FOURTH ESTATE’S “SHRINKAGE” IS ONGOING …
The decline of the mainstream media is something this website has followed with interest over the last few years. We’ve also followed how “news” has really become … well, something else.
It’s unfortunate.
The press (especially here in South Carolina) has become a subservient regurgitation platform at best – an apologist/ advocate for the status quo at worst.
One thing it’s not? And hasn’t been for a long time? An investigator of corruption or defender of the public’s interests.
And guess what: The already gutted investigative capability of the MSM is about to be diminished even further.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) latest “occupational outlook handbook,” there will be a 13 percent decline in “reporters, correspondents and broadcast news analysts” over the next seven years.
That equates to more than 7,000 lost media jobs … and the vast majority of them fall into the “reporters and correspondents” category.
What gives?
“Declining advertising revenue in radio, newspapers, and TV will negatively affect the employment growth for these occupations,” the report stated.
Ongoing consolidation of media will also play a role.
“News organizations also continue to consolidate and increasingly share resources, staff, and content with other media outlets,” the report added. “Reporters are able to gather and report on news for multiple media stations owned by the same corporation, while television stations reuse news and material already gathered by other stations and reporters.”
In other words the great proliferation of media is now folding back in on itself ….
“Think reporting is crappy now?” one of our readers noted. “Just watch as media continues to consolidate, and the emphasis continues to slide toward entertaining over informing the public.”
Indeed …
America needs an aggressive, independent Fourth Estate that’s not afraid to hold government at all levels accountable. Desperately. What we have instead is an increasingly centralized purveyor of special interest-approved pablum – which delves into real “news” only when it serves to stoke surface divisions and foment needles discord.
Think our government is in trouble?
It is … but so is the industry that’s supposed to be holding it in check.
18 comments
Don”t worry. The Kardashians will save us.
Hey, don’t make fun of our subscribership being small, we just got out of a cold shower!
Us some hot water and the fumigate yourselves…you’re even more filthy now, than before…
Think Rupert Murdock.
Start with the assumption that their business is “to report the news,” not “change the world.”
The Journalism schools of colleges and universities, for the last few decades, have been cranking out graduates with a desire to report the news through the prism of their perceived injustices in the socio/economic realm. I am not saying that a news person should not have personal views in these areas, just don’t let your personal prejudices taint your objectivity in reporting.
Also, as indicated in the article, news organizations have become slaves to the status quo. News outlets become slaves to business and political leaders at the local, state, and national level to enhance the possibility of getting first crack at breaking news. News people will have to have an apolitical attitude about news stories, even if it does not coincide with personal beliefs.
The news business has changed over the last few years and will continue to change. I hope it is for the good, a little bit of objectivity would help.
— good thinking
OK, wife had a good one last night. Guy calls the cops, and the 9/11 dispatch answers. “9-1-1, what’s your emergency.” “Help, send over a squad car right away. There are two women fighting over me.” “Sir, how is that a problem.” The anxious and distraught caller replies, “The ugly one is winning.”
HOWLING..!! This one added to my permanent files…. thanks
A blind man tells a stranger how bad things are. He hasn’t even sold one pencil and goes on. “I haven’t got a penny, I’m crippled, I’m blind, and I have eighteen kids at home.”
The stranger asks, “How did you end up with eighteen kids?”
“I’m blind! Can I see what I’m doing?”
?
“An investigator of corruption or defender of the public’s interests”….
No, not the media…but the Speedo Clad due of Caper-Staplers known as Boz and FITS…claiming bogus affairs, “Vacated” CWS games, and losing the The Sun News $600,000-plus for liable-ing a man for being Republican…
You show em guys…you’re the NEW (EVERYBODY’S GUILTY but Us) media…LMAO….
Your blog died quicker than your brain cells did.
+10
I’m turning in my Speedos. Will still has the age advantage, there, and well, dammit, I do realize it’s not a good look for me.
Is Fits going to cover the farcical “penalties” handed down to Danny Frazier, Jason Amodio, and one other member of the Lexington Ring, today?
Yet colleges and universities are still willing to take unlimited numbers of government backed student loans from tens of thousands of gullible students dreaming they’ll be the next Brian Williams.
Yeah they are not reporting the gotdamn traffic mess in Columbia and how Haley and Hugh Leatherman are ignoring the situation because its not their voter base.
All the state press Corp does is play gotcha. They take info from the corrupt “big dogs” and use it to hit some harmless elected official with something that does not amount to a hill of beans. Gotcha, they say.
They call it investigative journalism. I call it tattle telling.
There is real corruption in government. Go find it.
I thought that FITS advocated a free market. If the sheeple prefer to watch trash instead of truth, what business is that of yours?