June 6th, 2010 / 11:33 pm
Snippets
Snippets
Justin Taylor—
What I couldn’t understand, though, was why they killed the story. Sure, it wasn’t Blackwater, but this was a store that at least half our readers’ kids would have killed to work for, and it was being run by some racist, frat-boy cult, and the suburban teenagers it hired and fired so mercurially were going to grow into adults who thought this was . . . normal? That in the modern American workplace, this sort of Lord-of-the-Flies management strategy was just par for the fucking course?
And the difference between Moe Tkacik and the Emily Goulds of the world is what, exactly?
Hey dude, this isn’t Kaplan tutoring. If you’re too stupid to read the things we post, the onus is on you to come back when you’re literate. We don’t really give a shit if you get held back a grade or not.
Moe’s a much stronger writer than Gould. I read this piece a few weeks ago and found it pretty insightful.
> But I also saw Gawker as American Apparel’s journalistic equivalent
OMFG THANK YOU MO TKACIK
And the difference between Moe Tkacik and the Emily Goulds of the world is what, exactly?
Hey dude, this isn’t Kaplan tutoring. If you’re too stupid to read the things we post, the onus is on you to come back when you’re literate. We don’t really give a shit if you get held back a grade or not.
Moe’s a much stronger writer than Gould. I read this piece a few weeks ago and found it pretty insightful.
> But I also saw Gawker as American Apparel’s journalistic equivalent
OMFG THANK YOU MO TKACIK
She should write a longer piece on the Abercrombie story because, as she describes it in CJR, I can understand why the story was killed.
What evidence did she have – other than testimony of a source?
Instead of writing that article before she was done investigating (and then emailing it around), she should have continued snooping around and tried to get her hands on those defaced print-outs.
Finding out that Timoney’s daughter is (was?) a drug addict is also a non-story.
The most interesting part of her CJR article is where she talks about her lack of training. It’s obvious – despite the nice gigs she was able to line up for herself – that she lacked journalistic training. What it says – if true, and true at most pubs – for the future of journalism is pretty damning.
The reporter v editor battle is older than time. She’s not the only one to go through that.
She should write a longer piece on the Abercrombie story because, as she describes it in CJR, I can understand why the story was killed.
What evidence did she have – other than testimony of a source?
Instead of writing that article before she was done investigating (and then emailing it around), she should have continued snooping around and tried to get her hands on those defaced print-outs.
Finding out that Timoney’s daughter is (was?) a drug addict is also a non-story.
The most interesting part of her CJR article is where she talks about her lack of training. It’s obvious – despite the nice gigs she was able to line up for herself – that she lacked journalistic training. What it says – if true, and true at most pubs – for the future of journalism is pretty damning.
The reporter v editor battle is older than time. She’s not the only one to go through that.
a little harsh maybe
a little harsh maybe
> also a non-story
As in, well of course you can’t report it, or as in, happens all the time? Comment tone here implies irritation with Tkacik for making herself the story instead of making herself a better reporter. May have a point. I threw a yellow card at the line about the reporter who quit to write poetry. Not enough information provided.
> also a non-story
As in, well of course you can’t report it, or as in, happens all the time? Comment tone here implies irritation with Tkacik for making herself the story instead of making herself a better reporter. May have a point. I threw a yellow card at the line about the reporter who quit to write poetry. Not enough information provided.
I suppose the Timoney thing is fair game. I wouldn’t have had a problem with her reporting it, even though, yes, it happens all the time and should surprise no one. But it’s a non-story because it’s just not important and has nothing to do with what Timoney was doing in Philadelphia then as a public official – from what I can determine. It is difficult to tell (because she stops the narrative mid story) but she seems to think there was something meaningful in the fact that Timoney was cracking down on drugs while his own daughter was struggling with them. I don’t see why that’s important; expresses a kind of naivete about news, life, police work. Gossip is not news.
