For Whom The Bell Tolls

Funeral Bell: Photo by Steven Stokan

As mentioned yesterday, journalism is now one big communal discussion; and there's no standard bar to measure the quality of information suffusing itself through amateur or journalistic outlets nationwide and abroad (even my own writings here). It's led to a lackdaisical attitude and general indifference towards the quality of writing and stories, and now we're addicted to sensational news and getting it at breakneck speed. It's all taken for granted.

Here we are: quotes from The New York Observer, "The story burns more intensely and then it burns out more quickly,” said Jonathan Alter, the Newsweek writer, musing about the life cycle of pieces. “And there’s so much information and so much political coverage that it’s easy for good stories to be lost entirely in that register.”

“Very few of these stories have a long finish,” said Michael Duffy, the nation editor for Time. “The gong dissipates quickly.”

“My instinct is that there is such cacophony of commentary that it does sometimes drown out ideas from good and deeply reported journalism,” said Marcus Brauchli, the executive editor of The Washington Post.

“In the Internet age, the cycle is constant and people don’t really have time to reflect all day on a single story in the newspaper,” he added. “And it’s more difficult to set the agenda for very long.”

Our 'Hobbesian State'...