This is a great debate! My two cents: Much of the content that many newspapers still publish in print doesn't necessarily find the best home online. You know that firsthand, as do I. The media are so different, and many leaders in journalism still fool themselves into thinking you can just “repurpose” stuff between print and Web and satisfy consumers. Indeed, newsrooms have had to overcome the attitude of satisfying print first, and the Web second.

Who's to blame for that approach?

Those who are expected to produce content for print and the Web are really working in media that is dramatically different from each other. If we — the collective “we” who work in newspapers, and not just newsroom folks — have stumbled, it is because we have failed to grasp how game-changing the Web is for the content we produce.

The more I do this stuff, the more I realize that as a practical, day-to-day matter, journalists should focus almost all their energies on either satisfying the print beast or the Web beast. Because doing both well is exceptionally difficult, and you'll most likely end up doing a mediocre job in both.

Happy Monday!
Gus

This is a great debate! My two cents: Much of the content that many newspapers still publish in print doesn't necessarily find the best home online. You know that firsthand, as do I. The media are so different, and many leaders in journalism still fool themselves into thinking you can just “repurpose” stuff between print and Web and satisfy consumers. Indeed, newsrooms have had to overcome the attitude of satisfying print first, and the Web second.

Who's to blame for that approach?

Those who are expected to produce content for print and the Web are really working in media that is dramatically different from each other. If we — the collective “we” who work in newspapers, and not just newsroom folks — have stumbled, it is because we have failed to grasp how game-changing the Web is for the content we produce.

The more I do this stuff, the more I realize that as a practical, day-to-day matter, journalists should focus almost all their energies on either satisfying the print beast or the Web beast. Because doing both well is exceptionally difficult, and you'll most likely end up doing a mediocre job in both.

Happy Monday!
Gus

This is a great debate! My two cents: Much of the content that many newspapers still publish in print doesn't necessarily find the best home online. You know that firsthand, as do I. The media are so different, and many leaders in journalism still fool themselves into thinking you can just “repurpose” stuff between print and Web and satisfy consumers. Indeed, newsrooms have had to overcome the attitude of satisfying print first, and the Web second.

Who's to blame for that approach?

Those who are expected to produce content for print and the Web are really working in media that is dramatically different from each other. If we — the collective “we” who work in newspapers, and not just newsroom folks — have stumbled, it is because we have failed to grasp how game-changing the Web is for the content we produce.

The more I do this stuff, the more I realize that as a practical, day-to-day matter, journalists should focus almost all their energies on either satisfying the print beast or the Web beast. Because doing both well is exceptionally difficult, and you'll most likely end up doing a mediocre job in both.

Happy Monday!
Gus

Of course there are qualitative differences in journalism, just as there are in any media but quality tends to be a threshold issue. And of course poorly resourced outlets produce thinner fare. It was ever thus – just read Charles Dudley Warner's The American Newspaper from the late 19C.

I posted about it here.

There's a lot of great journalism around today – more than ever online – but that's not helping to make journalists more valuable in a mature mass media.