Internet opportunities overlooked in nostalgia?

Is Thomas Jefferson “spinning in his grave,” like Joel Shurkin argues? I walked out of his Tuesday, November 20^th lecture on at the Noel Wien Library appalled and dismayed with the state of American journalism. I’ve given his talk some time to sink in, and today, I’m not completely convinced with his argument, granted he had some good points.

Shurkin blamed the state of today’s journalism on “rampant capitalism.” He argued that Wall Street is undermining good newspapers and other news organizations, saying that by focusing on quarter profits, investors aren’t seeing the whole picture. He also blames monopolization. For example, Disney owns ABC News. Therefore, the executives at the top of the company probably aren’t as concerned with producing good news because they are largely separated from it. Reasons like these are linked to declines in journalism. Shurkin argued this by talking about permanent overseas correspondence. Africa, he says, only has one permanent American journalist stationed there. This reduces the quality of the news the public will be receiving from the region. Without good information, a good democratic system falls apart. And thus, Thomas Jefferson is spinning in his grave.

Is it quite that bad? Maybe. The part about one remaining permanent foreign correspondent in Africa is truly frightening. However, I detected a large amount of nostalgia in Shurkin’s talk. Technology advances and the infrastructure in which we receive information changes. I think that Shurkin understands this, but is unwilling to really latch onto it.

The vast amount of different ways we can get information today is astounding. Yes, perhaps the quality of newspapers and TV news isn’t quite what it used to be. But there are many different mediums to find information. The Internet has opened up doors to an incredibly vast amount of information. It’s just a matter of finding the right website. Over time, it seems like things will even out. I don’t ever think newspapers will die out, but they’ll probably get smaller and concentrate on longer stories that are harder for people to read on computer monitors.

I think that the growth of different news mediums is ultimately a good thing. However, I think more and more responsibility will be on individuals themselves rather than news organizations in finding good information. People need to seek information in several different mediums. In a sense, everybody needs to be their own journalist.

--Shawn Biessel