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The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

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Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#191

Post by spopejoy »

ForrestN wrote: post #178
spopejoy wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're railing too much on the "obvious victor" point, which the OP didn't even say. In fact, given your statement "Longtime establishment Democrat operatives acting on behalf of a longtime establishment Democrat against a non-Democrat", you've established the collusion yourself. The press part is their long-standing and equally unsavory relationship with the [DR]NCs to begin with. Indeed, the burden is on yo…

Again, I'm responding to this statement: "the corporate media [...] colluded to stop a once in a lifetime opportunity in Bernie Sanders to help their friend and collaborator Hillary Clinton, and so we ended up with Donald Trump." The fact that career democrats feel strongly about the outcome of a democratic primary is not a corporate media conspiracy. Should there be reforms to the Democrats' primary process? Yes. Is…

But you don't challenge the central point. Just because major media collusion with [DR]NC is normal doesn't make it any less galling. In fact the only reason there is any complaint this time around is precisely because Bernie's candidacy was so unexpectedly strong. When Howard Dean was demolished (DNC-orchestrated with the full participation of the press) there wasn't nearly the backlash as he was just getting started.

With that point standing, the statement is opinionated but hardly tinfoil-hat. Hillary and the DNC are definitely due for a great deal of blame for our current disaster -- if they had lifted a finger to accomodate the Bernie side -- make him VP maybe, or pick someone less nasty than freaking KAINE -- they might have been able to pick up on his momentum a little. Would Bernie have beat Trump, or even won without the DNC collusion? I don't know -- but you don't either.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#192

Post by fmoralesc »

mistermann wrote: post #188
fmoralesc wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope to clear this up. If I understood him correctly, he's saying that I was claiming that if we agreed on facts (if facts were settled, as it were), we would agree in opinions, which is clearly false as a matter of fact. My claim is that we should agree in opinions, if facts were settled. I think difference between would / should is significant here. I am saying: if facts were settled, and we had a disagreement, a…

It's a largely philosophical question so not surprising that it's difficult to go about. At least for me, I am coming from the angle that some things are a matter of fact, and some are a matter of opinion. For example, everyone can be fully informed on economics, but on the matter of "how much should a waiter be paid in New York City", there is no "right" answer. That might very well be not what the disagreement was…

Yes, I understand that. The issue is that not all disagreements are about what you call "matters of opinion" (and thus faultless [1]). (And even when they are, one can give an approximate answer that filters out a bunch of alternative opinions on the matter: for example, it seems like a waiter in NYC should not be paid less than a certain a amount, let's say, the average it takes for someone in NYC in the person's social strata to pay rent and be able to eat and go to work each day). The issue really comes up when one takes all disagreements to take this form, which is, I think, what this thread was initially about (then the GGP asked why we should care about the facts at all).

[1]: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4545405

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#193

Post by DanielBMarkham »

hxta98596 wrote: post #181
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #101

We as an industry have kicked around "how to save journalism" for years now. Here's what I've got: If you want journalism, sponsor endowments for journalists to report in certain areas, like foreign policy or local government. At the same time, and critically, sponsor endowments for editors to put a tight reign on these journalists. Completely decouple good journalism for hunting-for-eyeballs. Then let the content cu…

For the most part I agree. Some version of this has been discussed for years: basically a non-profit, non-commercial, bipartisan, transparent, independent, professional journalism organization(s) using an endowment or donation-based funding model seems to be one of the best options at the moment. The cynics and trolls will attack the idea that it's impossible. Ignore them of course, it is possible but it will not be…

You know, baseball is quite the pastime in the US. Professional players make a lot of money and have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks. (Where they get their money is important, but let's ignore it for now)

But there are a ton of folks playing baseball for a small salary -- the minor leagues. There's also scads of folks playing baseball recreationally.

I don't see any reason professional news journalism couldn't be done in a similar way: more secure, rewarding jobs for those at the top of their fields paid for by a permanent endowment. A "middle league" that may only get internet like points or small payments for worth contributions. And tons of folks yukking it up on the sidelines doing the best they can and hoping one day to make it to the major leagues.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#194

Post by mistermann »

fmoralesc wrote: post #192
mistermann wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a largely philosophical question so not surprising that it's difficult to go about. At least for me, I am coming from the angle that some things are a matter of fact, and some are a matter of opinion. For example, everyone can be fully informed on economics, but on the matter of "how much should a waiter be paid in New York City", there is no "right" answer. That might very well be not what the disagreement was…

Yes, I understand that. The issue is that not all disagreements are about what you call "matters of opinion" (and thus faultless [1]). (And even when they are, one can give an approximate answer that filters out a bunch of alternative opinions on the matter: for example, it seems like a waiter in NYC should not be paid less than a certain a amount, let's say, the average it takes for someone in NYC in the person's so…

Ah, I wasn't aware there was some formal theories on this idea!

Along the same lines (maybe), I've always thought an improved way to approach disagreement (breaking down "matters of opinion) is to break things down into components to better discover discrete points of contention. When you have a unsolvable dispute, you've either reached a matter of opinion, or, the disputed topic has to be broken down further. I wonder if that's the approach the book takes?

I think this approach could be quite successful, assuming two reasonable people involved (a tall order nowadays perhaps).

