Den of the Cyphered Wolf

Friday, March 9, 2018

The Medium Is the Message



So I went to a journalism panel. I liked it, but walking in one of the things I was afraid of was that the panel was going to bash the internet, and for the most part, they didn't but I still think it's worth talking about.

See I graduated from MSU J-school in 2010 and the overall conversation regarding journalism back then was "Oh dear lord the internet is going to eat us!"

It feels like journalists have moved on from that line of thought but with the proliferation of fake news I have this fear that the journalistic establishment will backslide, and for obvious reasons, that's bad for me. I've pretty much spent the last 7 years of my life trying to prove David Simon wrong. There are times when doubt the wisdom of that choice.

But as a guy who uses his computer as a second brain, I disliked how the internet was viewed as an inherently negative force. Good journalism is good journalism and bad journalism is bad journalism regardless of how its delivered to its audience.

I don't know how much I deserve credibility but I want to be judged on the merits of the work rather than the medium by which I choose to communicate.

That is not to say I don't have problems with internet media. I suck at marketing and advertising and even if I didn't CPM is horrible.

But beyond that what I feel was left unsaid 10 years ago is the medium is the message. That a lot of what distinguishes internet content from say film or television developed because of technological and production limitations; the run time of videos, jump cuts. Even the content itself is shaped by the fact that a huge chunk of the audience will be interacting with it not on its original page but on their Facebook and Twitter feeds.


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