NEW MEDIA? - Bloggers can't get no respect, except at the AP.

The Associated Press is starting to credit bloggers as sources. On the surface, this seems like an uncontroversial idea. There are some damn good blogs out there and their reportage is the equal of any traditional media outlet. On the other hand, not all traditional media outlets are as good as they used to be, so that’s a pretty low bar. And for every good, well-run blog, there are 10 million hacks like me.

The nut of this usually centers on the notion of credibility. No doubt that’s important, but the issue is as much about technology and a rapidly changing society as it is about credibility.

“The News” – with a capital “N” – is being pulled every which way by dozens of brand new technologies becoming obsolete as we speak. Sadly, newspapers and magazines are in their death throes. Uncle Walter’s nightly news has been supplanted by the Giant Screaming Heads on cable. As they shout into the ether, their day is coming to an end too – even if they don’t know it yet. Heck, even blogs, despite AP’s big leap into the future, are on the way to the dust bin. The abomination that is Twitter – operated by drunken Hollywood starlets or pinned-down insurgents in 140 character bursts – is the new wave of media. I expect news via telepathy in 10 years … no, let’s make that 6 months.

Oops, there it is now.

Oooo, I Gotta Have That
Our society has a great affinity for the new and the splashier and faster, the better. This is what drives cable companies to tout Internet service that saves milliseconds over DSL. Heaven forbid we have to wait another second to see which jail LiLo has checked into now. The rapid pace of technology has far outpaced the human ability to use it wisely.

There’s no longer anyone that isn’t part of the media – not withstanding Rush Limbaugh‘s and Sean Hannity‘s claims they aren’t. The impact of an Anderson Cooper, Brian Williams, Gene Robinson, or even (Dear God) Bill O’Reilly is big, but at a fire or flood or in a war zone, a scared kid Twittering and sending live video from his iPhone can be bigger.

It seems we’ve lost sight of the nature of news and failed to realize that a little time delay is sometimes a good thing. It gives humans time to digest information at a comfortable pace, rather than being distracted by their perpetually attached Bluetooths (Blueteeth?) It gives reporters time to collect their information and thoughts and news consumers time to actually understand what they’re absorbing.

Pffft, What Does the AP Know?
I don’t know if AP’s decision is a good or a bad thing – and I don’t think they do either. Their journalistic bell is being beat silly with a hi-tech, six-axis, robotically-controlled hammer … installed in a cellphone. Lost in all that God-awful racket is the other dimension of the issue – credibility.

What the hell constitutes as good blog? How reliable is reliable? Are they credible because some government official tells them so or does the AP reporter have to run a fancy checklist to see if the blog owner is on the up and up. Does he have to find at least 5 blogs that all say the same thing to before he can cite them?

Those are pretty tall orders for a reporter in search of news that’s spread around dozens of blogs at the speed of light, each with a particular ax to grind, and that change in real time to the “facts” on the ground.  By the time the fact checking is done, the story is already over and we’ve all moved onto the next catastrophe du jour or Hollywood breakup.

Credibility? Yeah, we have an app for that.

A big tip of the hat to Jr. Poobah Ari Cohn for the idea for this post.

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