News in the social networking era
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Though nobody seems very surprised over yesterday’s dismal circulation numbers for American newspapers—in which an overall decline of 10.6% was charted in a four-month period—the $64 dollar question still remains, what will replace newspapers as a commercially viable way to collect and distribute accurate, reliable information?
I’ve written about the emerging non-profit model for journalism, which might be one way to address the problem. Still, one wonders if future generations simply don’t put as much of a premium on standards of reporting as those that came before them. There’s little doubt that we’ve entered the age of social networking, in which individuals function as one-person production and distribution outlets. This snappy little video (at present one of the most viral on the web) is a handy primmer on the subject:
It’s a funny time, to be sure, in which we’re about to witness a major consolidation of media outlets (more so than we have already), until we’ll probably have a few national newspapers that won’t even offer paper editions. As Yahoo and the Associated Press have been doing, you’ll get local news filtered to you depending on where you live, but the actual sources for that information may prove to be much less diverse that you have now.
On the other hand, we’ll have the constant stream of first-person accounts on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, which will shape our experience of what it is to live in a place in ways different than traditional media has offered.
I think a lot of the advocates of the non-profit model have a good point when they argue that we need professional reporting, and overall journalistic standards if the press is going to continue to serve a truly valuable function in our society.
Clearly, however, the trend is heading in the Do-it-Yourself direction.
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It would have helped if professional journalists had not completely and shamelessly spent the eight years of the Bush administration neglecting their obligation to the public trust. They could have informed the public and demonstrated the value of a viable fourth estate.
It would have been helpful if newspapers were lead by publishers who were concerned with journalism instead of possible stock options to be had with a corporate take over from some media conglomerate with a colorful power point on vertical integration.
It would have been helpful if these new publishers didn’t think the answer to dropping ad revenue was to reduce content by firing writers and raising the price of papers. Thus concluding that readers are distracted by stories and certainly want to pay more for less.
It would have been helpful if print publishers and vertical integrators understood that the internet should have been included in the power point and hired someone who understood profit models that used ads with content.
It would be helpful if the public knew the difference between fact and fiction and the importance of citations and sources and that a man wearing a fedora and working a website does not make for journalist even if that person may be you. It is a profession and it takes more than google to get to the truth.
Finally it would be helpful to newspapers to realize that it is about the truth and they can’t let that quest die.
Libtree,
Not sure I agree with all of your conclusions. Some, yes. The simple fact, however, is that dropping ad and subscription revenue has meant that many papers have had to fire staff (if they can manage to stay in business at all). Running a news bureau in Moscow, Iraq, or Viet Nam is not cheap.
And I don’t think you can blame the demise of a whole lot of independent, small town papers on the greed of the executives there.
Seems to me that you are right that journalism has edged closer to opinion confirmation over the years (thank you internet and cable news!), but if that was at the heart of the failing business model, then I don’t think you’d see a commensurate rise in blog reading (even though it’s mostly free).
Truth in reporting has always been a sticky wicket. While the Iraq War build up was a low point for many of the journalists covering it, there was also a great deal of good journalism being practiced at the same time.
David,
I did not mean to come to any conclusions but to lay out some major missteps over the last decade. Corporate take over of newspapers did not help journalism, for instance, the expensive stories, the investigative stories, were put on a back burner for the sake of the bottom line. This happened right away. Now this may have been unforeseen when they purchased and the move may have meant to save the paper but it is also a case of cutting off your nose to spite your face. I have been reading papers nearly my entire life and know these are the stories that make you buy papers.
My main point is that papers under conglomerate control don’t do well because while they understand business they don’t seem to understand newspapers. The software is more important than the hardware. Now this does not fully explain newspapers dropping the ball on the run up to the Iraq war or the complete misunderstanding of the economy. I was reading some magazines that seemed to get the stories.
While I lived in Oregon my town daily was doing alright, mainly because the Oregonian did no news outside of Portland. Lots of little papers did fold but mostly from a publication called the nickel that ran free classified than any competition from the internet or blogs.
And while blogs have picked up readers they have been more a part of the social phenomenon than news. While they are getting better with actual news, siphoning up real journalists from the papers they are still a far cry from a good newspaper.
Lastly I would never demean the good work of journalists around the world. I have worked closely with many writers over the years, they are an infuriating and wonderfully crazed species that only share one common trait, they have to write. Unfortunately they also have to eat and take care of their families. Every time I hear of internet boosters bragging about putting MSM into the grave a writer comes to mind or a good story that changed history and think these fools who condemn newspapers should be very careful of what they wish for.
I understand that the business model no longer works for a variety of reasons but strangely there is one publisher out there who is a newspaper man manages to still make money: Rupert Murdoch and this is a publisher who knows what the real problem lies.
It is free and freeloaders. While the price of a paper goes up, these same papers offer the news for free. My wife nixed the NY Times subscription as well as the LA Times and made me a freeloader. Blogs and news and opinion sites are also freeloaders, feeding off the trough of free content. Murdoch is fighting the good fight but he knows his empire of paper is over and is trying to save his empire and the hide of journalists. It is the only thing that I admire in the man.
Let us hope that the non-profit model works because I shutter at the thought of a fourth estate being run by bloggers.
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