Boo Fucking Hoo

Bay Area newspapers are whining that Craigslist's free ads are costing them money, and reporters their jobs.

Please. Cry me a river.

Newspapers have been declining ever since...forever, but particularly since the rise of the web and the ability to get news from many sources, rather than being a captive audience for whatever paper happens to be in your city.

Is it bad for the reader to be able to get news from many different sources, to compare coverage, to be able to find out what's bullshit easily and quickly?

No. It's not. And newspapers have been losing audience themselves in their misguided attempts to increase revenue, such as "news you can use"--i.e. consumer news--being more supported than investigative journalism. What investigative journalism there is, is tainted; look at the NYT. Look at your Howell Raines, your Jayson Blair, your Judy Miller, your--god help us all--Bob Woodward. And most newspapers--like most MSM outlets these days--are really not much more than the mouthpieces of large corporations, who filter and spin according to their own economic agendas. Which have no bearing on the public's right to know.

Except when it comes to celebrity news, newspapers haven't cared about the public's right to know in a long time, and finally sealed their fate when they and the networks chose to help Bush in his lies about Iraq. You reap what you sow. We simply don't trust the MSM anymore and information is available elsewhere, and of course if one can post classifieds for free one will do it; is an industry's inability to compete our problem?

Who lost the faith and loyalty of readers? They did, themselves, through their spineless, blinkered greed. The MSM no longer serves the noble function it purports to; they themselves violated the sacred trust they like to trumpet now. The only time you ever hear them standing on that principle, it's not for the sake of the public, but of their own careers and their access to politicians, which they will not sacrifice for anything. Particularly not the truth, because that's whatever a reporter says it is, isn't it?

There are still many great reporters, but the industry they belong to has corrupted itself into dangerous irrelevance. The industry did this to themselves; why should we weep?

Fear for a free press? When was the last time the MSM was that? I suspect that we'll have a freer press once reporting is freed from its deal with the corporate devil.