Hard News: I've been hybridising for a while now ...
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Thanks so much for letting us know that Denis Welch has a blog. Bookmarked immediately!
Absolutely. I regard Denis as a very fine writer. Indeed his novel, Human Remains, is one of my very favourite books of all time. Meaty, delicious, and very satisfying. And Craig, many thanks for the Patti Lupone video. I'd never heard of her before, and isn't that a great voice she has?
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I suspect this debate over bloggers vs. jornos is a one year wonder. More of a battle over who controls the message to the wider public than anything else.
I do remember the anguish in the Press Gallery at the thought of having to admit a Newsroom representative, followed by Scoop. The thought that the Internet could provide serious news was, well, silly.
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yeah... i'm inclined to think we still listen to experts. the diff is that now we get to choose them.
I can't help feeling though that I get more illumination from every thread here than I did from a season of The Ralston Group.
Clifton should read Flat Earth News to get a handle on what newspapers in the UK are like - 80 % of their material is not generated inhouse, owners of news media are completely compromised in their collusions with politicians and journalists are confined to their desks doing churnalism at best.
In 95 I wrote a press release for OMC's How Bizarre. I was pretty happy with it, even if I did use a little flowering to, shall we say, emphasis, certain things which read better than were factually 100%. It was picked up and used by PolyGram worldwide.
Later, when the clippings came in I was a little taken aback by how often it had been printed verbatim, and how many bylines I apparently had written it under.
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ABC news. Big Name Reporter Dan Rather. Taken down by bloggers/commenters who recognised fake work over the Bush military service scandal.
That was all over the blog world flaming and then done deal before NZ MSM had even started reporting on it.
Fran O'Sullivan excusing the non reportage of Helen Clark lying to the media about Peter Doone. Sir Humphrey's had the documentation shortly before the 2005 election and the MSM suppressed it. Fran tried to pretend that it could not have been checked in time. Three phone calls would have sufficed.
Idiot/Savant has done some brilliant research in his own time and using his own skillsets.
Anybody who pretends that somehow journalists/reporters are better than bloggers merely by virtue of their occupation is being a fool. it is easy to see how often blogs are leading MSM in developing stories. Often they are a much better media, albeit with a smaller audience. TV news will only ever be able to present soundbites and summary.
In 1999 the Herald was all over the Government of the day, selling newspapers by highlighting scandals and sensationalising.
It remains a business trying to make a profit in 2008.
A blog is a better forum than a newspaper or TV. It allows presentation of proof such as scans of faked documentation. For freelancers & journalists who are pushed by that.. Tough. The successful people are going to be people like Russel & Colin Espiner who embrace the new formats and use each format in the most ideal way.
Welcome to the new world. The standard of proof has got higher and our trust, even of big media brands like Rather or O'Sullivan has reduced.
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Craig suggests:
And I might give the SST another chance if Ruth Laughensen [sic] applies for and gets the editor's job -- an actual journalist who's been doing some very solid work might be a good influence at the top.
Yes, yes, oh god yes!! (sorry about that). But the thought of the SST becoming a source of intelliget reportage and debate under the frankly excellent Ruth Laugesen is just about the most exciting thing I've heard in a long time (yes, I know exactly what that says about my life, thanks).
Perhaps we could start a movement to "draft" her into applying, lie they do with political candidates in the US. I'd chaeer till I was hoarse, with two provisos:
1. She keeps writing, not just editing; and
2. She makes at least giovanni tiso and myself (but I suspect lots of other people as well) very very happy by making her first order of business ceasing to pay NZ's most narcissistic and predictable "columnist" for his very very small "thoughts". -
Huge point, that one. It's where the Guardian's Comment is Free blog venture most often falls down -- because those fancy public-school-educated Guardian journalists very rarely get themselves mucky by joining in their own discussions.
That is less and less true Russell, though often the responses are later in the discussion and tend to be one long post addressing a number of points. It is often the younger, staff commenters that do this. Guest commenters rarely do. Polly Toynbee has done so too. So your blanket description is innaccurate. It possibly depends on what articles you read and how long you hang around (a problem with time zones, I know which is why this so long after your post..)
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"I'd like to point out that I've been hybridising for quite a while now: since 1991, when Hard News was first born as a radio commentary."
Absolutely ,your ancient. In the 90's Hard News was a friday morning current affairs highlight on a radio station that was blitzing a lot of demographics it wasn't supposed to own. It was an incredibly popular news segment and an eye opener to plenty of the common people that Clifton seems to feel can't grasp political discussion. Slagging political bloggers as a frenzied indistinguishable mass is just a poor story that seems to have been written every week in traditional media for the last 5 years...
