grodscorp@grods.com
Great opinion piece in today’s Age about society’s need for quality newspapers offering quality journalism. The irony of such a piece appearing in The Age — Melbourne’s leading “AB” advertisers’ lifestyle and celebrity news journal of choice — was delicious.
My emphasis on newspapers is rooted in the core belief that political civilisation may depend in some circumstances on their flowering. Whether arrayed clinically on a digital computer screen, or splashed across newsprint that inevitably leaves ink on your hands as you pore over it, the newspaper at its best is a carrier of complexity. Any idiot news medium can handle the Paris Hilton story, but only a truly good newspaper can hope to offer you any wisdom at all on the daunting complexities of international currency imbalances, the Russian resurgence and China’s weird stock market — not to mention the entire sprawling complexity of the Muslim world.
And just for a giggle, The Age provided us with the ultimate juxtaposition in the article’s online version:
Highlighted: “Any idiot news medium can handle the Paris Hilton story”
UPDATE 8 JUNE: And The Age’s front page a day later…
UPDATE 9 JUNE: Iain Hall — idiot news medium.
Thursday 7 June 2007, 12:58 pm #Steve
You should send the Paris Hilton juxtaposition into Media Watch.
Thursday 7 June 2007, 7:26 pm #Mikey
Pure West.
That bad boy should go to boss@crikey.com.au
Sunday 10 June 2007, 9:59 am #junaman
Front page of today’s Sunday Age - Masterpiece.
Wreaking of literary prowess, with journalistic integrity seeping from all orifices.
Sunday 10 June 2007, 10:38 am #The Editor
Beat me by half an hour, junaman.
Sunday 10 June 2007, 10:38 am #GrodsCorp » Idiot news medium gets idioter
[...] few days ago The Age ran an opinion piece arguing that newspapers were a special news medium in that they offered serious, important and [...]