The Press: Making Bloggers Look Good Since Before Blogging Was Invented

January 2, 2009 5:38 PM

Of all the offshoots of the "Stuff White People Like" meme, my favorite is Stuff Journalists Like. From Free Food to Press Passes to Exclusives, this blog is covering everything in the ink-stained-wretch's lifestyle, including some things they really just barely tolerate. For a more serious look at the Journalistic Profession during this time of Transition/Crisis/Insanity, there's always Jay Rosen, whose PressThink blog has been previously seen here and is getting more attention than ever via (shudder) Twitter. Or, for something more in-between... 10,000 Words uses a bright, shiny bunch of tag clouds, maps and other visual aids (plus fun with typography) to tell the journos how it should be done while doing it.
posted by wendell (20 comments total)

Ha. I just sent this to a bunch of my fellow journalism majors. Thanks.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 6:04 PM on January 2

#117: Not having the entire industry collapse into a pitiful, bankrupt husk of its former self
posted by Rhaomi at 6:09 PM on January 2 [3 favorites]

Question, question!! How do you "respond to charges" that "some" are making that there's no way to know what a journalist likes since we haven't seen one in the wild for over a decade?

Send your reply directly to the print room, since we won't be fact-checking it or anything.
posted by DU at 6:21 PM on January 2 [4 favorites]

Man, they sure showed press passes!
posted by starman at 6:29 PM on January 2

I was hoping for a scathing but hilarious Greenwaldian analysis of the culture of modern journalism, but all I got was BORED. So I will have to propose some of my own.

#7: Cute animals: Easily eat up 1/4 of your broadcast with live reporting of puppies being rescued from a burning building.

#13: Blonde girls in distress: Preferably on vacation in an exotic and scary-sounding country.

#19: Analysts: These people of dubious intelligence will gladly answer your questions no matter how inane and leading. Plus you don't have to worry about them saying anything remotely controversial because they're getting paid-off by someone in the military-industrial complex.

#28: Sex scandals: Easily depose politicians guilty of no actual criminal wrong-doing!

#33: Africa: Haha, just kidding. Palin might think it's a country, but at least she can find it on a map.
posted by mek at 6:37 PM on January 2 [2 favorites]

This is fun, although those guys really need a copy editor. I just got laid off from my part-time proofreading gig ... maybe I should offer my services...
posted by limeonaire at 6:43 PM on January 2

#99 years in reviews review

#207: forcing people to write letters to the editor about improper pluralization.
posted by CKmtl at 6:45 PM on January 2

Wow. I don't want to fuel the stereotype that "those who can't do, teach", but Jay Rosen really cannot write. What a horrible blog PressThink is.
posted by game warden to the events rhino at 6:53 PM on January 2

years in reviews review

"years in review" is multiple years, being reviewed. For instance, a review covering 2006-2008. This does not occur, unless it's by decade ("the 60s") or some other relevant factor ("the Clinton years").

"year in reviews" is multiple reviews of a year (or one for each of several years). A "year in review" happens every year--in fact, more than one does. Thus, "year in reviews".
posted by DU at 7:04 PM on January 2

Jay Rosen is, I think, a much better Twitterer than blogger. He seems to be, from what I can tell, a great connector of people and a great evangelist for the soon-to-be-inescapable idea that journalism must migrate online—but it's exactly that zeal that makes him try to cram so much and so many links into each post.
posted by limeonaire at 7:35 PM on January 2

Check out the Complete List. Scandals is on there with a pic of Spitzer.
posted by wendell at 8:11 PM on January 2

DU: Hm. I suppose.

I've always considered 'year' the main part of the compound 'year-in-review'. Plus, that other formulation has punny connotations (literary/entertainment/food reviewers going over that year's best reviewed books/CDs/games/restaurants).
posted by CKmtl at 8:24 PM on January 2

God, I could write that blog.
I am currently looking for a job anywhere outside the newspaper industry. Along with the low pay that will keep me living with my parents until I'm 35, the lack of raises, promotions and job stability isn't helping either. Anyone need a person with writing skills in the greater Cleveland/Akron area?

Another good site to see some "shop talk" (ignore the trolls) is angryjournalist
posted by greatalleycat at 9:29 PM on January 2

Stuff grapefruitmoon likes: Numbered factoids presented in sequential order.

#15 followed by #84? DO NOT WANT.

(Yes, yes, it's ripping off "Stuff White People Like," but at least that was in order.)
posted by grapefruitmoon at 5:14 AM on January 3

"Jay Rosen really cannot write..."

Haven't looked at Pressblog yet, so can't comment there, but there are a lot of journalists who can't write good English. It's not a core skill - or at least, it didn't use to be. That's why you've got subs. At least, why you used to have subs.

There are some journalists who can write superb camera-ready English, and who also have the ability to find the information and build the constructions that make a good story. There are plenty more who can do the latter two - or even just the former of the latter two - and while the economics of newspapers allowed extra staff members to fix up the actual text, then good things happened.

Now, production staff are the first to go. Blogs were the first sign of the new age - and part of that new age is that there are journalists who can't write but whose raw copy ends up in your face. (There are some very popular and high-profile Web publications whose sloppy copy makes them unsafe for me to read in the company of ladies.) Another part, which is particularly galling for journalistic ego, is that there are non-journos who can write like angels and who no longer have to get someone else to publish them.

I think this all balances out. The difference between a blogger and a journalist is that a journalist has a telephone, and there'll still be money in maintaining standards, even if the source material has changed and the distribution model is hugely different.

At least, I hope so.
posted by Devonian at 7:34 AM on January 3

The trouble with all these Stuff [something] People Like lists is that they really need the word American added at an appropriate point in the title.
posted by i_cola at 7:51 AM on January 3 [1 favorite]

Um, we hate NPR- especially the irritating This American Life.
posted by Zambrano at 9:22 AM on January 3

.. and The Wire? Are you joking?

We don't watch crime, drugs, mayhem, lawyers or crime scene investigation. We get enough of that in real life.

This blogger is either a wannabe or he's been out of the business for a long time.
posted by Zambrano at 9:27 AM on January 3

Um, the Wire was a huge favorite of many journalists, Zambrano-- at least here in New York. Though the season about the Baltimore Sun was probably one of the weakest.

However, that season did show that while the newspaper obsessed about ridiculous-- and, as it turned out, fake-- stories, it missed the real stuff that was going on completely.

And the real Baltimore Sun could take a clue from the Wire and perhaps not be under so much threat: the way it covers drugs is so bad it's not even wrong.
posted by Maias at 10:58 AM on January 3

who doesn't like free food?
posted by saul wright at 7:47 PM on January 3