.... and why the irrational pairing?
Russell is Russell, farrar is farrar. ..hagar/ wishart ??????? I don't see any real connection there. Wouldn't it be more sensible for J.C to challenge ideas rather than fret about the medium . It' s all just written word.
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They'll be there for sure. A poorly-sourced story can very easily flash around the world and wind up in our papers. Medical research is the ostensible topic of many of them.
Ain't that the truth brother. As a biomedical researcher every such thing I see in the MSM makes me head for source or close to source material which my finely honed scientific skills enable me more times than not to tell that the MSM story bears no relation to the actual research or even the University/Institute press release.
Sorry to say but too many arts graduates expected to cover medical/science stories is to blame. For people raised on the idea that there are no facts only opinions putting a nonsense spin on something cannot be a problem. Then there is stats abuse, but at least we have Ben Goldacre to keep us on the straight and narrow.
For one thing he keeps the Grauniad's excellent science journalists on their toes. The last thing Alok Jha wants is one of his pieces getting shredded by Ben on Saturday. As a scientist I approve of the Grauniad's science reporting. Now if they can only wrestle the health stories off the sports reporters...
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In the end, doesn't it come down to this -- it doesn't matter how the crap is served up, life is not a John Waters movie. (Guess what - link NSFW or for those of a nervous disposition.) Whatever the medium, there's always going to plenty of hacks and slackers whose continued existence is an offence to the idea of a just and loving deity. But I really think the trad media need to spend some time cleaning the glasshouse before throwing stones. I'm not going to say every blog post/comment or PA Radio piece I've written is solid gold, but I'd really expect to be given the pink slip from PAR if I ever got as monotonously toxic as Darth George or Michael Laws. My standards may be low and elastic, but they exist.
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phew. what a discussion. Am loving it.
As a relative "newbie" to NZ media (well not new, but things change a lot when you're out of the country for 13 years) I came home to find the MSM strangulated by its owners and editors with what little analysis there was having to be either provided by [usually] right wing commentators (to reflect views of owners/editors) or stories lifted from the Grauniad. And what room there was for comment on the MSM websites was moderated.
NZ's MSM was now controlled by so few, with so little competition that I went into mourning for an independent fourth estate. I even missed the UK redtops.
Adrift in a bloody sea of law and order or accident stories; horrified at the prospect that a slip onto a highway north of Wellington could actually make it into the national radio news bulletins for a whole day, I was heading into deep depression - until I discovered the NZ blogosphere - most especially Hard News, but also sites like Scoop.
it's the blogs which don't have editorial control, keep the MSM on their toes, cover the stuff the editors don't want to see, and allow room for intelligent commentary... thank you all for keeping me sane.
More please.
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NZ's MSM was now controlled by so few, with so little competition that I went into mourning for an independent fourth estate. I even missed the UK redtops.
My opinion exactly Cindy. The major newspapers in NZ have effectively no competition. The DomPost doesn't compete wth the Herald and the Press doesn't compete with the Oddity. Which means there is this idea that 'your' local newspaper should be neutral, an idea completely foreign to the UK where if the paper you are reading goes off on a limb you can simply change.
Which is why I view the complaints over the SST's going all tabloid, so don't read it or start up some competition.
Back in the day in Dunedin I worked with people who bought The Observer weekly on subscription. It came airmail on seriously thin paper. They got it because the coverage of international and serious issues in NZ media was so bad. Now of course The Observer or The Times or the NY Times are just a click away. The then Editor of the Oddity told a friend of mine that if a proper national daily ever happened in NZ they would happily drop any pretence at International or even much National news coverage.
Stephen Jones aside I go for a UK broadsheet description of an All Black game before somewhere like Stuff. The NZ report will be a pedestrian bare bones description whereas the writers over here will give you an erudite and well written piece of prose that is a pleasure to read. You even get to correct the misconceptions about our 'poached' Islanders.
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Speaking of John Waters, I am going to see him live next month in Hammersmith. I'm not really sure what the hell I'm going to see once I get there but I am sure it will be an eye opener
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And Craig, many thanks for the Patti Lupone video. I'd never heard of her before, and isn't that a great voice she has?
Certainly does, Jackie. Even if you're not a wretched show queen, you've got to admire someone who, this year, took on the considerable shade of uber-diva Ethel Merman (and won) as Mama Rose in Gypsy:
And there's the blackly comic patter song 'A Little Priest' from Sweeney Todd:
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A blog is a better forum than a newspaper or TV.
