Mar 14th, 2009
What happened here?
I am back in the United States this month after being away since July, 2007.
And as far as I can see from my parents’ home in suburban Chicago: the state of the news media in the US has, to put it as nicely as I can, gone to shit.
- The Chicago Tribune has been horribly gutted. The paper has narrowed in size and increased its font size, thus lessening its news hole. It’s also increased the size of its mastheads, further decreasing news hole. And the story selection is really the pits. One day last week, Page 3 of the front section was dedicated to a “Gee, aren’t lots of people using Twitter?” story. Prime real estate given to prime fluff…
And I notice a lot of “postcard” and fluffy fun pieces similar to what we were doing at The Island Packet when I worked there two years ago. Have journalists no fresh ideas on how to interest readers while simultaneously informing them?
- I have no idea what’s going on in the world if I rely on the Chicago Tribune and CNN. I have been looking at both for at least 30 minutes per day, in all, and I had no idea about the recent
upheaval in Northern Ireland or the school shootings in Germany until I came online.
- The state of broadcast journalism here is deplorable. Why is CNN dedicating so much time to a story about domestic violence in the life of a pop star? And so much time on Rush Limbaugh (wow, he does not like Democrats… Big Scoop!) And why is there so much fear mongering in the stories about gangs and Mexico?
- Also, why do I have to head over to Comedy Central to see an interviewer ask difficult questions? Jon Stewart is earning a lot of credit for his interviews of financial journalists while Anderson Cooper is on CNN talking about (again!) Rihanna.
- Things on TV have gotten simpler: On Wolf Blitzer’s situation room show tonight, there was a “story” about American vice president Joe Biden appearing in front of Amtrak trains and speaking about what a good thing it is for the rail systems to get bailout money (agreed). The story showed Biden talking about rail projects, showed a map of the railroad corridors that will benefit most (those in the northeast) and then flipped to an interview with a congressman from Oklahoma calling the project one of special interests. And then Blitzer changed the subject to another “story”.
Why is this worthy of being considered journalism? I learned nothing from the piece. There are reporters on YouTube who provide more angles.
I think CNN could learn a lot from its international department, which actually devotes time to world news (and less to Rihanna).
And the Chicago Tribune? I don’t know if there are even enough reporters or editors left employed there to have time to learn from anyone.