the same kind of service.

Blogs seem to perform best as op-ed mills for their respective author(s).  Which is all fine and well, so long as the respective authors know what they are talking about.  But guess what?  Many of them don't.  The most popular political blogs in the US are not run by political scientists, talented analysts and former strategists - they're run by rabid partisans with too much time on their hands.  Poli Sci blogging is a niche interest, and a frequently underrepresented niche at that.  You know who is overrepresented in political blogging?  Office workers and academic lawyers...and most of the latter never even discuss law!  People who've mastered the art of being verbose and obsessive about news stories, but not necessarily people who have any relevant knowledge on the topic at hand.

Science blogging is in a good place, I agree, and that's because the sciences themselves are in a far healthier position than most of the rest of what is considered news.  And that the people who are running science blogs know what they are talking about, because if they do not, other science bloggers descend on them like a swarm of locusts and leave no-one in any doubt that they do not know what they are talking about.

Political blogging isn't like that.  If a blogger is wrong, and you try to tell them that, you'll end up being blocked most likely.  If they even take notice of you, which they probably wont since the influential blogs get a couple of hundred comments per entry.  And if you tell them they're wrong and you're from an opposing political team, or perceived to be, well, prepare to be eviscerated.  This is because Politics Is The Mind-Killer, as we all know too well.  Political Scientists can resist this (partially at least) through use of statistical wards, but everyone else is screwed.

Professional journalists are likely depressed by the state of the media industry, and every metric says that is pretty much the right position to take.  The media industry is depressing.  New journalists are likely to be excited by the potential of blogging, Twitter, social media etc.  And the potential for it to be very powerful is there.  But at the same time, the potentials of those tools are going to require money for anything more than a cursory analysis.  And that's where journalism and the traditional media meet.  Those independent websites who do try to do proper investigative journalism without the backing of the media are few, and tend to be in a constant state of fundraising, for emergencies.

That's the reality of the situation, as it currently stands.  Potential, but without funds.  People prefer free news, and blogs allow for that, but the news has to come from somewhere, and eventually there is a cost involved, which is what is undermining the traditional media.  It's an untenable situation in the long-term.  Something will have to give.

I realize it's true for science journalism on the Internet, as well. Ed Yong may look freelance, and is to some extent, but he works in large part for Scientific American.

What do you think will give?

ETA: Heard yesterday on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me that "media brodcaster" is considered one of the top ten worst professions in terms of stress and prospects.