Matt Drudge ja Rupert Murdoch - sipelgas ja imperaator

Mis saab blogidest tulevikus? Kas nad kaovad ülejäänud infomüra sisse või integreeruvad nad hoopis traditsioonilisema meedia interneti lehekülgedega? Kumba peab tõenäolisemaks proto-blogija Matt Drudge, kumba aga meediamagnaat Rupert Murdoch?

Viimase nädala jooksul on mõlemad mehed küsimusele vastanud ja esmapilgul mõnevõrra üllatavalt, kuid seda ainult esmapilgul. The Times'il õnnestus Drudge'ist tema Londoni külastuse ajal välja pigistada põgus intervjuu, kus Drudge ka blogidel peatus:

Back in the 1990s Drudge was a believer in the empowering potential of the internet. In a speech he said, “We have entered an era vibrating with the din of small voices. Every citizen can be a reporter, can take on the powers that be.”

Now he sounds disillusioned and says that the “din” is growing into a cacophony: “There’s a danger of the internet just becoming loud, ugly and boring with a thousand voices screaming for attention.” He is no fan of the blogging phenomenon (weblogs linking sites): “I don’t read them. I like to create waves and not surf them. And who are these influential bloggers? You can’t name one because they don’t exist.”

He loves The Sun — “the best newspaper in England” — and BBC Radio 5. He even loves Michael Moore, the Bush-baiting documentary maker: “He’s genius.” And he does not believe that the internet will be the end of newspapers: “The internet feeds off the main press and the main press feeds off the internet. They’re working in tandem. I think what will happen is that newspapers will be printed throughout the day so you get different editions like in the old days.”

Vaid mõned päevad varem pidas Rupert Murdoch (ülevaatlik artikkel mehe varasemast tegevusest) Ameerika Ajalehetoimetajat Ühingule kõne, mis oli märksa positiivsemalt blogide suhtes meelestatud, kui mitte öelda entusiastlik. Soovitan lugeda tervet Murdochi kõnet kõigil, kes ajakirjandusega tihedamalt on seotud, kuid toon ära ka mõned huvitavamad lõigud:

Think about how blogs and message boards revealed that Kryptonite bicycle locks were vulnerable to a Bic pen. Or the Swiftboat incident. Or the swift departure of Dan Rather from CBS. One commentator, Jeff Jarvis, puts it this way: give the people control of media, they will use it. Don’t give people control of media, and you will lose them.
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We have to refashion what our web presence is. It can’t just be what it too often is today: a bland repurposing of our print content. Instead, it will need to offer compelling and relevant content. Deep, deep local news. Relevant national and international news. Commentary and debate. Gossip and humor.

Some newspapers will invest sufficient resources to continuously update the news, because digital natives don’t just check the news in the morning – they check it throughout the day. If my child played a little league baseball game in the morning, it would be great to be able to access the paper’s website in the afternoon to get a summary of her game, maybe even accompanied by video highlights.

But our internet site will have to do still more to be competitive. For some, it may have to become the place for conversation. The digital native doesn’t send a letter to the editor anymore. She goes online, and starts a blog. We need to be the destination for those bloggers. We need to encourage readers to think of the web as the place to go to engage our reporters and editors in more extended discussions about the way a particular story was reported or researched or presented.

At the same time, we may want to experiment with the concept of using bloggers to supplement our daily coverage of news on the net. There are of course inherent risks in this strategy -- chief among them maintaining our standards for accuracy and reliability. Plainly, we can’t vouch for the quality of people who aren’t regularly employed by us – and bloggers could only add to the work done by our reporters, not replace them. But they may still serve a valuable purpose; broadening our coverage of the news; giving us new and fresh perspectives to issues; deepening our relationship to the communities we serve, so long as our readers understand the clear distinction between bloggers and our journalists.

To carry this one step further, some digital natives do even more than blog with text – they are blogging with audio, specifically through the rise of podcasting – and to remain fully competitive, some may want to consider providing a place for that as well.

And with the growing proliferation of broadband, the emphasis online is shifting from text only to text with video. The future is soon upon us in this regard. Google and Yahoo already are testing video search while other established cable brands, including FOX News, are accompanying their text news stories with video clips.

To carry this one step further, some digital natives do even more than blog with text – they are blogging with audio, specifically through the rise of podcasting – and to remain fully competitive, some may want to consider providing a place for that as well.

And with the growing proliferation of broadband, the emphasis online is shifting from text only to text with video. The future is soon upon us in this regard. Google and Yahoo already are testing video search while other established cable brands, including FOX News, are accompanying their text news stories with video clips.

What this means for us as newspapers is the opportunity to partner with credible video programmers to provide an infinitely better product. More access to news; more visually entertaining news and advertising product; deeper and more penetrating coverage.

Kõne on pikemat laadi, kuid lugemist väärt, sest Murdoch on korduvalt demonstreerinud võimet tajuda trende ja inimeste vajadusi ning mitte ainult tajuda vaid ka reaalselt pakkuda inimestele seda, mida nad soovivad. See, mida keegi pakutavast arvab on aga eraldi teema, millesse selles postituses ei soovi laskuda.

Drudge'i ja Murdoch'i suhtumine blogidesse näib olevat nagu öö ja päev, kuid arusaam blogide rollist tulevikus tundub mõlemal mehel olevat sarnane: blogid ei hakka kunagi ajalehti asendama vaid täiendama, pakkuma lisandväärtust, mida saavad kõige edukamalt kasutada meediakonglomeraadid, mis ei piirdu ainult tekstiga vaid suudavad pakkuda ka audiot ja videot.

Mulle tundub, et Drudge ei näe blogides enda tegevusele mingit erilist tuge samas kui Murdochi silmad on blogide tegevust vaadates särama löönud ning mees tajub, millist tuge võib anonüümsele meediakonglomeraadile pakkuda blogide isiklikus.