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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

Missing it

David Herman, writing in Prospect, does not think the Old Media are giving way to the New Media. He just reckons that some of the Old Media are crap:

The reason the Guardian’s circulation is falling is not because of the internet or because young people have gone blog-crazy but because G2 is full of uninteresting new columnists and the op-ed page has a kind of infantile ultra-leftism that no sane person would go near. Similarly, ITV is haemorrhaging viewers not because of the challenging new multi-channel environment but because it keeps making programmes like Celebrity Wrestling and Celebrity Love Island. After all, the Daily Mail and the Sunday Times do not seem to be losing too many readers and the viewing figures for BBC2, Channel Four and Channel Five are remarkably stable. Interestingly, it is the losers in the ratings wars who tend to be the hardcore technological determinists.

But hang on. If the numbers for some of the Old Media are “remarkably stable”, while other bits of the Old Media are “haemorrhaging” viewers and readers, does that not mean that the total amount of attention being paid to the Old Media is in decline?

It makes sense to me that the New Media should be better at supplying infantile ultra-leftism and uninteresting new columnists for free, than they are at replacing the Sunday Times and the Daily Mail. So, if infantile ultra-leftism is what you want, you no longer have to pay for it. However, free substitutes for the Sunday Times and the Daily Mail will be a bit longer in catching on, not least, I should guess, because their readers are more conservative in their reading habits as well as more Conservative in their opinions. The picture that Herman sketches is entirely consistent with the notion that the New Media are losing out, starting with their youngest readers and viewers.

And when the brains of all the not-so-infantile not-so-ultra-leftists cut in, as Blue Peter loses its influence over them and as Real Life impinges, will they suddenly switch back to reading newspapers, in the form of a smartened up Guardian, or the Sunday Times, or the Daily Mail? It seems improbable. They will surely carry right on with their New Media, and the New Media will expand to accommodate them, as viewers, as readers, as writers, and in whatever other ways develop.

David Herman sounds to me like he is saying that sailing ships will sail on unscathed, and that this steam stuff will never catch on. His title is: “Am I missing something?” Yes he is.

13 comments to Missing it

  • Ted

    Old Media used to have a monopoly on information. They no longer do. Consumers can access real time information from many sources and form their own conclusions. This gives consumers new power, as they are in a position to evaluate the information they used to receive as truth. Dont know about you guys but what has happened to me has been revelatory – a growing realisation that big media is largely inhabited by poor thinkers, often pushing a biased agenda, who are seeking to entertain rather than inform. With this has come a huge decrease in trust levels, not to mention frequent anger at their incompetence.

    As a result I only read The Times (UK), whereas I used to read the lot – and even then I only read it occasionally. I think TV news is dire and get most of my info from bloggers, who are often far more intelligent than the journos out there.

    Comments?

  • veryretired

    Once again, the holders of a powerful position cannot understand why they are no longer as powerful as they used to be, and so they attack and ridicule the up and coming instead of honestly examining what is going on.

    For good or ill, the younger generations now coming into their own, as the boomers blessedly fade into retirement age, are not interested in much of what the traditional “big media” has to offer. Specifically, they turn to satellite and web based sources much more than newspapers and network news.

    The problem isn’t bias, as all media has always been biased, but the relentless concentration on sensational trivia to the detriment of any deeper analysis. But, just like the vaudeville moguls who couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to watch those stupid flickering images on a screen, or the radio powers that dismissed television as a passing fad, the current czars can’t comprehend the attraction of the web for breaking news stories, downloaded music and movies, or real time chats with someone on another continent.

    Its the shallowness of what the MSM presents, and the closed-minded timidity with which they approach everything, that is causing their fading influence.

    I think it’s funny that the transition from hegemony to a multi-polar environment, which so much of the MSM supports on the political scene due to their extreme anti-Americanism, is happening to them in their own realm, and they can’t figure out what’s up.

    While I write this, I just happen to be watching a Pink Panther sequel based on the Clouseau character’s utter cluelessness as he accidentally avoids one disaster after another. I doubt the MSM, while equally clueless, will have as enjoyable a journey until the case is “sol-ved”.

  • ernest young

    Couldn’t agree more, with either of the above comments. MSM has lost it’s integrity and sense of direction – it has no morality!.

    The rot seems to date back to the day that journalism became a university course, and today, it seems that many so-called reporters are ‘bought men’, and have hidden agendas, as we saw with the NY Times and many others.

    It is hilarious that the Grand Panjandrums of the media – both written and visual, are so imbued with their own importance that they fail to see progress coming up behind them to bite their backsides…

  • Chris Goodman

    I have just watched the Thursday edition of BBC Newsnight. With the exception of the report by Susan Watts (who sets journalistic standards for herself that bear little relation to the rest of the programme) the only quality control seems to be the desire to win the ‘dumb leftist bigot of the week’ award. They get paid for doing this? In all honesty what – other than extracting money from the poor – is the point of this programme? You are more likely to find out about the world by sticking your head up a cow’s bottom.

  • RAB

    Well it depends on where you’re standing folks. I’ve said it before but most British journalists have never been near a Journalism course – We make it up as we go along!
    And if you get found out making it up too often, you get fired. Otherwise you’re set for life.

  • In America the rot in the MSM goes back to Vietnam, a war America fought with men who were drafted, but not allowed to win.

    They were doing a terrible job in fighting a good fight — against evil commies.

    Because LBJ and Nixon, and their generals, kept lying about the war, the truth-seeking press turned against the war.
    The activist oriented press was successful in getting the US “OUT NOW”.

