Journalism's Death Spiral--A Disaster for Learning? A Disaster for Democracy?

You've undoubtedly heard that newspapers are in trouble.

But think about it this way--this means stories aren't being written--or are being written by (1) amateurs who largely do a poor job and (2) financially-motivated people who often do a biased job. 

When less information is uncovered, or when more information is biased, we have a recipe for disaster in a citizen-governed democracy.

Read this article from the Los Angeles Times to see the extent that journalism is crashing.

In order for a democracy to work, its citizens have to be learning from good sources.

Some say that the blogosphere will compensate for journalism's rapid death spiral. I'm not at all confident of this. People have to put in substantial time to do good honest reporting (and good honest research, by the way). Putting in a lot of time generally requires some kind of payment so the reporter can afford the computer, the roof, and the food to keep doing the reporting. 

I just don't see 100 people doing shallow reporting equaling the quality of one person doing deep reporting.

A full-time reporter puts in 40 to 60 hours a week, allowing them to dig deeper, develop more insights, and do fact checking. Part-time bloggers may put in one to five hours, maybe ten. Having a salary also makes it less likely that financial incentives will bias the reporter's work (ignore this for Fox News). 

I try to make this obvious in the following graphic. You might have to click on it to expand it and see the details.

Eventually, poor information will lead to poor decisions. Eventually the democracy implodes. Some may see signs of this already. Certainly, most of us would like our democracy to be doing a better job.

But with journalism's problems, it is bound to get worse.

Comments

[Harold Jarche]

Personal experience only, but every story that I have been connected with that got published in the mainstream media has had major errors in it. While bloggers may not be able to dig as deep, according to journalists, they are at least self-correcting. By the way, the Supreme Court of Canada recently ruled that there is no such legal entity as a journalist. We are the media.

[Ben Curtis]

Thanks Will. I think you're on the right track. Blogs mostly just seem to reinforce the same "what's hot now" misinformation, wasting way to much time. Bloggers may be self-correcting, but who has the time to know? Maybe, as the postmodernists say, the truth just ain't out there. Hope they're wrong.

[Will Thalheimer]

I want to clarify that I don't think all reporting is better than all blogging. That would be silly.

What I hope to convey is that there are forces at play that make it more likely that full-time reporters can do a better job than part-time bloggers.

Also, I would expect the differences between the two to depend very much on the type of reporting that is being done.

To wit, that Harold's reporters tend to get stories wrong is probably due to the fact that Harold's paradigm-bending work as an astrobiologist cadmium-mercury-arsenic rock star is difficult to fully comprehend.

By the way, not only was there no fact checking in the previous sentence, there was no attempt at all at reporting. In other words, I just made that stuff up. SMILE.

[Mark Cody]

I agree with the comparison of full-time journalist to part-time bloggers. However, I'd like to see another different diagram comparing full-time reporters to full-time bloggers. I have an alternate theory. Full-time bloggers may be more intrinsicly motivated and may have a better external reward system. If I am correct, they are compensated with revenue from advertising and donations that increase via page views. They also seem to have fewer inhibiting job constraints: they are answerable to themselves only, not to editors and owners who may suppress messages that offend patronizing interests. And bloggers may follow any topic of their choosing, instead of assigned topics, which may also lead to intrinsic motivation greater than their peers in journalism. In a meta function, they have become vital fact-checkers of full-time journalists, in light of staff cuts in the major media. And personally, I've found that freedom, democracy, due process, defense, national security, and the rule of law have been more fervently defended and insightfully analysed by independent full time bloggers than by journalists in the main stream media.

[Ken Allan]

Kia ora e Will

Oh dear! Oh deary dear dear! But I agree with you. The way things are going, it's bound to get worse.

This is not being negative, but it's not being postmodern either. It's using a modernist approach to analysing data gathered through observation. Bloggers won't necessarily do this, like the experienced journalist might. Does this mean that journalism per se is to be extinct - a thing of the past? I wonder.

Oh deary dear dear!

Catchya later

[Adam Neaman]

Very very scary. I find myself quoting Neil Postman's shockingly prescient mid-1980's predictions about this issue.

http://www.serendipity.li/jsmill/post_1.html

[Mark Cody]

I should elaborate on my comment: some of the full-time bloggers I had in mind are associated with major print publications.

[Richard]

Afraid I have to agree with you Will. Then add to the trends you noted:

--the trend toward a blend of opinion/news/entertainment. News personalities are also talk show hosts, game show hosts, morning show hosts.....

--the trend toward media as a vehicle for arousing passion vs communication of information (blogs and tv both)

(I have not verified to determine if these trends are real in fact.....)