This tangentially relates to something I was thinking about earlier today--Amazon.com's decision to enable comment trails on every single reader review has done things to the discourse there that are subtle, but irreparable. The reviews there used to give a reliable sense of a "hive mind," so to speak; however, since the comment trails were enabled (which are almost always uniformly negative, full of ad hominem attacks, poorly phrased, and so on), reviews sometimes tend to be preemptively defensive, attacking those who disagree with the reviewer rather than analyzing the book. (See the reviews for Pynchon's Against the Day for one example, and Dawkins's The God Delusion for another--in particular, the Dawkins review section is even worse than AtheistFilter on MeFi.)

In summary: Internet--threat or menace?

This is also coupled with a consumer mentality; "I'm paying for this [directly or indirectly], therefore I should be able to insist on exactly what I want." I've noticed this a lot more frequently in my field. Folks believe they are entitled to ask us to change our presentations, or sometimes even the facts of history, because they would rather not hear about certain topics, and they seem to have a retail model in mind -- a model of full capitulation in the name of customer service.

In academia and public history, as in journalism, we resist changing the facts or presentations only to meet with customer approval. But it just amazes me that people now often expect those changes to be made.

I actually also really liked his point about journalism becoming pugnacious or contentious, needing to cater to that level of response.

I assume part of that feeling is just the general "The sky is falling! Civility is in decline!" handwringing, but... it does seem like civility is in decline. Or at least thoughtfulness, in its full sense -- people don't want to think, just react.

I'd guess that part of that seems heightened on the internet because the immediacy of the medium encourages it, so maybe I'm just seeing it overrepresented.

(After spending part of last night reading some of the most vile, incoherent ranting by men's rights groups, I also had to laugh at the author's swipe about people bitching about ex-wives online.)

The article was a bit interesting, but kind of old hat for anyone who's read much around the internet. Of course, Miko puts it well when she talks about a consumer mentality for culture and history which is hard not to see as opposed to the very essence of what it tries to influence. But there's an even more pernicious thing at work, most easily seen, I think, in the present US administration, which basically has that same consumer mentality toward the media. If you write something critical, the administration venue shops until they find somewhere else (say, FoxNews) that will be more sympathetic. Journalists get shut out of the room. Consequently, political reporting, particularly interviews, have become another form of celebrity journalism, filled with slow pitches and scripted questions.

I agree it's not new news -- though maybe it is for Salon, given the total absurdity that their comments section has become -- but I liked the way the author pulled some of the threads together. And the whole "We seem to think we have the right to mock everything and anyone, in public" aspect was something I hadn't seen before, and something I've been thinking about a great deal lately.

Hm, good points all round. Also, when it comes to arguments like this about journalism 'changing', it's also good not to romanticize journalistic history too much. Though it reached heights of objectivity and ethics in the mid-20th century, it took a long time to evolve to that point, beginning as a slathering, partisan Colonial penny press and spending many late nineteenth-early 20th century years as a sensationalistic, competitive, highly unethical business that concentrated on swift response to the marketplace and happily accepted political buyouts. In one sense, the idea of journalists as distant, objective, one-way voices was a historical anomaly.

I totally agree with you, Miko, but I think what *does* seem different to me now -- though it could be due to historical ignorance -- is that the subjects of the articles have gone up for grabs. Either in the case that the author cites of the family grieving for people lost in 9/11, or of the authors who write more personal first-person essays and suddenly find their entire lives pulled apart, mocked, criticized. It's not just politicians and other "public figures" -- or political journalists who are dealing with facts -- who are under scrutiny. Suddenly everyone who dares to offer up part of themselves, through sharing their story with a journalist or through their own writing (or who ventures a question on AskMe...), is torn apart by wolves, in public.

It's the public chastisement of private individuals, I guess, that's starting to get to me. Not that I think attacking politicians' private lives is great, but they at least signed on for that. I worry that such bullying will end up silencing authors with unpopular or difficult stories to share -- which, in many cases, at least on Salon, have been women writing about their lives. The absolute bile that gets thrown at those women is astounding, and most of it's not even related to the premises of the article itself. It's just a general "How dare you think differently from me, or have a different life!"

I think Miko is right in that while there have always been noble, populist journalists eager to Spread the Truth, there have also always been sensationalistic slimeballs only in it to make a buck. And sometimes one employed the other.

I think things are different now, though, and for several reasons. First, in an era where the AP wire is just as easily accessible to any of us sitting in front of our computers as it is to the NYT, the competitive aspect has changed. Twenty-four-hour cable news and the constantly updated news feeds of major dailies mean that fewer of us actually buy newspapers anymore; what's printed tomorrow morning is what we've already read/seen tonight. Media outlets have to dance a whole new dance now in order to lure readers away from their competitors. (And they haven't figured out how yet, which is why most big publishing companies are laying off scores of employees and merging into bigger and bigger conglomerates.

But I have a hard time believing that the prospect of a slew of shrill, poorly spelled reader comments actually changes the way that most journalists report. (By god, I hope it doesn't change what they write.)

From the article:

The Wikipedia model of journalism, in which a vast community of readers functions as a self-correcting machine, is an incredibly powerful development, and much of it is positive....

And yet, it's too easy simply to celebrate the downfall of the elite media and glory in the toppling of the gatekeepers. Yes, they -- we -- could and can be smug and arrogant. Yes, we should be summoned to account when we screw up. And yes, the online revolution has made it easier to do that. But to be part of an elite doesn't mean you're divinely anointed. It simply means you have some aptitude for what you do and have spent years learning to do it, and so you're probably better at it than most people. Not smarter, not a better human being -- just better at your craft. This is true of football players, surgeons, chefs and auto mechanics -- why shouldn't it be true of journalists as well? Forget the word "elite": In our laudable all-American haste to trash bogus royalty, let's not forget there's a completely different category. It's called professionalism.

