Comments on: Behind the Pulitzers

By: BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » The problem with Pulitzers

BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » The problem with Pulitzers — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:14:44 +0000

[...] have been arguing for sometime that the Pulitzer Prize is bad for journalism, turning the profession into a circle-jerk of mutual [...]

By: BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » The Pulitzers enter 1994

BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » The Pulitzers enter 1994 — Fri, 12 May 2006 14:19:14 +0000

[...] I have argued often that the Pulitzers have been bad for journalism, motivating papers to be edited for prize juries instead of the public. The Pulitzers have helped separate journalism from its public. That’s why I don’t like prizes. [...]

By: Ralph Phelan

Ralph Phelan — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 18:21:12 +0000

Why do people want to be Pulitzer Prize winners? Is it really such a great honor to get to join the same club as Walter Duranty and Peter Arnett?

By: Jack H

Jack H — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 22:22:57 +0000

Journalists have squandered the legacy that old Hollywood movies gave them. Brash but honest cynical idealists who embodied and celebrated the best of the American spirit. “The Front Page.” “It Happened One Night.” After “All the President’s Men,” they seem to think that their job is to destroy – not for the sake of cleansing rottenness, but to promote their agendas and careers. Maybe it’s always been that way, but not in the public eye. I see journalists nowadays as pretty much on a par with abortionists and class-action laywers. There’s gold in them thar pockets! Let’s git it.

I wrote something light on the subject, here:

http://forgottenprophets.blogspot.com/2006/04/how-can-it-be-hot-out-it-was-just-cold.html

and something darker, here:

http://forgottenprophets.blogspot.com/2006/02/white-sheep.html

Ah well. The times, they are achangin’. The bad the Times doesn’t. The dead tree media have become the petrified forest media – might as well be writing in cuneiform, for all the relevance it has.

But enough.

Best,

Jack H

By: Steve Teeter

Steve Teeter — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 21:10:06 +0000

Two comments from New Orleans — First, regarding thinking “beyond the presses, in evaluating the Times-Picayune the Pulitzer folks did for the first time allow the paper to submit materials that had been published only online. As you noted, during the height of the crisis that was the only way they could publish at all, and it was greatly appreciated by me in exile in Jackson, MS. Second, while the T-P won for coverage of breaking news, that category is a little misleading. Almost as soon as the winds stopped blowing, the coverage turned into precisely the type of local enterprise reporting that Bunch was talking about. Local readers know the paper has been relentless in investigating what went wrong, especially focussing on the Army Corps of Engineers. Questions such as whether the Corps built the levee walls up to the standards of their own design (they did) and whether those designs were adequate to the task (they weren’t) have been front page stories here every day. Yes, the Corps is technically a Federal entity, but how they performed locally is the big question, and the mayor, the governor, the city council, the police, etc., are hardly getting a free ride. The T-P is doing the job.

By: hart

hart — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 20:26:32 +0000

You and other influencers in the ’sphere have argued forever about the need for news to “get local” both online and in print. No argument from me there. Our shop traffics heavily in “local” news, albeit in a unique way. But I have to say that by taking the Pulitzer board to task this year, you are torturing your argument. Hurricane season 2005 was a huge, huge **local** story to communities all around the Gulf of Mexico. The storms visited not just catastrophic physical damage to people, their homes and communities, but it also ripped apart social and political infrastructures and created an environment where taxpayer and private funds were wasted and used for corrupt purposes just about everywhere one looked. The newspapers — their reporters, photographers and editors — that won awards this year (and the broadcast outlets which won their own awards) covered those issues in a spectacularly dedicated way. So come off it. Give credit where credit is due, even as you properly urge news organizations to “get local.”

By: David Mastio

David Mastio — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 19:53:39 +0000

A big factual error in the piece you quote:

The editorial writing Pulitzer went to exactly the kind of coverage you are extolling.

See links here: http://www.inopinion.com/features/?itemid=556

Doesn’t really undermine your point, but give em some credit.

By: Notes from a Teacher: Mark on Media » Thursday squibs

Notes from a Teacher: Mark on Media » Thursday squibs — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 18:09:34 +0000

[...] Behind the Pulitzers. Jeff Jarvis picks up on Will Bunch’s critique of the latest Pulitzer Prizes and adds his own thoughts to what the Pulitzers should reward. Lots of great comments, too. [...]

By: blackminorca

blackminorca — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 16:40:52 +0000

Pulitzer?

Puleeez!

http://ucca.org/famine/gordondispatch.html

By: Ivan Lenin

Ivan Lenin — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 14:21:10 +0000

Amen, comrade Jeff.
I want to read about what happened next block, other than somebody got raped and murdered. It takes creativity to make something like that interesting, and right now too many journalists and bloggers waste their creative energy on driving the same political points back and forth. It’s boring.

By: Menlo Bob

Menlo Bob — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 14:12:12 +0000

If I read your quote correctly, reporters think journalism awards should be based on exposing malfeasance, corruption and scandal. Well okay, but what about all the other stuff that people need to know about? Little wonder that readers are bailing out of that hopeless sink hole of negativism.

