After the newspapers die, who will watch the police?
washingtonpost.com
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As a teenager, I was always shocked at how rude police were to me; they seemed to have no respect for the laws they were supposedly there to enforce. However, as a 30-something, even when getting a speeding ticket, the police are generally polite. Have the police changed, or have they started treating me as someone who might have some power to keep them in check?
At the age of 14, I used to carry a Commodore 64 to my friend's house, and once the police stopped me thinking I was a burglar, and I showed them this thing with circuit boards hanging off, and said 'Would I steal THIS?'. It was pretty funny. I also ranted on about being a 'law-abiding citizen', which helped.
http://reason.com/blog/show/131954.html
I've rarely seen newspapers conduct that kind of journalism, especially on the national level. Another example: Balko has been almost single-handedly raising awareness about the death and violence that occurs from the military-style raids that many police departments use to arrest suspects of non-violent crimes. I haven't heard any newspapers tracking that story:
This website has exposed more corrupt police practices than any newspaper I know about:
But regardless, the death of the newspaper is going to cause a lot of change in our society. Not all the costs will be easily dealt with.
How much money would people pay to provide the service of watching the police? I'm afraid the answer is... not much. It has to be tied to something else, or to have a nonprofit structure.
Journalism backed by advertisement pushing consumerism isn't a valid democratic institution, IMHO. It doesn't represent anything. As a control system it is a travesty, you don't vote them and you have to pay for access. And then it forces candidates to be press-visible with the same marketing machine, with the same backers.
Full government transparency is required, not just rhetoric. The technology is available already.
Journalism needs to have its own source of power besides the government. You can't simultaneously depend on the government for funding and make it your mission to expose the government's shortfalls. Profit provides that power.
I don't have the answer; papers funded by the government would be a disaster like you said. But I don't think profit is the panacea to the world's problems.
* Yes, I'm really, really simplifying here.
We produce enough surplus that society can survive a great many parasites (the entire public sector, and all the loss-making businesses) but every little is a brake on potential, particularly the potential for compounding growth. It retards the future.
The best we could come up with was something along the lines of a modified subscription plan with a low yearly rate (n < $40 usd) funding automated collections of government data with a very small cadre of reporters writing stories and editing each other.
Either that or beg-a-thons like public radio.
That's the same model used by magazines like the economist and the atlantic, and I think they're doing well.
This would not be the end of the tabloid, the are so cheap to produce they can go on forever. It would not be the end of local news, it would not even be the end of local daily or breaking news. It would just be the end of of printed daily local news.
This seems like it would be a cheap (< $500K) experiment to conduct in a few towns. Perhaps some foundation interested in government transparency could fund it. However, I don't see how it would scale out without a revenue model behind it.
It's probably better that responsibility for tracking cops is more widely disseminated, so that one or two lazy (or corrupt, or ideologically motivated) reporter(s) can't set the tone for an entire city.
On the other hand, it does help to have these things spread by someone seen as neutral, and willing to do some leg-work. Perhaps we need something like a consumerist for police? (I could see this being generalized to local governments too). Or perhaps it will fall into the purview of hyperlocal sites like everyblock. Right now most of these seem to use a highly automated approach, although I imagine they'll evolve into a more user-contributed model.
We need something more than the patchwork "Hope someone catches it on video and it makes youtube's front page" model for accountability than we have now, but I'm not sure that local newspaper reporters are the best solution going forward.
There's been talk for years about getting a standardized accessible electronic format for crime data across the US (John Udell in particular has discussed this at length) but I think we're a long way from any real implementation of that, sadly.
+ Its not like the newspapers do anything about it, they just report it. Its the redditors and 4channers and youtubers who go on a crusade to hold these guys accountable
The unexamined fallacy that I saw in the post was the idea that TV stations engage in hard hitting news at the level of the local newspaper reporting. Internet outlets can publicize local stories if the original stories exist. The original article's point remains: without newspaper digging there would be no local story, especially no credible local story.
The problem would be worst in smaller cities like Baltimore.
http://www.injusticebusters.com/04/Diotte_Kerry.shtml
It's only one story, but it includes lots of bad cops. One newspaper reporter. And no video.
Yes, there was an overheard conversation on the police radio. But that was 'hearsay' evidence. Not something that was copied (at least to my knowledge).
Edit: NO, it doesn't qualify. The conversation was recorded. Thanks for making the point.
http://photondetector.com/blog/2009/02/16/photographing-poli...
Consider the article's example of Baltimore. How often is there a reddit, 4chan, or youtube outrage relating to Baltimore? Whereas the Baltimore Sun can have crime reporters there every day.
