ChrisWeigant.com

News Consumers Way Ahead Of David Brooks

[ Posted Tuesday, August 13th, 2013 – 18:38 UTC ]

The publishing world in general -- and the newspaper sector in particular -- has not been noted for being able to quickly shift gears when a technological paradigm shift happens out in the world at large. Print journalism has resisted such changes with stupefying short-sightedness, which partially (if not largely) explains why they're in such a downward spiral these days. If newspapers had embraced new technologies instead of scorned them, they'd be in a much stronger position than they are now. As but one easy example of this, imagine if newspapers had banded together and launched their own competitor to Craigslist and EBay roughly a decade ago. If they had created a "ClassifiedAds.com" of their own then they wouldn't have been so decimated by the disappearance of one of their revenue streams -- the classic classified ads section. But they refused to keep up with the changing marketplace, and now those dollars are forever gone to the newspaper industry.

But newspapers' woes don't end there, of course. They strongly defend their philosophical ways of doing things, because (1) they have a rather outsized opinion of their own worth, and (2) they cannot for the life of them see why they should change the way they've been operating for roughly the last 90-100 years. In a single phrase, newspapers see themselves as "gatekeepers" of the "serious opinions" the public should be exposed to. Such gatekeeperism has been on display in the discussions of how the venerable Washington Post might change, now that an online entrepreneur has bought it, lock, stock, and printing press.

The Huffington Post just highlighted the worst example of this from last Sunday's political chat shows on television, and while they did an exemplary job I feel further deconstruction is necessary. David Brooks, in discussing the online changes in the journalism business, falls back on the sneering contempt print journalists have long voiced towards the blogosphere:


Yeah, I think the audience has changed online. I think there's been a return to authority. You know, I used to read blogs, and you'd kind of be reading something interesting, and then the blogger would write, "Well, I've got to quit now. I'm going off to junior high." I realized I'd been reading a 12-year-old.

But I think there has been a return away from some of that toward, whether it's online or in print, a return to quality. People who actually make the calls, who are not speculating, who are reporting. And I think there's been a return to that sort of stuff.

And so I'm a little more of the belief that the old media is going to continue. Look at ebooks; they've hit a plateau. Look at online; it's hitting a plateau, I think. And so I think we're going to be stunned by how much of the old media, whether it's delivered online or not, is going to be around, as the audience returns to authority.

Kara Swisher, an online editor, took exception to the breathtaking elitism Brooks displayed:

I think people are just resistant to the change, and they have to say "blogs" as if it's an insult. They have to, like, separate them. And they're all part of a living, breathing news organization that has to use these tools. It's like arguing against printing presses. You know, monks arguing against Gutenberg. I just don't understand why --

At this point, Brooks tries to fit the changing world we live in into a comfortable "if we ignore the online world, it'll just go away" bit of head-in-the-sand-ism:

Yes, I'm not sure we're disagreeing. I would say when you look at projections of the future, go back, look at how people predicted the future, they always underestimated the extent of technological change. They always overestimated a sense of behavioral change. So the technology's going to change, but what people want to read is going to be basically the same --

To which Swisher responds with a hard cold slap of reality:

But the consumers are way ahead of you.

I don't mean to jump all over David Brooks and his obvious desire for a return to those gauzy, halcyon days when the public revered the Voice Of Authority emanating from the pages of Very Serious Newspapers across the land -- he's just the most recent and most convenient example of this type of antediluvian thinking. He's certainly not alone in his belief that if everyone just calms down for a minute, they'll all realize how valuable the gatekeeping function of newspapers truly is, and that they'll all reach for the phone to renew their subscription to the local printed newspaper of their choice (while canceling their online access as superfluous and unnecessary).

Brooks doesn't work for the Washington Post, which has actually done a fairly good job of bringing some bloggers on board in order to keep up with the changing times. Ezra Klein and Greg Sargent were both prominent bloggers before joining the Post, and they also have bloggers from the righty point of view, for balance. These have been valuable additions to the Post, and generate oodles of online views, at least as measured by their comment sections.

