`How News Happens’
A study from Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism finds that real “news” – that is, something new, and not just recycled – is reported almost entirely by traditional media, especially newspapers. The study of news reporting in Baltimore for the week of July 19-25 found that it is very rare for “new media” to do any original reporting. The study, called “How News Happens,” added:
In the growing echo chamber online, formal procedures for citing and crediting can get lost. We found numerous examples of websites carrying sections of other people’s work without attribution and often suggesting original reporting was added when none was.
Project for Excellence in Journalism has provided some actual evidence to counter those advocates of so-called “citizens’ journalism” who have gleefully been preaching a sort of media apocalypse in which bloggers will replace the mainstream media. It is time to face up to the fact that while “citizens’ journalism” will occasionally add some worthwhile new information to public debate, it will never produce any meaningful volume of original news reporting. It is vital to our country that newspapers make the transition to the Web so that they can continue to do original reporting.
A fair amount of foundation money has been going toward funding “citizens’ journalism” experiments, and maybe these foundations should re-direct that money to help preserve traditional media, perhaps as non-profits. Unfortunately, even major newspapers are trying to do local coverage that relies on unpaid bloggers.
on January 11th, 2010 at 10:08 pm
This rings true to me. I realize some have antipathy towards the New York Times. But I still mainly rely on it to let me know what the major stories are and what is of interest. To tell the truth if you include arts, finance, and business it is really hard to keep up with unless one wants to neglect other things in life.
It seems in the area where many object to the NYTimes is where the internet blogging is helpful. That is in assessment and opinion or in the interpretation of news and events. Important also in the church.
Many say that the videotape brought down communism when people could actually see what was happening in the wicked west rather than have it filtered. The Times rarely filters tho it can be incomplete. But it certainly reports the church more honestly than do church leaders. That includes Rocco who never forgets that the Vatican is the hand that feeds him also.
on January 12th, 2010 at 12:34 pm
This is no surprise, but it seems more descriptive the prescriptive to me.
Of course the traditional media are doing most of the reporting. They are the ones with the most news collection resources. That does not mean that the traditional media must be preserved at all costs.
As resources shift, a new model can emerge. What the “new media” has shown is that the “old media” doesn’t always get it right, and frankly, that they are often more interested in influencing events than reporting on them. Moreover, the new media can take and fuse multiple sources in ways that the old media can, but won’t.
The new media are not just a bunch of geeks in their mother’s basement blogging in their underwear. There are great examples of excellent reporting. Michael Yon is a good example. While all the traditional media was reporting that violence in Iraq was destined to continue to increase, he was in the Sunni Triangle reporting on the changes in allegiances that were reducing violence. The traditional media didn’t, because it didn’t fit the narative they were building.
Let’s see seven years from now what happens. The need for information will still be there, so the resources won’t just dissappear.