There are already great examples of 'new media,' amateurs supported by new technologies & online communities doing things that would not have gotten done under a 100% old media regime. Exposing police brutality, war crimes, or other issues we associate with heavy duty press. That is, there are circumstances that involve more then a flood of commentary where new media does a better job then old media.
On the other hand, New Media is not going to fill all the wholes old media leaves behind. I think that's clear already.
But we don't really know what, how deep or how many these holes are going to be. Currently, reddit/youtube supplement exixsting media because existing media exists. If we take professional media out of the equation, it will evolve differently.
There might not be that much of a long term net loss from newspapers going out of business. There are some shocking videos going to be produced outside of conventional media. It's still not clear how many or what quality.
My point: the idea that the old order has to be preserved because the new order is not up to the task carries a lot more water if the old order is functioning effectively.
I wonder if newspapers and other media overestimate their power? They would like to think that they can sway public opinion, but maybe ultimately they are simply forced to write scandalous stories, but they can not manufacture them. Like they can make a lot of money out of "Britney Spears cut her hair", but maybe if they tried to make a big fuzz about that police incident, nobody would care and nobody would buy the newspaper anyway.
It's time for a change.
And I can think of numerous cases where the press "uncovered corruption" that wasn't. I can think of cases where the press helped with/caused corruption.
Never confuse ideals with reality.
Even in cases where the press "got it wrong" the harm of public interest was not that great. Maybe in the USA there are not a lot of corruption - but in my country it is rife.
Politicians wants to push everything under the carpet and the police system is wilfully incompetent (since it falls under the minister of safety and security, another politician).
The reality is that there are a few publications that do excellent work. Here are a few things in which the press paid a significant part in bringing to light: corruption in a massive arms deal (and by the next president), dealings of a mining magnate (who eventually was murdered), showing corruption by the national police commissioner, shedding light on numerous large fraudulent financial schemes, etc...
The list can go on. I doubt a blogger will be able to take on complex and multi-faceted corruption cases while he is being sued from all sides.
A few years ago it came out that Deep Throat was Mark Felt -- he had been #3 at the FBI. Felt was disgruntled that Nixon had passed him over for promotion after JE Hoover died, and so carried out a leak campaign through the Washington Post that ultimately brought Nixon down.
The Post editors and Woodward & Berstein knew who Felt was. They chose to keep quiet and accept decades of hero-worship. The truth was that they were willing participants in a rather slimy and petty act of political revenge.
So? What is to prevent a rival paper from reporting on the newsroom? (I actually have memory of this happening - an editor of a major newspaper was a philander and another paper ran an article on him. Another big story happened 20 odd years ago - one paper was funded by the government and another newspaper brought that to light - the result was that one of the people who organised funding did not become president).
"And politicians don't always want to hide things."
So, if they are not hiding something they would not mind people looking? I am one of those people who think it is a good idea of a healthy dose of cynicism for public officials.
"They chose to keep quiet and accept decades of hero-worship. The truth was that they were willing participants in a rather slimy and petty act of political revenge."
The question is not if Woodward&Bernstein were upstanding citizens with good values. The question is this: Was the Watergate affair good for the country? Would it be better if it had not been brought to light?
As for the case of the government covertly starting a newspaper, I have not heard about it (but read about it in history books). They did this with the express purpose to change public opinion - since the current English newspapers were too critical of the government (with good reason). That really is before my time (20+ years or more).
I do not recall a single instance in my country where journalists were found guilty of corruption. Yet for politicians the list of the non-corrupt would probably be shorter.
"Don't say anything" isn't the only alternative to "tell only part of the story".
Woodward and Bernstein deliberately withheld relevant information to make themselves and their source look good. If anyone else does that, the press screams "coverup", "corruption", etc.
I'm always amused by the assumption that Watergate was a relatively big deal. Yes, taking down a president was a major accomplishment, but I'm talking about the underlying crime and coverup.
Does anyone seriously believe that far worse things don't happen fairly regularly?
I'd argue that Watergate actually argues that the press is relatively useless.
Refusing to name sources is about two things: actually protecting people in danger, and protecting your rep as a journalist. Felt's safety was never an issue. This is a man capable of bringing down the president, right? He was sitting on 50 years of dirty secrets collected by JE Hoover. No one dared touch him.
So B, W, and their editor kept quiet for purely selfish reasons. Then they willingly let themselves and their paper be used to settle a personal score against Nixon. They provided Felt with cover to make his leaks more effective. All the while they painted it as a home run for integrity and democracy, when in fact it was a political feud.
How is all of that not that a violation of the public trust, ie, corruption?
It's actually fairly commonplace for "the press" to be involved in public corruption. They'll even defend the corruption.
