Michael Massing’s essay in the current New York Review of Books is worth reading. In The End of News? Massey discusses some of the challenges of news organisations, how those in control of news organisations are reacting, their role in the politics of the day and the devastating impact of cost cutting. Part two, yet to be published, is to look at “how the press will respond”.
The publication of this essay is timely given the cost cutting at Fairfax announced recently. Massing’s work warrants robust discussion and even debate among journalists, editors, publishers and news consumers.
This second last paragraph from the essay could easily be written in Australia and about the Australian situationâ€
If the newspaper industry continues to shrink in response to the unrealistic expectations of Wall Street, the loss would be incalculable. The major metropolitan dailies, for all their faults, are the main collectors and distributors of news in America. The TV networks, to the extent they still offer serious hard news coverage, get many of their story ideas from papers such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The Boston Globe, and The Christian Science Monitor. Even the bloggers who so hate the “mainstream media” get much of their raw material from it. If the leading newspapers lose their capacity to report and conduct inquiries, the American public will become even more susceptible to the manipulations and deceptions of those in power.
This is a long yet thoroughly compelling essay.