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What Will Replace The “Dead Tree Edition”?

[ Comments Off ]Posted on June 2, 2010 by admin in Popular Media

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

While the continuing demise of major print news sources is inevitable, what will replace them?

The fact that the term “dead-tree edition” even exists is a clear expression of the state of newspapers today. It’s clear that big changes are afoot, and it’s even clearer that no-one knows where those changes will take us. While Steve Jobs is talking about his fear of America turning into a nation of bloggers, Yahoo News is banking on exactly that as a big moneymaker. And while Rupert Murdoch loves the iPad – which is being touted as “being to news what the iPod was to music” – he has also lost billions on his takeover of the Wall Street Journal, while not ruining it in the ways everyone expected. And though people have been arguing for a while that Google has somehow contributed to the demise of print news, this piece in The Atlantic not only points out that Google CEO Eric Schmidt wants to help print news (and ironically said so in a December 2009 Op-Ed piece in the WSJ), it also points to some of the real causes of the newspapers’ demise – mostly loss of ad revenue. And mostly in forms you wouldn’t imagine, like classified ads, which with many papers generated as much as 30% of their income. I’m personally excited to see where it all goes, as long as the Huffington Post doesn’t become the leading on line news source as some expect, and as long as Google doesn’t become the world’s news filter, with their search portal dominance dictating which news Web sites we can find. Oops! We forgot that the new AP Style guide says it’s “website”, not “Web site”. Not that the AP has quite the nearly-biblical influence it used to; even their net income is down 65%, and their very identity is being parodied daily by crappily edited sites that wantonly violate half their guidelines with almost every sentence.

We Don’t Need No Education

[ Comments Off ]Posted on September 5, 2009 by admin in Politics

Saturday, September 5th, 2009

But we’ll have another serving of that delicious thought control, thank you very much.

But we’ll have another serving of that delicious thought control, thank you very much! In the past decade or so, the political landscape, the media’s portrayal of it, and the irrational, polarized public sentiment aroused by the combination of the two have nearly driven me back to a position I held in my twenties, which is that the only rational response to politics is to become apolitical. I’m not quite there yet, so I’d like to share a few thoughts, and get your feedback if you have the time and interest. For the record, I have to confess that the recent ranting about whether or not President Obama’s speech next week should be viewed in the public schools was sort of a last straw for me; I dropped out of high school in the tenth grade in the seventies, a time when I feel safe in saying public education was in better shape than it is now. Education is a hot-button topic for me. And frankly, even Republicans like Colin Powell are concerned about the alarmingly high dropout rate in America. The idea that a local public school system would decide to censor a presidential speech directed at school kids – rather than viewing it and having intelligent classroom discourse about it – is mind boggling to me. In my view, it’s a perfect example of the negative impact of politically driven, media-fueled, irrational public sentiment. So, listed below are a few things I think are at the core of many of America’s problems right now. Please save me from my own political apathy; if I know there are others out there with similar thoughts, I might stay engaged and even pursue action. Otherwise, I’m likely to end up as one of the first proud citizens of the impending Idiocracy. Read the rest of this entry »

The Bad News Is That Good News Isn’t Free

[ 1 Comment ]Posted on August 7, 2009 by admin in Popular Media

Friday, August 7th, 2009

Rupert Murdoch wants his two dollars, and my hometown newspaper is better off dead.

Rupert Murdoch’s plan to start charging for online news is an interesting test of the theories laid out in the recent bestseller Free: The Future of a Radical Price. I think most consumers feel that given the quality of journalism over the past decade, the price of free news is just about right. It’s interesting to me that Murdoch would choose to monetize online news at a time when real-world papers are failing at an epidemic rate; I’m of the opinion that his massive media empire is simply unable – much like the music industry – to adapt to the evolving market. And apparently Gartner Research agrees. Unfortunately, with the current trend of blogs-as-news and Twitter-driven media, the problems created by completely profit-driven journalism (outlined nicely in the book The Elements of Journalism) are replaced with new ones, primarily a total lack of professionalism and ethical guidelines. I’m sorry to say that in the supposedly media-hip town that I live in, I did little grieving over its recently failed newspaper. It was an awful publication. And while I had some hopes for its online/hybrid replacement, they’ve created what many already feel is a failure of epic proportions. It’s hard to tell how bad the content is; the interface is so awful you’ll never find it! Likewise, even savvier attempts to infuse online news with a degree of journalistic professionalism and integrity – like The Faster Times – end up falling short in a number of ways. Maybe if the government somehow supported and regulated the news we could find a balance. That always turns out well. See you in the funny papers!

Read the rest of this entry »

Is Obama A Socialist? Are Republicans Gay Fetishists?

[ 1 Comment ]Posted on April 28, 2009 by admin in Politics

Tuesday, April 28th, 2009

Can someone please tell me what country I live in?

I’m not sure what country I live in any more, and the media certainly isn’t helping me figure out the answer. Between the Fox Effect (their new approach is apparently not broadcasting the president’s speeches at all) and the rapid demise of the nation’s newspapers, I’ve been feeling a little in the dark lately regarding whom to rant about. I found it odd that while Bush was still in office, few took issue (well, I did) with the fact that the administration was nationalizing the banks, but when Obama pursues actions like this, Republican wack-jobs start teabagging and calling him a socialist. With the traditional (and apparently somewhat meaningless) 100 days upon us, we have Republicans both jumping ship and throwing the cargo overboard while the “No Drama Obama” style (see this fairly balanced Politico piece)  seems to be keeping seas calm. I look forward to Obama’s address Wednesday, perhaps especially because it’s not on Fox. Maybe he can give me some idea what’s going on around here.

If You Don’t Read The Newspaper, You’re Uninformed

[ 5 Comments ]Posted on March 29, 2009 by admin in Popular Media

Sunday, March 29th, 2009

If you DO read the newspaper, you’re misinformed.


Is This News?

I’ve always loved Mark Twain’s saying “If you don’t read the newspaper, you’re uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you’re misinformed“. Sitting down this Sunday morning to not read the Sunday paper – something I used to love to do – I was really struck by this change in my behavior over the years. Living in a town where the local newspaper is failing as a business, I’m surprised by the way people talk about the topic. Some seem almost shocked, as if the news were some public utility, like electric power. I find that level of ignorance strange, because aside from the fact that the trend away from print has clearly been in motion for over a decade (I even used it as a sales pitch on this dated page in 2005 in the sidebar), newspapers in general have struggled since the 1970′s. Those who like to think they’re more informed show an interesting ignorance of their own. They’ll say things like “this is no surprise, the blogosphere has shown that we don’t need newspapers“. Which is a REALLY scary level of ignorance, as this Guardian UK interview with David Simon, creator of The Wire points out. As he puts it: “The internet does froth and commentary very well, but you don’t meet many internet reporters down at the courthouse.” Another argument that Simon (a former crime reporter for the Baltimore Sun) puts forth is that the failure of local newspapers will allow unprecedented political corruption. Which I think shows a certain insider ignorance all its own. The ownership of newspapers by large media companies effectively killed the Woodward & Bernstein style of reporting years ago, as pointed out by journalism professionals themselves in the excellent book The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect, which is a great read, if you’re not familiar with it. In any case, the bottom line is that these days, news is business. In spite of sites like newspaperdeathwatch.com that track the carnage, there are still people who see a business opportunity. And some on line news sources understand that there are things you can do to attract visitors that you just can’t do in print, like photo features on cheerleaders wrestling in Hershey’s Syrup.

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