> I doubt a blogger will be able to take on complex and multi-faceted corruption cases while he is being sued from all sides.
And how many press organizations will do that?
More important, that's irrelevant because corruption investigations rarely involve lawsuits.
Could we please have some examples? I can recall many cases where the press has made mistakes, but none where they were actively corrupt.
What definition of "actively corrupt" are we using? Is it enough for them to get paid off in return for looking the other way/not reporting, or do they have to actually steal something? Does it matter who pays them and what the connection is between the source of the money and the evil-doer.
Note that "the press" is often a cheap date. They'll go out of their way to avoid writing bad things about folks/programs/issues that they like. They'll trade access for non-coverage.
For example, CNN admits that they didn't report things that Saddam Hussein didn't want known in return for being able to report from pre-war Iraq. That let them make money, money that didn't come from SH. Do you count it as corruption? (I don't, but many folks who get excited about corruption do.)
Can you give some examples?
> And how many press organizations will do that?
Not all papers - but some do. In my country there are 2 good English newspapers and one magazine that does excellent investigative reporting.
> More important, that's irrelevant because corruption investigations rarely involve lawsuits.
Corruption cases are full of lawsuits! My favourite investigative magazine (http://www.noseweek.co.za/) was closed for almost a year because the person running it was sued for libel. He won that lawsuit - but he had to stop publishing that year while defending himself in court.
In 2007 he was sued by a bank to prevent him from naming a list of clients that the bank helped with tax evasion - he won again and published the list of names.
> Corruption cases are full of lawsuits!
We're both assuming that our home turf is universal.
Libel suits in the US are extremely rare. Libel lawsuits involving public figures are a small minority because they're almost impossible to win. If the accused libeler can argue "I'm part of the press", it's even worse.
As a result, libel lawsuits aren't a factor in corruption investigations in the US.
- The arms deal (in which half of the ANC had a share).
- Corruption by the National Police Commisioner and head of Interpol (Jackie Selebi) and his links to organised crime.
- The Fidentia financial fraud scheme by Athur Brown
- A tax evasion scheme by RMB (a private bank for rich individuals)
- Tokyo Sexwale's (a businessman with links to the ANC) involvement in Iraq oil-for-food fraud.
- Fraud by state owned oil company PetroSA who passed on R15 million before an election to an ANC financier.
- Links between the ANC investment vehicle Chancellor House and government contracts (i.e. conflict of interest)
I am pretty sure you can make the same list for your own country.
Not a day goes by on Reddit without a video of someone being beaten by the police in the street, and thousands of bloggers pick it up instantly.
If I were a corrupt officer I would fear a horde of a thousand angry bloggers with video as proof more than a single journalist that has the home number of a local judge.
When just the reporter tried after the judge had retired reporter was ignored like everyone else.
Effective journalism is important to a democracy and it should be funded in as democratic manner as possible.
The newspapers are desperate for a reason to exist.
At the very, very least, new organizations free of legacy costs will step up. In Chicago, the Chi-Town Daily News (http://www.chitowndailynews.org/) is one of them. They've got a bunch of citizen journalists, supplemented by a handful of paid staff.
Journalists are called to the vocation the same way that artists, musicians, priests, and others are called to theirs.
The Huffington Post doesn't have the desire nor ability to chase up on some local police shooting, unless it really, really stands out as a potentially big, national story.
A local daily newspaper, with a staff of investigative journalists some of whom are dedicated to watching the police, does. None (or almost none) of those stories will make national headlines (and so they're not suitable for national papers), but they most certainly make a huge difference to local life.
Personally, I don't think the solution is to have newspapers watching the police. I think the solution is that all police officers at work should be permanently under watch via a justin.tv kind of system. Maybe with one day of delay (to prevent "the bad guys" from being able to tell that the police are on their way to their place), but no more. And this should most likely be administered by a third party with the power to have police officers docked if they refuse to hand over full recordings (so probably by a sub-department of the DoJ).
The HuffPo is fascinating - they provide an outlet for 9/11 truthers and their own paid reporters on the same platform. And the President of the United States recognizes such a brand as worthy of engagement. People run for local school boards for a reason - don't underestimate local citizen journalism just yet.
And cops already have cameras in their squad cars; many cities are already awash in CCTVs.
But there's something that David Simon says that's really interesting - he's fighting for a document. A paper document. That's the sort of stuff that EveryBlock and Public.Resource.org are fighting to free. And Carl's trying to get the GPO job: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=498610
I'm biased reading any David Simon article because I use the context of The Wire as sort of an opening to Simon's points in any article. One of the big themes of The Wire was how people don't easily care about things immediately outside of their own frame of reference. That means that cops don't care about anything beyond cophood, politicians only care about relevant political issues, and so on.