But Brooks' attitude towards anyone who did not enter the gate that major newspapers are supposed to keep is nothing short of breathtaking in its scorn and elitism. After all, if Brooks really had been reading a 12-year-old, finding his or her reasoning and writing skills interesting and competent, then what does it really matter how old they are? What does it matter if they draw a paycheck from a large newspaper or not if their writing is compelling and original?

Brooks has apparently convinced himself that online readers are returning "to quality," or to "people who actually make the calls, who are not speculating, who are reporting." Brooks longs for the days when the gatekeepers were godlike in their powers of keeping the riffraff from the eyes of the public. Without a shred of evidence, he projects his wish onto the public at large, stating that their is an enormous movement back to the voice of "authority."

Except, you know, for the dying newspaper industry. The fact that the Post had to put itself up for sale is completely ignored by Brooks, which is odd, since that was supposed to be the topic under discussion in the first place. By virtually every metric, newspapers are on a downward spiral. Perhaps being sold to a man who knows how to make money online will revitalize the Washington Post, but the fact that the paper had to put itself up for sale absolutely contradicts Brooks's assertion that people are flocking back to the voices of "authority" rather than reading more interesting commentary by others online.

Swisher is right -- the consumers are way ahead of Brooks and his refusal to come to terms with the new online reality. Perhaps it is just the fear that David Brooks could be replaced just about any old time by a younger and hungrier pundit who is capable of writing far more interesting columns, and who would likely do so for half of Brooks's current salary.

Don't get me wrong -- I often enjoy reading columns by David Brooks. He attempts to be a centrist voice on the Right, and this often leads him into amusing pretzel-bends of logic which are entertaining to read. He has the capacity, when all else fails, to realize that the Republican Party did something wrong or just plain stupid, and this is indeed a valuable thing in any partisan commentator. But his refusal to admit that his own professional world is not just changing but already has changed in a major way shows exactly the type of thinking that, hopefully, Jeff Bezos can change at the Post. Because out in the real world, the audience for political commentary is hungry for a lot more interesting voices than just David Brooks. The sooner he (and his ideological kin in the industry) realizes this fact, the better.

-- Chris Weigant

 

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant

 

8 Comments on “News Consumers Way Ahead Of David Brooks”

  1. [1] 
    BashiBazouk wrote:

    The Washington Post Company also hired Rob Malda a.k.a. CmdrTaco who started Slashdot. He works for WaPo labs. I wonder if the labs comes with the post purchase? I think Bezos bought the paper from The Washington Post Company but not the whole company with the agreement that they change the company name to something that does not include "washington post" in the name...

  2. [2] 
    Michale wrote:

    I submit that the attitude displayed by Brooks is not just limited to media types..

    Feinstein: You’re Not A Real Journalist Unless You Draw A Salary
    https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/why-sen-feinstein-wrong-about-whos-real-reporter

    Our politicians also seem to be stuck in that same type of archaic and medieval thinking...

  3. [3] 
    Chris Weigant wrote:

    BashiBazouk -

    I think you're right, the newspaper itself (and, I think, the WashingtonPost.com website) was the only corporate entity sold. The WaPo empire itself is a separate thing. What I wonder is what will happen to the syndicates, as Washington Post Writers Group has a pretty deep stable. Also, comics -- because one of the most important entities owned (lock, stock, and almost all of the characters except for Steve Dallas) by a WaPo corporate tentacle is "Bloom County." Look on the tag of every single "Opus" doll you've ever seen -- it lists a WaPo syndicate as owner of all rights.

    Michale -

    Chalk up another mark on my "Why I Cannot Bring Myself To Ever Vote For DiFi Again" board... thanks for the info, I think I had heard this one, but it's good to be reminded now and again...

    :-)

    -CW

  4. [4] 
    Michale wrote:

    Chalk up another mark on my "Why I Cannot Bring Myself To Ever Vote For DiFi Again" board... thanks for the info, I think I had heard this one, but it's good to be reminded now and again...

    Oh, I could give you a whole long list of reasons for your WICBMTEVFDFA board.

