Government and new media (Bloggers scaring the MSM)

News and Record ^ | 1/1/07 | John Robinson

[Rb ver. 2.0]

I’m on a panel this afternoon speaking to the 2007 Conference on Public Administration in Chapel Hill. Here’s the first sentence of the description of the topic: Saber-tooth tigers, oil, polar ice caps, and newspaper control of news — all may be gone soon, if not forgotten. So how does a government handle overwhelming demands for information and participation on the new frontier of journalism?

Well. They got the verb tense wrong. “Newspaper control of news” is long gone.TV saw to that years ago. And you can make a strong argument that it never was. But that’s another post.

Here is the list of questions the moderator is going to use to spark discussion, although I have no expectation that we’ll need more than No. 2 to do that.

1. We have recently seen high profile conflicts between media and politicians/bureaucrats here in North Carolina. Many of these conflicts center around interpretations of the Public Records Laws. Where do you see these laws and their interpretations going in the future?

2. The blogging world has been referred to as the “fifth estate.” This implies a certain level of importance in the balance of government branches and citizens. Do you think blogging has such a substantial role, and if so, is it a healthy or unhealthy influence?

3. Bloggers are sometimes accused of being less subject to laws and ethical restrictions than mainstream media, primarily because they do not have assets at risk. Please comment on this perception.

4. What suggestions would you offer government officials for dealing with inaccurate blog postings?

5. There is some pressure for professional government employees to create and maintain blogs. It may be hoped that this would shorten the time lag in government response to the people on issues. Given that the time lag is often the product of a need to review records laws, etc., what advice would you give to appointed government officials regarding this suggestion?

6. Most newspapers and television stations (according to recent reports have added blogs to their repertoire, including The News & Record. How do you see this merger affecting news coverage?

7. What are the implications, professionally and ethically, of government employees posting information to blogs? Given the ability to make such postings anonymous, an option generally not available in letters to the editor, what impacts might their ability to share inside information have? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

8. How do you see the speed and anonymity of web-based news ultimately affecting the democratic process?

Most of these questions are the wrong ones, it seems to me, coming at the topic from the wrong angle. As the world of news and information moves from the one-to-many model of mass communication to the two-way model of the Web, then hand-wringing about whether that move is good is irrelevant. It simply is.

I wrote about my initial talking points here. Now that I have the questions, anything else I should add?

The need for greater transparency in government will be a key addition. What I’ve learned is that when people aren’t given full and complete information, they often fill in the blanks on their own, creating a version of reality based on some facts, some assumptions and some biases. It has little to do with “new forms of media,” which is the title of the panel. People have always done that. The difference now is that the people have a voice of their own on the Web. As with everything else, some of the voices will be cranky, mean-spirited and off-point. Others will be relevant, insightful and helpful. It is what it is.

What else?

[Rb ver. 2.0]

Question #3 "Bloggers are sometimes accused of being less subject to laws and ethical restrictions than mainstream media, primarily because they do not have assets at risk. Please comment on this perception."

Missing the point. Bloggers are not forced to push their employer's agenda.

[Bitsy]

What suggestions would you offer government officials for dealing with inaccurate blog postings?

How about suggestions offered government officials for dealing with THEIR inacurate statements and the MSM inacurage statements? People blogging can be corrected by people reading the blog. Gov. officials and MSM ostly get away with inacurage reporting. IMHO.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Question #3 "Bloggers are sometimes accused of being less subject to laws and ethical restrictions than mainstream media, primarily because they do not have assets at risk. Please comment on this perception."

You are a stone's throw from Durham, the site of the Michael Nifong crusade to keep his job long enough to get the maximum pension by railroading three Duke U. students into prison for a generation.

That is relevant to the issue of "ethical restrictions and the mainstream media" because I just finished reading the book Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case by Stuart Taylor, KC Johnson. A major conclusion of which is that the coverage of the case by the MSM in general, and The New York Times in particular, was (and is) absolutely without ethical restraint.

To go by the MSM coverage you would think, according to Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson, that Roy Cooper had found the Duke boys guilty rather than exonerating them.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

5. There is some pressure for professional government employees to create and maintain blogs. It may be hoped that this would shorten the time lag in government response to the people on issues. Given that the time lag is often the product of a need to review records laws, etc., what advice would you give to appointed government officials regarding this suggestion?

To the extent that government employees actually know the answers to questions, the Internet is a superbly efficient means of transmitting valid information.

OTOH any means of communication can be a bane if used to transmit authoritative falsehoods or even irrelevancies. Irrelevancies being the stock in trade of the MSM, and being the mechanism by which they produce propaganda effects. For example, covering the prior violence in Iraq as if it were important, then covering the present (relative) peace in Iraq as if it were irrelevant. If the violence was important, then the peace is just as important.

The fact that the peace is less exciting and will do less for ratings is relevant only if you assume that "What's good for Big Journalism is good for the country." And bloggers have no reason to accept that premise.

Why Broadcast Journalism is
Unnecessary and Illegitimate

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Ping

[Lee'sGhost]

“Saber-tooth tigers, oil, polar ice caps, and newspaper control of news — all may be gone soon, if not forgotten.”

Hey, John, be sure to tell the dumb@sses in Chapel Hill that Saber-tooth tigers disappeared a long time ago.

Sheeesh.

[E.G.C.]

BTTT

[advertising guy]

so.............who is winning the war on news ??

that would be us via Drudge and FR

WWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

providence I tell ya !!!!!!!!!!!!

[PGalt]

Thanks for the ping. Truth is trumping lie.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

... whether that move is good is irrelevant. It simply is.

That may be what they are trying to change, the unfettered access to them and each other we have through the internet. The internet is like a large townhall meeting and many politicians and government officials don't like facing the public directly.

We also know the left, which is dominant in the media and academia, want only their side told.