The Huffington Post doesn't care about local news. They don't care about issues in Baltimore specifically. They care about big generic things, and as such they miss the point more often than not. They're a pretty poor source even for online reporting. Even the best ones, though, don't focus superlocally like actually local papers do.
Simon's argument isn't that newspapers are wonderful and magical, though. His argument is that newspapers also failed us, after they started chasing sensationalism and yellow journalism. His second point, made here, is that too few bloggers care about things like this. A local blogger doesn't have the instant influence that a journalist for a paper does. As a result, the local stuff gets even more ignored, beyond the basic cheap local news that everybody knows and nobody cares about. That's a major problem, and it's not one that's easily fixed.
And it is not like the newspapers are aggressive against the government, they let them get away with way too much.
The article isn't about "the government," it's about the impact local newspapers have.
I guess this is not "crime reporting" in the Baltimore Sun sense. A lot more bloggers will go after national news, since it's more common for blogs to have a national audience. Blogging just isn't organized around the city level like journalism is.
This sentence is probably true at the moment. Yet it still amuses me greatly. It's like living in 1910 and reading an article about the automobile. ("They're great toys for rich people, but they just don't have the same rich infrastructure that the horse and buggy does.")
The word weblog is not yet twelve years old. The short form, blog, will celebrate its tenth birthday in a couple of months. This technology is a baby. And on the local scene bloggers compete for audience with newspapers, radio, and TV, which have had a headstart of between fifty and four hundred years, and which even now command large budgets, large staffs, and a lot of very flashy advertising.
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/
http://missionmission.wordpress.com
The local blogs tend to link to each other quite a bit so if you find one you like its pretty easy to become exposed to more that might interest you.
http://www.newspaperdeathwatch.com/2009/02/25/sf-chronicle-o...
The short of it - unless the paper cuts expenses by somewhere in the range of 50%, Hearst will will sell it. And in this economic climate, that's code for close it; see the Rocky Mountain News (http://www.vimeo.com/3390739) or the Tucson Citizen.
IF the SF Chronicle goes under - making San Francisco the first major metro market without a daily paper - I have no doubt that the displaced journalists and strong startup culture of the area will forge the first steps to a true, information era watch dog journalism.
In short, newspapers need to stop pretending they still cover the news so that the next generation can figure out how to make this work.
And no, citizen journalists and the twitterati are not the answer. Great journalism can only exist when it can support the salary of a great journalist. Otherwise, that journalist WILL go work as a spin doctor for whatever private firm or state government will pay them. I've seen it happen many many times. How can an unpaid citizen journalist match wits with that?
I could not have said this better myself. In fact, if I could have said this, this is what I would have said!
3 years from now there will be hundreds of local blogs in every U.S. city. We need "interesting-ness" filters for this stuff just like we need filters for tech blogs and political blogs right now.
If there's anyone out there interested in chipping in some tech expertise to help out (I'm a journalist and am bootstrapping this) I'm all ears.
Of course, some investigations will still be needed, but even if there are currently no investigative reporters who blog as their primary outlet, other types of reporting has successfully made the jump. I couldn't find him in google just now, but there was a blogger from several years ago who was embedded in Iraq and made his living off of his blog and occasional freelance stories sold to other outlets (newspapers? Dunno).
One objection to this might be that governments will just legislate against cameras recording their workings, which they're already trying, but in the long run, as cameras and other recording devices get smaller and become more integral to everyone's life, this will have no more effect than Canute's courtiers' plans to roll back the tide.
I don't see much from newspapers, either. That's the point of this article: The guy is telling us that newspapers are already dead, and the problem is visible right now.
I don't see any reason at all why a blogger couldn't be just as effective as a crime reporter. Except for one: They need to have enough money to survive. We're going to have to work that out somehow. But I wouldn't be surprised if Twitter turns out to be a part of the solution. People use the tools they have.
Of course, even if we work as hard as we can, the future won't be perfect. But neither was the past. Despite the best efforts of folks like the author of this article, police brutality and corruption weren't exactly unheard of even in the newspaper-reporting heyday of the 1940s and 1950s.
That's no reason to fear the future. We'll figure it out, I'm sure. But it's (to me) a little Pollyannish to assume that because the new media formats are easier to use and disseminate information rapidly, it's all somehow automatically better than older media. Stuff changes, and as you point, out we've got some things to work out.
Death of newspapers != Death of investigative reporting
Thats what I am really worried about. That without good newspapers, politicians who allow an increase in crime through their policies will go unaccountable. (Whether that is already a problem is a matter of much debate).