Journalism in the crapper

Following up on comments made on my earlier post about journalists and cutthroats, here's an op-ed from Tuesday's Christian Science Monitor.

It is entitled "Why journalists deserve low pay." It was written by one Robert G. Picard, a professor of media economics in Sweden and a visiting fellow at Oxford.

I held back on posting it because ... well, because I didn't want to step on anyone's toes. But now the way is clear, I think, so here goes.

Journalists like to think of their work in moral or even sacred terms. With each new layoff or paper closing, they tell themselves that no business model could adequately compensate the holy work of enriching democratic society, speaking truth to power, and comforting the afflicted.

Actually, journalists deserve low pay.

Wages are compensation for value creation. And journalists simply aren't creating much value these days.

Until they come to grips with that issue, no amount of blogging, twittering, or micropayments is going to solve their failing business models.

That's the beginning of the piece. This is the end:

Finding the rights means to create and protect value will require collaboration throughout news enterprises. It is not something that journalists can leave to management. Journalists and managers alike will need to develop collaboration skills and create social relations that make it possible. Journalists will also need to acquire entrepreneurial and innovation skills that makes it possible for them to lead change rather than merely respond to it.

The demise of the news business can be halted, but only if journalists commit to creating value for consumers and become more involved in setting the course of their companies.

Along the way, Picard says something I've been saying: people are tired of the same-old standardized style of reporting. Well, he doesn't say people are tired of it, he says it doesn't work anymore.

We can all see that for ourselves.

I look at old newspapers - ones from the early 20th century - and I see that the style back then was much more "homey" and included rich details and descriptive devices that are no longer in practice.

Perhaps because I did not go to journalism school, I am somewhat enriched in that it is a real struggle for me to strip down a news story to its bare bones.

For example, what are the implications of Mayor Moak seeking a job in another community? What effect would it have?

It's fine for a newspaper, or several newspapers, to quote someone saying the implications are far-reaching, but what are the implications?

How do people in Ward 3 feel about perhaps losing their ward councillor if all this goes down and City Council President James Shanley becomes mayor?

And why isn't this situation addressed in the city charter? The charter review people are short on signatures. Wow, this is one good case for charter review.

Perhaps the City Council should not elect Shanley but rather go for an At-Large person, like they did when Lisa Mead left.

Why is it up to us bloggers to try and analyze this?

But the fact is, we do. And therein lies the problem facing newspapers.

Get the news, report it in a timely fashion and most important, get it on line as quickly as possible. That's where people are looking for their news now.

That story, the one from the CSM? I got it off a Facebook status update. I don't have the time to surf the Net for relevant stories; I have to make money.

All that being said, I think Picard ignores one basic fact: you get what you pay for. Maybe journalists are tired of busting their hump for pennies.