Re-Thinking Objectivity Reaction

The word objectivity has been beaten into all our heads for so many years now, that it almost seems like we "have" to believe it. It's not that I don't believe in objectivity, well, actually let's stop there. One persons reality is another persons fantasy. Some people see the glass half-full, while others see the glass half-empty. Objectivity is one of those words that people like to throw around to describe things the way they ought to be. A lot of things SHOULD be a certain way, but aren't. Look at the MLB. Should there be zero steroids in the game, sure, but will it ever happen, almost certainly not. Just because things should be one way, doesn't mean that they will or can be that way.

I don't want to sound like I am knocking on objectivity, but the better point raised in the reading has to do with the idea that journalist can't go investigate something and report back what they have found without having official, on the record sources. Why is this? People thing that just because you are a reporter, that you shouldn't have an opinion? If this is the case, then people in this country need to wake up. EVERYONE has an opinion on everything, and not matter how hard they try and how much they hide it, it comes through in one way or another.

If a journalist finds out that something is wrong or corrupt, they should be able to report that without the fear of not having 10 on-the-record sources to corroborate their evidence. Reporting is reporting, it's not copying, it's not listening, it's the act of taking off your blinders to the world and investigating what is wrong and right. If that means giving you opinion, then that's the way I want my news.

PBS Video Reaction

I left class on Thursday with a little bit of indecision on the whole topic about blogging and the future of how the news is reported online. Even though the video was made relatively recently, a lot of the information that was presented to us was old news. With the way the internet has been moving forward with such speed, videos like the on we saw are most of the time meaningless because the information they present is either old or the younger generation of students has already heard of it. In now way am I trying to say the video was useless, but I think a lot of the points touched on in the video have already been resolved in the industry. Bloggers are getting press credentials and we have seen blogs become even more important in the whole scheme of reporting the news.

I think that citizen journalism is extremely important to the spectrum of news because it keeps journalist on their feet. They are not able to cover everything they want or need to, so having citizens cover these issues is a good thing. People finding out the news is more important than making sure the people reporting it are true journalist. What is a "real" journalist. I always have had a hard time defining the word because I don't feel that you need a B.A. with the words "Journalism" on it for people to consider you a journalist. I have done investigative work for school that is most certainly journalism, but I have no graduated yet.

The way the internet has evolved over the last month, year, and years has made covering the news more in depth, more niche and much more video and audio driven...all of these things are good in my opinion. The more people who can report what they see on a daily basis, the more accurate or informed the public can become.

Agenda Setting Reaction

There is no question in my mind that agenda setting happens on a daily basis. However, I think that the idea is a little blown out of proportion because news channels do not have an endless amount of time to give the news to the viewers. There is no doubt that some stories get left out of the news segment because they are considered less interesting than others, but that is what the producer is supposed to decide. I understand that TV news has a tremendous roll on what people think about on a daily basis, but I don’t buy the idea that every single news program in the country thinks about their programming that intensely. There just isn’t enough time in the day to produce a news program that persuades and informs people with every story that you tell. Media outlets are looking for more eyeballs so they can pull in more advertising money, and if this means they show every single high-speed chase, well, I can’t really blame them. Different people have a different idea of what is important in the world. To me, it’s not so much agenda setting as it is a differing opinion on what is important in the world.

A Year In News Reaction

The article spends a good portion of time talking about the major stories that were covered by traditional news outlets, and how there is less variety than before. In class on Tuesday we talked about how newspapers are going to become a niche publication that will only be available to the wealthy in the coming years. While this might not happen economically with TV or radio, I still think that all media outlets are becoming niche in one way or another. People who want to read about foreign relations with certain countries can go to different publications to read in-depth coverage. The nightly news can’t cover everything that Americas wants to hear, but they know what most of their viewers want to see. Nightly news is a niche just like anything else. Even though you might not be able to classify it as a political news outlet or a business outlet, they cover the same sort of stories night in and night out. People know what they are going to get when they watch the nightly news, and that is why people continue to watch it. All media is becoming more niche because they have to be in order to stay alive. To say that certain aspects of journalism like newspapers and blogs are not becoming niche is just incorrect, because all outlets cater to a certain group of people in a way that no other outlet does.