Slouching Toward A Coddled And Toothless Blogosphere
Remember when blogs were going to be fiercely independent firebrands who, purified of old media insidery stench, would pull no punches against traditional power structures? So much for that. Today’s laptop media is shaping up to be nothing but lapdogs.
Then again, even a poodle will bite once in a while.
Take the TechCrunch dust-up. The tech business blog sheepishly negotiated with Twitter Inc. the release of internal company documents it received, unsolicited, via email. It was tech bloggers who lead the craven charge, excoriating TechCrunch for daring to run anything at all. On Twitter, several of Arrington’s tech elite colleagues said he deserved to be literally spit upon. John Gruber of Daring Fireball called Arrington “a very sad excuse for a man” in a post that garnered strong agreement from longtime newspaperwoman Kara Swisher at All Things D, who added, “there should be no difference between Web ‘journalism’ and the old-fashioned journalism.” Except of course, Swisher was only demonstrating just how different the two are.
This episode’s Woodstein was as distraught as anyone to see their dear friends at Twitter burned. TechCrunch founder Mike Arrington wrote: “I wish this had never happened.”
But of course, as at least two media lawyers have pointed out, old-fashioned journalists have been utilising information obtained in violation of both laws and legally-binding civil agreements for years without this sort of ethical outcry. As far as the law goes, it is legal to use such information to journalistic ends, within some fairly wide parameters.
Yet blogs, especially tech blogs, lash themselves oh-so-closely to their sources. TechCrunch is hardly the only example. The diverse and vibrant collection of blogs that track Mac rumours routinely cave to cease and desist letters from Apple, because who wants to end up like the teenaged publisher of ThinkSecret, bullied into submission by Apple for reporting legitimate news about Apple products, news that was proven accurate and was gathered no more nefariously than the stuff that turns up regularly in the Wall Street Journal?
Who wants to be trashed by a spoonfed CNBC reporter , or have your (eventually proven accurate) sources called “illiterate”-sounding by a blogger, for contradicting Apple’s company line on the health of its CEO?
This is how journalism dies. Not with a bang, but with a series of favours and quiet surrenders.
(Top pic: Alison McNeill of bub.blicio.us and “Gadget Guy” consultant Dave Mathews engage in a typical in-depth interview at a TechCrunch party last year, via Flickr)
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@LeeMarvinsPants: Basically, blogs were supposed to be the alternative to old media journalism. Old journalism had become so distorted due to journalists not wanting to step on anyone's toes that what they were producing was, essentially, not journalism.
If I'm understanding Ryan correctly, I think he's talking about how blogs have gone down that same path... Instead of providing the straight up, no-apologies stuff, blogs/bloggers now worry, give-in, receive favors for what info they do or do not put out, etc. - thus skewing their journalism in the process and rendering it not real journalism anymore.
The actions may be small but they're chipping away at what journalism is supposed to truly be about.
I really hope this is somewhat close to what Ryan is saying. If not, my bad and please ignore.
Um... what?
LeeMarvinsPants
Correct me if you can prove me wrong: the following is pure speculation.
Say you run a major blog covering an industry, say tech. And you would like to be very, very rich someday, as rich as the people you cover (whom you consider, deep down, nothing more than "material in chinos"). And one day from the sky falls all this material that's really, really juicy, the kind of stuff that could be of great advantage to an investor, the kind of stuff that would be of GREAT interest to your audience.
But you hate lawyers, and you love making money. What do you do?
You hype the hell out of your "scoop" for 36 hours or so, long enough to tip off the other side to send their negotiators/get an injunction. You, meanwhile, read EVERY WORD.
You don't publish. You apologize to your readers, you say your hands are tied. Ethics, ya know.
Meanwhile, you know where to put (or save) your money for the next little while, and everyone on the planet knows that you know. And that company? It is going to try to keep you happy from now on.
@Conchie Birdie: I think you're probably right in gleaning Tate's meaning, but this is akin to being incredulous that white people are co-opting rap music. "White people co-opting black music? I never thought I'd live to see the day!"
The Dominant Glee Club
The funny thing about all this is the fact that it's not even a "journalistic ethics" issue despite how much the laptop warriors doth protest to be offended as such, but really just a simple PR issue. Once the information gets out, it's out. They should be trying to find the hacker in a criminal investigation--I mean if that kid guessing Sarah Palin's email account could go to jail why hasn't this been wrapped up yet?--and then deal with Arrington mano a trollo for damage control. And, honestly, as if all this tiff really matters. I don't see Anderson Cooper mincing words about this whole affair.
I mean, are we going to string up Perez Hilton because he starts publishing naked Paris Hilton mirror-pics hacked off her Sidekick? Let's be fucking serious here.
Perez Hilton and Arrington are just the patsies filling the trough but you can't get force a leopard to change its spots like how you can't get bloggers to not stare at their iPhones at a party.
PS. Alison's a cutie.
I love this Ryan. Because it's true.
It'd be even funnier if it turned out Croll forged those documents.
Just like the last.fm crap, this is all about Arrington running up his pageviews and unique visitor counts.
Gotta wonder at Croll's motivations for going to TC, too. Why not Wikileaks? Why not a torrent? Random web page? Why not... oh, right. He didn't care about the information. He just wanted to get paid.
Come on, guys, you can't namedrop Woodward and Bernstein (even if it's a "MUST BLOG FASTER AND CLEVERER" sort of name drop by calling them "Woodstein") without checking how well you're following the money.
WilletteEchidna