Not waiting for the asteroid, a dinosaur evolves;
Linda Parker has a memo for professional journalists: Contrary to the fear rippling through newsrooms, citizens don’t want your job. They don’t want to interview obscure officials to write boring stories about arcane changes in local zoning laws. As online communities editor, Parker should know. A GetPublished! button features prominently on many Enquirer Web pages, and the submissions land in Parker’s queue. They almost never resemble anything commonly considered journalism.
“It used to read, ‘Be a Citizen Journalist,'” Parker says. “And no one ever clicked on it. Then we called it ‘Neighbor to Neighbor,’ and still nothing. For some reason, ‘Get Published’ was the magic phrase.” Parker, a cheerful woman in her mid-fifties, will pore over several dozen submissions from readers today. These will range from a local custom-car builder trumpeting his upcoming appearance on the BET show Spring Bling to an emotional notice about a play being staged to raise funds for a fifth-grader’s bone marrow transplant. Contributors submit to one of 233 neighborhood Web sites, each aimed at a town or community in the Cincinnati area. Parker approves the submission (“I almost never reject one,” she says), scans it for “the F-word,” and posts it to the site. “A few years ago, these would have come across the transom as press releases and been ignored.”
There’s a valuable lesson here — and not just for newspapers. Citizens are desperate to broadcast their message to their communities; they just aren’t going to employ the conventions of journalism to do so. “One of our most popular categories is called First-Person,” Parker says. “People really love to reminisce about the 1937 flood. We got great stories on that.” The reader submissions do more than provide the Enquirer with additional content to sell ads against. “Our 27 suburban papers could never fill their pages without this material.” One of the common criticisms levied against Gannett is that it is crowdsourcing content in order to cut staff, but this charge misses the point. Crowdsourcing enables the publisher to expand: more Web pages, more niche publications, more ads.
While much of the citizen-produced writing is about church picnics and school sports, readers are also contributing to serious journalistic investigations, breathing new life into a genre that is increasingly considered an endangered species at metropolitan newspapers. Last spring, The News-Press, a Gannett paper in Fort Myers, Florida, heard that readers from a new housing development were being charged up to $45,000 to connect to the water and sewer system. Rather than assign a conventional investigative reporter to the story, “we asked our readers to help us find out why the cost was so exorbitant,” says Kate Marymont, News-Press executive editor.
The response overwhelmed the paper, which had to assign additional staff just to deal with the volume of tips, phone calls, and emails. The News-Press posted hundreds of pages of documents to its site, and readers organized their own investigations: Retired engineers analyzed blueprints, accountants examined balance sheets, and an inside whistle-blower leaked evidence of possible bid-rigging. “We had people from all over the world helping us,” Marymont says.
The information firehose illustrated.
If mainstream journalists and their editors would pause to absorb that first sentence quoted, the relationship with news consumers might mature into something useful. Allow the channel of communication to flow both ways, and the quality, accuracy and authoritativeness of journalism can only improve. How do we know? See here.
They may even coax back some former readers.
Contrary to popular media mythology, bloggers don’t want your jobs.
We’d just like you to do yours.
In today’s National Post the fighting Irishman has a column that opens with his oft-reiterated false assertion: “Bloggers, Internet enthusiasts and denizens of Facebook like to assert that, because of them, conventional broadcast media are doomed.”
Perhaps he means they “like to assert” bt that they are holding their proverbial tongues? No, they’re saying it, and they keep saying in apparently epidemic numbers, causing WK to raise an index finger in front of an arched brow and say “They’re wrong.”
Who’s wrong, and who’s saying what? Nobody can tell. Here’s what WK says about the CRTC’s 1999 decision to leave the internet unfettered by the sort of government regulation and scrutiny that has traditionally been applied to radio and television: “Whether one approves of governmental regulatory oversight or not, it was a rather baffling decision, a little bit like dinosaurs expressing a lack of interest in an approaching meteor strike.”
In other words, he went directly from stating, as the premise for his column, that the conventional media are not doomed, to describing the conventional media as dinosaurs doomed by an imminent meteor — the internet. And he can’t figure out why the government wouldn’t regulate the internet to protect it’s own interests — which apparently include the traditional media.
Who’s a Liberal?
Near the end of his column he says that blogs “depend almost entirely on news sites for their factual fodder.”
