A Slightly Educated View of Important Stuff: Blogs v. Newspapers

Occasionally WDR finds some subject of importance to chat about that, well, we might actually know a thing or two about. Usually it's Nic who puts these together, but this time Mr. Zhuang is going to contribute.


There's been a lot of talk about the legitimacy of blog news sites versus traditional newspapers. Much of this talk is coming from newspapers which are, if you haven't noticed, drowning like rats on a sinking ship.

First I should say that I am a professionally trained journalist who likes to read information off of a printed page. I'm not exactly sure why I prefer this method and I know that I'm part of a dying breed. But there it is. I prefer print. I'm sad to see newspapers go under, but what hurts me more is the desperate way they're leaving us.

Newspapers have been our primary source of news since the founding of this country. In fact, newspapers (and other print media) are the only businesses specifically protected under the constitution. They have been important to the development of our country. The spread of basic literacy throughout the country can be attributed largely to newspaper production. Several of the Founding Fathers owned and operated newspapers. But now, with the competition from television, internet and blogs, newspapers are dying out. And of all of these competitors, blogs are being targeted most by newspapers. Blogs are singled out for not being professional and lacking the ability to properly serve as news sources.

Now let's think about this for a moment. If we looked back at the newspapers of this country early in their history, we would find something far less professional than even THIS blog. We would see newspapers with minimal stories with a blank back page for people to write in their own stories or comments. Sound familiar? Except that these comments and stories BECAME news! None of these things were cited! Most of them weren't even coherent! There were no fact checkers. The only people who would point out the problems of the paper were rival newspapers who had problems of their own.

Gradually, the press evolved to become more timely and accurate. Rules of grammar were enforced. Facts were checked. Codes of ethics were written and generally followed. It took time for newspapers to become legitimate in the eyes of the public. Even now some people won't trust newspapers. Trust is hard won and easily lost.

So now the newspapers are attacking the blogs for a lack of professionalism. To an extent it's true: Many news blogs pull stories from other sources (i.e. newspapers) but this hardly describes all of them. In all fairness, any semi-educated monkey can track down sources and make phone calls. Local news is easy enough to cover without getting out of the office if you have contacts. If you've got a contact list of trustworthy sources, a computer, a phone and the ability to write something that is reasonably coherent, you've got a local newspaper without a press.

Newspapers have one big advantage in coverage, though: National and International. If you're writing a blog in California (and not getting paid for it) you probably can't afford to go (or send someone else) to Iran and cover what's happening. Newspapers and television can afford to do this. Does this mean that they're more qualified to cover this news? No. It just means that they have enough money to send people they find competent to cover what's happening.

But what newspapers fail to notice (and perhaps it's intentional) is that blogs have the ability to become legitimate news sources if they have reader support and funding. Really, blogs are just another medium for news. They can have editors, fact checkers, foreign correspondents, etc. If blogs can figure out how to make money and hire people, they can essentially become the new-newspaper. Sure, it isn't there now, but it can be there at some point and do it a hell of a lot faster than newspapers did.