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| JAMES GORDON BENNETT still holds sway over Andrew and Tim |
Unfortunately James Gordon Bennett did serve some time in Nova Scotia and his baneful influence on current NS journalism is even more apparent.
In an age before bylines, it is unclear if Bennett practised journalism during his time in Halifax or whether he ever conducted the first ever “for-the-record-press-interview” here.
But history does record him being a journalist in New York and in conducting the first ever “on-the-record interview” in April 1836.
They didn’t become popular with other journalists any earlier than the 1860s and in turn they spawned the even greater evil of the press conference : the first US presidential one occurring in 1913.
Neither event became the journalistic norm until the 1970s in many communities : try to prove me wrong by reading the archives of many small town dailies : you will find that on-the-record press conferences and on-the-record interviews simply didn’t exist at that level until recently.
I.F. Stone argued forcefully for a different type of journalism.
He felt that the powerful (or anybody really) should carefully write and edit their information or opinion, put their name to it and publish it publicly for all to see - and to then live by what they wrote. No more false claims that their verbal speech was distorted by the journalist’s printed prose.
And any journalist or any citizen should be able to easily view that statement and to critique publicly, based exactly upon what the author wrote.
Stone did not hate the press release : far from it : he thought there should be more, not less, of them. His journalism mined them for stories : along with public testimony in court cases and before legislative bodies.The grist of his journalistic mill was “for-the-record” but only of the “for-the-public-record” variety.
Call it “Public Domain” journalism.
By pointed contrast, interviews are never granted to everybody nor are press conferences open to everybody.
Technically there aren’t enough hours in the day or strong enough tongue muscles to pull off the first, nor buildings big enough for the second.
So why hold them then, given their technical difficulties ?
I.F. Stone would argue that they exist because they are hugely popular among two sorts of unsavoury types, precisely because of those technical limitations.
The first unsavoury type are the powerful : agreed, aren’t we, that no one really like the powerful ——- even other powerful people don’t like them.
The second unsavoury type is a harder sell ; for they are the paid, professional journalists from the established media that we see and read everyday.
But, bless’em, they are always quite uncertain of their actual social status.
Sure they are paid for their journalism : but so are the hacks from the PUBLIC INQUIRER. Sure many have degrees in journalism but we all know friends’ kids with journalism degrees that never got hired by anyone.
They work for the established media - great ! That establishes their elevated social status above all internal doubts. But wait a minute : who or what defines the “established” media ?
Its actually quite easy. If your publication covers the music industry and Madonna puts out a new album and grants you an exclusive interview, then you are an established music industry publication.
Ditto, if Premier McNeil grants you an exclusive right to attend his press conferences and even sends you an invite, you are definitely an established media outlet in Nova Scotia political circles.
Insecure paid professional journalists and their editor-publisher bosses daily re-confirm their established status (also so very vital to the guys in the bowels of the media outlet trying to selling ads and subscriptions) by checking to see if they are still being invited to the right sort of parties.
But, of course, you gotta pay the toll, to get inside with the in crowd and to remain inside with the in crowd.
You gotta play ball with the guy granting the interview or inviting you to their press conference.
Now there are some limits on their power : in a province with only one big province-wide daily print paper, Premier McNeil is never going to deny the Chronicle Herald a seat at the press conference no matter how much he hates what they write.
But his staffers can hint that the Herald’s reporter X will never get a sit down interview till hell freezes over ( because she always asks unpleasantly tough questions) while reporter Y can drop by anytime (as he only throws softballs).
It used to be easy for the powerful, sitting on the other side of this equation, to pick out the established media from the also rans.
The established media printed a daily broadsheet by hot metal, not a bi-weekly tabloid on offset (oh the battles Nick Fillmore’s Fourth Estate used to have back in the early 1970s.). They have a powerful radio or TV signal, (not a weak community radio or community cable license.)
Back then, it cost at least millions to own a “big iron” rotary press and a fleet of trucks or have a TV station with all its various antenna and equipment. But today, I have a worldwide reach with unlimited space for my stories at the cost of precisely zero.. free.
So then, where does the online newspaper La Presse fit in today ?
In its heyday it sold 250,000 daily print copies into a potential 8 million reader market : that is equal to 10 million copies in today’s USA terms : a powerhouse.
But how to tell it apart from this daily blog for example or the the Halifax Examiner and Frank Magazine blogs ?
The centre cannot hold : journalistic anarchy is loosened upon the world.
The problem deepens when “non-established” “adversarial” publications like the EXAMINER or FRANK seek to become part of the “established” media and expect me to cheer them on.
I can’t : I sincerely believe that the exclusive interview and exclusive press conference seat is the kiss of death to true adversarial journalism.
Exclusivity Journalism, today’s mainstream journalism, is just a variant on the world’s oldest profession...
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