Changing Journalism

The digital age has resulted in a paradigm shift in journalism. The authors of both texts state that there is change in audience in journalism, with the accessibility of the internet and social media. The article titled Against ‘Long-Form Journalism’, is written to call out the negative connotation of the taxonomic classification of Long-Form.  The author sites that ‘Long-Form’ journalism usually turns people away from reading the piece. The video text, How is Social Media Changing Journalism was more focused on the change that is currently being observed in the digital age. I believe the best explanation of the change was when Paula Kerger (President and CEO of PBS) stated that “…what old media can learn from new media is the ability to move quicker, to bring more voices into the conversation, to really create an environment that you could previously only create when you were able to convene people together.”

The accessibility of pictures, video, and text on the internet allows us to connect with stories on a new level. Against ‘Long-Form Journalism cites Snowfall as an exceptional work of modern long-form journalism (taxonomy aside), with over 3.5 million views. I think that this method of journalism is great, and that writers should strive to incorporate mixed media into their work. However, I disagree with the authors viewpoint that long-form journalism is appealing to the audience on the internet.

The author in Against ‘Long-Form Journalism sites Buzzfeed as a source of long-form journalism, but only publishing them a few times, putting emphasis on quality instead of quality. Besides the fact that they used Buzzfeed as an example (I can’t stand logging into Facebook seeing the ’17 pictures of ____ that will make you ____’ posts they usually make’), I disagree with this argument.  If long-form journalism is so compelling to the online community, it would make sense to publish as many as possible. Like Kerger said, new media is all about engaging the audience and starting a conversation. Another person in the video said if the media is not shared on facebook, it is not successful. Buzzfeed knows this, and that’s why they post those puppy articles. While the 3.5 million views seem impressive on Snowfall, I wonder how many views the puppy articles that they release daily receive. Sources of ‘long-form’ journalism should be separate from common internet articles, as long-form journals are more serious. If I see Buzzfeed release a long-form article, I will not read it because I see no credibility in Buzzfeed. Perhaps long-form is successful, but I don’t think it has the huge impact across the web as the author in  Against ‘Long-Form Journalism’ portrayed it.