The background:

Andrew Bogut, Australia’s only “proper” NBA player, recently gave an interview to the Sydney Morning Herald, the Aussie version of the NY Times, in which he said some pretty pointed things about American culture. Some of the comments, it seems, came off as race related (NBA players are predominantly Black[1] after all).

This would, on the surface, appear to be the sort of issue the media usually blows out of all proportion. But they didn’t, as the mainstream American media was, well, quiet.

Where this gets interesting for me is this articles by David Steele of the Baltimore Sun. In the article, David Steele writes:

…and virtually nobody talks about (the article on Bogut).

Well, that’s not totally true. The blogosphere blew up as soon as the article started making the rounds… Refreshingly, much of the talk was calm and reasoned, something we’re still waiting on with the Imus and Duke lacrosse cases… One segment of the population talked about the same issues Bogut brought out without actually mentioning them directly, while a parallel media universe dug into Bogut’s comments and actually advanced the dialogue.

Here’s to that parallel universe, then.

Great, an old media guy gets it. Blogs, far from being written by a bunch of illiterate, extremist nutjobs, can actual provide reasonable comment, even the best commentary on occasion.

But wait, where are the links? Why didn’t Mr Steele link to all those “calm and reasoned” blog posts? He must have read them to be able to make such a statement, so why didn’t he link to these posts, at the bare minimum to the SMH article he directly quotes?

As an editorial piece (i.e. opinion not reporting of fact), where is Mr Steele’s attempt to join the conversation he praises? It makes sense to further the discussion by linking to some of these “calm and reasoned” blog posts, and to go one better and quote some particularly poignant comments.

That there are no links shows that, even when they kinda, sorta, almost get it, old media still doesn’t quite get it. A written conversation requires links to what you are responding to in order to be, well, a conversation. If you want to be a part of the conversation, or “advance the dialogue” as Mr Steele phrases it, you have to link out and let people explore the conversation as they choose. Even if we do Mr Steele the favour of assuming that this is an online version of an offline piece, making links in the original format impossible, a set of URLs at the bottom, even of the paper article, would have been a helpful.

What is perhaps most interesting is that a journalist would dare entertain the notion, let alone put into print, the possibility that the unpaid, unprofessional hoards of people who write blogs for love not money could be capable of writing reasoned posts, and tackling a thorny issue that the old, professional media ignored.

It shouldn’t really surprise anyone that it is possible though. Mainstream media are driven by one primary goal: to make money. big media companies need to turn a profit, and this has lead to the rise of “infotainment” and “newstainment”, where journalism takes a back seat to ratings winners. News and current affairs today, rather than offer reasoned debate, instead juxtapose extreme viewpoints that lead to ratings winning shouting matches heated debates, or choose over scrutinise trivial, popularist issues like every tiny aspect of the few days a woman who is famous for being famous and making a sex tape spends in prison. When old media, serious, proper old media not just the tabloids, is not just reporting Paris Hilton’s prison stay, but leading off news bulletins with the story, all because it rates well and makes the outlet money, is it any wonder that complicated and delicate issues like race and culture are no longer tackled?

For all the criticisms Blogs receive, and old media loves to sink the knee in at every opportunity, the fact that blogs are not money makers for shareholders motivated by monetary self interest before journalistic integrity may actually be their greatest advantage. And when Blogs written out of passion with no expectation of financial gain are not only representing a broader range of human perspectives than the myopic, middle of the bell curve old media, but are also venturing into a wider range of topics, is it any wonder that old media is scared?

1 – And Black, not African American, is the right word, as Tony Parker, Johan Petro, Dikembe Mutombo Mikael Pietris are all examples of non-American blacks playing in the NBA.What is the Politically Correct word for the non-American blacks, or the collective term when not every black person in the group is American? Does such a Politically Correct word exist?

Addendum
To avoid howls of hypocrisy, for those interested in the conversation surrounding what Bogut said, this article and this (unfortuantely numbered) article are good places to start.