More than a profession or even a calling, I consider journalism to be a breed. While as unique as snowflakes and as stubbornly individual as teenagers in the throes of self-discovery, all journalists have certain traits and skills that make them almost genetically predestined for the field. Following that same consistency, journalism and the ubiquitous "media" have stayed within a fairly specific definition of the job and its role in society throughout most of the 20th century.
Journalism requires a specific kind of thinking and it conforms to a time-tested set of standards. Certain questions must be answered and structures must be followed. In the days of olde, editors filled the space between the reporter and the reader, making sure the puzzle of words and facts blends together to form a coherent, informative and captivating piece of writing. But beyond meeting presentational criterion and checking all the facts, even the most well-edited story is deeply and critically analyzed to assure accuracy and truth, keeping in mind that the two terms can't be used interchangeably. Truth is the reality that lives behind and between the facts. It's seeing the big picture and capturing the tiny details. It's also something that's not very well defined in the minds of the average reader.
The truth to most of the world is a matter of belief and credibility, which is why there are still masses of Americans who believe Barack Obama is not a U.S. citizen or that the recent health care bill will kill off Nana to save money, among other myths and misinformation. To his credit, Joe the Plumber doesn't have either the time or the resources to sift through 48 claims against the health care bill in that chain e-mail Nana sent him. So it's up to journalists to let him know that only four of the 48 were true.
Twenty years ago, these myths might have been discussed among neighbors or around the water cooler if they couldn't find a place in printed publication, but the average citizen had no personal means of mass communication. The defining development of the late 20th and early 21st century has been the ability of the individual to connect with anyone at any time with any message. Funny how these days many people don't know their neighbors, yet they talk regularly with what Amy Gahran calls a "personal posse" of Twitter followers, and they network with hundreds of Facebook "friends" from all over the world.
The catalyst, of course, was the introduction of the internet, a tool many people underestimated back in the days of AOL and chat rooms. Oh, how primitive life was before Google. For journalism, the internet shortened deadlines -- rather, it replaced them with one universal deadline: NOW -- and created a constant stream of unedited information. All this information is now searchable, and instead of "papers sold," a publication's worth is measured in "hits" and "posts."
Writing has changed to adapt to a new way of finding this information and reading it, in some cases sacrificing creativity for searchability. Headlines should be "abstracted sentences," writes Jim Stovall.
"That is, they must contain a subject and a verb and be as specific as possible. No puns, no play-on-words. Use alliteration only when it makes sense." He also advises using only one direct quotation per story when writing for the Web, which in my opinion essentially takes away the very voice of the public that news tries so desperately to capture.
The name of the game now is brevity. Enter: Twitter, the not-so-inner monologue of modern society. For journalists, the benefits are obvious. It is the ultimate networking mechanism, and it condenses the public consciousness into convenient 140-character squirts. It even offers the chance for collaboration in a way that would make traditional newsies cringe at the thought of fraternizing with the enemy. It's called "networked link journalism," pioneered by four journalists in Washington during a big breaking news story, according to the blog Publishing 2.0. This kind of endeavor is rife with techno-jargon like "hashtag" and "widgets."
Only recently out of its infancy, Twitter has become a fixture in today's media and in the everyday life of people all over the world. It even received international attention when it played a role in covering protests in Iran when journalists were prohibited from entering the country. It even allows for the customization of news to fit the reader with Twitter Time.es, a concept only dreamed of before.
Somehow in condensing information, the world of mass communication today has expanded to a realm that is quickly expanding beyond the comfortable control of the traditional news media.
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