Journalists are trained to do what they do. It takes a hell of a lot of work to write a story that appears in a daily paper -- and that's before you even sit down at the keyboard. Phone calls, background research, leg work -- the reporter must learn everything there is to know about a story before a single word is written. Yeah, there will be mistakes made. But for some internet yahoo with a passing interest in a subject to come along and, in a single snark, cast doubt on the skills or the dedication or the honesty of a reporter's work -- that's arrogance.

That, of course, is a personal reaction, because the prospect of having a written product dissected by unhinged internet tongues hits fairly close to home for me. But in my opinion, there's a bigger problem with what the writer calls "Wikipedia" journalism.

First off, the public doesn't trust the media. For whatever reason, there's a lot of anti-media bias. (Which, ironically, seems to be fueled by media outlets like, say, Fox News.) Okay, so there's that. But you add to that a vehicle (the comments section of Salon, say) for the most biased of the observers to shout their own version of the story -- loudly -- and whatever information was conveyed in the article is lost. Readers pay as much attention to the commenters as they do the writer -- because, let's face it, a lot of people don't exercise critical thinking, and a lot of people only listen to what they heard last. It scares me that some significant percentage of readers will put more stock into what commenters say than what the reporter says.

Yes, media corporations kind of suck right now. Yes, they put at least as much thought into retaining advertisers and shareholders as in getting broadcasting the deeper part of the truth. But that all exists on a corporate level. The reporter doesn't share that mindset. That mindset is anathema to the reporter.

So this whole thing, it scares and irks me. Casting doubt on the reporter's work, when s/he's the only one who still really gives a shit about getting the real story out there -- that sucks.

And finally, the truest sentence, in my opinion, in the Salon piece:

[T]he kind of people who are prone to flipping others off, braying obscenities and ranting pointlessly are disproportionately represented in online letters sections and reader blogs.

And there's the rub.

On preview: I also agree with occhiblu.

People read the comments on Salon? I hadn't even thought of reading those and I've had a Salon Premium account for three years running.

Yes, media corporations kind of suck right now. Yes, they put at least as much thought into retaining advertisers and shareholders as in getting broadcasting the deeper part of the truth. But that all exists on a corporate level. The reporter doesn't share that mindset. That mindset is anathema to the reporter.

The people running the corporations now are probably not less greedy than those who ran them back in the 50s or 60s. But back then the corporations had less options when it came to consolidation and ways to monetize their holdings--in other words, the reporters held more power relative to the corporate interests and thus the report mindset was pervasive. But the corporate players have evolved while the reporters have either stagnated or diluted their power over more outlets (blogs, TV, cable news, radio, etc). I guess the standard response to this situation is to attempt to re-impose regulation over media ownership and consolidation, but I wonder if there is an alternative involving reporter-controlled mainstream media outlets--but "reporters" don't seem like a naturally cohesive group to organize around.

People read the comments on Salon? I hadn't even thought of reading those and I've had a Salon Premium account for three years running.

I used to read the forums -- was that Table Talk? -- and there were tons of really interesting, thoughtful people there. Then they opened up the comments section, so I started reading those, figuring it would be the same people. Ha!

It actually caused me to stop reading Salon.

But that all exists on a corporate level. The reporter doesn't share that mindset. That mindset is anathema to the reporter.

As another aspect of idealistic reporter vs. the corporate environment: I saw one of my favorite blogs decay because, after initial success, having created a space for thoughtful, in-depth discussion, ad revenues climbed to the point where the owner could quit his job to concentrate on the blog full time. So he did, and it was all down hill from there, because, once he was depending on the blog for his income, he had to take on that corporate role. He introduced lurid and controversial topics to generate traffic. He deliberately dumbed down the conversation to broaden his demographic. He started posting articles with no purpose other than getting you to click on a revenue-generating link. He even promoted books defending positions so wildly in contrast with his own that the only explanation is that he was paid to promote them.

I guess the point is that I wouldn't have had much sympathy for the idea that a media corporation can enable idealistic reporters by shielding them from business pressure, but I'm not so sure any more. Hopefully some happy synthesis will emerge.

Journalists are trained to do what they do. It takes a hell of a lot of work to write a story that appears in a daily paper -- and that's before you even sit down at the keyboard. Phone calls, background research, leg work -- the reporter must learn everything there is to know about a story before a single word is written.
And yet, any idiot with a computer and an Internet connection can publish whatever inaccurate, biaised, poorly researched crap they want and, while they may not enjoy the instant level of readership of a major news outlet, they still stand a chance of gaining a level of readership that, over time, can lead to a kind of false respect for their writing simply because x number of people read it. In the past, these people were restricted to mimeographing their screeds on cheap paper and handing them out on street corners, which appropriately limited their influence. This is just one of the downsides of the Internet being so available.

The Duke rape scandal is a perfect example of all this. Once the online community got their teeth into the issue, the MSM was dragged from one development to the next rather than being the first to report.

For example, Google has a long memory, but Lexis-Nexis has one even longer, and the few facts about the accuser led the blogosphere directly to her name and criminal record. Even Wikipedia's tough stance on verification could not prevent users from identifying the accuser with her own article.

As the MSM is discovering, a juicy story = page hits, and those who create an open forum garner the eyeballs. Again, the Duke scandal reflects this as those bloggers who began moderating comments either lost readers or became so overwhelmed that they shut down their blogs altogether. As the old saying goes, if you can't stand the heat...

Thank you all for an interesting discussion.