dagblog - Comments for "Another death in Dallas"

Yet another sign of the print

acanuck — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 04:29:44 +0000

Yet another sign of the print news industry's painful and increasingly speedy self-immolation:

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/01/01/austerity_advocate_peter_g_peterson_buys_media_con/#more

That it's happening at the Post comes as no surprise. It simply needs the cash, given that its previous blatant attempt to pimp out its reporters and editors flopped so badly. The Post's return to journalistic integrity was obviously just a short-term tactic.

To cross the Is and dot the

acanuck — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 23:54:05 +0000

In reply to It was a good procrastination

To cross the Is and dot the Ts, I ran the quotation past a court-recognized expert on the Kennedy assassinations. He e-mailed back:

I recall it being Lifton as well, not Chomsky. Don't remember which documentary or the exact phrasing, but it was something to the effect of, "The authorities treated this as an ordinary crime -- a man in a building shooting a man in a car."

As for the initial question of saving newspapers from themselves, the otherwise execrable Rupert Murdoch is onto something: papers somehow need to retake control of the aggregation of their product on the net. For-pay firewalls have failed as a model, even for such powerhouses as the New York Times. But that's because today's sophisticated news junkie wants (and expects) to sample the entire range of reporting on a subject -- not one paper's take. Especially if there's a premium to pay.

What might work, least for big-city publications, would be to form (say) a nationwide consortium to both share reporting resources and aggregate all their content, which would be available free to subscribers to any one newspaper -- or for a fee that would be less than the print edition. Since web content isn't limited to a given size of news hole, stories could come in short, medium and long versions, with detailed sidebars and graphics there's no room for in the dead-tree versions.

This would require pulling the same content off Google News, or truncating it to little more than a headline. An alternative would be for aggregators like Google to share their profits with the consortium. That would work to the advantage of both.

In the pre-web heydays of journalism, individual papers often performed the "aggregator" role. Copy editors would collate reports from every available wire service -- in those days, we got them all -- into one seamless article that combined the best of each. If there was a local aspect to the story, you'd send out a reporter and wrap their contribution in as well.

Ah, the good ole days. Then came the hard part: chiseling the text into stone tablets. Very tedious and time-consuming.

I'll corroborate: I was there

Nebton — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 00:22:00 +0000

In reply to It was a good procrastination

I'll corroborate: I was there when Chomsky didn't say it.

It was a good procrastination

Michael Wolraich — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 23:04:47 +0000

In reply to BTW, thanks for doing the

It was a good procrastination excuse. But I'm not sure that attribution is correct either. As you mentioned, it was hazy, I didn't find corraborating evidence.

BTW, thanks for doing the

acanuck — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 22:07:53 +0000

In reply to This guy attributed the quote

BTW, thanks for doing the research I was too lazy to do.

Aw crap! It sounded so much

acanuck — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 22:04:24 +0000

In reply to This guy attributed the quote

Aw crap! It sounded so much better coming from Chomsky.

I'd read Lifton's best-selling conspiracy theory, Best Evidence, but don't recall his using the line there. Even the source you cite seems a bit hazy about attributing it to Lifton ("reportedly," "supposedly"). But for now, Chomsky's off the hook; I'm sure he's said a few other things that were controversial.

(I won't change the initial post, 'cause otherwise this part of the thread makes no sense.)

This guy attributed the quote

Michael Wolraich — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 21:20:36 +0000

In reply to Chomsky at his most

This guy attributed the quote to JFK conspiracist, David Lifton: http://alt.nntp2http.com/conspiracy/jfk/2009/07/9ae5a143463b27c8b824a178...

Chomsky at his most

acanuck — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 20:22:17 +0000

In reply to be curious where you got that

Chomsky at his most chomskyesque, isn't it? I heard it years ago, but secondhand. After I wrote it here, I did a quick google of the phrase and found no references, which is why I changed the wording to "was quoted ... as saying."

Check back in a day or so; I may be able to pin down a source. You're right, it is a great quote.

I forgot two other weekly

Nebton — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 17:42:22 +0000

In reply to If locals demand (and will

I forgot two other weekly local "newspapers": The Virginia Law Weekly, and Iris (a publication of the UVA Women's Center).

I'm definitely not trying to negate acanuck's primary point, however. What I'm trying to suggest is that there are ways of fighting this if the motivation is there.

Actually, of all our local

Nebton — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 17:38:16 +0000

In reply to So far, local papers have

Actually, of all our local papers, only the local daily one charges. The others are all ad supported, and all of them are already on-line as well. Of course, because Charlottesville is so awesome, we've been ahead of the internet curve for quite some time…

It really does depend on the audience, of course. Charlottesville has quite an eclectic mix of people, including some fairly well off liberals.