    But being that you are already there, what would be the point?? :D

  5. [5] 
    akadjian wrote:

    You know, I used to read blogs, and you'd kind of be reading something interesting, and then the blogger would write, "Well, I've got to quit now. I'm going off to junior high." I realized I'd been reading a 12-year-old.

    The question David Brooks really should be asking is, if he thought it was interesting, why would it matter to him if it were written by a 12-year old?

    Perhaps the 12-year old knows something he doesn't.

    He is just horrible. Almost everything I read by him makes me cringe.

    Don't get me wrong -- I often enjoy reading columns by David Brooks. He attempts to be a centrist voice on the Right, and this often leads him into amusing pretzel-bends of logic which are entertaining to read.

    Hahahaha ... ok, point to you, sir! You came up with a good reason to read Brooks ... I didn't think that was possible.

    Ok, I won't bash Brooks anymore. As fun as it is :)

    This is a great column, CW. Have you ever heard of Clayton Christensen or "The Innovator's Dilemma"?

    http://csinvesting.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/the_innovators_dilemma.pdf

    In a nutshell, his thesis is that innovation often comes from the bottom, not the top. That is, someone comes up with something which is almost as good but costs a lot less and this virtually wipes out what had existed before.

    This is what has happened to news. Bloggers are faster, more interesting, less expensive and often just as good as mainstream journalists.

    While a little may be sacrificed in terms of quality (debatable), the trade off isn't worth it for the market to pay more. At least in most cases. Traditional media is still trying to figure this out.

    Anyways, Christensen is interesting because his ideas basically saved Intel. Quite likely a number of other companies as well.

    -David

  6. [6] 
    akadjian wrote:

    a WaPo corporate tentacle is "Bloom County." Look on the tag of every single "Opus" doll you've ever seen -- it lists a WaPo syndicate as owner of all rights.

    Nnnnnoooooo!!!!

    Doesn't WaPo also own Kaplan as well? I think online learning was one of their major revenue sources

  7. [7] 
    Chris Weigant wrote:

    akadjian -

    In the early 1980s, Doonesbury took an enormous vacation (18 months?). The WaPo decided it needed a comic to fill the spot (aside: the Washington Post comics page is the BEST I have EVER SEEN -- THREE full pages of comics!).

    So they hired Berkeley Breathed, a no-name artist who had a comic at his college's newspaper (somewhere in Texas). His main character was a frat boy, Steve Dallas. He had a hound dog who morphed into being Opus in Bloom County.

    He was told to make a comic without word balloons, just the single line (a la Doonesbury), so it would fill the slot nicely. But -- key point -- he was a hired hand. The Post itself owned the comic. Milo and all the kids, Bill the Cat, Opus, and all the rest of them were the sole property of the Post, not Breathed. He didn't reap the full benefit of all those Opus dolls sold, to put it another way.

    This is why he eventually quit the strip, too.

    If you can find a used copy online, look for the book of Breathed's college comic strip -- it's hilarious! He had a gay college football player, long before anyone had even contemplated such a thing in popular culture.

    Anyway, yes, the Post company also owns Kaplan. And you're right, it's a cash cow for them, although not so much anymore (the feds are trying to crack down on for-profit education, which is hitting Kaplan hard).

    -CW

  8. [8] 
    akadjian wrote:

    The Post itself owned the comic. Milo and all the kids, Bill the Cat, Opus, and all the rest of them were the sole property of the Post, not Breathed.

    I had no idea about the backstory with Breathed. This makes me sad as Berke Breathed is such an amazingly nice guy.

    In college, I designed a t-shirt for one of our tours based on Bill the Cat. I wrote Breathed to ask his permission to use the character. We weren't going to make any money off of this, but just thought it would be fun. His wife wrote me back to say how pleased she was that someone would even reach out and ask - apparently, this isn't typically the case.

    She said they had no problem with us using my drawing of Bill. I had no idea I should have been writing WaPo.

    I knew he quit the Post but never knew the reason. Bloom County was so far ahead of its time that nothing I can think of currently has caught up. It was absolutely brilliant and I miss it!

    -David

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