I feel a little like Dr. Zhivago
Time magazine has told us what many of us already know.You are the Person of the Year. The Internet has liberated you to make a statement that is as accessible to the world as the statement of any politician. Or any columnist.
Hmmmmm. So it has come to this? Yes, it has. And I am so glad I am no longer dependent solely on my job as a newspaper columnist. Don't tell anyone, but it appears that newspaper columnists - people who make their living telling the masses what they think - is a dead-end career.
These days, anyone with access to the Internet can be a columnist. It's amazing, isn't it? People with ideas they want to share with the world have the capability of sharing them with an audience that's a thousand - no a million - times larger than most columnists who are is fortunate enough to still publishing a newspaper.
I love the movie "Dr. Zhivago." A scene from that movie comes to mind. After the Russian Revolution, Zhivago returns to his spectacular family home in Moscow. He discovers that the expansive mansion is inhabited by 15 families of Russian peasants who have "liberated" it in the name of the people.
When confronted by the fact that the revolution has changed things, Dr. Zhivago tells one of the peasants "It's much better this way, comrades...really it is."
Did the good doctor really mean it or was he simply trying to pacify "the majority" that had taken over his house?
Well, does it make any difference? That's the way it was in Russia and Zhivago knew that he simply had to deal with it.
So it is with the Internet revolution. Nothing can stop it. Like the Russian Revolution that was inevitable, so is the Internet Revolution. My ideas are no more important than anyone else's.
The fact I had access to the major distribution system for years, while others didn't, made all the difference to me. Now everyone has access to an idea distribution system that's many times more potent than an ink-on-paper distribution system that is rapidly disappearing as a major force.
But I really don't have to worry about the demise of one system in favor of another, at least when it comes to ideas. I can sit back and enjoy the chaos it has caused while I collect my Social Security check and revel in the joys of writing two columns a week for the Charleston Daily Mail because someone up there still thinks they matter. And who am I to argue with them?
posted by Dave Peyton @ 11:43 AM
4 Comments:
Take heart Dave.
While shoppers will continue to flock to Wal-Mart and eBay in the name of price, we are seeing a rebound in retailing where 'middle-market' stores such as Target are finding that many shoppers want a different mix of price, quality and service than you generally get at Wal-Mart or on the Internet.
You're right, the Internet is an information dissemination system unlike anything seen before on this planet. It's the Wal-Mart of information, and most of it is crap and clogs up the aisleways.
It was once said that had the railroads understood that they were in the transportation business and not the railroad business, we would be flying C&O Airways today. But they got stuck in the past. It didn't help that they had 'railroad' in their name.
Same thing with the newspapers. As you know, we had online newspapers on CompuServe nearly 25 years ago. Most publishers thought it was a cute experiment, but nothing that would replace newsprint and ink. Most newspapers got stuck on the 'paper' in their name, and forgot that their business is information, not printing.
Part of my daily routine is to scan the RSS feeds to which I've subscribed. Some are big name news organizations such as CNN, and others are individual blogs, like yours. I subscribe to publishers who have sufficient quality in their writing to make it worth my time and attention. I read my local paper, the Columbus Dispatch, first through the RSS feed, and pick up the printed version only after I've retired for the evening.
But the point is that I still look for information, analysis and commentary from organizations and individuals who publish a high-quality product. The medium has changed, but not the value of the writing -- or the writer.
By the way, I'm disappointed that neither the Gazette nor the Daily Mail generate an RSS feed.
Paul:
I know where you're coming from. I was working at a newspaper full time when I was doing CompuServe and folks there were literally laughing at me because of my fascination with this "craze" that would soon pass, as they saw it.
When it comes to the present, I am not talking about the nuts and bolts of news gathering and dissemination that news organizations continue to do and will continue to do. I'm talking about the opinion side of the business, which is where I have been for a couple of decades and where I continue to be.
Opinion writing is a separate entity and, as I see it, that's the side that has changed radically because of the unleashing of the Internet upon the world.
People will still seek out reliable sources where they can get the news they want. I still check the Huntington newspaper online daily to see if there is any substantial news that might affect me. Usually there isn't. Now that I am older, I check the local obituary column to see who I know who has died. I read the Charleston Daily Mail online and the Charleston Gazette online to see what's happening at the state level that might affect me or for column fodder.
But here's a revelation: I do not know a single person who reads commentary produced by any of these newspapers these days. I get a few e-mails about my columns in the Daily Mail, both pro and con. But my friends don't read my column in the Mail and neither does my wife most of the time.
And here's yet another secret. No one that I know reads individual blogs on a daily basis either. I suspect there are more Americans writing blogs than reading them, I mean really reading them rather than "hitting" the site.
However, I don't believe the real purpose of blogs etc. is to convince anyone of anything or get anyone to read what's being written. For the most part, I look at blogging as verbal masturbation.
But come to think of it, so is column writing.
I still read the paper, and I read the news online. I'll read pretty much anything Dave, but I only read a few blogs- some of them are local, but I have to say most of them aren't. I believe that you are correct when you say that most people don't read the blogs. There is a reason for that- most of them are terrible. I mean, opinions are one thing, but fanatics abound, and the rest is pretty boring. Really Dave, who cares what color some lady in Berkley Springs is going to paint her bathroom? (If she was going to encase it in glass so she could see outside while she was using the toilet I might read it.)I'm just saying...
you keep writing it, I'll keep reading it. Yours is one that I read. darbi
And I'll keep reading yours Darbi at
http://www.bearwallerhollar.net/ because it's damned funny.
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