This morning, I appeared as a guest on WHYY's Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane, talking about the future on newspapers. Tom Rosenstiel of the Project for Excellence in Journalism was the other guest and we discussed how journalism will be paid for in the Internet era.
The death of newspapers need not be the death of journalism. Kossacks know newspapers aren't the only, or even best, source of news. Years of cuts have left too few newsrooms with the ability to pursue in-depth reporting. And the industry's doctrine of fairness has too often led to a reticence to directly confront powerful sources who lie. Those are two of the reasons why so many readers have turned to the Internet to read alternate news sources, as well as why so many knowledgeable readers have turned to the Internet to become alternate sources.
None of this is news to Daily Kos readers. What I wanted to ask you today is to take the next step, to help those of us who remain in the news industry ensure that investigative reporting remains as powerful a tool for public policy reform.
Our final caller question this morning evolved into a discussion about journalism's role in setting the agenda for public debate. The majority of readers in a given community no longer get their news from a single, common source - the daily newspaper. Instead, people have the power to go online and discover news from a wide variety of sources. But many people fear that, without a common source of news, important investigative stories will not get the public's ear. People will burrow into self-affirming echo chambers where they never find news that challenges their selected point of view.
That's where you come in. I love that people now have the power to select their own sources of news. Breaking the news monopoly allows us to hear from many important points of view that were silenced before, including points of view more accurate and honest than those that make it into traditional daily news reports.
But... "For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required." Or if you prefer more contemporary superheroes: "With great power there must come great responsibility."
The power to select the news cuts both ways. As you have the power to select the news sources you find most compelling, you, as an individual news consumer in the Internet era, have a responsibility to help deliver that news to the public's ear. You cannot rely anymore on a story's appearance on the CBS Evening News, or on the front page of the New York Times, to get the public's ongoing attention. It's up to you to create the echo chamber that spreads a story to those who must hear it, including those burrowed into their own personal information chambers.
This is the point that I was not given the time to make at the end of the show: When you see important information online, as an educated news consumer you have a responsibility to pass it along. And not merely to those who share your point of view, but to friends and family who do not. E-mail it, post it to Facebook, Twitter it, Digg it and blog it, too. Talk about it, face to face, or over the phone. Use the power of today's social networks to replicate the power of yesterday's newspapers to spread vital reporting throughout your community.
The price of democracy is engagement. And that's price of people-powered social media, as well. Progressives who won in 2008 did so not simply by appealing to their base, but by appealing to others'. We must engage all in our communities, online and off, if we want to see the truth spread.
We can't rely on professional journalists and monopoly newspapers to do that for us anymore. And I welcome that. I hope that you will, too.