Maybe he means “blogs that depend almost entirely on news sites for their factual fodder depend almost entirely on news sites for their factual fodder.” Because there are SO many blogs extant that do not link to MSM coverage, or hardly at all, and choose instead to disgorge celebrity gossip, sports opinions, lawn care tips, hunting stories, advice on colon cleansing, etc etc etc.
And of the many blogs that write on issues of government, many do so from a a frustrated individual’s point of view, in some cases because there is no local media to trust; go to some Russian/former east bloc sites for evidence of that.
And even if blogs link to one of the myriad news organizations spitting out “news” — “the police are searching the harbour for bodies” — the MSM doesn’t *own* the news they report on. They present a convenient array of sources, each endowed with the resources to gather information that, frankly, will always be publicly available one way or another in the free world. If the MSM were to be hit by an MSM seeking meteor, people would get their news from blogs, or from some other source of what would then be the mass media.
The raw “fodder” for both the mass media, and the chat ‘n chew crowd will always be actual events.
Except, of course, when Mansbridge intones “Stephen Harper just signed a free-trade agreement with Ahmadabadistan — but can he avoid the controversy over nuclear waste in Keith Boag’s ass?”; that is always fodder in and of itself, amusing, combustible fodder that’s no credit whatsoever to the CBC or it’s producers.
I think of it more like a fraud artist wending his way through town, pretending to be a tinker; no one would suggest that the neighbours talking about it “depend” on Jojo for their conversations, and Jojo would get neither credit nor a cookie, and couldn’t credibly claim that he’s being “used.”
And no one would suggest that Jojo’s ilk is “doomed” even if WK said people were suggesting that en masse. Everyone knows there’s always be another Jojo around the corner.
But that’s neither here nor there; personally, I’m just sick of WK depending on the blogosphere for his columnar fodder.
My guess is smoke is really wornoutcantsellit.
Penny: Kate’s blog here is a good start. Extrapolate from there. FOX today in it’s tv coverage today of the bridge collapse had an area blogger(add Powerline and Captain’s Quarters locally reporting too) that captured the event better than the media swarm. The embedded military bloggers are superior to the fat cat NYT’s and others running up bar tabs in the Green Zone. In most categories, citizens are doing a better job then the lame lemmings in the newsroom.
First, regarding the bridge collapse, I took a look at Powerline and CQ’s “coverage.” It unsurprisingly appears to be culled almost entirely from articles and reports from mainstream print, radio, and television sources, with their own synthesis and commentary. So while they basically do some of the sifting out and thinking for you, they aren’t exactly beating the press to the story. Or can you point to some examples from this tragedy where bloggers provide additional factual coverage not reported in the MSM?
As for the embedded milbloggers, much of their work is indeed of high journalistic quality, but make no mistake, they are more like freelance journalists than typical bloggers. The internet allows them a venue to publish their work, so they differ from the traditional freelance model in that they sell their work directly to their readers (who remunerate via paypal, etc.) rather than to a media outlet. Also, need it be said that their work is no less value-free or agenda-neutral than any MSM reporter? I trust you’re not so naive as to think that, say, Michael Yon’s reports constitute the “truth” while, say, the NYT’s reports constitute “lies.”
As for SDA, what exactly do you think happens here? The standard modus operandi is to cite some other source — more often than not, an article from the MSM — add some wry commentary about how it conflicts with conservative values, and then open up the comments section to people who then proceed to mostly agree with each other. The SurfaceStations.org project is a true example of a bottom-up citizen initiative, abetted by the blogosphere and the internet more generally. Even then, however, SDA’s involvement is merely as an amplifier to other people’s work. At the end of the day, it’s primarily a sort of MSM news aggregator filtered through a right-wing lens, and while it clearly appeal to you because it conforms to your own political values, tell me: precisely what added value does it offer, beyond serving as a kind of meeting place for like-minded folks to have their own opinions confirmed to them?
Put another way, what exactly is it about Kate’s blog that you believe should/can be extrapolated? The comments section, so as to take advantage of the bountiful professional and technical knowledge among her loyal readers? Great idea — in principle. In reality, almost all those who comment here fall to the right-of-centre, and those rare leftist commenters are typically greeted with personal insults. So, already virtually no debate goes on, as it currently stands. So what exactly would you like to see extrapolated to the level of the general population?
[So what exactly would you like to see extrapolated to the level of the general population?] Smoke … and mirrors.
The truth !! Not “dumbed-down” tabloid-like news.
[In reality, almost all those who comment here fall to the right-of-centre,] S&Ms
More like ‘the correct side of correct’.
