Newsweek has done us all a very great service by printing a pure, perfect example of just how wrong-headed journalism's old guard can be.
Robert J. Samuelson's recent "Judgment Calls" column takes a long look at the future of journalism. His main thought about the web: "If the Internet crashed permanently tomorrow, I'd be thrilled."
In the same column, Samuelson calls journalistic integrety "snobbery," and goes on to pooh-pooh the idea that Rupert Murdoch might tinker with the Wall Street Journal's integrity. It's a real-life version of Kent Brockman's "I for one welcome our new insect overlords."
Samuelson, described by the magazine a "one of the magazine's most recognized writers for his biweekly columns analyzing and reporting socioeconomic issues," uses his Harvard education and decades of experience to draw two conclusions:
1. Loss of editorial independence is good
Samuelson recalls the (imaginary) days when journalists simply did their jobs and didn't bow to outside pressures, such as from advertisers.
"We condescendingly thought that the moneymaking people—advertising salesmen, managers—toiled so that we could pursue our higher purpose, which was to inform the public. We were snobs," he says.
"We've been disabused of our naiveté and arrogance."
Got that? It was naive and arrogant to think their purpose was to inform the public.
2. The Internet is Bad
He doesn't really expand much on his wish that the internet crash permanently, but we don't have to look far in the article to find his reasons.
"...we news types are mourning our lost autonomy and power," he says at one point, and at another "The Internet is stealing our audiences and our ads."
So there you have it: Increased choice has caused his former captive readers to go elsewhere. He misses the days when he was a powerful gatekeeper, and wishes he could go back.
These two things are exactly what the dying media establishment gets wrong over and over again. On the one hand, they've sold out to outside pressures: they serve advertisers, they serve government, they serve everybody but the readers. But their audience should just shut up and take it like they always used to.
And the internet, a miraculous democratizing force that's rushing to fill the void left by the neutered, compromised professional media? Well, it should just go die.