(Above: step right up, for a dose of healing snake oil from Chairman Rupert, it'll fix the blogs that ails ya, with some right decent top notch free conversations, of an evolving kind, courtesy of Mark Day).
Lordy, lordy, poor Mark Day has finally slipped off the twig, veering from respected columnist and media commentator to hack spruiker and snake oil salesman for Chairman Rupert in the twinkling of an eye.
The Punch is edited by David Penberthy, who was formerly editor of Sydney’s Daily Telegraph. Penberthy has found his niche here: his site is full of ideas and he presents his opinions strongly and with a sense of humour. Some of what he writes appears in News Limited newspapers, including The Australian, but on the site you get the full scope of the opinions and twittering which has positioned The Punch as one for my favourites list.
Fairfax seems to have hedged its bets by integrating the NT site into its main newspaper masthead sites, which I think muddies its waters by making it, in effect, an offshoot of its newspaper opinion pages. But it is early days.
Lordy, lordy, poor Mark Day has finally slipped off the twig, veering from respected columnist and media commentator to hack spruiker and snake oil salesman for Chairman Rupert in the twinkling of an eye.
Chatty's in, daggy's out in changing news world, he chirps, seemingly having forgotten his righteous indignation a week ago at Crikey, and its constant commentary on the imminent death of newspapers, and the dazzling future of the web, not to mention his confected outrage at Chairman Rupert being accused of using his media clout to further his business interests.
This week?
The Punch was the first local site to try to create a format to meet the habits of that part of the audience that had forsaken the traditional and more formal methods of news delivery. It spins off the news: rather than reporting the fact that, say, Kevin Rudd has announced new carbon reduction targets, The Punch is likely to ask: is climate change ruining our sex lives? It’s a collection of opinions, sometimes straight, sometimes off the wall, and it is designed to encourage reader feedback and participation.
Sic transit Crikey and all the others that were in there years ago experimenting with web-based formats, written out of history with the flourish of a keyboard in a way worthy of an in-house historian dressing up Stalin's years at the top. The first local site? Oh give me brass balls and call me a cheese eating male monkey.
And eer, by the way, the question as to whether climate change is ruining our sex lives was a tragic attempt by David Penberthy to spice up a very dull piece, and after a few pars he abandoned the riff for other jokes about sex in a Prius - and since incestuous self-referentialism seems to be all the go in Murdoch rags these days, you can read our take on this in Loon Pond, and even get a link back to the original hideous Penbo piece, by going here.
But it seems Penbo is the golden haired boy for his bold taking of readers into the world of blogging, never mind that blogs were once disdained from a great height by the likes of Mark Day:
Sssh, it looks like a blog, is designed like a blog, and walks and talks and quacks like a blog. But don't call it a blog, call it a "site". So Day can have his pleasure thinking he's devouring quality journalism that just happens to also turn up on a "site" full of exciting twits and tweets.
Oh choke on my bilious bile, what a pity there's no law against advertorials on the intertubes. One of his favorites? Well he would say that, wouldn't he. Even if it shows a remarkable subservience in the house style these days adopted by members of the Murdoch empire, who constantly tout Chairman Rupert's products as the next best thing to snake oil as a cure all.
The Punch is essentially a wide-ranging, news-oriented blog. It has links to news stories but does not attempt to report the news except in passing. This reflects the way we “use” news - a part of a conversation may entice us to find out more by searching the subject.
By golly, it sounds like a marvel, a wonder for the ages, a veritable conversation piece of such exquisite quality even Oscar Wilde would be put to shame. What a pity there's no law against snake oil salesmanship on the intertubes.
But since we're on a roll, how does the National Times badge stack up at Fairfax stack up? Well of course integrity leads us all to tell the truth. It's based on a title that slipped into oblivion, and it doesn't seem up to the job:
Fairfax Media quickly recognised the potential of the “conversation” concept and announced plans to launch its own site under the banner of the defunct National Times, a much praised title that slipped into oblivion because of a lack of buyer support.
Fairfax seems to have hedged its bets by integrating the NT site into its main newspaper masthead sites, which I think muddies its waters by making it, in effect, an offshoot of its newspaper opinion pages. But it is early days.
