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Monday Morning Meta Media Mashup

James Brady, David Carr, Bambi Francisco, John Mancini

By Dylan Stableford – March 19, 2007
monday_morning_media_brady.jpgA weekly meta-roundup of our favorite media pundits, what they're saying, why they're saying it, and an all-important grade, subjective and arbitrary — just like their columns!
  • "All The World's A Story" | David Carr, New York Times

    Timesman David Carr turns free-time, post-Carpetbagger blogging duties, into bonus coverage of Assignment Zero, the "crodsourcing" journalism experiment from Wired and NYU journo prof Jay Rosen and his NewAssignment.net. Before your eyes glaze over while processing the "gossamer bit of Web 2.0 precociousness," Carr points out that Gannett is in the process of making the newsrooms at its 90 newspapers into "information centers," a place where readers "are given access to all the tools of journalism including, yes, the journalists themselves. Tools? You mean like Google and a phone? GRADE: B+

  • "Vanity Fair-est" | James Brady, Forbes

    Shameless:  "I enjoyed a 'power lunch' at The Four Seasons in Manhattan the other day with the slick monthly's new publisher, Edward J. Menicheschi, just back from his first-ever 'night at the Oscars,' who told me all about Vanity Fair's juice out there on the West Coast. Norman Lear asked if he could bring a guest to Vanity Fair's famous Oscar night party, a notoriously tough ticket. 'Sure, who is it?' Menicheschi asked. 'Maya Angelou,' said Lear."  GRADE: D

  • "Emerging confrontation with 'citizen journalists'" | Bambi Francisco, Marketwatch

    Taking a break from our weekly meta-media commentary on Jon Friedman's media commentary, we turn to Friedman's fellow Marketwatcher Bambi Francisco (real name) who attempts to traverse  something that, despite the title, doesn't seem to be an "emerging" phenomenon: mainstream media confronting "citizen journalists." Bambi points to Andrew Keen's The Cult of the Amateur: How the Democratization of the Digital World Is Assaulting Our Economy, Our Culture and Our Values: "If we keep up this pace, there will be over five hundred million blogs by 2010, collectively corrupting and confusing popular opinion about everything from politics to commerce, to arts and culture." Bambi says Keen is "spot-on" in his prediction, but stops there. "I disagree that the influence will corrupt the process." Agreed, Bambi, agreed. GRADE: B+

  • "What's Going On" | John Mancini, Newsday

    John Mancini is not a Newsday columnist. He's the paper's managing editor. He didn't write a media column. He wrote an e-mail to his staff. But it wasn't your typical editor-to-staff state of the union fare. We wouldn't even call it a pep talk. It was out of a movie, like "something between a cri de coeur and a call to arms," as Gawker so aptly put it. It was impassioned, rambling, scary. "Newsday is blessed with a talented, loyal and determined staff. You have endured sweeping change, embraced new challenges and overcome daunting obstacles in the past few years. Uncertainty surrounds our corporate ownership structure. Yet throughout unsettling times, you have produced first-class work. Still, we have a higher mountain to climb." It should've been a media column. Seriously. GRADE: A


    [Dylan Stableford is mediabistro.com's managing editor, media news. He can be reached at dylan AT mediabistro DOT com.]
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