I get the impression that this thread has fallen into the same trap that 'we' would accuse the mainstream media of generalising about blogs. No doubt Clifton could point to WhaleOil's blog as an indication that a blog is a much worse forum than a newspaper. And Russell could point to Investigate or The Truth as a way to show the lesser side of the print media.
There is nothing wrong with the forum of the newspaper, or indeed tv. The fact that it's become more reduced to sound-bites and recycled press releases is as much the fault of the consumer who doesn't demand more from their media in a way that the media responds to, as it is the media itself. There are still nuggets in amongst the chaff however.
I mean a whole bunch of bloggers, and regular readers of blogs, sitting around in a little group agreeing how bad the mainstream media is isn't exactly 'mainstream'.
Most Hard News posts link at least once to a mainstream media story, even if we read news through online blogs and discussion such as this, much of it still originates with the mainstream media.
The media is continuing to move towards the internet and the opportunities that it provides, but it's a long journey that they've only taken the first steps on.
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I get the impression that this thread has fallen into the same trap that 'we' would accuse the mainstream media of generalising about blogs. No doubt Clifton could point to WhaleOil's blog as an indication that a blog is a much worse forum than a newspaper.
Clifton raised a set of fairly specific points withing the context of political reporting and commentary. She went as far as to say that she doesn't know whether the advent of bloggers and the threat it poses to her profession is lamentable or not. But I think she has also shown an uncharactertistically weak understanding of the landscape, and a patronising attitude towards the public. The point is precisely that these days a newspaper is not a forum, the august Listener is not a forum, in that they do not meaningfully engage with their readers. I can't tell you how many times I've thought, reading her column, "jee, nice turn of phrase, Clifton, but what the hell did you mean by that?" or "yes, this makes sense, but what about..." You can write a letter to the Listener, sure, and those pages are still the first ones I turn to, but the restrictions of the format are obviously crippling compared to the kind of discussion we can get going in a place like this.
(I'm not saying that Clifton should from now on spend her time answering my rants, mind, but perhaps once in a while it wouldn't hurt. And at any rate that's the challenge for somebody in her position.)
Ultimately, other than painting an interesting picture of the anxiety of professional journos, the point of the column seems to be 'won't the public be confused'? And that borders on the disingenous, resting as it does on two very questionable assumptions: firstly that professional political reporters and commentators are gifted with Pope-like infallibility when it comes to upholding objectivity and balance (cue the collective laughter of people who actually bother to read and watch the stuff); and secondly it assumes that we are uncritical consumers of media, blind followers of the Farrars and the Browns, the Hagers and the Wisharts (oops, I just threw up in my mouth) of this world. Whereas I'd argue that people who read blogs and alternative media haven't stopped relying on the pros and reading first-hand reporting from the gallery, but are better able to form a nuanced understanding of what goes on in the halls of Parliament and how power works than they did when the mainstream was the only stream.
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No doubt Clifton could point to WhaleOil's blog as an indication that a blog is a much worse forum than a newspaper.
Only if you don't consider Granny's "Your Views" to be an extension of the paper. After all, some of the hysterical comments in YV drive and/or are driven by stories that Granny publishes. Look at how hard they bag the cops, ably supported to legions of rabid YV'ers who think the police are marginally less competent than a retarded goldfish, and marginally more socially-acceptable as an organisation than Pinochet's death squads.
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Hoo, wee, ...where to start? Ok, Ta for the hon mensh, Russell. I'd like to say I started blogging for the sort of strategic reasons you mention but it was nothing so well thought-out: I had a sick wife and a sick daughter and at the time blogging was my social life and also way of keeping in touch with things going on politically.
As they improved my blogging got more into non-political areas. I can get all that stuff at work...
On Jane Clifton's column - and Vernon Small's similar piece a week earlier - they’ve both prompted quite a few earnest discussions over the coffee.
Vernon's piece was also from the perspective of the Press Gallery chair and dealing with applications for accreditation from all sorts of publications.
As an aside, I think it would be helpful if a discussion about blogging and journalism didn’t always descend into a slagging match about journalists or bloggers people dislike. It doesn’t really illuminate the issues at all.
So, keeping to the issues a bit:
The parallel I draw is with the rise of pamphleteering in 18th Century London. A lot of it was quite scurrilous - it matches the worst of the blogs. Incredibly bitterly partisan. But gradually things settled down.
People got to 'pick their own experts', to use Che's great phrase.
There never really has been a gatekeeper deciding who can and cannot be a journalist. The main skills are an ability to write well, an ability to ferret out information, and to organize that information.