[.. and those rare leftist commenters are typically greeted with personal insults.] S&Ms
Because they are a) tolls, b) make no sense, c) just regurgitating a University Arts class “lecture” or d) stupid.
You may think they should be taken care of — sda does not have to 🙂
The MSM lost me when they refused to dig into the Liberal scandals that plagued JC & PM all the while hounding BM over leasing some airplanes. Go after BM until you are sure there is no scandal there just give the same treatment to JC & PM.
Some thoughts on Mainstream media..
Most paid writers for papers and other media do absolutely NO research. They watch the newswire feeds and regurgitate whatever strikes their fancy or fills the edicts of the editorial staff. Sometimes they editorialize on their own sometimes they don’t even bother to do that much.
You can verify this by studying the AP – Reuters – CP sites and comparing that material with what you read or see or hear in mainstream outlets.
Many of the writers for the newswires consistently editorialize or worse. Maybe because that’s what their bosses are telling them to do? Maybe it’s the editorial staff tweaking the field reports? Maybe it’s the original gatherers doing this to fulfill their contracts?
It really does not matter why. With the number of cases where the sources were found to be bogus or lying. With the number of reports knowingly misreporting events. With the number of cases where the news gatherers were found to be falsifying or fudging stories and caught trying to cover up for it….
The reason you are hearing about these things is BECAUSE of bloggers and others who make it their business to uncover and make public the incompetence and dishonesty of media organisations who are trying to SELL you the news they choose for you.
Want to see a blogger go out and do interviews with politicians ( aside from some of the obvious US based conservative ones!) ??
Get me an expense account and official press credentials and I’m there!!
ron in kelowna: The truth !!…More like ‘the correct side of correct’…Because they are a) tolls, b) make no sense, c) just regurgitating a University Arts class “lecture” or d) stupid.
Thanks, Ron, for proving exactly my point.
Mr. Smoke, seems you conveniently ignored the on-the-scene commentary with pictures from this guy:
http://www.blanked-out.com/
Which was mentioned at Captain’s Quarters very early on.
Typical Leftard debate technique, ignore any evidence that doesn’t fit the boilerplate. And you wonder why you get told off by your betters.
Oh, Phantom, yet again you are quick with the “leftard” insults, but miss the mark in your struggle to comprehend and reply to my actual argument.
I didn’t purposefully ignore Blanked Out, but note that I asked whether any local blogs offered “additional factual coverage” of the collapse — “factual” being the operative work here.
The entries from Aaron and Noah provide a poignant personal touch to the story, but really, is anything they’ve blogged so substantially different from those 8-second “first hand from the survivors!” interview segments that CNN et al. play ad nauseum as part of their sensationalistic coverage of any tragic national event? Blanked Out’s version is certainly more composed, but other than learning that some guy had a dream involving Peyton Manning, took some photos of the wreckage from different angles (“Hey, look at that, it really did collapse!”), and is currently without a home, what new facts emerged from this particular blog coverage? It’s all still personalized stories, anecdotal opinions, and relaying of facts presented by the MSM. “‘On-the-ground’ commentary” is not necessarily the same as proper journalism.
Wow, I see someone fighting to keep his job alive. Eh smoke?
On the scene, Mr. Smoke-but-no-fire. Meaning the guy watched the son of a b1tch fall down, and mentioned right off the bat that he heard no explosives go off.
Even if I’m not inclined to accept the official “no terrorism” story for whatever reason, here’s an UN-official corroborating observation posted on the web before the official story has been concocted. Couple of unrelated on-the-spot reports like that, I don’t even need an official story. I can make up my own mind.
But because it doesn’t fit your theory, you ignored it in typical Leftard fashion.
This kind of thing is only going to become more and more common. Joe Schmaltz is going to be on site with his smart phone when the Event du jour happens, he’s going to have pictures and video up on his blog inside of ten minutes, and it’ll be up at an aggregation site like this one ten minutes after that, with learned analysis by people I respect to boot.
Meanwhile the “proper” journalists are still warming up the chopper and trying to figure out their on-air spin. Like, who do we blame and who do we make look good today? Newspapers are 24 hours behind the event horizon by design, and their “analysis” is done by people I know to be both frauds and idiots.
Being a determined Lefty dumb ass is going to cost you money, Mr. Smoke sir, which I must admit fills me with joy. Me, I’m buying tech stocks. I want a piece of this little revolution to retire on.
And knowing that you will now avoid tech stocks like the plague just makes it all the sweeter. Nighty night, Smoketard.