tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1023809150725835717.post6273809528667955359..comments2023-11-05T01:05:38.453-08:00Comments on chespeak: Is there Future for Journalism as a Career?Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08922847649122074587noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1023809150725835717.post-1826634274255218132008-04-02T07:44:00.000-07:002008-04-02T07:44:00.000-07:00Thank you Che for letting me know about your blog....Thank you Che for letting me know about your blog. I went through it and found the postings interesting and thought-provoking. I shall watch out for future postings. <BR/><BR/>This one about journalism touches a raw nerve. Don’t know why it should after all I am no longer a ‘journalist’ but it does probably because it was my first and only profession and I feel strongly about the relationship between media and society. <BR/><BR/>Dr Santhakumar has implied that media organisations do not or will not need talented and / or trained journalists. Funnily enough, I was one of the last batch of non-trained, non-MCJ or non-diploma journalist to enter Indian Express and I remember S.K. making his terse (and only) favourable comment to me then: “As long as you know your English, that is fine, the rest you will pick up here”! Later on, we saw the emergence of trained journalists – I trained them too a decade later - entering the print and later in a very big way the electronic media. While I agree with the spirit of what Santhakumar has said, I think it is the case that leading newspapers now take in only trained applicants but the talent they are looking for is completely different to what it used to be earlier. Herein his later comment fits: the gap between rhetoric and reality. If profit is the only motive, then you do not need that well-trained or talented journalists. Such a paper is also less problematic to those in power and less upsetting for all concerned. <BR/><BR/>On two opposite counts I agree with my one-time colleagues Satyadas and Chekkutty. Satyadas is right in saying that morons were always around (we should know☺) and that with commercialism comes in a certain kind of professionalism. But I also agree with Chekutty that there is a problem regarding retaining potentially good journalists in the field (it is the same with teaching – it is badly paid!). The professionalism that creates some celebrity journalists, well-paid jobs and a well turned out and readable paper is around but needless to say, these are not taking on the task of also empowering the backward, marginalized and powerless. Sometimes, I wonder if we are getting nostalgic about good ‘ol times. But, maybe not. I think what we are seeing now is unprecedented - an unabashed and unashamed global capitalism making inroads into every institution in our society. And it is disturbing when that happens to our media, as it still is our only public conscience. If you look outside India, you will see a more professional but a more homogenised media. Big corporations rule. But surely, struggles (hopefully not suicides) both individual and collective will create changes. I see both the bleak future and a light at the end of the tunnel!!! Maybe media can become the conscience of capitalism? Or maybe new-media, the Internet, will wage a war against it?J.Geethahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07513478136910631305noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1023809150725835717.post-25672149913546767002008-03-25T23:32:00.000-07:002008-03-25T23:32:00.000-07:00Joseph Satyadas, a senior journalist in Singapore,...Joseph Satyadas, a senior journalist in Singapore, writes in an email:<BR/><BR/>On journalism and journalists, Malayalam papers have attracted and kept many bright sparks despite journalism veering towards populism and the mundane. That may be true of other regional papers as well. I don't know. <BR/><BR/>Also, morons have always found a niche in English journalism, even before the owners caught on to the idea of populating papers with more of them.<BR/><BR/>There is a bit of light at the end of the tunnel though. Looking at how journalism has grown outside India, commercialism cannot breed morons for long. That is the law of the jungle.<BR/><BR/>SatyadasAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08922847649122074587noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1023809150725835717.post-79736066365038405452008-03-21T21:58:00.000-07:002008-03-21T21:58:00.000-07:00Dr. V Santhakumar writes in an email:Interesting t...Dr. V Santhakumar writes in an email:<BR/><BR/>Interesting to read the essay Saab: When a major part of the revenue comes from non-news content, owners have lesser incentive to improve the news content. Moreover, the advertising revenue(and subscription)depends on larger readership-such larger readership need not be based on reliable reporting. Thus newspapers in an economic sense has lesser incentive to produce and publish relibale and informed pieces. Thus newspapers are like political parties. They have an ideology, but to survive in political market has to please the majority. Thus there can be a gap between rhetoric and reality - and the gap between ideology and practice narrows only when majority has a stake in that ideology. <BR/> <BR/>Newspapers will start publishing reliable and informed news when this is demanded by a larger number of readers. Otherwise, accurate reporting and analysis should become a niche product - and some firms will try to capture such product markets. To some extent The Hindu was doing that earlier but now it has shifted its focus to another market.<BR/> <BR/>As you can see, reality is not that confortable if somebody wants to publish socially relevant informed articles. <BR/><BR/>V SanthakumarAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08922847649122074587noreply@blogger.com