Just how divided are we?
: We are not as divided as media would paint us. Damnit. www.hungari sex
Last night, I was listening to All Things Considered on the way home as they reported on the Supreme Court refusing to rule on keeping God in the Pledge of Allegiance. The anchor said this was a deeply divisive issue and some expert quoted said this was a cultural war over the soul of the nation.www.hungari sex
C'mon, guys. Reality check! Does anybody really believe that the Pledge of Allegiance deeply divides us into a cultural war over the soul of the nation? www.hungari sex
Hell, no.www.hungari sex
Oh, most people surely have opinions and those opinions may well be statistically divided. But that doesn't mean we're ready to go over war over the Pledge.www.hungari sex
I said below and I've said before that we are not a nation divided, as politicians and reporters would paint us. www.hungari sex
Now it's time that a social scientist or a pollster to measure the passion of our opinions -- and an issue better come out pretty high on that passion scale before any reporter can say it's deeply divisive. www.hungari sex
Imagine a 0-5 scale like this:
0 - Don't give a damn.
1 - Would defend my view in a conversation
2 - Would start a conversation on the issue to say what I think.
3 - Would write a letter to the editor (or weblog post) on the issue.
4 - Would consider the issue when voting for a candidate.
5 - Would change a vote for a candidate over the issue.www.hungari sex
Most issues that are called deeply divisive probably come out about 0.5 on that scale. We are not facing each other, armed, on the borders of red states vs. blue over the Pledge of frigging Allegiance. We might discuss it over coffee. www.hungari sex
It's time to demand accurate portrayal of just how divided we are -- and aren't. www.hungari sex
: By the way, if this does take off -- if reporters regularly report on how much people care about the issues they report -- I hope it's named the Jarvis Passion Scale just cuz I like the sound of it. www.hungari sex
Old v. new
: In a post below, I noted that Rafat Ali beat the hell out of the big, lazy papers with his scoop on Starz and Real teaming up to create an Internet movie channel. In the comments, a "reporter" -- who didn't have the guts to leave name or affiliation -- snarked about Rafat's work:
Reporters do read blogs, but in order to get the full details on a story like this, they typically agree to an embargo. In this case, the embargo was for Monday, June 14. Rafat broke the embargo by reporting the story Friday, which no reporter at a professional publication could do if s/he wanted to be able to interview executives in the future. Perhaps more importantly, Rafat got several important details of the story wrong. Those who respected for the embargo had access to company executives and therefore, by and large, didn't.
I did nothing, for I knew it wouldn't take any time at all for Rafat to come back swinging, as well he should:
Mr Reporter
Had you read my story, you would have seen the first para which says both Starz and Real refused to comment on the story. I had been working on the story since early last week, since Rob Glaser shot off his mouth at the D Conference by telling people present at the conference that they were launching this service next week. Someone passed on the tip to me...
The first thing I did was contact the two companies, saying I am doing the story, they should comment officially. but they did not want to spoil there PR plans, which of course I was not a part of.
I spoke to about 20 people, just none of them the official sources, since they didn't want to. I don't adhere to PR schedules, since I am usually not a part of these schedules. I am known to spoil companies' PR plans by breaking stories through unofficial sources..its called reporting, Mr Reporter. Did you learn your journalism from a PR school?
Regards
Rafat
Go get 'im, Rafat! Exactly. If all you do is wait for the embargo to be lifted and the press release to be sent out to write your story, then we don't need you, Mr. Reporter; we, too, can read the press release. That kind of news is a commodity. It's also controlled news; by then, it's spun into cotton candy. Let me say that again: We don't need reporters to give us that sort of "news." Especially in a day when news organizations are losing audience and revenue and need to decide where to put their resources, the worst place to put them is in retyping press releases at the same time everyone else is retyping them, after the embargo is lifted. For that, link to the damned release. Start a blog. We still need reporters to do real reporting, to ask the questions people don't want to answer, not the ones they send out on the PR Newswire.
www.hungari sex
: UPDATE: The "reporter" leaves a response in the comments below that's just as frightening as the first:
Please. This is entertainment business journalism, not Watergate. Breaking the "news" that this service was launching is not some big scoop. Everyone knew it was coming fairly soon.
Well, "reporter," you still should be serving your audience, your public, by telling them what you know as soon as possible. That's when it's still news, not just a press release.
By respecing the embargo, professional reporters were able to get all their details right, something Rafat didn't do. They also maintain good relationships with the companies they cover so that they can get good stories in the future.
You really are looking upon your job as that of a flack. Get this straight:
The relationship that matters is with your audience, not with your sources!That's not the schoolchild's ideal journalism, but it's the real world. And it's obvious that Rafat's "tip" can in one way or another be sourced back to somebody who knew about the embargoed news.
So, clearly, Rafat had better relationships with better sources than you did, for Rafat got the story first and Rafat served his audience, his public better.
The simple fact is that blogs can do whatever they want, but professional reporters need to pick and choose their battles, and getting several important details wrong in order to break a story like this a (business) day early is not something that professional reporters an afford to do.
Hate to break it to you, mate, but Rafat is a professional reporter. He makes money reporting. He serves a public. He gets quoted. He breaks news. He's as professional a reporter as I know.
If professional reporters acted like some bloggers do, there wouldn't be any business news getting broken, by and large.
Turn that prism the other way: If reporters acted like bloggers like Rafat, they'd be breaking news instead of just retyping press releases.
Bloggers like Rafat provide an important service, but most of what they do is leeching off of what professional reporters do, either through links along with commentary or by "breaking" news that we have to agree to embargo. Claiming the moral high ground when they wouldn't exist without us is laughable.
Looks to me as if you leached off both Rafat and your industry's press releases to write the same damned story everybody else wrote.
www.hungari sex
What's most shocking about this exchange is that you know Rafat's name and my name but you don't know this alleged "reporter's" name. I don't either.www.hungari sex
And folks wonder why the public doesn't trust "reporters." This is a case study.www.hungari sex
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