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Talking Heads and Food Fights
“Arguably, contemporary [news] media has made [a] shift away from hard information toward free-for-all opinion and speculation. This shouldn’t cost a lot, and indeed modern media peddles an inexpensive product. Most cable television ‘news’ is just talking heads and food fights; they don't even change the heads very often—they hire regulars who appear week after week. Most newspaper reporting consists of rewritten press releases and faxes. Many reporters don’t go after stories, they wait for the stories to be fed [to] them by publicists and flacks.”
—Michael Crichton (1942-2008), best-selling author, who died Nov. 4, in Slate interview (Thanks to alert WORDster Anne W. Anderson)
Editor Peter writes:
ReplyDeleteI'm old enough to be an old fart and bitch about what I see being reported and not reported. But I'm old enough, too, to remember that the good old days weren't as great as complaints about today's reporting would imply. Excepting everyone's individual "golden age of newspapering" (which not-so-coincidentally almost always concedes with our own moment in time) I think overall that news reporting has gotten better rather than worse over the decades. While it is true, for instance, that we now sometimes see too much "balance" struck by quoting a nut rebutting a scientist by saying, "ain't so," we shouldn't forget that if you go back far enough, only that side of a story that the writer agreed with was quoted at all. Usually the official side.
Ted and Friends,
ReplyDeleteFollowing up on Michael Crighton's charge that "most newspaper reporting consists of rewritten press releasess and faxes," has anyone seen any good studies or news reports about the amount of news that's simply PR? I know Oscar Gandy's book from more than 20 years ago and Judy Turk's monograph, but nothing more recent.
I suspect with the deep cuts in newsrooms that PR turned into "news" will become much more common in U.S. newspapers.
Thanks!
I share his dismay at the lack of serious reporting, but fairness requires recognition that most papers are too shorthanded for city editors to send reporters out on many stories. City hall, the courthouse, the police dept., the sheriff's dept and schools occupy most of the reporters whose jobs have survived downsizing. If he or she is lucky, the city ed has one or two general assignment and feature writers to send out for on-the-scene reporting. Even then, they probably have three or four stories to check out in a day.
ReplyDeleteI always tell civic clubs, church groups, "Get your facts in order and turn out a news release that will answer most of not all of the reporter's questions. He or she is very unlikely to have time to come in person. Don't send a copy of the minutes, which have the info in chronological order, not in order of importance (I like to cite the school district that sent minutes of a trustees meting to the local weekly, which was too short-handed even to re-write them. After all of the stuff on who was present, who was congratulated on her birthday, etc., etc., the 17th graf had the fact that they had fired the head football coach!). Include names and phone numbers of at least two people who can provide additional info or clarifications."
Obviously, the few remaining metropolitan dailies have bigger staffs than that, but as you know, even they are getting zapped with firings and buy-outs. Friends who worked in places such as Baltimore, Chicago and Dallas say that the newsrooms are getting to be as empty as churches during the week
Cheers,
Joe