News War A Fitting Title

Frontline's documentary News War talks about the transition reporting news has made in the past several years. In the chapter “Info Snacking” they argue that the reporting of hard news has fallen to the wayside as reporting has become opinionated or more entertainment based. They argue that when cable television first came along it was to report hard news twenty-four hours a day, but with the amount of competition today it has turned from traditional reporting to opinion based commentary. Walter Isaacson former CEO of CNN argued that cable news stations wanted both opinion based reporting but also news reporting and that strict news reporting should come from media outlets like Time Magazine and CNN. Frontline argues that CNN has become opinionated commentary and simply pass on rumors by showing footage of a CNN news anchor introducing a story with an opinion and showing a clip of CNN’s coverage of Anna Nicole Smith’s death. Former CBS anchor Dan Rather argues that news reports today have taken out the sense of public service associated with television news coverage.

The chapter transitions from its argument of hard news versus opinionated reporting to the argument that television news broadcasts will have to one day be put online as is the case with the most popular cable news show 60 Minutes. 60 Minutes offers a variety of hard news stories and lighter pieces highlighting celebrities or sports personalities. As with many news shows, 60 Minutes’ audience is aging, so the show’s Executive Producer Jeff Fager teamed with Yahoo.com to create a space where segments from the show and never before see footage were just a click away and provide more links to more content of the same nature. Fager argues that this attempt to gain revenue is in its early stages and that it’s too early to tell if this attempt has brought more viewers to the actual 60 Minutes broadcast. Google CEO Eric Schmidt argues that being online is the future, but now is the time for companies to bring their organizations to the Internet. Larry Kramer, creator of marketwatch.com argues that an audience will find a way to get the news they want when they want it and if CBS fails to deliver consumers will find somewhere else to get their news. Schmidt channeled Kramer, stating that consumers want their news when and where they want it, which oftentimes leads them to create it themselves on websites such as YouTube of MySpace.

I agree with Frontline’s argument that television news is no longer reporting the amount of hard news they once did. A lot of cable television shows have entire segments devoted to sports and entertainment. I also agree that television reporting on cable news has become opinionated commentary. Almost all of the cable news channels have shows that feature commentary from popular anchors such as Fox News’ Bill O’Reily or CNN’s Anderson Cooper. Even hard news reporting is being mixed with the opinions of the anchors reporting on them, such was the case in “Info Snacking” with CNN anchor Nancy Grace giving her opinion on the death of Anna Nicole Smith instead of simply reporting the facts surrounding the death. As for the second part of Frontline’s argument that television news will one day have to be on the Internet I disagree. As it stated at the beginning of the chapter, many Americans are still getting their news from television news shows. I feel that television is a mainstay in American society and no matter how popular the Internet may become, it will never replace what Americans get from television. I also think that different forms of media need competition from other forms of media so that the best story is reported. If a story were to be reported the wrong way on the Internet, then television news is there to correct it and vice versa. I just can’t see there ever being a situation where it will become necessary for television news shows to bring themselves to the Internet.

I think that blogging is a lot like what Frontline was arguing with opinionated commentary and lack of hard news. While it’s true I have not looked at a majority of the blogs available to me, I feel that the ones I have looked at focus more on the writer’s opinion and on softer news stories. I think blogs are a way for regular people to express their opinions and report on stories, but I feel that most of what they are reporting is not hard news stories. I think that blogs are like cable news shows because the writers are expressing their opinions like the news anchors who are reporting but also giving their opinion in the report.

In News War’s next chapter “The Universe of Online Media” Frontline’s main argument was the role of the citizen journalist. It begins the chapter talking about the online mock news show Rocketboom, which has both hard and soft news delivered by citizen journalists. However, Rocketboom creator Andrew Baron doesn’t consider his online show to be a form of journalism, but says that other people consider Rocketboom to be an act of journalism. Jeff Jarvis, a blogger for Buzz Machine, argued that not all bloggers want to be journalists, but there are some that find a story and tell it accurately, fairly and completely the way traditional journalists do. Jarvis also argued that the role of citizen journalists it to set the agenda, keep stories alive and tell mainstream media what they ought to be reporting on. Nicholas Lemann, Dean of Columbia University School of Journalism, argued that citizen journalism is important, but it produces a lot of commentary with very little new information. Lemann compared blogs to church bulletins because both are community bulletin boards of sorts, but there isn’t a lot of reliable or original reporting coming from bloggers.

Frontline argued against Lemann’s points with two instances that were defining moments for blogging and citizen journalism. In 2002, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott was giving a speech at Strom Thurman’s 100th birthday celebration. In his speech he praised the segregated ticket for which Thurman ran. The national media never picked up the story, but Josh Marshall reported it on his blog Talking Points Memo. The national media then picked up the story and two weeks later Lott resigned as Senate Majority Leader. Then in September 2004, conservative blogger Scott Johnson of the Power Line blog went after CBS News and anchor Dan Rather about the authenticity of documents stating former President George W. Bush’s military record. Power Line drew many people’s expertise in a small amount of time to eventually show that the documents weren’t authentic. Dan Rather and CBS News apologized for the story and soon after Dan Rather was pushed out of CBS News. Johnson thought that at first he was putting the credibility of the blog in jeopardy, but as time progressed thought more about how many times CBS News had run a story like the President Bush story and gotten away with it. Both instances were proof against Lemann’s argument and praise the role of citizen journalists.

I agree with Frontline and Jeff Jarvis that citizen journalism is important and that many citizen journalists think of themselves as traditional journalists. However, I also agree with Nicholas Lemann’s point that a lot of bloggers are focused on commentary rather than original reporting. Frontline proved that citizen journalism is important by showing the instances that caught the mistakes of both Trent Lott and Dan Rather. Without citizen journalists checking into different events or checking the mistakes of traditional journalists, we as citizens would not be given the full and true story. The Trent Lott story showed that the national media still picks and chooses the parts of the stories they feel are the most important, but as Josh Marshall pointed out it may not be the complete story. The Dan Rather story proved that even the greatest of traditional media make mistakes, but now citizen journalists like Johnson are there to make sure those at fault take responsibility and correct those mistakes. I also think that Lemann had a point in saying that many blogs today are more about commentary and getting one’s opinion out to the masses then it is about being a journalist.

Blogging is a popular form of citizen journalism and defining the role of the blogger is an ongoing debate. Frontline tries to show that the debate over the role of citizen journalism is currently being waged and that so far nothing has been clearly defined. The opinions of experts in the field such as Jeff Jarvis and Nicholas Lemann are important because they are currently in the field or researching the field and this is how the role is going to become defined. I think that Frontline’s examples of the defining moments of blogging thus far show how important citizen journalism and blogging have become to our society. I think it also shows how vulnerable traditional media has become to citizen journalism because they are going to continue to be there keeping them in check. While the role of a blogger or a citizen journalist has yet to be defined, Frontline did show how important they both are becoming to today’s society.

I think that blogging is going to continue to evolve. As the capabilities of the Internet continue to evolve I think the types of blogging are going to become even more vast then they are now. While I think that written blogs are going to continue to be a mainstay, I think video blogs are going to become more popular and are the type most likely to evolve further. I think with sites like Current available, video blogging is becoming more popular, but with the vast amount of written blogs, as witnessed by almost any search on technorati.com, I think video blogging has more room for expansion. I also think that the role of citizen journalism will continue to be debated and will not come to a clear definition for many years because there will always be two passionate sides like Jeff Jarvis and Nicholas Lemann demonstrated.