U.S. news cutbacks drive quality down

[xchrom]

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/03/20/business/u-s-news-cutbacks-drive-quality-down/#.UUmtTO1qP8s


NEW YORK – Years of newsroom cutbacks have had a demonstrable impact on the quality of digital, newspaper and television news and in how consumers view that work, a study released Monday found.

Nearly one-third of consumers surveyed by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism said they have abandoned a news outlet because it no longer gave them what they had counted on, either with fewer or less complete stories.

Pew’s annual State of the News Media report delivered what has become a common litany of grim business statistics. Television news viewership is down. Newsroom employment at newspapers is down 30 percent since a peak in 2000 and has gone below 40,000 people for the first time since 1978. Newsweek shut its print edition and Time magazine is cutting staff.

“These cutbacks are real,” said Amy Mitchell, the project’s acting director. “And based on the data that we’ve collected, they are having an effect.”

[hobbit709]

1. what quality?

[grilled onions]

2. All Fluff...No Stuff

You are you are in trouble(and very less informed) when most of the content is Hollywood or the typical stories for that time period(Easter egg hunts,parades,Halloween costumes of the year etc). The only part they still hang on to is sports as they rattle off scores for endless teams, pro,college,local. But if you are wanting to find out about the gritty side of life,cutbacks,layoffs,what Congress is NOT doing etc you have to put up with a lot of nonsense to get it---if you do. We lost something when the one or two newscasters read off the sheet he was reading to the time when they turned every news setting into a lounge and they hired even more "news people" so they could banter back and forth and stretch for lines of news into a 15 minute time frame.
Meanwhile the papers/websites and done such a great job of hiding the news stories in the ads that you have a tough time finding and often missing what is going on. They have lost their polish as well because there are so many typos that you wonder how they got the job in the first place. Web news has a great advantage to being up to date yet they will have the same story on line for DAYS with rarely an update as an excuse. They put those annoying flashing ads,ads with sound right next to a video you are trying to watch so it's either listen to both or neither.
Now they are trying to demand you to pay for such greatness. One would not mind to pay for,say web news, if you got out of it what you pay for it and not just a bigger excuse for them to haul out even more ads with bells and whistles. Also one would not mind if the print news spent time on anything but their Sunday paper where they do little but run off news that went on all week with a books worth of ads for people to power shop on Sunday....goodnight Chet wherever you are!

[MindPilot]

3. Well, duh!

I think the virtual collapse of the US new media can be directly attributed to the Iraq war. While journalists refused to accurately report the run-up to the war, and those few who did were quickly ostracized, most major media outlets simply became mouthpieces for the Bush Administration. That information vacuum was filled by the Internet blogger who with absolutely no credentials whatsoever, can call themselves reporters and publish literally anything.

Now we got nothing--most especially at the local level.