This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on
May 15, 2009 2:29 PM.
The previous post in this blog was
Let me tell you how it will be.
The next post in this blog is
Have a great weekend.
Many more can be found on the
main index page or by looking through
the archives.
Comments (10)
Um, I hate to break it to this columnist, but "aggregation" is the model that the American media industry has been following since at least the 70s.
Craigslist is a growing business, the Oregonian is a dinosaur just beginning to choke on the ash. The difference between the two is that the former is sitting on millions of eyeballs and has monetized (maybe) 1% of it's content, and the latter has a firm grip on the 55-90 age group and has already squeezed every drop of revenue from it's business model.
Where would you put your money?
Posted by Gener | May 15, 2009 2:44 PM
One person: Uncle Sam.
John Q. Public
You and me, fellow citizens, buy them with our taxes, administer them with our majority stakeholder position. 'All the news, none of the lies' ... or the reporter gets fired. Everyone in line gets called to serve some time -- like jury duty -- as reporter. Photographer. Press operator. Driver. Editor. Publisher. All that gets the needed job done, according to and in respect of our individual abilities.
Some might decline to serve, (like declining doing jury duty). Some might stay on indefinitely, happy with a job suited to their talents, (like re-up'ing a 'careerist' in the public-employee military service).
Buy with our (town) taxes at least one newspaper for every town, the newspaper 'of record,' and beyond that then 'free-market' entrepreneurs can go right ahead ... just they don't get a monopoly on 'news' and what isn't.
Buy with our taxes all the broadcasting going on, PBS at least and after that 'pirate' broadcasting can go right ahead.
Buy with our taxes all of this, instead of and none of the Dept of unnecessary break-the-bank ungodly costly 'Defense', and we shall have a massive MASSIVE tax rebate coming back. ... plus we'll own the mass media and have jobs to do in it, for ourselves.
Posted by Tenskwatawa | May 15, 2009 2:54 PM
Somehow I don't find this model any more tenable than that posited yesterday in your "Just don't call me chief" post.
If the "localized electronic news model" you cited (in DC) is the best we can do, I fear most people will only view sources that selectively report facts supporting their political view. Frankly, if such online sources become like FOX News or Air America, it will be the start of a great tuneout of issues for the great mass of folks in the middle of the political spectrum.
Posted by PMG | May 15, 2009 3:03 PM
So Tenskwatawa, we all become enslaved to pump out state controlled "news"? That's the check on government power and abuse?
Let's see, where has that been done before ...
Posted by D | May 15, 2009 3:19 PM
Правда
Posted by A Hopeful | May 15, 2009 4:06 PM
A Hopeful:
I can read "Pravda" in the Cyrillic alphabet. Makes me feel like I learned something in the one quarter of freshman college Russian I took, besides how to say "German Shepherds eat small children" and "I want to embrace you".
Practical stuff like that.
Posted by Cynthia | May 15, 2009 5:00 PM
I used to know how to say "Did you ever participate in an Air Raid?" in Serbo-Croatian, from an Army manual from WW2, and when I lived in NYC & went to Chinatown functions frequented by local pols, my girlfriend taught me to say "Are you corrupt?" in Mandarin - all the grinning ignorant Public Servants reflexively replied "yes, yes" when I asked them, to the delight of the Chinese at the table.
Posted by Lalawethika | May 15, 2009 5:13 PM
We already have a similar model to the gov't owned newspapers: Schools. And to top it off, we have compulsory education laws.
Posted by William Henry Harrison | May 15, 2009 5:55 PM
Sam Smith, one of the heirs of the real tradition of newspapering, explains why the archaic media FAIL continues:
Posted by George Anonymuncule Seldes | May 15, 2009 6:50 PM
Thank you for heads up.
I found this article from the Asian Times from 2003. According to the author, the Bilderberg does not invite Asians, Middle Easterners, Latin Americans or Africans. The group sounds like the successor to (continuation of?) of the Knights Templar.
Fascinating.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EE22Ak03.html
Posted by A Hopeful | May 15, 2009 9:18 PM