Are Blogs Bringing Back Yellow Journalism?

Suzanna Logan thinks the blogosphere is producing the sort of yellow journalism people really want to see.

In fact, I think the willingness of bloggers to jazz up journalism is precisely why more folks are turning to them for their news fix. They have tapped into the irresistible appeal that cut-and-dried, faux-objective news stories just don’t have.

This is the niche that used to be filled by local television stations and city newspapers. But local news stations aren’t local anymore. It used to be, at least in the Washington, DC area, you could watch the entire 6 o’clock local newscast without seeing a single national story. The late newscast — the one at 7 P.M. — was where you got your national news. Local stations had reporters like I.J. Hudson, Joe Krebs, Dave Marash, Katie Couric (yes, she used to be an actual journalist), and Lynda Lopez out and about in the city doing stand-ups from the Old Post Office Pavilion, the scene of the latest murder in Southeast, a school whose opening was going to be delayed yet again, or outside the City Council chambers. The only time you saw the Capitol Dome was during the opening credits or if Congress was debating some law that would directly affect the city.

And don’t even get me started about the glories of Dallas Week.

The point is, local news was important and local news stations and city newspapers were expected to cover it. Nowadays they don’t, even though local stories are important and we still want news outlets to cover them. That’s why newspapers are folding and local television stations are laying off reporters. Why should I watch my local NBC station cover the same story that the network’s going to cover with more reporters who are where the story is happening with glitzier production values? Why should I pay to get the Washington Post for news I can read from exactly the same AP and Reuters news wire stories on the internet? What is the Post or Channel 4 doing that I can’t get elsewhere faster, better, and for less money?

Local journalists back then were the same sort of “honest” yellow journalists that Moe Lane is talking about. Heck, sometimes between stories, the anchors would chit chat for a few seconds about the story they just aired. Sometimes they even took a poke at the Powers That Be, especially if they had just wrapped yet another story about how the DC Government couldn’t manage to fill the city’s potholes, some of which were large enough to be considered Hellmouths. The story teasers from the anchors and reporters were attention-getting, occasionally lurid, and often just a tease to get you to the next newscast (who can forget “film at 11″?).

But you’d better believe that we watched them. What’s more, we loved them.

Of course, it would help greatly if our media outlets weren’t acting like a giant cheerleading squad chanting only the party-approved mantra for one side.

Tags: Blogs and Blogging, Journalism