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.

My Media Pyramid

Cable News
Various Women’s
Magazines
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Movies on Cable – Tabloid Magazines
The Albrightian – Movies In Theater – DVD’s
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Juicy Campus – OnDemand Movies - AIM
Books For Pleasure – Primetime Network TV – YouTube
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Specialized Cable Channels
Perez Hilton – Popular Music Radio Stations – ipod/itunes – Pandora Radio
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Albright E-mail – Facebook – Textbooks - Texting

Judging by the media listed in my pyramid it is obvious that I am getting a limited understanding of the world around me. There is virtually no news in my media diet. The closest thing to news that I have listed consistently throughout the pyramid are things like tabloid magazines and Perez Hilton. Those types of sources typically only give ‘news’ about celebrities not more concrete news.

This has shown me that I hardly ever seek out credible news sources to find out information. I mostly rely on word of mouth to understand things going on in the world such as the current economic crisis. I never thought to just take the time out to watch the news for a few minutes or pick up a newspaper to keep myself informed.

The pyramid shows me that instead of seeking out sources that will inform me of all types of information that I’m relatively selfish with my media consumption. I consume media that only pertains to my interests and likes and just disregard everything else even if it would keep me more informed. The bottom tiers of my pyramid deal predominantly with media that are tailored to my life such as Facebook and my E-mail, the rest of the tiers follow suit. It's opened my eyes and showed me that even though I thought I was getting a more 'balanced diet' of media, I'm actually saturating my consumption with things that only cater to my tastes.

Media Pyramid

In-theater movies
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Magazines – Textbooks
Books – The Albrightian
Early morning talk shows
Specialized cable channels

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The Times of Trenton – Action News – facebook.com
msn.com – variety of country and hit music stations – ipod
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perezhilton.com – Albright and personal e-mail – people.com – instant message – texting
nascar.com – primetime network television – USA Today – jayski.com – The Trentonian

The first level of my media pyramid represents media that I use everyday and read thoroughly. Many of the website I access more than once a day because they are always being updated and I like to be the first in the know. Even though most of the news in both the USA Today and The Trentonian can be found online in different venues I still like to read them to a get a different and even sometimes more accurate account then what has been reported online. I also like to read the special columns in both. When I am here at school I do not have access to a hard copy of The Trentonian, as it is my hometown newspaper, so I read that online while I am here and in print at home for all of my local news. I use texting and instant messaging to talk to my friends and family all day several times a day.
The second level of my media pyramid represents media that I use on a daily basis, but often do not detailed pay attention to. My homepage for Internet Explorer is set to msn.com, and I often skim through the headlines but only click on articles that interest me. I access facebook.com several times a day but only really pay attention when someone has written to be or invited me to an event. I listen to music several times during the day using my ipod and the radio, but I often do not pay much attention as I am usually doing other things. Action News is usually something that I have on in the background while I am making dinner and generally only pay attention to the weather report. I access The Times to get another perspective on my local news as The Trentonian is usually considered to be a tabloid.
The third level of my pyramid is media that I use weekly. Classes require reading from textbooks but it is usually only one reading per week, which I can have done in one day. I read a lot of magazines but with classes and homework I can only read them in my spare time. I usually only watch specialized cable channels when there is nothing else on television and they have something that I find interesting or entertaining. The fourth level of my pyramid represents media that I use on a monthly basis. I really enjoy going to the movie theater, but with cost and time constraints it is something that I usually only do once or twice a month.

Jay Media Pyramid

Books



Facebook
Real Estate Websites
AIM



Health
Seventeen
Cosmo
Sports Illustrated



Pop/Rap Q102.5
Oldies B 101.1
Country 105.1 & 92.5



6 ABC
CW
MTV
ESPN Basketball & High Lights


Jay Warker
The media pyramid I have created shows my life in a base of a week. The television is always on in the background when I am in my room. I always watch it before I go to bed and I find it relaxing. The radio is the second most media I use. I am in my car a lot driving from practice to my house, to campus or even if it is driving all the way home to see my family.
Headlines on magazines can grab my attention and that will make me want to read the articles. I like the sport and health magazine because I am an athlete and the other two are more girly and about glitz and glam. When it comes to the computer I am rarely online and books I have just never been a big fan or reading. I find that the pyramid works for me because it is the way my life really is. I feel now that television has improved with Plasma televisions more people watch it. As technology improves books and magazines will become obsolete.

Media Pyramid

Kevin Brogan

My media pyramid is exactly how it looks. I am a huge sports fan, and watch ESPN constantly. It is on almost all day, and usually at night when I fall asleep. Hence, being my most watched show, it is the base of my pyramid. The next biggest sources are the internet: Facebook, Comcast, and SI.com. They are my three most visited websites, and I use them a lot in my free time. After that is funny TV, namely the Simpsons and Family Guy being two of the funniest shows I have ever seen. Judging from my first two layers, it speaks I don’t care much for politics, which is true. After that, it is my cell phone which I use to check sports constantly, NBC, due to my preference of their news coverage and Jay Leno (and all late night TV on the station), and an AP logo because most websites I get stories from, they were contributed by the Associated Press. My last level is the Philadelphia Inquirer, which I rarely read. When I do, I find the comics, crosswords, and cryptograms real quick.

My Media Pyramid

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books

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facebook

linked in

in-theater movies

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HBO
cable movie channels

specialized cable channels

ipod - industry blogs - PR News

Cision Webinars - text books

Albright AM - Albrightian

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evening television news - personal e-mail

variety of rock music stations - industry blogs - USA Today

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cnn.com - Philadelphia Inquirer - primetime network television

morning television news (varied programs) - WHYY - Albright e-mail

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