Study: Non-Traditional Media Attracting Eyeballs

According to the second annual State of the News Media report, blogs and other alternative sources are increasingly caputring eyeballs, USA Today reports. The study, conducted by The Project for Excellence in Journalism, was released today. Key quote...

"Blogs and 'so's your mother'-style talk shows are distorting news in America beyond what anyone could have imagined 10 years ago," (Joe Angotti, a former NBC News executive who now teaches journalism at Northwestern University) says. "The public is finding it more difficult than ever to distinguish between legitimate news and unverified drivel. The problem is that most news consumers don't realize that mainstream media reporters work within strict policies and guidelines that these other outlets don't require."

(via IWantMedia)

Comments

[Tom Hespos]

My God...That guy works for Northwestern? The same Northwestern that has a huge reputation for its journalism program? I fear for today's students.

"The public is finding it more difficult than ever to distinguish between legitimate news and unverified drivel."

Correction. The public is finding it more difficult than ever to get correct facts from so-called legitimate news sources. You're just as likely to find unverified drivel in the MSM as in most blogs.

"The problem is that most news consumers don't realize that mainstream media reporters work within strict policies and guidelines that these other outlets don't require."

Oh, you mean those strict policies and guidelines that allow for so-called journalists to fabricate entire stories while their editors rubber stamp them for publication with little or no fact checking? Or perhaps the policies and guidelines that let the news media run government-produced propaganda segments as news? Maybe he's talking about those established guidelines that allow for consolidating media ownership into a handful of conglomerates, so as to homogenize opinion and make it a business imperative to appeal to the lowest common denominator? So many rules and guidelines that apply to the MSM but not to blogs...I'm not sure which ones he's referring to.