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I never thought I’d see the day when newspapers would be agonizing over whether to allow readers to comment on stories. An excerpt:
Faced with declining circulation, many U.S. newspapers are trying to engage readers by allowing them to respond to news stories online. But the anonymity of the Internet lets readers post obscenities and racist hate speech that would never be allowed in the printed paper.
First, how does allowing comments on stories posted online help with print circulation? With a few exceptions, newspaper web sites allow free access to all stories (though they may require free registration). I don’t see the connection. Regarding online ad revenue, I don’t think allowing comments on stories necessarily increases online newspaper readership. Some of the highest trafficked bloggers I know don’t allow comments. It’s the perceived value of the information, in my opinion, not what readers have to say about it, that brings the eyes.
Second, I’m not too quick to trust a leftist journalist’s judgment about what is or isn’t “racist hate speech.” Sometimes, telling the truth about a person or situation is construed as hateful. Expressing an opinion that may offend liberal sensibilities or challenge his worldview might be called racist.
Third, while I get a kick out of reading feedback on some stories, I don’t think newspapers should waste time worrying about whether to allow it. Like this guy:
Ted Vaden, ombudsman for The News and Observer in Raleigh, N.C., wrote an editorial earlier this month questioning whether anonymous Web posts hurt the credibility of the paper. He supports requiring users to attach their names to comments, just as they are required to do for letters to the editor.
“We’re trying to conform to the blogosphere culture, which is one of freewheeling debate and resistance to censorship,” he said.
But that format “seems to provide an opportunity for racists and various other kinds of unpleasant comment,” he said. “It challenges our standards because information can end up on our online sites we would not allow in print.”
I do think anonymous comments hurt a newspaper’s credibility. Newspapers supposedly operate under certain journalistic standards – unlike blogs – and if they wouldn’t allow anonymous letters to the editor or the use of anonymous sources for stories, they shouldn’t allow anonymous comments.
But that’s where they run into the cost issue. How much time should they dedicate to moderating comments? Time is money, and if you believe the hype, newspapers are losing money.
If a newspaper wants to “conform to the blogosphere culture,†they can create a blog, as many have. While I’ve argued that the growing influence of the blogosphere has challenged journalists in many ways, journalists shouldn’t concede their primary position as reporters. Their job is to find the story and report it, not worry about what sort of comments they’ll receive from online readers. The blogosphere has the flexibility to allow “freewheeling debate and resistance to censorship†(though what goes on in most comment sections is not a true debate), but a newspaper is not a blog and a news story is not a blog post. A newspaper is a newspaper and a blog is a blog. Readers have plenty of opportunities to provide feedback for stories. They can start a blog! After all, that’s how the blogosphere became the “next big thing.â€
A media guy quoted in the story said, “Lots of people want to take action when they read a story. In the old days if you were upset about something, you could tell one person at the water cooler. Now you can forward it to 100 friends and say, ‘We need to do something.’”
Starting a blog is doing something. On the conservative side, we were frustrated by what we consider to be a liberal slant in most news stories. We went online to vent and to correct, and that’s how the political blogosphere grew. Blogs exist for people to “take action.” It’s not a newspaper’s job to allow a bunch of idiots hiding behind phony names to vent on their web sites. If they want to do something, let them create their own web sites where they can vent to their hearts’ content.
I’ll admit my bias. I don’t like anonymity or pseudonymity. While I understand that some people use fake names for safety reasons or to avoid retaliation, I prefer they use real names. I tolerate anonymous or pseudonymous comments from civil commenters, but I have no patience for it in trolls. It’s cowardice (in trolls), plain and simple, and cowards are a turn-off. If I can blog under my real name and stand behind what I say, I don’t see why anyone else (blogger or commenter) can’t do the same.
If newspapers want to conform to the blogosphere, they should stop wasting time worrying about comments and learn how to hyperlink to sources the way blogs do. Who cares about reader feedback? Being able to go to the source and see what’s going on for ourselves is much more important.
Agree or disagree? What’s the value, if any, of reader comments on newspaper web sites?
Addendum: In light of my opinion about anonymity, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that I know the real names of many anon and pseudon LBC commenters. It would be unfair to compare them to the total fakers who comment (or try to comment) on this blog.
Update: Commenter “Tyrian Purple” makes an excellent point about newspapers’ old-school way of reporting. Reporters write stories about events, speeches, etc., but here’s how they can improve coverage (emphases added):
“[I]t seems like the editors just don’t get the internet. I am only interested in reading the paper online if it’s from out of town/country, and I therefore can’t get it conveniently. If it’s my hometown paper, I want them to differentiate themselves enough from the dead tree version a coworker brings in. That means, don’t characterize the mayor’s speech, link to a streamed version of it so I can hear it for myself. Don’t tell me what the study said, put it in a PDF or something and let me see it . Then you interview whoever did the study and flesh out the details. If they did that, I’d be interested in the comments, but they don’t do that. So if I’m ignoring the dead tree edition, what’s my incentive to read the electronic one when it’s just a digitized version of the one I ignored in the first place?”
Some (major) newspapers already do this. At least one North Carolina newspaper included links to video clips and PDF legal motions during the Duke case. It’s a multimedia world.
All newspapers with online versions should to get into the habit of providing supplemental material for readers and linking to sources within stories. Storing a digital file is cheap. Hyperlinking to online sources takes time, but it should be considered part of the “reporting.”
Later…Echoing Tyrian Purple’s comment, Angel writes, “[I]f you as an editor make it possible to reach beyond the news and give them a portal to further examination of what you have presented as news, no one can claim the ‘liberal’ media isn’t telling the truth.”