By: don surber

don surber — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 11:49:16 +0000

“They should be encouraging old newspapers to think past the press.”

There you go again, Jeff. Newspapers led the way online, followed by TV and then by bloggers. But I do agree:

“If they truly cared about journalism, they would be rewarding local reporting, for local is the one thing that newspapers must do well to distinguish themselves in the borderless world of online news.”

By: Ron Hardin

Ron Hardin — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 09:43:02 +0000

Stop worrying about the Pulitzer and start worrying about the soap operaization of everything.

The soap opera audience may be the biggest and most reliable audience, but it’s not enough to support the news business.

When soap opera potential edits the news for everybody, everybody else tunes out.

Everybody else is the majority.

By: Eddie

Eddie — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 09:33:01 +0000

Nick Kristof winning for his Darfur columns (and endangering his life on several occasions travelling there to cover the ethnic cleansing in that troubled region) was about the only slam dunk award… everything else was either undeserving or arguably weaker than some of the other stories in their fields.

By: Lee

Lee — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 07:22:48 +0000

The Pulitzer is going the down the same path as the Nobel Peace prize. Too bad.

By: DEAN BERRY -- REAL AMERICAN

DEAN BERRY -- REAL AMERICAN — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 07:03:31 +0000

Because of how evil the amerinazis have made America, Jesus Christ has removed His blessing. Can’t you tell? http://www.deanberryministries.org/index3.html

………..

By: M. Simon

M. Simon — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 06:34:59 +0000

Pro illegal immigration:

What happens to the economy when you eliminate 10 million workers and 20 million consumers?

By: AST

AST — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 06:18:32 +0000

The point came home during the last election when the Deseret News sent a reporter to cover the party conventions. The press service pieces were cynical and snyde, while the local reporter wrote about the experience and what the local delegates were doing. It brought back the old feeling I used to get watching Cronkite and Huntley/Brinkley covering the conventions live. It was a big show with human interest. Now the press writes everything off because it’s packaged. Once reporters become jaded to the point where nothing is new to them they cease to be reporters and become amateur novelists.

By: DEAN BERRY -- REAL AMERICAN

DEAN BERRY -- REAL AMERICAN — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 06:16:57 +0000

Because of how evil the amerinazis have made America, Jesus Christ has removed His blessing. Can’t you tell? http://www.deanberryministries.org/index3.html

By: Laika's Last Woof

Laika's Last Woof — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 06:11:11 +0000

“Clinton’s problem wasn’t that he started wars, it’s that he started wars that didn’t have a particularly coherent narrative.”

“Ahh! A narrative! Thank the Gods!” Karl Rove must’ve exclaimed when he saw the towers crumple.

You’ve got some nerve.

By: PJ

PJ — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 05:24:30 +0000

My vote for the top old-school story’d be CBS’ investigative reporting of Miami police, where citizens went in to inquire how to make complaints, and got brutally harrassed, even threatened with death, by police officers. In response the local PBA head put out a bulletin on these reporters.

Now that’s the kind of reporting we need more of; the type of shit that gets “the man” hunting down the reporters is the kind of stuff Pulitzers were made for.

http://cbs4.com/topstories/local_story_033170755.html
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/14218941.htm

By: TLB

TLB — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 05:18:27 +0000

In light of "high" journalistic "standards", could someone explain pro-illegal immigration propaganda to me? I scan several immigration-related stories per day, and they're almost always full of misleading statements or outright lies. Other than by ignoring such articles, how exactly does one square that sort of coverage with the proposition that reporters and newspapers are stalwart defenders of the truth?

By: Toni

Toni — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 04:34:03 +0000

“not a whisper from the Pulitzer committee”

??? It was a nominated finalist!

By: M. Simon

M. Simon — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 04:14:22 +0000

I have been covering one of the biggest corruption stories in America at my blog. What we call "addiction" is in fact a false diagnosis. Long term addiction is in fact self medication for trauma. I have discussed drug company complicity in this. In fact the new head of the NIDA has come to a conclusion on the subject similar to what I have been propounding for four years. i.e. Drugs do not cause addiction. So our war on drugs is in fact a war on the afflicted run for the benefit of drug companies and the prison industrial complex. I have done articles on how the drug companies who sell medicines for "anxiety" profit from keeping such competition off the market. A local free weekly ran my articles until the local police pressured them to stop running my articles: bad for their business and police morale. Now I don't expect an award. However, you would think that such corruption of drug companies and law enforcement might be of more than local interest. In fact I have put the case to both Rosen and Loveday. No interest. Zero. Nada. Some day this story will break because the medical evidence keeps piling up. In the mean time I keep plugging away. Here are a few of the articles. Decide for yourself. (more on my sidebar) scroll down). The War On Unpatented Drugs. Is Addiction Real? Heroin Genetic Discrimination A well known secret

By: Dexter Westbrook

Dexter Westbrook — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 04:12:12 +0000

The Ohio “Coingate” scandal is a good example of what Mr. Jarvis is talking about. Here is a story that literally turned Ohio politics upside down, yet not a whisper from the Pulitzer committee.