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I agree that twitter and citizen journalism have shown themselves to be quite capable of disseminating information and news. It's still not quite the same as r
by dhotson 16y ago
I agree that twitter and citizen journalism have shown themselves to be quite capable of disseminating information and news.
It's still not quite the same as reading a well written, unbiased, in-depth analysis of a story in The Economist or The New York Times (or even Al Jazeera).
Sure, there's a large market for "news-tainment". But I think there's also a market for high quality journalism.
I'm also tipping that people are more likely to pay (and pay more) for the latter too.
- ThomPete 16y agoI too love well written articles. But it is unlikely a big enough market to entertain that many newspapers. I do however have quibbles with the idea of unbiased journalism. Personally I prefer highly opinionated pieces, but that's another discussion :)
- dhotson 16y agoI think you would be surprised. :-) You're right about unbiased news though. It's a myth. You really need to make up your own mind and read various sources to get some balance. I'm pretty sure all news has some inherent bias. Opinion is fine, but don't try to make out like it's real news. Techcrunch is a major offender here.
- chc 16y agoThis is a distressingly common sentiment these days. I can't think of any good reason to prefer opinionated screeds to well-balanced factual analysis. Very often it boils down to "I don't have confidence in news stories to have a 100% optimal distribution and analysis of the facts, so I've decided it's not even worth pursuing the truth."
- ThomPete 16y agoOpinionated does not mean that it's not balanced or factual. Everything is at the end of the day interpretation. I would rather know what peoples stance are whether I agree or disagree than to read something that is stated as the truth.
- chc 16y agoSomething opinionated is by definition not balanced (in the sense of giving everything an equal shake) or factual. "Fact" and "opinion" are antonyms. And I can't imagine what it would look like for an article to be opinionated but not explicitly favor any particular view over another. Are we using different definitions here or do you genuinely believe somebody arguing that Steve Jobs is a worthless sonovabitch is being evenhanded?
- ThomPete 16y agoWe are perhaps using different definitions.