A lot of young people go into journalism and then leave it – discovering it’s not for them. That’s fine. I found her CJR article interesting because of what it might say about younger journalists today, in terms of the training they are getting or not getting, etc. The mentors she might have had – perhaps – are being let go – as media has been decimated by cuts in recent years. This story she’s telling might be better told by someone who has had a long career in journalism. And though I think she’s off the mark at times with her ideas, her perspective is interesting. I read this article in a way that I doubt she intended.
> think there was something meaningful in the fact
That this was nearly exactly the heavy backstory in Traffik/Traffic may also have had something to do with it? Or maybe I’m misremembering it – I get distracted when Bill Forsyth alumni turn up twenty years later.
You’re right no doubt about heavy damage to the journalistic ecosystem. Why is that blame-finger never pointed at the publisher, by the way.
Right, right. I’d forgotten about Traffic.
Publishers deserve a lot of blame. You’re right.
This is an example of where she’s off the mark:
“So I wrote what I know, or rather what I’ve learned, which could be summed up this way: when the Internet forced journalism to compete economically after years of monopoly, journalism panicked and adopted some of the worst examples of the nothing-based economy, in which success depends on the continued infantilization of both supply and demand.”
Well, this began long before the Internet was a factor – publishers looking to boost profits for their newly publicly-owned companies began to cut away at news a lot earlier than when the web came along. That’s an oversimplified version of what happened.
I can go on and on.
Hey, if you want to read a great piece on the end of news and newspapers, and you haven’t already, try this one:
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/11/0082712
You won’t regret it.
> an oversimplified version
Not that oversimplified.
Also, it happened in every other industry. As they’re saying on Boing Boing, “Are you fcking happy? The rig is on fire”
Thanks for the Harpers link. I liked this piece there:
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/12/0082740
The unresolved mystery is why everybody just played along. (Everybody still does. Me too.)
I suppose the Timoney thing is fair game. I wouldn’t have had a problem with her reporting it, even though, yes, it happens all the time and should surprise no one. But it’s a non-story because it’s just not important and has nothing to do with what Timoney was doing in Philadelphia then as a public official – from what I can determine. It is difficult to tell (because she stops the narrative mid story) but she seems to think there was something meaningful in the fact that Timoney was cracking down on drugs while his own daughter was struggling with them. I don’t see why that’s important; expresses a kind of naivete about news, life, police work. Gossip is not news.
A lot of young people go into journalism and then leave it – discovering it’s not for them. That’s fine. I found her CJR article interesting because of what it might say about younger journalists today, in terms of the training they are getting or not getting, etc. The mentors she might have had – perhaps – are being let go – as media has been decimated by cuts in recent years. This story she’s telling might be better told by someone who has had a long career in journalism. And though I think she’s off the mark at times with her ideas, her perspective is interesting. I read this article in a way that I doubt she intended.
> think there was something meaningful in the fact
That this was nearly exactly the heavy backstory in Traffik/Traffic may also have had something to do with it? Or maybe I’m misremembering it – I get distracted when Bill Forsyth alumni turn up twenty years later.
You’re right no doubt about heavy damage to the journalistic ecosystem. Why is that blame-finger never pointed at the publisher, by the way.
Right, right. I’d forgotten about Traffic.
Publishers deserve a lot of blame. You’re right.
This is an example of where she’s off the mark:
“So I wrote what I know, or rather what I’ve learned, which could be summed up this way: when the Internet forced journalism to compete economically after years of monopoly, journalism panicked and adopted some of the worst examples of the nothing-based economy, in which success depends on the continued infantilization of both supply and demand.”
Well, this began long before the Internet was a factor – publishers looking to boost profits for their newly publicly-owned companies began to cut away at news a lot earlier than when the web came along. That’s an oversimplified version of what happened.
I can go on and on.
Hey, if you want to read a great piece on the end of news and newspapers, and you haven’t already, try this one:
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/11/0082712
You won’t regret it.
> an oversimplified version
Not that oversimplified.
Also, it happened in every other industry. As they’re saying on Boing Boing, “Are you fcking happy? The rig is on fire”
Thanks for the Harpers link. I liked this piece there:
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/12/0082740
The unresolved mystery is why everybody just played along. (Everybody still does. Me too.)