Investigative Journalism Being Reborn Through the Web? 265
Combating the stigma that investigative journalism is dead or dying, the Huffington Post has just launched a new venture to bankroll a group of investigative journalists to take a look into stories about the nation's economy. "The popular Web site is collaborating with The Atlantic Philanthropies and other donors to launch the Huffington Post Investigative Fund with an initial budget of $1.75 million. That should be enough for 10 staff journalists who will primarily coordinate stories with freelancers, said Arianna Huffington, co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post. Work that the journalists produce will be available for any publication or Web site to use at the same time it is posted on The Huffington Post, she said. The Huffington Post Web site is a collection of opinionated blog entries and breaking news. It has seven staff reporters. Huffington said she and the donors were concerned that layoffs at newspapers were hurting investigative journalism at a time the nation's institutions need to be watched closely. She hopes to draw from the ranks of laid-off journalists for the venture."
BS (Score:2, Interesting)
it's really in response to propublica.
http://propublica.org/ [propublica.org]
Why are all the newspapers surprised?? (Score:3, Interesting)
Welcome to the 21st century Huffington (and NY times, and Washington Post, et. al.) No bailout loans for those that refused to change until it was too late, or changed and couldn't figure out how to make money at it.
Re:Shattered Glass (Score:5, Interesting)
Stephen Glass wasn't busted for plagiarism, he was busted mostly for making up sources and facts.
:)
A contemporary of his at TNR, Ruth Shalit, was busted (& fired) for plagiarism and factual errors.
Under Peretz (the Editor-in-Chief of TNR), TNR has lost a ton of respect in journalistic circles.
There have been more recent issues with TNR, (google Spiegel, Ackerman, or Beauchamp and The New Republic for details)... lots of factual problems and insufficient editorial oversight.
At any rate, you're correct about investigative journalism on the web... I just find it interesting that the examples you cite (sans wikileaks) deal with 'disproving' traditional print media investigative journalism. I find the web to be a great source for debunking falsehoods, but not as good for primary material... maybe I'm looking in the wrong places
Re:Investigative? (Score:1, Interesting)
Content Theft (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Investigative? (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't see why this is flamebait. At all.
Look at pretty much any "bias" ranking thing, even skewz.com [skewz.com].
Or, just visit the site for yourself. Let's see. Headlines show bias pretty quickly...
"Obamas Are Personally Paying For White House Renovations"
Just what I needed to read about. One of those very important things. Up there with the White House garden.
"WATCH Weekend Late Night Round-Up: Sarah Palin, Obama's Rabid Questioner, And Octomom"
They are STILL talking about Palin. And apparently, Obama's questioner has problems.
"WATCH: Steele Discusses Hard-Partying Past, Getting Kicked Out Of College"
Definitely one of those big news items. I wonder what would happen if Fox News started reporting on Biden's college years? Incidentally, I'm conservative and I don't even really like Steele... but something is fishy. I don't see any democratic leader stories on here...
"Lawyer Peddling Alleged Biden Daughter Cocaine Tape Withdraws"
It's a good thing he withdrew, I suppose? If he has a real tape, what's the problem with him "selling" it and if it's not a real tape, then it's obviously not going to be Ashley Biden, so what's the big deal? Seems it'd be better to just get the tape and see if it's real or not? Oh, but family members should be off limits. Like Huffington Post left Palin's daughter alone. [huffingtonpost.com] (they even covered the daughter/boyfriend breakup.)
"Obama Calls For Global Unity In FT Interview"
Well good for him. He does a lot of calling. It'd be nice to see HP criticize Obama at least ONCE somewhere. I don't think anyone but the most deluded think that Obama has actually made no mistakes and has acted perfectly since he's been in office, do they?
They even call out a Republican and only a republican on some stupid remark during a Senate debate. Strangely enough, a search for a flat out mistake (or something) by Pelosi, the house speaker, of saying "500 million" American jobs were lost every month yielded no results on HP except in user comments.
Yeah, sounds "reality biased" to me...
Re:Investigative? (Score:5, Interesting)
Seems to me this new investment directly addresses your problem with them. Hiring investigative reporters is the best way to become more fact-based.
That depends on what they choose to investigate and the angle they take. They might take the angle that the Bush twins are party-girl lushes and with a straight face, claim that Biden's daughter "has an addiction problem" with cocaine.
OK, here's a better example: Did the recession start under Bush's watch or did it start when Democrats took over congress? Both are true. How do you report it? Looking at Huff-Po's record of distortion and hatred, I don't have high hopes for honest, non-biased reporting.
Re:Journalists protection (Score:1, Interesting)
http://secure.wikileaks.org/wiki/Wikileaks:Feed-all, how about that money goes to wikileaks...
Re:disconnect. reconnect. abort, retry, ignore. (Score:4, Interesting)
Having worked in the graphic design industry for at least 10 years now I have to point out that you're quite mistaken about the state of the industry.
