Charles Pierce on April 10th, reacting to a couple of postings by Kos:
I would like an explanation, in detail, of how much the people who work for the various “organically sprouting” news operations, both locally and nationally, actually will get paid. I know the HuffPo doesn’t pay its contributors, and I’m willing to bet that nobody at A Better Oakland makes enough to live on, either. Is this the new business model for the new paradigm? Don’t pay the reporters and writers?
Geez, Louise, I wonder why nobody ever thought of that before. I have been a working journalist for 30 years now, in one way or another. I have made a living and raised three children that way. I’m one of the lucky ones. There are thousands of people all over the country at newspapers large and small, people who cover sewer commissions and city councils and high school football, and who do so because they believe in the importance of newspaper journalism as a life’s work, and even though they realize at some level that they might be working in the buggy-whip industry. I am not unaware of the problems in my profession. I frequently rail against them. But it is still a profession and, I believe, an honorable and important one, and one at which people should be trained and paid what they’re worth. It deserves to be a profession at which people can make a living.
Kos replies on April 20th:
For Charlie Pierce and many of his journalism friends, this debate is about how they continue to get paid. For me, I don’t give a shit who gets paid or how much, but whether people get the news they need to make informed decisions in a democracy. If people get paid in the process, great! If they don’t, but people still get good information, then great!
And you know what? Lots of “amateurs” are producing excellent information. Sometimes, even better than what the pros used to deliver. Now the old media types can rail and complain and bitch and moan about this, but it is what it is. The times are changing, and the culture with it. And consumers are getting increasingly sophisticated about how and where and from whom they consume their news. Shoot the messenger, Charlie, but it doesn’t change anything. I’m not the reason people are deciding to take more direct ownership of their media production and consumption.
Oh, and one more thing Charlie: The Huffington Post does pay its reporters.
Pierce comes back yesterday:
I would argue that there are a great number of people in a great number of professions having a great number of conversations about how they will continue to get paid. Auto workers come immediately to mind. I give a shit about all of them, including the people in my profession. I would argue that giving a shit about whether or not people should get paid a decent wage for an honest day’s work is what progressive populism used to be about. I don’t recall any legitimate progressive determining on his own which work is worthy of having a shit given about it. I would argue that my friend in Chicago, who was a decent and honorable sportswriter with two young kids and a mortgage, and who was laid off this week because the Chicago Tribune is owned by a vicious vandal named Sam Zell who needs to have his balls in the mouth of a shark right about now, is worthy of having a shit given about him. I would argue that the cafeteria workers, security guards, printers, drivers–and the newsroom staffs–at the newspapers in Seattle and Denver that went under are worthy of having a shit given about them. ….
Of course, I do not understand the new world of progressive activism, where some professions are unworthy of having a shit given about them. I weep at my ignorance, of course.
You will note, for the record, that there is nothing in that previous passage that can be reasonably interpreted as having “attacked the messenger.” The message, yes, but not the messenger. Were I to go on and point out that, for someone who doesn’t give a shit whether people get paid for gathering and disseminating the news we need to make informed decisions in a democracy, The Future seems to be making a pretty tidy living his own self, and were I to go on to point out that making yourself comfortable while convincing the suckers to work for the honor of it is a business plan that would make Sam Zell green with envy, and were I to point out further that the great Australian phrase, “I got mine, Jack” seems now apropos to the discussion, that would be “attacking the messenger.” I hope this clears up any confusion on the matter.
I’m with Pierce on this one.