Whereas the way the journos at News Corp do their bits for both the main titles and The Punch doesn't make it a spin off of a half-baked kind? No, no, no!
There's more from Day, about television programs and the way ahead, but I'll leave you to read it, because I felt sad at the sight of an old newspaperman diving under a bus - as if no one on the intertubes can remember what anyone's said further than a week back.
But how's this for a wrap-up?
I am not suggesting that a presenter like Kerry O’Brien on the 7.30 Report should hang up his hat as the country’s most formidable political interviewer and throw the switch to vaudeville. There’s still a role for serious reporting, but the challenge to current affairs producers is to see beyond the predictable and present it in a less tired and daggy way. Something more conversational, perhaps?
What, like The Punch, Australia's best conversation? Well we're all doomed. Roll on the day when Chairman Rupert decides to charge for Australia's wittiest conversation, so I can spend my time at other blogs, free and with a damn sight more wit thrown in as a free bonus (though who could match the chortling joy of reading Bronwyn Bishop. Hmm, maybe there's something to this freebie culture).
Not surprisingly, Day's own attempt at a conversation outraged the punters who could be bothered to muster sufficient indignation to post a comment. One even remembered John Hartigan's take on blogs and bloggers - in the days before they decided that News Corp needed a blog - but rather than re-hash that speech here, why not have a read of the send up it got at mumbrella under the header Hartigan: Journalism, not the limited intellectual value of blogs, is the future of the web.
Oops, sorry! That was the actual speech. I just read the bit about taking the news to advertisers that pumpkin soup was very big on Tuesdays and thought I was reading a satire.
So why not quote the esteemed Hartigan a little on the evils of blogging and of free:
Then there are the bloggers.
In return for their free content, we pretty much get what we’ve paid for - something of such limited intellectual value as to be barely discernible from massive ignorance ...
... Citizen journalists, he says, simply don’t have the resources to bring us reliable news. They lack not only expertise and training but access to decision makers and reliable sources.
The difference, he says, between professionals and amateurs is that bloggers don’t go to jail for their work – they simply aren’t held accountable like real reporters.
Like Keating’s famous “all tip and no iceberg”, it could be said that the blogosphere is all eyeballs and no insight.
How quickly the view changes. That was July 2009, and now News Corp runs a blog, where the content is free - either cobbled together in house, or accepted from politicians only too ready to fill up space with self-serving tosh, or ripped from aspiring wannabes willing to work for 'the man' for a byline in lieu of cash. It's called The Punch, Australia's most cheap-skate, half-assed conversation.
In return for their free content, we pretty much get what we’ve paid for - something of such limited intellectual value as to be barely discernible from massive ignorance ...
... Citizen journalists, he says, simply don’t have the resources to bring us reliable news. They lack not only expertise and training but access to decision makers and reliable sources.
The difference, he says, between professionals and amateurs is that bloggers don’t go to jail for their work – they simply aren’t held accountable like real reporters.
Like Keating’s famous “all tip and no iceberg”, it could be said that the blogosphere is all eyeballs and no insight.
How quickly the view changes. That was July 2009, and now News Corp runs a blog, where the content is free - either cobbled together in house, or accepted from politicians only too ready to fill up space with self-serving tosh, or ripped from aspiring wannabes willing to work for 'the man' for a byline in lieu of cash. It's called The Punch, Australia's most cheap-skate, half-assed conversation.
And boy do we get what we paid for.
As Robert Thomsen of The Wall Street Journal says: “the blogs and comment sites are basically editorial echo chambers rather than centres of creation, and their cynicism about so-called traditional media is only matched by their opportunism in exploiting it”
One of the best known comment sites in Australia matches this identikit.
It started as a moralising soapbox; boasting about its lack of standards. Positioned as an underdog, it lectures mainstream media every day.
In the blogosphere, of course, the mainstream media is always found wanting.
It really is time this myth was blown apart.
Blogs and a large number of comment sites specialise in political extremism and personal vilification.
Radical sweeping statements unsubstantiated with evidence are common.
One Australian blogger who shoots first and checks facts later is proud to boast that his site is “Not wrong for long”.
