Monday, November 10, 2008

PBS Frontline's "News War" -- The Future of Journalism?

See part three of PBS Frontline's "News War," entitled "What's Happening to the News," segments 16-25. The series examines the mounting pressure for profits faced by America's network news divisions and daily newspapers, as well as growing challenges from cable television and the Internet.

Network executives, newspaper editors and publishers, bloggers, Wall Street analysts and key players at Google and Yahoo! discuss the battle for market dominance in a rapidly changing world.

The primary challenge to both newspapers and broadcast networks is the growing power of the Internet as a news distribution platform, pulling consumers and advertisers away from more traditional media.

But Internet news providers like Yahoo! and Google say that they are not in the business of creating content, relying instead on traditional news-gathering organizations.

If not newspapers, who will create content for the Internet news aggregators? Bloggers? Self-appointed pundits? Anyone with Internet access and an opinion, informed or otherwise?

This is clearly no longer traditional "reporting." But is this journalism?

Read about it here. View it online here. And start praying for the soul of the Fourth Estate.

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