MMMM # 450 -- Media Adaption.

     OK. I'm a senior journalist, at least in years on the job.
     There are advantages, but also bumps along the way.
     Change is fine, but some of the recent changes I've confronted are just jarring.

EXAMPLE: The National Geographic writer who "storified" a series of tweets for a piece about the dangers of health reporters making some breakthrough sound like, well, a breakthrough, only to have it torn apart by newer research not long afterwards.

I tried to read it, I really did. But I found it disjointed and difficult to follow, the exact opposite of what I have  been taught (and teach) is the way to write stories.
     But there is a website that seeks to teach the new way to tell stories, so I waded into it, and I'll report back on the experience. 
     I emailed the author of the story, but got no reply.

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Glenn Greenwald (l)

    Reporter Glenn Greenwald had this to say about The Washington Post during an appearance on Democracy Now:

“The editors at The Washington Post are very much old-style, old-media, pro-government journalists, the kind who have essentially made journalism in the U.S. neutered and impotent and obsolete… And the reason I went to The Guardian is because they have a history in the past of deviating from this sort of very conservative, pro-government line and doing reporting that’s in the public interest.”

      What I would like to ask Mr. Greenwald about his sweeping indictment of journalism in the U.S. is at what point did this happen? Yours is the same kind of sloppy over-reaching "journalism" that happens when people have been drinking too much of their own cool-aid.

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     Came across this item on a 9-11 timeline as I read about the dedication of the memorial at ground zero:

10:49: Fox News Channel is the first of the United States news networks to implement a news ticker at the bottom of its screen for supplementary information about the attacks. CNN adds one at 11:11, and MSNBC adds one at approximately 2:00 pm. All three cable networks have used a news ticker continuously in the years since (and many local television stations have followed suit).

   

Now they are everywhere, of course. 

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     And a blogger in Mississippi has been charged with invading the privacy of a nursing home patient whose husband is a U.S. Senator running for re-election. The woman has dementia, and they say he snuck into the woman's room and took pictures of her, allegedly to help an opponent of the Senator.
     I can't imagine any legitimate "Mainsteam" media outlet stooping to this kind of behavior. Shame on him.

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of TimLennox.com]