I endorse almost everything you have written here.

There were two spots I found myself groaning a little, and one where I thought you over-simplified.

Yes, Digital First is not the Holy Grail, but no one said it is, no one except writers making the obvious point that it isn’t. So I don’t see how it adds to your argument.

Similarly: who in this debate thinks a citizen journalism idyl is out there as a reasonable replacement for what is being destroyed? To me you’re talking to phantoms there, but if there are such arguments being made and some take them seriously when they shouldn’t, let’s hear about it.

The over-simplification was in this graph: “I believe quality news organizations should view the current taste for affirmation rather than information (aka Fox versus MSNBC) as a premier challenge. Rather than passively accepting the ugly fact that too many citizens are enamored of this kind of affirmation, responsible news organizations need to contrast and compare their performance.”

There are several problems with this. It’s convenient, it feels good, and it makes argument easier to claim otherwise, but I do not think Fox and MSNBC are the same, journalistically, even though the temptation is to see them as matching twins and there are many aspects of their performance that confirms it.

This for example would be unthinkable at MSNBC, but it is routine for Fox and its leadership.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/post/roger-ailes-attests-to-fox-newss-factual-perfection/2012/04/13/gIQAQSi6ET_blog.html

But more than that: “people want to hear news that confirms what they already believe” is just way too pat an attitude to take toward this issue. You have to also look at the fact that viewlessness and “balance” and “leave it there” journalism have failed, and their failure expands as the partisan divide grows.

David Gregory avoids the sins of Fox and MSNBC; he is also helpless, hopeless and completely at sea in interviewing, say, Ed Gillespie and David Axelrod, which he does routinely. I think the failure of that ritual and the “quote both sides and leave it there” model, such as the AP still uses, deserve more of your attention.

But…. These are small objections. Overall, I think your observations are accurate, shrewd, insightful, supple and even at times courageous in the way they depart from what many in your peer group tend to believe about the present moment. I appreciated especially the moments of blunt talk.

Thanks for an important and remarkably complete assessment of where we are now. Cheers, Tim.

Media organisations in the UK tend to hire young people so they can capitalise on their enthusiasm and keep rates down. Even in specialist fields like subediting (copyediting in US), the rates are the same as 10 years ago if not worse.

No wonder many journalists turn to PR, marketing and the corporate world, where writing skills are rewarded and there is still some respect for quality standards.