I have to agree that I think bloggers are taking over journalism, and I think that they are in a way replacing it. They will be the only source of news we have left when paper news is gone. But I don’t think its the bloggers faults.
I read an article about Facebook ruining Journalism, and although Facebook isin’t a blog, I thought it was fitting for this. Part of bloggers ruining journalism is the journalists fault. I didn’t think this until I read this article, but this totally opened my eyes. Blogging, or even Facebook, is much faster and a more convenient way to get information out there, but journalists are going onto Facebook and getting ideas for stories, which I think is not okay. If they can’t get a good story before it goes on Facebook, its probably not worth going in a paper after its been all over a website.
That is why newspapers are dying. Everyone can get all the information and details on something before the paper even comes out, so then there is no point in buying the paper itself.
People aren’t always looking for a huge three page story about something that happened yesterday, and that is what papers offer. You can look up something, anything, in a search engine and come up with websites and blogs that have short stories about the same thing, that give you only and exactly what you need.
On the Ryan Coke Experience, he talks about exactly this. He talks about a man named Ian Shapira complaning about one of his stories from The Washington Post being “condensed”, and put into just a few paragraphs on a blog. I hate to admit it, but people are lazy these days, and that is all that they are interested in reading. Literally, what he wrote about her was so long, I looked at it and didn’t even want to read it because of its length. But I did.
His article was about, bloggers, actually. And about how they steal stories from other people and make the stories shorter and more their own. And then, that is exactly what Gabriel Snyder did. To me, it is extremely ironic. She did exactly what he was complaining about. Almost like she really wanted to make him mad about it, even more then he already was.
I really believe that this is where print news is going. Paper reporters are mad at people who blog and report online, and and people who report online and blog are defending themselves and getting mad at paper reporters.
I don’t think that bloggers are ruining it for everyone. I don’t think that reporters that report on paper all have to loose their jobs. What I do think is that they need to learn to work with each other. Not to fight and cause conflict with the other side, and to really just learn to get along.
But I dont see that happening, and so that is why I think print news will all be over within the next few years.
October 6th, 2009 at 9:23 pm
Savanha,
I appreciate your perspective. You do a great job of staying focused, bringing in outside perspectives, and coming to a great conclusion on a difficult topic.
I don’t know if I agree that Facebook is ruining journalism. I definitely think that its influence is 100% negative, but I can see how it’s hurting the practice of reporting.
I blogged for a 10 days about Facebook and journalism last year. Check out my blog http://blogs.bhs.cc/mccallum to see what I concluded.
October 7th, 2009 at 11:50 am
Thank you.
It might not be completely ruining it, but I just think that it is a horrible way for them to get stories.
They also talked about getting interview subjects through Facebook, and I think that it isn’t right either.
I don’t think they shouldn’t use Facebook, but I don’t think it should help them with their stories.