Comments on: Incompetence, not net, kills media

By: For true Grace, nothing beats mags | importance of ideas...

For true Grace, nothing beats mags | importance of ideas... — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 03:42:08 +0000

[...] Incompetence, not net, kills media [...]

By: Newser pays #2 « the news with nipples

Newser pays #2 « the news with nipples — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 07:36:51 +0000

[...] pays #2 I keep going back to a piece Jason Whittaker wrote in March. He argues that the hope that ad revenue will support online news has been dashed [...]

By: Punch no knockout for journalism | importance of ideas...

Punch no knockout for journalism | importance of ideas... — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 22:48:18 +0000

[...] bleated about this before: on why blogging is merely new-age op-ed, and on the lack of vision and courage by traditional media owners in preparing for an inevitable digital-only future. It’s so fundamental to the ongoing debate [...]

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 06:57:40 +0000

there isn’t any decent engaging critical mainstream media in australia that is well rounded and balanced any more – zip, zero, none….

Fairfax is f*d by its management; abc and sbs are pretty much dumbed down (the former after being constantly defunded); and the australian – don’t get me started on that climate-change denying, racism and war-pushing, vehicle for neo-liberal think tank spin….

the rest is commercial pap, talkback rant or tabloid sensationalism…

By: Google should search for solution, too | importance of ideas...

Google should search for solution, too | importance of ideas... — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 16:06:54 +0000

[...] doesn’t really ‘get it’, and I made a lot of noise about this recently. I have also written in the past about the fight not to save newspapers or [...]

By: ez norton

ez norton — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 21:42:09 +0000

Jason, have you noticed that aside from the shouting, you don’t seem to have indicated any real alternative.

One possibility, of course, is that social media, blogs, web-based news and so on is not actually a threat to good journalism?

I quote Kate Jennings, Quarterly Essay 32, page 7:

“Communities on the web are, by and large, disastrously narcissistic,
eye-crossingly moronic, and don’t give a tinker’s damn about piracy or plagiarism or fact-based editing. On these sites, truth is extremely relative.

“Qualms about this vast, ever-growing mosh-pit of noxious mediocrity are usually shrugged off by web true-believers……it’s impossible for
cream to rise when communication channels are clogged with half-baked opinions, illiterate rants and skateboarding dogs.”

By: Noam

Noam — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 00:13:53 +0000

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/daniel_hannan/blog/2009/03/25/my_speech_to_gordon_brown_goes_viral

By: Adam McWhinney

Adam McWhinney — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 02:55:06 +0000

It seems the US is taking the situation with its newspapers in particular quite seriously…

Quote from Reuters:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – With many U.S. newspapers struggling to survive, a Democratic senator on Tuesday introduced a bill to help them by allowing newspaper companies to restructure as nonprofits with a variety of tax breaks.

“This may not be the optimal choice for some major newspapers or corporate media chains but it should be an option for many newspapers that are struggling to stay afloat,” said Senator Benjamin Cardin.

A Cardin spokesman said the bill had yet to attract any co-sponsors, but had sparked plenty of interest within the media, which has seen plunging revenues and many journalist layoffs.

Cardin’s Newspaper Revitalization Act would allow newspapers to operate as nonprofits for educational purposes under the U.S. tax code, giving them a similar status to public broadcasting companies.

Under this arrangement, newspapers would still be free to report on all issues, including political campaigns. But they would be prohibited from making political endorsements.

Advertising and subscription revenue would be tax exempt, and contributions to support news coverage or operations could be tax deductible.

Full story:
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE52N67F20090324

By: Pink Starfish

Pink Starfish — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 02:49:40 +0000

Jason it seems to me that you’re writing for a sense of martyrdom.
If you want to earn a dollar as a journalist you need to come to terms that the consumer is the one in control.
We can act as righteous as we want about “quality journalism” but at the end of the day sensationalism sells papers. And why does it sell papers? Because deep down we are all warped individuals thriving on human tragedy. And unfortunately, there is a direct correlation between paper selling and making money as a journalist.
The Internet has become a great platform to publish (credibility issues aside) but you are never free of constraints if you want to earn money doing it. Charge subscription on your blogs, have advertiser links or be commissioned and there is once again that inherent need to please the reader or advertisers. And the other part of the internet… why pay for something you can get for free? In most instances, people will source a free blog first or look for the article recycled on the Internet.
While your integrity sounds great in theory buddy, applying it in practice might just do yourself out of a job – brings a whole meaning to starving artist.

By: steven ellis

steven ellis — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 02:48:38 +0000

trashy tabloid rag doesn’t begin to describe the news-limited dross dressed as a ‘news’paper that unfortunately dominates the australian major cities…

in our major city sydney…the fact that the local media is dominated by one simplistic , jingoistic low-brow tabloid rag ..one wonders serves no -other purpose than shamelessly serve its own commercial interests and prop up and be the marketing arm of its love-child ..a struggling local provincial ‘footy code’…
sydney ‘global’ city…my a*se..