Response to Quotes

Journalists stand in a paternalistic relationship to readers: They guide them rather than engage them in conversation. They decide on the legitimate and valuable topics for the agenda based on their estimation of the public's need to know, but don't see the necessity for listening to the public. (Page 18)

The following quote seems to be accurate to me. In most forums of journalism, people don't seem to fully delve into subjects and encourage further discussion. The news outlets simply churn out the news but don't go any further. Readers don't make enough noise about it to change this fact, and are thus subjected to this treatment even further.

It seems that there are two extremes: one in where the media is the king and one in which the readers/public is the kings. There has to be a common ground between the two in order for the most important news to be covered. The readers need to be trusted by journalists and vice versa.

Making news became commercially viable through the selling of audiences to advertisers, instead of newspapers to partisan audiences... The new centrality of advertising income also meant that owners and editors were compelled to abandon controversial, partisan material from their reports, and instead aimed to please as many advertisers and consumers as they possibly could by printing ostensibly "neutral" content and proclaiming their political independence. (Page 38)

This quote I think holds true as well, more visibly in newspapers. Newspapers try to remain more neutral than news channels for the sake of advertisements, and it is at the cost of real investigative reporting. The economic system of newspapers requires advertising, and newspapers are willing to sacrifice controversial voice if it can net them a few dollars. News networks claim there are no biases, but anyone could tell you which ones are liberal and which ones are conservative. Advertisers don't shy away from them. It makes me wonder why newspapers don't take more chances like news networks do as far as giving some opinion.

The Senatorial Election

On Tuesday, January 19, the race for Ted Kennedy's vacated seat in the US Senate came to a very surprising conclusion. Republican Scott Brown defeated the Democratic candidate, Martha Coakley, to shake up the power structure in Washington. I am not from Massachusetts; I hail from New York. I wasn't very aware of the issues surrounding the candidates, but I followed the election on Twitter and on Boston.com.

The networks that I was watching during the election (MSNBC, Fox News, CNN, etc.) were only showing the latest results coming in from different districts. They didn't show much commentary from the general public. The Twitter-verse, however, was buzzing with different news and opinions. Not only were they offering the latest voting results, but giving their views as well. Those with conservative views were very excited, and usually ended their tweets with exclamation points and optimism. Liberals were very nervous and skeptical, already showing frustration with how they felt Coakley hurt herself in the election.

Boston.com had a live forum set up four days before the election even began. People were commenting and discussing their views early and often, continuing to do so throughout the election. The site also had readers reporting in about the polling stations in their town. People chimed in about who they voted for and how crowded the station was. The web site also followed Tweets from the candidates, with a widget set up on the page. It was a site filled with user-generated material that helped me follow the election more easily.

The Tweets about Scott Brown still keep flying on Twitter, and my favorite one of late:

"chalupatime Scott Brown is going on Leno, Scott Brown supports backstabbers."