Mainstream media understands, most of the time, that comment and opinion is legitimised by evidence.
Opinions, however strongly held, draw their legitimacy from the factual accuracy that underpins them.
Many of these sites and bloggers say their radical new approach is a modern form of participatory democracy.
But as Andrew Keen says, amateur journalism trivialises and corrupts serious debate – it degenerates democracy into mob rule and rumour milling.
Of course, Day couldn't own up to the truth of The Punch. Here's his dissembling response after a question in relation to payment of contributors:
One of the best known comment sites in Australia matches this identikit.
It started as a moralising soapbox; boasting about its lack of standards. Positioned as an underdog, it lectures mainstream media every day.
In the blogosphere, of course, the mainstream media is always found wanting.
It really is time this myth was blown apart.
Blogs and a large number of comment sites specialise in political extremism and personal vilification.
Radical sweeping statements unsubstantiated with evidence are common.
One Australian blogger who shoots first and checks facts later is proud to boast that his site is “Not wrong for long”.
Mainstream media understands, most of the time, that comment and opinion is legitimised by evidence.
Opinions, however strongly held, draw their legitimacy from the factual accuracy that underpins them.
Many of these sites and bloggers say their radical new approach is a modern form of participatory democracy.
But as Andrew Keen says, amateur journalism trivialises and corrupts serious debate – it degenerates democracy into mob rule and rumour milling.
Of course, Day couldn't own up to the truth of The Punch. Here's his dissembling response after a question in relation to payment of contributors:
I can’t answer with certainty. Mary because I don’t know how Fairfax structures its pay, but both The Punch and National Times draw on staffers and outsiders for their opinion pieces. I presume the staffers get their salaries and writing for the sites is part of their job, while the outsiders do it for love. I think that’s how The Punch works, but again. I’m not certain.
Oh come on Mark Day, you know the game, you know how it works. 'Fess up.
Do it for love? So it's all about eyeballs and no insight, and show us the luuuve?
Well if you do go over to read poor hapless spinning like a top Mark Day, make sure you read the comments. You'll get more insight and less dissembling there than you'll find in Day's column. Here's one punter's thoughts, under the avatar Epiphany:
Sorry Mark, but what are you telling me here that is not blindingly obvious and a blatant ad for The Punch?
What has actually happened is profound and at the core of the problems traditional media is now experiencing.
Your newspaper sites, in common with other news sites worldwide, have been magnets for reader comments for years.
The Daily Telegraph site was receiving more than 30,000 comments a month as long as four years ago.
Readers were telling you loud and clear they wanted to be a part of the news cycle, but they were ignored.
The overdue arrival of The Punch means you will now own a small bit of that conversation, but the masses have moved on.
They are at Facebook, on Twitter and blogging on a wide array of other sites, where they are discussing your news.
And more than a few of them are making good money out of it too - dollars they are taking from you.
The simple fact is, you failed to listen to your audience when they needed to, and they moved on.
What has actually happened is profound and at the core of the problems traditional media is now experiencing.
Your newspaper sites, in common with other news sites worldwide, have been magnets for reader comments for years.
The Daily Telegraph site was receiving more than 30,000 comments a month as long as four years ago.
Readers were telling you loud and clear they wanted to be a part of the news cycle, but they were ignored.
The overdue arrival of The Punch means you will now own a small bit of that conversation, but the masses have moved on.
They are at Facebook, on Twitter and blogging on a wide array of other sites, where they are discussing your news.
And more than a few of them are making good money out of it too - dollars they are taking from you.
The simple fact is, you failed to listen to your audience when they needed to, and they moved on.
Well as Day would say, it's all part of an evolving process. Why didn't the dinosaurs realize that?
(Below: and here's how The Punch cranks up the hits. Note that I ended the last sentence with a reference to dinosaurs, and of course Raquel Welch starred in One Million B.C., a masterpiece by Don Chaffey that includes humans and dinosaurs. QED it's incredibly relevant to include a picture of Raquel Welch to illustrate this piece about media dinosaurs. Oh yeah, oh boy. Click on her picture and she even gets bigger. Oh boy, oh yeah).
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