Thursday 16 July 2009

I hope they're not talking about me

The National Business Review, New Zealand's leading business journal, today pitches for subscriptions, promising subscriber-only online content (no link, as from the emailed pitch).
As you know, there has been endless discussion for a number of years about the crazy model adopted by newspapers in most parts of the free world in which they pay the enormous costs of running professional newsrooms only to give their content away free – while at the same time slashing newsroom numbers to save money as circulation and advertising revenues fall.

And to add to the madness it has been the aggregators that have profited the most from the supply of that free news copy. Worse still the model has spawned a huge band of amateur, untrained, unqualified bloggers who have swarmed over the internet pouring out columns of unsubstantiated “facts” and hysterical opinion.

Most of these “citizen journalists” don’t have access to decision makers and are infamous for their biased and inaccurate reporting on almost any subject under the sun (while invariably criticising professional news coverage whose original material they depend on to base their diatribes).


It is only a matter of time before the model collapses. The alternative is newsrooms decimated to the point of processing public relations handouts or unedited government propaganda from their fully staffed team of spin doctors.
I'm a fan of the NBR, and not only because they've been about the only outlet consistently covering the Hurly-BERLy. And, I'd far sooner pay for decent content than have it cease to exist. But it's a bit quick to blame the bloggers here. Bloggers aren't entirely parasitic on journalists; it's very much a two-way street. See here especially, but also here and here. In New Zealand, Kiwiblog's broken stories picked up without attribution by the mainstream.

5 comments:

  1. decimated newsrooms
    "The alternative is newsrooms decimated to the point of processing public relations handouts or unedited government propaganda from their fully staffed team of spin doctors."

    Is this opposed to NZPA, Fairfax and APN plagerising the releases the spin doctors send out and putting their own names on them? Or does the public need a decrepit egotistical editor telling them what is and is not news?

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  2. "Most of these “citizen journalists” don’t have access to decision makers and are infamous for their biased and inaccurate reporting on almost any subject under the sun (while invariably criticising professional news coverage whose original material they depend on to base their diatribes)."

    Interesting how they slate citizen journalists, bloggers and Spin doctors. Where do the majority of their own news stories originate from?

    And why if, are they opposed to them, do they allow users to post their own news on "from the horses mouth", which surely is another angle on citizen journalism?

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  3. Don't worry Eric, I'm sure they mean Seamus, not you!!!

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  5. Snap! I'm a big fan of the NBR too. Chris Keall is my fav tech writer and I follow his blogs daily.

    But its sorta like the effect Trademe's had on the second-hand industry, or the auctioneers industry. Technology has changed the way the good (news) is being delivered. The NBR maybe howling to the moon for all the effect its going to have on how news is delivered. And despite what they think, caveat emptor has always been the comment for new infromation, regardless of the source.

    Many moons ago when I did my law degree, we looked at a similar problem facing the American media of the 1930s where radio transmission across the USA meant that articles published in news papers on one side of the country could be reported on the radio in time for the other side of the country to include the substance of the comments in their newspapers becuase of timezone differences. From memory, no copyright breach was found, but you can bet the first publishing paper was howling as every bit as the NBR is above.

    From memory, I think the non-legal outcome was that one paper brought the other paper on the other side of the country. Information wasn't "property" which was owned and supported rights to exclude others, only the expression of the information could be copyrighted. The second best option was to buy the competition and internalise the profits from reproducing information into the company where it originated. A solution which doesn't help the NBR and other media effectively deal with bloggers.

    What's the name of that economic thingy where you can't reap all the benefits of your investment....

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