It has for me. Now when I read the newspaper or a magazine–I don’t care how prestigious it’s supposed to be–I see the columnist as just a blogger or poster. The only reason they deserve my respect more than any other poster is if they post really good stuff.
And, for the most part, it isn’t. Not the opinion pieces. Just another opinion, not any better than the average decent SDMB OP.
I haven’t watched TV news for the longest time, so that’s just about irrelevent to me. I have respect for the AP and other wires–news often requires risk and hard work, but that’s about the only thing that earns especial respect from me.
When, on websites, there is no place for me to post my comments (The New Republic, etc.) something seems amiss. But then I remember: Oh yeah, there are guys out there that still think they are “real” columnists and writers and above a direct critiqe. Riiiight.
But their day is fading fast, IMO. What do you Dopers think?
I haven’t thought of this before but I suppose you are right. I read so many new stories and opinions every day that I just expect each to stand on its own merits whether it is a blogger or an editorial in the New York Times.
The SDMB has bested every other analysis and opinion piece so many times that I can’t count. It is like a real-time peer review. That is pretty unique.
Respected news sources may have generally better content in general but with thousands of other sources competing with with, it is unlikely that they will win for the best piece any given time.
I had soured on most television news years before I started using internet news services.
I definitely rely on the Google News aggregate to a huge degree now, but my respect for individual news outlets remains the same – I don’t bother with TV news, local or national, I hold the The Globe and Mail in high esteem, will read The National Post if there’s nothing else, but can’t make up my mind what bothers me more: its bias or its mindless puffery. The local papers are only good for starting fires or cleaning windows.
No change in perception of individual organs, but using Google News definitely exposes me to more information. It feels more “researchy” than print news, which is more of a morning ritual, and certainly more than news updates on CBC radio. The only television news I ever go to is CNN, for the real-time stuff. (I think their coverage of “the blogosphere” is just sad. The internet is not news; it’s the damned internet. While we’re at it, knock it off already with “The Morning Papers,” Mr. Brown.)
I don’t read blogs at all – or at least not journal-style blogs. The few “blogs” that I have bookmarked typically link to items from traditional news outlets’ webpages and provide extremely laconic summaries. Come to think of it, the closest I come to reading editorial content in print media is the “letters” page.
I’ve always preferred to just be presented with the facts – If I want an opinion, I’ll conjure one up myself, somehow. (Or read the SDMB.)
Yes, the internet has changed how I respect the media.
I respect it moreso.
You can read 1000 posts on the SDMB and not have something presented as clearly, concisely and with such a complete understanding of the subject as anything Thomas Friedman writes on any given day.
And, I consider the SDMB relatively intelligent for the internet.
Weekly, I read/hear on the radio/see on TV people with a grasp of certain issues that pales anything you read here. Many people in the media have advanced degrees in the subjects that they are writing about and sometimes a bevy of fact checkers and researchers working for them. They have considered every side of the issue. They’re researched facts and had their pieces edited.
I consider a place like this to be a shirts & skins pickup game in a playground compared to the actual media.
Keep in mind, I’m talking about the media I follow. I’m not talking about the Jayson Blairs and Tucker Carlsons of the world. I’m talking about Fareed Zaharia. For writings on sports and economics, David Leonhardt of the New York Times. A. O. Scott on movies and entertainment.
Beyond factual things here – an answer to a math question – most opinions I see are derivative, repetitive and often uninformed.
Friedman this week is riding around on a warship in the gulf. He’s experiencing first hand how Iraqis view women in power, how the view different ethic groups working together, people of different religions working together. Who the hell HERE is going to be able to tell me something that’s a fraction as interesting or informed as what he’s writing?
I was already losing my respect for traditional (news) media; the internet simply hastened it.
If I had a nickel for every time a hair-raising news event coming out of Washington DC got buried while the conventional outlets talk about Yet Another Missing White Woman™, I’d be richer than Bill Gates.
I had lost most respect for the major media long ago. Local news is a joke (a FIRE! a CAR ACCIDENT! Is your ___ KILLING YOU? Check out our hottie reporter in a FUN RUN!)
I will grant you that the Dope is weak on reportage, which does take a certain amount of cash, especially the stuff that requires travel and hotel rooms and hookers and such. But the actual value of the SDMB is that one can be reasonably sure that the people who post to it are not bought-and-paid for servants of one ideology or other. So often in watching shows like the McLaughlin Group or Meet the Press, I hear commentators spouting obvious lies and half-truths that have long been thoroughly debunked on the SDMB, or they advance arguments that are so feeble that they would swiftly get mugged on the SDMB. They do it because as part of traditional media, they have learned that they can get away with it. Their columns are printed by the millions, the response to them are rarely printed at all.
Here on the Dope, and on many blogs, a lie or a half-truth or a weak argument immediately gets spotted and worked over big time. (That’s the main reason I value conservative contributor to the Dope – they keep us honest). Makes for a much more intellectually rigorous examination of issues than you’ll find in traditional media.
BTW, Friedman ain’t all that. I remember watching him on CSPAN and such talking about his “Edge of the World” book about outsourcing and such. His ONLY response to the problem of outsourced workers was, ‘give them government-funded job training.’ Well, it’s better than nothing I suppose, but it did nothing to address the question of where the jobs to be trained for will come from. A definitely lack of intellectual rigor there.
I’m not much of a newsie, outside of sports it’s 95% depressing, so I’m not going to spend 2 hours a day seeing the lousy side of life.
I like the SDMB for news because it’s interactive. If there is a story about law, I can be pretty sure a few honest to goodness lawyers will chime in, not just with their take, but with give and take between different opinions. Politically, I know there will be people on both sides, taking sides, and poking holes in the opposition. There’s also nobody here taking an opinion because they need to maintain an image, it’s honest.
You get a lot of different opinions, very often from experts in the field, and they discuss the issue, rather than just posting their article.