I'm Concerned

So I've been rereading Jeffrey Scheuer's "The Big Picture," (okay, truth be told I only read the first 60 pages fall semester when it was assigned reading, but I've held onto it knowing that when I had more leisure time I would read it). I've been reminded of some interesting points.

Scheuer talks about chief threats to indpendent journalism - profit and power. But then says the more serious threats are political and economic (Scheuer, 2008, p. 48).

If we rewind a bit Scheuer also discusses the fact that information is an economic good. This essentially means that information is subject to a market economy. Journalism is the transfer of information into context and understanding for the general public, thus journalsim is subject to a market economy (thus "the journalism industry").

But one of Scheuer's main ideas in his book is that democracy depends on quality journalism, and the quality of journalism that is produced within a state is indictative of the quality of democracy to be found in that state (Scheuer, 2008, p. 11).

If much of this rings as true to you as it did to me, then a state of grave conern must be encroaching upon your usually complacent state - maybe in the form heartburn, indigestestion, upset stomach or diarrhea (pink does more than you think) - because of what we see happening to journalism in its current forms. We see layoffs, we see cuts in content, we see all online news "papers," all in the name of money and profit. We see newsroom headhaunchos trying to use citizen journalists. Blogs are booming as replacement news sources and shows on comedy central become people's goto for hardhitting news.

One could argue that journalism quality is significantly decreasing. Does that mean so is the state of our democracy? How can we keep the quality while morphing into modern journalism? How do we swallow the bad taste of economically hard times and still provide citizens with "enough good information to make informed judgemdnts," (Scheuer, 2008, p. 25)?

Scheuer points out that not only do citizens need to be able to access good information, they need to understand the sources from which they are obtaining their info. How does that source reflect and explain and why? Do consumers of today's information understand from where they are getting their info? Does Joe Six-Pack's blog provide the same information as The Wall Street Journal? Does the average soccer mom understand the fundamental difference between the two?

All of this was just to say, I'm concerned.