Why Mainstream Media Shouldn't Fear Blogs and Web 2.0
Mainstream media (MSM) likes to worry.Newspapers got all hot and bothered when radio emerged. Radio went into fits when TV came on the scene. TV broke into hives when cable infiltrated the market. And now, all of these "mature" forms of journalism are dripping with perspiration over the Web.
People, you can all calm down. There's nothing to worry about.
Just as newspapers adapted to radio and radio adapted to TV and TV adapted to cable, MSM will adapt -- and work with -- the Web. It's happened time and time again, so why should this latest change be any different?
Moreover, the rise of Web 2.0 and the emergence of the audience as a major player in interactive news gives MSM something to celebrate.
Here's why MSM should smile: Many of the Web 2.0 applications being developed seek to reorganize and recategorize information. The entire Web 2.0 concept is based on freeing content from its container and allow the end user to manipulate the data in ways he/she sees fit. Blogs offer one way of doing this. Sites like Digg offer another. The Google maps API gets into visual repurposing. All this Web 2.0 stuff is interesting and impressive, but MSM need not concern itself with keeping up because it has the one thing all these other sites need: original content.
Blogs and Web 2.0 repurpose content. These sites take news and information and repackage and re-form and re-birth it into something different, and while that "something different" might be envelope pushing and dramatic and full of whizz-bang techie joy, it still feeds off of -- and needs -- original content.
And who provides this original content? The mainstream media
So, MSM should continue doing what it does best: finding sources, developing stories, publishing information. It can use its resources -- resources bloggers and Web 2.0 folks don't have -- to cover stories with breadth and depth. In short: It can keep on keeping on and it'll be just fine. -- Mac Slocum
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