Peter Thiel vs Gawker

[The Minsky Moment]

Does the First Amendment compel me to approve of everything?

Au contraire.  It doesn't compel you to approve of anything.  Certainly not the horrific shitshow that is Terry Bollea and Nick Denton.  But it also doesn't allow one to suppress or destroy that which one finds obnoxious.

[grumbler]

God forbid a media outlet should be fun. Pearl clutching aside there's nothing wrong with tabloid fun or a style that manages to still seem like a personal blog.

The biggest crime of any journalism is to be boring. Gawker was never that.

Our American posters are forgetting that the First Amendment protects freedom of the press.  Not freedom of "journalism"

Does the First Amendment compel me to approve of everything? Damn. Is happiness also mandatory?

Our American lawyer posters are forgetting that the First Amendment isn't about their personal tastes in journalism, it is about free speech.  Including yours.

[grumbler]

Don't have to be a shock-jock. The FT isn't boring, neither's Politico - they're just niche which is fine. But if they're putting out stuff that noone can be arsed, to read then they deserve to fail. The key for any journo is to be interesting and engaging because they're asking us to take the time out to read them

I absolutely disagree.  Proper journalism is about telling a compelling and relevant story, not about being a compelling and relevant journalist.  Better stories should be the goal, not better storytellers.

[Sheilbh]

I absolutely disagree.  Proper journalism is about telling a compelling and relevant story, not about being a compelling and relevant journalist.  Better stories should be the goal, not better storytellers.

I probably wasn't clear I mean for their writing and work to be interesting and engaging. Whether that's just on style points, for content or both I think is much of a muchness and different people will have different preferences. The only thing they can't be is dull.

For Gawker their whole approach was closer to blogging - which is always personal and depends on a voice. Like Andrew Sullivan (the only other example I can think of as an early blogger who defined the form) that voice was part of the reason to read. The stories are normally available elsewhere even if they break it. As someone pointed out, journalists are more fun to chat to in a pub than read in print and Gawker tried to close that gap. In general their work was too good (huge number of stories about domestic abuse by sportsmen which I think have mattered, Rob Ford) to be totally happy they're closing and too awful (they were, very often, bullies) to be martyrs.

[grumbler]

I absolutely disagree.  Proper journalism is about telling a compelling and relevant story, not about being a compelling and relevant journalist.  Better stories should be the goal, not better storytellers.

I probably wasn't clear I mean for their writing and work to be interesting and engaging. Whether that's just on style points, for content or both I think is much of a muchness and different people will have different preferences. The only thing they can't be is dull.

For Gawker their whole approach was closer to blogging - which is always personal and depends on a voice. Like Andrew Sullivan (the only other example I can think of as an early blogger who defined the form) that voice was part of the reason to read. The stories are normally available elsewhere even if they break it. As someone pointed out, journalists are more fun to chat to in a pub than read in print and Gawker tried to close that gap. In general their work was too good (huge number of stories about domestic abuse by sportsmen which I think have mattered, Rob Ford) to be totally happy they're closing and too awful (they were, very often, bullies) to be martyrs.

Bloggers are not journalists.  They are the equivalent of the old op-ed writers.  And you have been quite clear that, for you, style can substitute for substance.  I just don't happen to agree.  I think that there is writing for entertainment, and there is writing for communication, and that journalists do the latter, while Gawker et al do the former.  There is nothing wrong with writing for entertainment - that's what we all do here, after all, but I don't consider the writers here to be journalists any more than the Gawker writers were.   "Write whatever you want, however you want, as long as you get page views" isn't journalism.

[Sheilbh]

Bloggers can be journalists it depends if they're reporting or just commentating/analysing.

They were reporting too - as I say, see the Rob Ford stuff and NFL domestic violence cases. They broke stories and were a model for other new media sites like Buzzfeed who've now branched out into genuinely excellent journalism as well as internet snark/lists/cats. I think it's a bit like when the picture, scandal and murder heavy tabloids - like the Picture Post - came out in early twentieth century. It's just a slightly different approach.

[grumbler]

Bloggers can be journalists it depends if they're reporting or just commentating/analysing.

They were reporting too - as I say, see the Rob Ford stuff and NFL domestic violence cases. They broke stories and were a model for other new media sites like Buzzfeed who've now branched out into genuinely excellent journalism as well as internet snark/lists/cats. I think it's a bit like when the picture, scandal and murder heavy tabloids - like the Picture Post - came out in early twentieth century. It's just a slightly different approach.

We'll just have to agree to disagree, I think.  I simply don't accept that the difference between being a journalist and not being a journalist is whether or not you are reporting new information.  To me, journalism is about reporting all the facts available in a manner that gives the reader confidence that the story contains all the relevant facts and that the facts reported are true.  Journalists have editors (and, ideally, fact-checkers) and a reputation for professionalism to maintain.  I reject your concept that Ed Anger becomes a journalist when he describes here, first-person, his latest bowel movement.

[The Minsky Moment]

Our American lawyer posters are forgetting that the First Amendment isn't about their personal tastes in journalism, it is about free speech.  Including yours.

?

[dps]

To me, journalism is about reporting all the facts available in a manner that gives the reader confidence that the story contains all the relevant facts and that the facts reported are true.

So you consider journalism a fictional construct?

[The Brain]

  I reject your concept that Ed Anger becomes a journalist when he describes here, first-person, his latest bowel movement.

Indeed. He becomes a scientist, according to Real Peer Review.

[Ed Anger]

SCIENCE!

[Jacob]

The swan song: http://gawker.com/gawker-was-murdered-by-gaslight-1785456581?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=Gawker_twitter

[Barrister]

The swan song: http://gawker.com/gawker-was-murdered-by-gaslight-1785456581?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=Gawker_twitter

Good article.

[Sheilbh]

Agreed.

[Admiral Yi]

It sucked.  "The NY Times did stuff just as bad.  boo hoo hoo."