The MSM Economy
My favorite lecture at the Knight workshop was Duke economist James T. Hamilton speaking on media market economics, the pressures faced by local papers and what is to be done. He’s written a book about this, “All the News That’s Fit to Sell”, so this is much simplified (but not wrong, I hope).
Hamilton introduced four demands for information (from Anthony Downs) to describe the current frustration with MSM coverage.
The first three are met fairly well. If you don’t seek the information, you don’t get the benefit. People tend to remain rationally ignorant regarding the fourth – they don’t see a reason to seek the information. They may be interested in who wins the presidential race but they feel like their vote isn’t going to determine the outcome.
So media outlets fold public service into the first three demands, making politics a horse race or highlighting the campaign’s human foibles (entertainment), or else making the story about producer demand. No surprise here: we refer to civic coverage as vegetables all the time — and with web metrics we now know how many people do (or, more accurately, don’t) read these pieces.
What does it mean for the MSM to transition to hyperlocal? Hamilton brings the discussion back to the four information demands by asking: What decision do we want people to make with the information we provide?
January 1st, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Couldn’t agree more. We saw this in the run-up to the war, when most media outlets got caught up in the excitement of a real shootin’ match and forgot that fourth demand.
However, 2008 is at least starting off on a somewhat brighter note. For the first day of the new year, the nation’s paper of record ran the editorial they should have run long ago. I for one am heartened that they’re catching up. It’s worth a read:
Looking at America — The New York Times