Could Tribune employees soon be working for the Koch Bros?

What does that mean, genius? Am I suppose to stick my head in the sand and pretend everything is hunky-dory?

I understand how this business works. Something you have no fucking clue about.

When you find anything you know something about, then feel free to be critical of it.

 

I know someone who would rather wallow in pity and bitch than try to make something better.

Newspapers have always sucked and they are not going to get any better, but you chose to place your life's work in them? Great outlook. Enjoy.

 

Look, there are a number of smart, thoughtful non-journalists on this site. You, however, are not among them.

I have defended non-journalists plenty of times, so I have no problem when they express their opinions about the industry. But you're not expressing an opinion. You are TELLING people in the industry how it used to work, how it currently works and how it will work. And, as usual, what you are saying has no basis in reality.

Finally, no one ever said anything on this thread about how newspapers have always sucked. The adults are discussing the history of how news has been presented. It has ALWAYS been presented with bias to varying degrees. It used to be much, much worse than it is now. But it's never been objective. The ideal of the objective news organization is a myth. Hell, the ideal of the objective man is a myth.

I have sat in countless budget meetings at numerous papers in multiple regions of the country. The end result is that news is slanted by everyone that touches it -- editors, writers, copy editors, designers. Everyone. News is not produced and presented in a vacuum. It never has been and it never will be.

But feel free to hold your breath.

 

Fox and MSNBC are not real news. I said people would tire of this and go back to real reporting, or the real stuff, again.

You said that never existed.

And of course there is bias to some degree. People a human, there will always be some small margin of it, but to embrace it shits upon the entire industry, and this is what FOX and MSNBC does. And at some point they will go away or get pushed to the back.

 

Pick up my mic, bitch!

 

You ever wonder why you have worked at so many different papers?

 

A couple of the papers I worked at multiple times, which means I'm fucking awesome. The newspaper business affords plenty of job-hopping, and I took advantage of it, especially when younger and single. I suppose if I was too scared to learn new things and seek out challenges, I would still be at the first paper I ever worked at -- a small hometown daily. But I've done pretty much every job you can do in a newsroom, and people keep wanting to hire me. It's a good feeling. PM me and I'll be happy to explain it.

 

OK, YGB, that's on two threads now you've mentioned the mic dropping thing. That's a secret desire of yours, isn't it? Just to literally serve somebody up a can of shut-the-fuck-up and then drop a mic before you walk away. You can see yourself doing it in your head right now, can't you?

 

Oh, yeah.

 

Trends aren't fads because you decide they are fads. And the old days weren't better than today because you were too stupid to realize how shitty they were then.

And very nice work on the personal insult that really showed how little you know about this industry. Moving from job to job more often than not means a person develops a reputation for being good.

Keep on keeping on, though. What we need is more people voicing thoughtless opinions.

 

I could not disagree more. The trend has been worsening, not improving. Bias has gotten brazen and embraced as an alleged competitive advantage at many outlets, something that rarely happened over the second half of the 20th century. That alone has increased the overall quantity. Also, more "pundits" and columnists and analysts now vs. traditional reporters, crowding out pursuit of (yes, it's elusive) objectivity.

And just because it's acknowledged doesn't make it any less problematic. Obvious difference in levels of scrutiny and tone deployed in covering WH 2000-2008 vs. 2009-2013. Reporting vs. repeating, at network and major metro levels. I've had a good time in the toy department but I shake my head at the industry to which I've given so many years. It has earned its nosedive.

 

The paper I worked at in Trenton slanted right because the other paper in town slanted left. For the first few years I continued the editorial page "rule" of Republican words and cartoons.

At some point I realized how stupid the notion of being a "Republican paper" was. Why was I giving one slant over another? Because the other paper leaned Democrat? Why was I giving *any* slant? On top of which our political columnist lost his fastball and curve, so I played off his anti-Obama mush by filling the second op-ed space beneath the cartoon with a national Dem opinion. Many days I chose a GOP-bashing cartoon.

Did it "even" things out? Who knows. But I never heard a peep from the overlords.