Getting the information has become a lot easier. The biggest change since I joined the press gallery in 1997 is the colossal amount of information now available online to anyone with a computer but which then was the semi-exclusive domain of MPs, political journalists, lobbyists etc.
And I don’t just mean press releases. I mean real information, reports of government depts, state owned companies, etc. Even the bloody Budget bilaterals are posted on the Treasury's web site within a few weeks of the Budget. It’s all there if you want to find it.
That means the other skills will become more important.
I’m kind of an optimist on this stuff (medium term, anyway. Short term its pretty chaotic). Giovanni's points are well made: readers/audiences are not blank slates. They have minds (and, yes, prejudices) of their own.
Democracy, for all its messiness, is a great educator. A few years back the Economist made the point that in western democracies, the average citizen now has the kind of basic policy knowledge about, say, changes in interest rates, which would have been only understood by the elite 100 years ago.
Rob Muldoon was wrong. People do know a deficit if they fall over one.I see blogs - the best of them, anyway - as being part of this whole educative process which is, or at least should, be part and parcel of democracy.
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Unfortunately the party's over - the Listener has stuck the delaywall back up.
I wonder what effect it had on their traffic?
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@Felix:
Until there is a blogger who wishes to cover Parliament in a full-time capacity I suspect that will be the best avenue to take. (on that note is there currently a full-time blogger who could cover Parliament full time?)
No. The nearest thing would have been Keith Ng when he was at Salient: he was effectively there on the magazine's behalf, but I think got a wider profile from what he wrote here.
I think the issue is that some of the "game" element capture the attention with a lot more ease so people focus on that and some of the more ... umm ... less sparkly stuff (probably a poor choice of words) slips under the radar.
I still think the covering of the game happens a little too often., and that the journalists sometimes bring themselves onto the field too. Example: Winston Peters' unusual arrangements are a real story, but the day the Herald website led with the news that Peters had -- gasp! -- turned his back on journalists was a silly one. The fact that Peters has been rude to some reporters is not the lead.
And there are certainly times that gallery journalists do really nail the detail. As much as I thought the Herald got hysterical over the EFA, the way Audrey Young was clearly intellectually on top of the legislation and its flaws was hugely impressive.
OTOH, the way the therapeutic medicines bill was reported -- never mind the detail, it's another black eye for Labour! -- really did my head in.
Anyway that's my two cents worth for the moment. I just felt like doing my bit to defend, if not my honour, some of my fellow professionals.
Fer sure. And it's appreciated. I'm not one of those people who thinks that bloggers will magically replace professional journalists, or news organisations. We're providing commentary, linking things together and generally cohering to a form that's not actually the same as either news reporting or hard-copy commentary. It's not zero-sum at all.
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And if we want examples of media unprofessionalism, here's the Herald's Fran O'Sullivan talking chummily about National's secret agenda. Discussing Labour Party President Mike Williams' numerous board appointments, she goes on to say
Proportionately this is obviously out-of-whack and would be untenable if an incoming National government does tackle the major policy shift it talks about behind closed doors.
A "major policy shift [National] talks about behind closed doors". Isn't this the sort of thing journalists should be reporting on, rather than burying? Or is the purpose of the media now to obfuscate and deceive rather than inform?
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A "major policy shift [National] talks about behind closed doors". Isn't this the sort of thing journalists should be reporting on, rather than burying? Or is the purpose of the media now to obfuscate and deceive rather than inform?
Didn't Clifton two or three weeks ago remark that political reporters have known about internal conflicts and varying degrees of hidden agendaness within National for quite a bit, but they cannot report on them because they learned about them off the record? It could be one such instance.
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real information, reports of government depts, state owned companies, etc. Even the bloody Budget bilaterals are posted on the Treasury's web site within a few weeks of the Budget. It’s all there if you want to find it.
That means the other skills will become more important.
indeed, the people who know how to identify the weak signals in all this infobesity will be the ones helping us all to be better informed.
unfortunately those people will not be our infotainment/'opinion"-focused msm.
i'll head over the road, collar keith and plant him in front of a decent terminal. he's doubtless sick of all the scuttlebutt over there already.
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And if we want examples of media unprofessionalism, here's the Herald's Fran O'Sullivan talking chummily about National's secret agenda.
Oh, you mean when she's not slagging off Key as "Helen Clark in drag"? Sorry to tell you this, Idiot/Savant, but there just might be a little laptop interrogation going on here, but hey... you're being told exactly what you want to hear, so never mind.
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The Listener website is safely back under lock and key again, so no further danger of entering the conversation or anything.
Also, Fran's flaming The Standard.
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Also, Fran's flaming The Standard.
Oh, diddums. :)
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