I hope Wayne Ezell reads this
Murdoch to media: You dug yourself a huge hole
To make his point, Murdoch criticized the media reaction after bloggers debunked a "60 Minutes" report by former CBS anchor, Dan Rather, that President Bush had evaded service during his days in the National Guard.
"Far from celebrating this citizen journalism, the establishment media reacted defensively. During an appearance on Fox News, a CBS executive attacked the bloggers in a statement that will go down in the annals of arrogance. '60 Minutes,' he said, was a professional organization with 'multiple layers of checks and balances.' By contrast, he dismissed the blogger as 'a guy sitting in his living room in his pajamas writing.' But eventually it was the guys sitting in their pajamas who forced Mr. Rather and his producer to resign.
"Mr. Rather and his defenders are not alone," he continued. "A recent American study reported that many editors and reporters simply do not trust their readers to make good decisions. Let's be clear about what this means. This is a polite way of saying that these editors and reporters think their readers are too stupid to think for themselves."
At a recent luncheon, I heard the Florida Times Union's former ombudsman Wayne Ezell speak about the way news reporting is changing. I also remember hearing him denigrate blogs as inferior sources of information. The real kicker was when talking to him one on one, he asked me what I thought about the recent changes. When I indicated I wasn't impressed, he essentially told me that I should get used to them. So much for reader feedback.