Much-lauded Rutland Herald editorial page editor David Moats crosses the media divide onto radio this morning in a VPR commentary lamenting the current decline of newspapers across the nation. The topic is an important one, and one we’ve certainly addressed at this site on numerous occasions. Amidst the alternating praise and criticism that we pepper reporters with on an ongoing basis, we’ve also had a steady undercurrent of concern for the newspaper industry’s health given the free speech/free press niche they fill.
And it’s also a frustrating topic for those of us who, in our spare time, are filling a free speech niche of our own – either by writing for, commenting on, or simply reading new media sites, and whether those be citizen or alternative journalism websites, blogs, or even social networking sites like Facebook. Frustrating because, while many in the newspaper industry – faced with an “adapt or perish” paradigm for the future – are proactively integrating and engaging new media (see Seven Days as a great example), others are simply reacting.
And Moats, for all his talent, is doing nothing more than what Herald editorial has done in the recent past – simply shaking his fist at the heavens. In doing so, he illustrates what often is a significant impediment to the continued viability of the newspaper business model; newspaper professionals unable to (or resentful of) change (or possibly evolution).
Moats’s commentary focuses its ire on blogs (and those that read them), starting out in generally reasonable tones before rapidly devolving to a blanket dismissal of the medium as “Blogmaniac.com.”
But it underscores the reality that Moats is reacting rather than being proactive, when his industry so badly needs him to be the latter. He reacts in the same way he did during the iBrattleboro trial lawsuit. For those who may have forgotten, the administrators of iBrattleboro were sued by someone based on the content of a user comment. At the time, the letter of the law as well as legal precedent were crystal clear in that the case had no merit whatsoever. Observers across the nation rolled their eyes and declared the suit would be roundly dismissed in no time at all – which, of course, it was. Moats’s editorial page, however, waxed righteous at the prospect of new media’s chickens coming home to roost and even enthusiastically predicted a trip to the Supreme Court itself. A couple other Vermont traditional news sites followed suit.
It was, frankly, an irrational stance to take at the time, and we hear a bit more of that same irrationality in this VPR piece. What makes it particularly frustrating is that Moats is usually one of the most rational voices in the Vermont media. It is a shame that he loses his perspective on this issue. In the commentary itself, Moats not only myopically focuses on blogs (as though there is no other new media), he seems to take the stance that all news of any kind seems to flow from newspapers, casting his dismissive net across television and (ironically) radio in his determination to condemn those blog maniacs. Does he really believe that no other medium generates any fresh or breaking news reports? Probably not.
Does he really believe that blogs have no value or role to play in the media landscape?
I’m thinking at this point that that may well be the case.
Between the evolution of media and the economic meltdown, the storm is now raging for traditional media – but in particular newspapers. While we continue to need them as much as ever, the transition is proving fatal for many – and that’s a concern. New media is an inevitable by-product of our new communications infrastructure. The economic collapse is an inevitable by-product of years of economic wrongheadedness. Both, while born in human activity, are at this point cultural forces of nature.
Shaking one’s fist at (and castigating) forces of nature has a poor history of leading to anything productive. It’s going to be those that harness the storm, rather than curse it, that will be around to greet the sun when the clouds inevitably clear.
Mr Moats:
You lost us when you moved from focusing on advertising over reporting. I read a paper for the NEWS, and if I read news, I buy papers. IF I buy papers, you can sell advertising.
Reporting is not just getting the quote of the day from someone with an agenda, it is looking farther into the quote… your reporters arent doing that anymore…
Get back into the news reporting business… If you reveal it they will read it…
David Moats could just as easily have pointed out the success of TPM Media and many other sites as make the crack about blogomaniac.It strikes me as remark by someone unfamiliar with blogs as a whole .I wonder what news blogs he may frequent? Just as Detroit built yet failed to understand or promote the electric /fuel efficient car when it might have smoothed the way to the future for the auto industry the newspaper industry is mostly failing to seize the moment for its online possibilities .All this on top of the financial troubles(some self-inflicted on the industry by owners) must make for a depressing environment .The Times Argus and the Rutland Herald actually have set up a presentable blog effort :Vermont View ,yet I think fail to headline the feature adequately on either online site .Perhaps reporters are really put off by the immediate possibility of criticism from a loud and chaotic source or see blogs as another job rather than part of the whole reporting process.The reporter’s world must have been a comfortable clubby atmosphere and now barbarians are at the gate .
I was impressed by the mendacity and ignorance of it, but amused that all his editorials are available on VPR’s website 🙂
One of his laments was that people would miss stories because they’d say things like “did you read about…” and someone would respond “Oh, I don’t read that blog.”
Like this doesn’t happen with newspapers? I mean, seriously, does he think the Rutland Herald or the Brattleboro Reformer have larger reader bases than Crooks and Liars or Daily Kos?
Had to giggle .”Land of digital ubiquity where you can get the new for free”
Thanks for the article odum. There have been many others out there about the decline of the once-vaunted newspaper industry. My verdict is still out on this, but, like the autos, the old ways are a thing for historians to study. Newspapers can no longer work as they have in the past, especially when there is no ad revenue. It is digital or die, I guess. I am not sure whether blogs have been all or partly responsible, but blogs are definitely much more fun, and often more informative, than the traditional newspapers. It might not be long before we are bailing them out too.
Moats seems to mourn the loss of a strong sense of community based, among other things, on shared sources of information. Those days have been gone since the emergence of cable news, and are not likely to return. Allowing nostalgia to guide a suicidal business plan in which readership drops, advertisers follow readers, and then to cut costs corporate managers spend less on journalism will not save the enterprise. For the most part newspapers have failed at their primary mission – holding governments accountable. It should come as no surprise that their compromised product is rejected by consumers. Enter citizen journalists who are anxious and able to hold politicians accountable. While on-line news sources are many and varied in quality and point of view, taken as a whole they are becoming effective in filling the role of an independent free press. I don’t have the answer to the plight of newspapers, but I know it won’t be found by yearning for the good old days.