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#195

Post by hxta98596 »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #193
hxta98596 wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the most part I agree. Some version of this has been discussed for years: basically a non-profit, non-commercial, bipartisan, transparent, independent, professional journalism organization(s) using an endowment or donation-based funding model seems to be one of the best options at the moment. The cynics and trolls will attack the idea that it's impossible. Ignore them of course, it is possible but it will not be…

You know, baseball is quite the pastime in the US. Professional players make a lot of money and have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks. (Where they get their money is important, but let's ignore it for now) But there are a ton of folks playing baseball for a small salary -- the minor leagues. There's also scads of folks playing baseball recreationally. I don't see any reason professional news journalism couldn…

I get what you're saying. Though I'm not sure baseball is the best example here as baseball is kind of broken right now. Look at the strikes, bargaining issues and communist cartel of baseball team owners needing to cooperate to keep it together, just barely.

Other industries have similar development programs like pro baseball's farm and minor leagues. But all these are getting difficult to maintain. Pro baseball teams supporting minor leagues isn't what it used to be and they have become harder to afford. Still I agree there are many lessons to take from what baseball does well and not so well.

I do agree a lesson from baseball is that the best in journalism should be highly paid for their work. Journalism needs to continue to attract and retain talented professionals who are compensated competitively. This is harder than it might sound though. Professional baseball players don't really have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks; rather players make a lot of money because of MLB television and media rights in the billions of dollars. Players play 162 games on television every season so TV commercials and expensive TV cable packages is what pays for baseball.

One big advantage if the endowment model can be pulled off and funded as a source for journalists income is it could in theory help minimize the corruption and pandering to advertisers at the higher levels of journalism too.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#196

Post by erikpukinskis »

oever wrote: post #183
dredmorbius wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I.F. Stone had a great deal to say on journalistic independence in a 1974 public television interview on "Day at Night". https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qV3gO3zxQ1g Small-town papers are beholden to small-town interests. Stone notes that the large-city and national dailies (NY Times, Washington Post, LA Times, possibly the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal at the itme) were freed of dependence on any one advertiser…

The last observation in that interview is still current. > The president, irrespective of who he is, today, is so powerful that the temptations of the office for good or evil are too great for any one man. I think we ought to begin to dismantle the office. I think we ought to have a head of state symbolizing the country around whom the natural feeling of patriotism and reverence accrue and separate him from the head…

This will happen naturally as small scale self e-gocernance takes on more and more responsibility. As the responsibilities of the state dry up, city, state, and federal government figures naturally become more figureheads. It will be a race to who has the best parades and funnest hats.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#197

Post by erikpukinskis »

snarf21 wrote: post #134
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #101

We as an industry have kicked around "how to save journalism" for years now. Here's what I've got: If you want journalism, sponsor endowments for journalists to report in certain areas, like foreign policy or local government. At the same time, and critically, sponsor endowments for editors to put a tight reign on these journalists. Completely decouple good journalism for hunting-for-eyeballs. Then let the content cu…

I agree with you but the unsolved problem is the "... and make some kind of business out of it, if they can". Netflix is $10 a month and look at all the value you get there. News will have to be half or (maybe much) less than that. Can you build a good news product on $1/month? I'm not sure you can. Additionally, how do you make people actually want the news? A sound bite or tweet or headline is super easy to digest…

> Can you build a good news product on $1/month?

Sure, find something 5000 people with a dollar go crazy for and then pay one person full time to investigate that stuff.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#198

Post by erikpukinskis »

ForrestN wrote: post #120

I recently saw a very astute analogy between Facebook and cigarette companies. I suspect that in some years there will be testimony about what Facebook knew, and when, with respect to the addictiveness of its product and its links to mental health problems. I'm quite sure they know how harmful their product is and that's probably behind a lot of this absurd "we're going to save the world" rhetoric. This whole fight e…

It'll never happen. It hasn't happened for casinos, and we've known about the health effects of those for a long time.

Smoking went big because of second hand smoking and because of family members in hospitals on ventilators. There's no equivalent for Facebook or Casinos. No acute trauma to stir the public indignation. Just quiet mental deaths stretched out over years.

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#199

Post by erikpukinskis »

DenisM wrote: post #33

Here's an interesting observation. Distributing information in its written form used to be the domain of the Church. Printing press has democratized that, for a while. Eventually the diversity of information was roped in to serve the agenda of the new, capitalist elites. While individual journalists often thrive to deliver the best work, the editors inevitably arrange things to serve the interests of particular busin…

The difference between the printing press and the internet is that you and me could make a whole new Internet happen with just two $70 handheld computing devices.

The printing press needed a newsroom with typists and ad salesmen and a team of people wrestling with an ink belching mechanical beast. The minimum corporate interest required to feed such a beast is substantially more than the Internet business, the physical plant of which costs pennies a day in overhead to maintain (i.e. your cell phone and a few gigs of bandwidth.)

Re: The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroying Journalism

#200

Post by DenisM »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #199
DenisM wrote: post #33

Here's an interesting observation. Distributing information in its written form used to be the domain of the Church. Printing press has democratized that, for a while. Eventually the diversity of information was roped in to serve the agenda of the new, capitalist elites. While individual journalists often thrive to deliver the best work, the editors inevitably arrange things to serve the interests of particular busin…

The difference between the printing press and the internet is that you and me could make a whole new Internet happen with just two $70 handheld computing devices. The printing press needed a newsroom with typists and ad salesmen and a team of people wrestling with an ink belching mechanical beast. The minimum corporate interest required to feed such a beast is substantially more than the Internet business, the physic…

Money still buys you a lot of upgrades to your $70 internet. Ad campaigns, talented copy writers, data scientist, psychologists, computing resources for data analysis, large training datasets, cross-channel promotion (e.g. internet + billboards), astroturfers, community management, marketing, focus groups.

The amateur hour will come to an end. Especially now that the presidential election campaign has shown us how it's done.

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