Comments on: The News Ain\’t What It Used to Be http://www.contentious.com/2005/03/25/the-news-aint-what-it-used-to-be/ Amy Gahran's news and musings on how we communicate in the online age. Fri, 22 Aug 2008 02:35:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: Kim http://www.contentious.com/2005/03/25/the-news-aint-what-it-used-to-be/#comment-15227 Kim Sat, 26 Mar 2005 18:01:10 +0000 #comment-15227 Great post, loved the points you made. I'll add a couple of my own. I see mass media as a behemoth that is rapidly outliving its usefullness. There is too much bureaucracy inherent in the power structure (and too many people invested in not losing their perceived "power") for most mass media agencies to move and change with the tides. I saw a similar phenomena when I worked at Eastman Kodak in their internet marketing division. The "old guard" at Kodak was so invested in their belief that film would always dominate and that Kodak's brand loyalty would help it survive the coming digital age, that we in our division saw manager after manager decry the coming age of digital as just a fad that would never replace film. They didn't get that the consumers who trusted them for film wouldn't trust them for digital the way they would trust companies they already associated with technology. The consumer (film) division and the digital division did so much infighting for "turf" that they missed market opportunities. The longer time-to-market project management that Kodak had developed for film products bogged down digital development, which was changing rapidly. The result? When I started working at Kodak in 1996, the stock was in the triple digits. Right now? 32.23. It's just too large of a bureaucracy, with too many managers, to move and change as swiftly as smaller companies that "get it". Mass media is already taking a nosedive. A lot of people don't trust that the media is as fair and unbiased as it should be, and are turning to grassroots sources for their news. I'm much more likely to check out Andrew Sullivan and Instapundit to see what's going on than the New York Times, and largely because of the interactive nature of the discussions. You get multiple points of view that give you different perspectives than just reading what one editor wants you to hear. The interactive nature of news blogs also allows the site owners to be more in touch with their readership and to learn, over time, what "news" their readers want to hear. Blogs are also redefining "news". The speciality sites like Exploding Cigar (http://www.explodingcigar.com) and Wonkette (http://www.wonkette.com) are finding niche audiences previously underserved by mainstream media. And then we could talk about how things like TIVO, satellite radio, and the internet are changing traditional advertising. But that's a post in and of itself. Great post, loved the points you made. I’ll add a couple of my own. I see mass media as a behemoth that is rapidly outliving its usefullness. There is too much bureaucracy inherent in the power structure (and too many people invested in not losing their perceived “power”) for most mass media agencies to move and change with the tides.

I saw a similar phenomena when I worked at Eastman Kodak in their internet marketing division. The “old guard” at Kodak was so invested in their belief that film would always dominate and that Kodak’s brand loyalty would help it survive the coming digital age, that we in our division saw manager after manager decry the coming age of digital as just a fad that would never replace film. They didn’t get that the consumers who trusted them for film wouldn’t trust them for digital the way they would trust companies they already associated with technology. The consumer (film) division and the digital division did so much infighting for “turf” that they missed market opportunities. The longer time-to-market project management that Kodak had developed for film products bogged down digital development, which was changing rapidly. The result? When I started working at Kodak in 1996, the stock was in the triple digits. Right now? 32.23. It’s just too large of a bureaucracy, with too many managers, to move and change as swiftly as smaller companies that “get it”.

Mass media is already taking a nosedive. A lot of people don’t trust that the media is as fair and unbiased as it should be, and are turning to grassroots sources for their news. I’m much more likely to check out Andrew Sullivan and Instapundit to see what’s going on than the New York Times, and largely because of the interactive nature of the discussions. You get multiple points of view that give you different perspectives than just reading what one editor wants you to hear.

The interactive nature of news blogs also allows the site owners to be more in touch with their readership and to learn, over time, what “news” their readers want to hear. Blogs are also redefining “news”. The speciality sites like Exploding Cigar (http://www.explodingcigar.com) and Wonkette (http://www.wonkette.com) are finding niche audiences previously underserved by mainstream media. And then we could talk about how things like TIVO, satellite radio, and the internet are changing traditional advertising. But that’s a post in and of itself.

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