    The biased press then refused to cover the Killing Fields consequences of following their suggested policy.

    Most of the press thinks it was “good” for America to leave Vietnam AND let the commies win, and murder. By denial of responsibility for consequences.

  • Midwesterner

    “You are more likely to find out about the world by sticking your head up a cow’s bottom.”

    Chris, please oh PLEASE tell me that’s not an empirical statement!!

    (Coming to you from “America’s Dairyland”)

  • Much as though I dislike defending the Guardian, to some extent its falling circulation can be attributed to the success of its excellent website (excellent from a technical, not content point of view).

  • J

    I agree that the MSM in its current form is failing, and _probably_ as a result of new media. However, I don’t think the decline is irreverisble by any means. There are a few things to bear in mind:

    1. Print is inherently better than online media for several things, such as high quality images, large amounts of prose, and so forth. I see no decline in sales of glossy magazines or books as a result of the Internet. If daily papers move in this direction, they may increase circulation.

    2. Stick to the facts. MSM still has the infrastructure in place to get facts that the new media simply can’t. A tiny number of bloggers have access to political press events and even few to military press sessions etc. On the other hand, the internet is not exactly short of home-spun op-eds of every flavour imaginable. The MSM should stick to relaying facts, and let the new media produce 1001 high-minded opinion pieces.

    It is also true that the fast majority of political blogs are largely re-gurgitating or commenting stories produced by the MSM. One does wonder what they will do when there is no MSM to complain about.

    It’s nice to imagine a revolution in the media, but I think evolution is much much more likely.

  • Ted

    I was hoping that the current crisis in New Orleans might have been used as an opportunity by big media to be responsible but how wrong that has proved.

    I have never seen such hysterical nonsense. Let me make a few predictions about the real figures that will emerge post Katrina:

    1 Big Media : NO will be abandoned. Me: New Orleans will be up and running again in 12-18 months. In 6 months, the vast majority of the population will be back.
    2 Big Media : death are in the thousands. Me: Death will number about 300.
    3 Big Media: there are rapes going on, gangs of armed thugs run the city and babies are dying of starvation. Me: There will have been no evidence of rapes, gangs of armed thugs and no babies will die of starvation.
    4 Big Media: there are sharks, alligators or giant snakes preying on hapless citizens. Me: none of this is happening at all.
    5 Big Media: 80% of the city is underwater. Me: about 30% is ‘underwater’, but there is flooding in the city.
    6 Big Media : this is about global warming. Me and vast majority of scientific community : there is no connection at all.
    7 Big Media: There is vast ‘looting’ going on. Me: a minority is going into supermarkets and clothes stores and taking things. This is to be expected.
    8 Big Media: there are building buckling and in danger of collapse. Me: rubbish. They have already survived Katrina itself.
    9 Big Media: there is starvation, violence and rape at the superbowl. Me: rubbish. There is no starvation, no violence and no rape. However there is tremendous anxiety and frustration – understandably.
    10 Big Media: millions will be homeless.Me : rubbish. In fact the insurance industry are not panicking at all.

    I could go on and don’t want to make light of a disaster. However the people of NO, as well as concerned US citizens, not to mention millions of us outside the US, need better than this garbage. The media outlets have from the first sign of Katrina hoped for the worst as this helps ratings. They have deliberately manufactured an apocalypse from a natural disaster, where no such apocalypse exists.

    Turn off the TV news and stop buying newspapers NOW.

  • Tim

    In a microcosm, the computing industry, I don’t read any computer publications. Bloggers have taught me all sorts of things about how that industry works.

    Forgetting the more nefarious practises (like looking after advertisers), they just can’t beat bloggers. Bloggers can write direct. A company with a piece of software can write about it, the users of the tool can write about their experience, not just 2 days with it, but months of experience. The people writing are real experts in the field. It’s a much richer experience.

    Not only that, but bloggers can write as and when they want, because it’s not an activity designed to pay the bills for most. So, they don’t have a deadline, 3000 words or whatever. The costs mean that they can set their own agenda, not that of an editor, sponsor or advertiser.

    It’s democratised publishing and very much like a market. Boring blogs don’t get read. Niche blogs get read by a niche. Good blogs get people commenting and spread. A blog acting as a front or a shill will be exposed quickly and spread like wildfire. A blogger misquoting facts will get other bloggers posting something about what is wrong with it. This is not like a newspaper which can keep compounding their biases with incorrect facts.

    The SCO vs IBM case over Linux code was reported as something akin to a press release by the mainstream computer press (mostly staffed by journalists, not IT experts). The bloggers (on places like groklaw.net and slashdot) were doing the real investigative work, reading papers, digging out old quotes and information.

  • guy herbert

    Someone from Prospect accusing the Guardian of infantile ultra-leftism looks funny from this end of the telescope. Until you realise that this is a rephrasing of Lenin’s crack about left-wing socialism being a juvenile disorder. Prospect for all its self-consciously intellectual approach is becoming something of a house magazine for the thuggish New Left Corporatism of Blair & Co.

  • 2. Stick to the facts. MSM still has the infrastructure in place to get facts that the new media simply can’t. A tiny number of bloggers have access to political press events and even few to military press sessions etc. On the other hand, the internet is not exactly short of home-spun op-eds of every flavour imaginable. The MSM should stick to relaying facts, and let the new media produce 1001 high-minded opinion pieces.

    It is also true that the fast majority of political blogs are largely re-gurgitating or commenting stories produced by the MSM. One does wonder what they will do when there is no MSM to complain about.

    It’s nice to imagine a revolution in the media, but I think evolution is much much more likely.

    Finally someone gets it.