Patters

I have a friend who works for the Boston Herald, who I was discussing the future of newspapers with. This thread is based on that discussion.

In recent years, both tv news and print media have faced major competition from the internet. The number of people who read newspapers and watch tv news has significantly declined, and so has ad revenue. The loss of revenue has led to a reduction in staffing, and there is less original content (i.e., more articles from AP) and less investigative journalism. So, the result is our media is less able to dig deep into stories, have a single reporter working for a long time on a particular story, or even have a reporter follow a speculative lead. The result is that our news media is less effective in its role of keeping government, business, unions, and other groups honest, and less effective at reporting stories objectively. Too often, the media merely relies on quotes and comments from talking heads, who usually do not give the whole story.

I think this is a serious problem, and don't know what the solution is. Perhaps in time the problem will solve itself. Any thoughts?

Harry Boy

My stupid thoughts are, "we now know all the little things the newspapers didn't want us to know"

The NY Times can feed us all the Left Wing Socialst Crap they want to but when we get through reading it we can go to the Internet and see "The Other Side" they don't like that.

Newspapers have always Preached "Freedom Of Speech" but it always depended on who was giving the speech, times are changing.

Chavez Is "Closing Up" his country's free speech.

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Harry Boy (Genius)

In The Absence Of Law And Order Society Will Surely Destroy Itself

Fogbuster

We're in a new age, Pat. The "information age" has grown up. Now we don't need talking heads or even the mega-resources of the "Gray Lady" or the Washington Past. Interesting that CBSNBCABC all lost their long-time anchors within one year -- might be a signal there, I don't know.

Result is we now have myriads of sources of information -- that's the good news; the bad news is it is up to each one of us to evaluate this sudden plethora of news. Hm-m-m. How does one go about evaluating all this information???

Well, it would help to have a set of guiding principles about life, I would venture. Now where can we find something like that, I wonder... ??



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DarrylS

What makes the internet better than one paper, is that on any given morning I can review the headlines of about 50 different newspapers, blogs and media services. A viewer can see both sides of the story and come to their own opinion, no longer will there be one newspaper as the info tends to be one sided, instead there will be more of a balance. Personally I still get the ProJo, as even though I read it on line, there is a lot of stuff in the paper I still pay attention to that I do not on line.

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"Being the best doesn't mean you always win. It just means you win more than anyone else".. tweet from Kurt Warner to Tom Brady.

Patters

I get about half my news from the internet and half from newspapers. What newspapers provide that the internet does not is a more natural compendium of all news. On the internet, I tend to read only the stories I want, but with the newspaper, I flip through all pages at least skimming every article. Pick up any newspaper and count then number of stories you did not see on the web. I think many people would be very surprised.

But, again, what's missing are indepth stories that rely on more than just what some important person says. On tv, journalists have largely been replaced with comentators who are often no clever than any of us. In the print media, reporters merely regurgitate what someone tells them, rather than investigate the details or find their own stories.

I think the internet is great in many ways, especially since it probably brings news and information to an audience some of whom never read newspapers or paid attention to television news. That said, something important is lost, namely an independent media that can help keep our institutions honest.

Harry Boy

COURIC HITS NEW ALL-TIME LOW FOR 'CBS EVENING NEWS'

VIEWERS, WEEK OF 5/21/07
ABC: 7,780,000
NBC: 7,190,000
CBS: 5,960,000
http://www.drudgereport.com/

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Harry Boy (Genius)

In The Absence Of Law And Order Society Will Surely Destroy Itself

QuiGon

Sounds to me like you're just another liberal terrified of the fact that you and your people no longer control society's access to information.

If it wasn't for the internet, we would have never heard of Monica Lewinsky (thank you, matt Drudge) and Dan Rather would still be gainfully employed at CBS. So don't give me any bull***** about how "our news media is less effective in its role of keeping government, business, unions, and other groups honest."

BelichickFan

I'm fine with the disappearance of the media as we've seen it. There's plenty of interest in good reporting whatever the media that is used, newspaper, magazine, internet, whatever. It's not a concern unless you are worried (like Patters) about losing the status quo in reporting.

Real World

I think journalism as a whole has suffered over the last 15-20 years. People just report without checking facts, and by the time the real news gets out, there are 1,000 tinfoil hats being worn, and urban legends become gospel. Working your way through the cluster fugg of crap that is in the news is a must now. You have to read as many sources as is humanly possible, as integrity in the media was lost a long, long time ago. Personally, I feel bad for newspapers, as I grew up on reading them. However, that's life.

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"The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him."
Leo Tolstoy, 1897

Patters

That's not my point, and your view seems parochial. First, let's remember that most news isn't political. I doubt if that kind of news represents more than 10% of any newspaper (outside it's editorial pages), but maybe you don't read about business, sports, entertainment, science, local news, and so on. The internet news is fine, and Drudgereport, Rawstory, HuffingtonPost, and others play a legitimate role, but they're not the same as a newspaper or tv station that can afford to hire investigative journalists who may spend weeks or even months investigating a single issue. Also, let's remember than many of our best newspapers are conservative -- including the Wall Street Journal and Washington Times, and many of these have laid off people too. Newspapers like the Boston Herald are an important conservative voice for working people, and if they fold it actually plays to advantage of liberal newspapers like the Globe.

News today consists of talking heads or of rather shallow stories where the facts aren't thoroughly investigated. Drudge may suit your political aims, but perhaps that's all you're interested in. Maybe you're not interested in learning.