In-Class Response

Question 3. "Blogs bring on decay. Each new blog is supposed to add to the fall of the media system that once dominated the twentieth century." Do you think that this is a true statement, that blogs have contributed to the erosion of mass media or are they the second step in the progression of mass media in people's lives?

First of all, i think it's pretty fucking stupid to analyze what blogs are "supposed" to do. Out of all the reasons i can think of for setting up a blog, "adding to the fall of the media system that once dominated blah blah blah" is last on a long fucking list that includes reasons like vanity, a profound desire to project thoughts and opinions to a group of people that don't matter, and being really stoned.

having said that, the only reason blogs cause the fall of the media system is that the media system is letting the blogosphere matter, when it really shouldn't. If, god fucking forbid, print media weren't an overblown, outdated and irrelevant form of media, then it wouldn't be getting edged out of the public space by a bunch of assholes with iBooks.

Newspapers have been undercutting themselves for decades by firing writers and increasing advertising space, graphics, and other "cutting-edge" shit that really only serves to magnify the fact that all the talented writers have left or been fired from journalism. papers are dying because they, like the music industry, failed to adjust to changing social climates and trends and are now reverse-engineering their own failure to make it seem like blogs were out to get them.

blogs are not out to get anybody; but if someone is writing something funny or engaging and you can get it for free, you're damn sure NOT going to pay for inferior writing. the funny thing is that most bloggers parlay their experience into books; i'm thinking about garfield without garfield or stuff white people like. this proves that the print format is still valid; people are just tolerating crap less now that better material is available for free.

print media fucked itself over by trying to cut costs without realizing it was actually just cutting quality. it's like when Coke tried New Coke to compete with Pepsi and after a colossal market failure, realized that people are more invested in the image and connotation of Coke as opposed to its actual taste.

people are attached to papers and magazines for the same reason: reading the Wall Street Journal or Rolling Stone says something about you as a person, it crystallizes a certain image people have of themselves. this is the only thing that's going to reverse the downward slide that print journalism is in.