I happened to enter the industry after computers were fully embraced by the industry but just as the internet was starting to take off. What I've found is that the perception towards graphic design has changed, but the reality of the work itself has not.
Because people have access to desktop publishing applications there has a tendency for design to be trivialized. It's all well and good for simplistic newsletters, but what I've often encountered is that once these people start trying to put something together they find themselves overwhelmed. Design wasn't about having the mechanical skills to produce a layout; it's about working with a variety of resources and using creativity, improvisation and strategy to produce work that meets particular requirements. It's common to have people look at design and claim they could do it themselves. But try doing so without copying.
As for the nature of freelancing in design, you'd be shocked by how many design companies exist out there. If anything, I think the market is over-saturated, but the fact is that the work is there. There aren't a lot of freelancers in this profession not because of a particular challenge facing the industry. There are so many of them out there because it's so competitive a market. And a lot of design companies have adopted the approach of primarily hiring freelancers because it's cost effective. It's because design has been commoditized. A lot of the same business idiots who keep outsourcing work think they can get everything on the cheap. They'd outsource design if they could, but it's almost impossible to get someone overseas to produce the kind of design work companies here need.
This brings me back to journalism and this attitude that anyone can produce this work and be good at it. There's this talk about how blogging is changing things. It is, but is it doing so in a good way? Nearly all blogs are little more than a news aggregate. All they provide in the way of content is commenting and maybe some editorializing.
This brings me to another issue. At least traditional news agencies have the pretense of being unbiased. Blogs are almost always dripping with bias and are generally unfriendly to dissenting views. Slashdot's format is better than most, but even here certain viewpoints have a tendency to be modded down. I have no problem with this, whatsoever, if it's clear the blog is more of a personal editorial. But I do have a problem when they try to pass themselves off as being impartial.
Another problem is that people want everything spoon-fed in bite-sized doses. How many people actually read full articles and don't just read sensationalist headlines and maybe skim over the summary. Blogs encourage this model.
Well, I could go on with the problems I see. And despite this I do think that the internet has real value and will probably bring about positive change. The problems I describe are probably symptoms of American media in general, but from what I've seeing the web isn't really helping.
Re:disconnect. reconnect. abort, retry, ignore. (Score:3, Interesting)
whoa. whoa boy. A lot of good points, but you are mistaken about the level of self-employment. Read this [bls.gov]. They quote 25%. I know the amount of freelance work done is more -- even graphic designers who have a permanent position do it on the side. It's just the lifestyle we have. As to market saturation, i don't know where you live, but here in Minneapolis/St. Paul, all my contacts say we have more candidates than positions right now. And I know how many design companies are out there. I also know a lot of them are sole proprietorships with less than 25 employees -- it's freelancing "plus"... Everyone has a graphic design "business" on the side. Few of them are making much money.
I agree that Joe Average can churn out a simple newsletter and do simple layouts. Which is all a lot of people need. But running a marketing campaign, or designing an art catalog, submitting to a magazine -- they wouldn't know a bleed margin from a x-line, or Helvetica from Century Schoolbook. :) Absolutely there's a need, but for small projects that publish directly to the web or a small circulation they can print at Kinkos? Not so much.
There's this talk about how blogging is changing things. It is, but is it doing so in a good way? Nearly all blogs are little more than a news aggregate. All they provide in the way of content is commenting and maybe some editorializing.
I didn't say it would be an improvement. Frankly, the quality of news in general has gone down in recent years. Few people have time to do fact-checking and research and a lot of embarassments have happened in recent times. Blogging only lowers the professional responsibility to uphold journalistic integrity another notch. And as to bias, you're right again! But most people don't want unbiased news. Witness the Fox News Network, or the Rush Limbaugh Show, or Larry King... dear god, it's horrible out there. But people are buying it.
Another problem is that people want everything spoon-fed in bite-sized doses. How many people actually read full articles and don't just read sensationalist headlines and maybe skim over the summary.
There's more information on a soup label today than most people's knowledge of the world a hundred years ago was. We are swimming in information; When you're faced with so much data, you're going to skim, look for key phrases, and try to "surf" it rather than "absorb" it. That's just human nature. The media needs to adapt to this, because most people can't read 500 WPM at post-doctorate level like most of us can. The average reading comprehension is 5th grade, and you're lucky if they have ever read a book cover to cover in their life. That's why people still spend so much time watching TV instead of the internet -- they can't type as fast and they can't read as fast. The average person can listen to a conversation (about 200-300WPM) faster than they can read. So any news publication will need to adapt to that reality, not the other way around.
despite this I do think that the internet has real value and will probably bring about positive change. The problems I describe are probably symptoms of American media in general, but from what I've seeing the web isn't really helping.
The problem is not limited to "american media". We're just ahead of the curve.