One final note: a constant gripe from reporters is that if all you chase is money, money, money, you only end up reporting on puppies, puppies, puppies. And if that’s the case, and that all people really do want are puppy stories, then give them puppy stories: about how many bomb-sniffing dogs are dying in Iraq; or about how much the average pet owner spends on his vet bill versus his prescription drug bill; or about what happens to the family dog after a foreclosure.
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The steady drip of layoffs and buyouts, slowly desiccating once-vibrant newsrooms around the country, has also produced a reservoir of anger, sadness, fear, uncertainty—even some cautious optimism here and there—among reporters and editors who invested years, decades in some cases, of their lives to print journalism. We’ve asked anyone so inclined to channel these emotions, not into rant—although there will be a bit of that—but rather into reflection on what went wrong, and where we might go from here. We will publish one per day, under the headline “Parting Thoughts.” All of the letters we publish will be collected here.
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I'm doubt that the new owners of old media will save journalism and stabilize the profession.
I am radio journalist who finds the author's fall from the mountain top a too familiar tragedy. It appears to be the same freefall I've witnessed among journalists in local radio news for years.
Many radio newsrooms vanished leaving a precious few stripped-down survivors. It ocurred by design driven by front offices frantic to survive the ad wars with newspapers and television.
Can any community who once supported five or six fully staffed radio newsrooms truly say it's better informed with the leftovers? Public radio tried to step into the breach but its own finances are under seige.
Now we see a similar scenario, this time with newspaper and television front offices having to compete with a new threat--the internet. Their newsrooms are suffering the same fate that wiped out radio newsrooms en masse.
Now a new money-making superstructure has to be devised to house what's left of newsgathering. But does anyone really believe that it is the finance guys who are interested interested in salvaging journalism?
Will internet or citizen journalism-- as admirable and inevitable as it is--will it be the cover to replace costly news staffs with inexpensive amateur journalists for the sole purpose of saving money.
And will these amateur journalists and one one-man bands do any better than a profession honed by experience, training and adequate resources? If the internet is free...will news get what we pay for-- nothing.
It is really the masterminds of New Media commerce who have the ultimate responsibility to define the news of the future not Old Media front offices. The hope is that these new leaders will stumble across a solution.
It's interesting that the new bosses of newspapers in places like Chicago, Los Angeles and Orlando who are causing such angst have a background in radio.
We need only look at radio's history to see journalism's possible future.
Posted by Cecil Hickman on Thu 31 Jul 2008 at 05:27 PM