Excellent piece.
But his comment that "The Latin Mass has also opted for a professional, shiny-paper look, and strips of self-consciously arty purple ink are pasted into every page" is a howler.
Or maybe I am not appreciating his reference to 'self-consciously art[iness]." My point is that The Latin Mass magazine would be described as 'professional' looking only to an idea person completely unconcerned with design to begin with. Before you read a word, you know it is put out by folks who inhabit or hanker for a nostalgic universe in a manner reminiscent of The John Birch Society. Don't get me wrong: I actually am a fan of the magazine's *content*. But in a media culture dated design seems unwise if not ugly. You'll have a hard time convincing folks that your hang up is not about the absence of *latin*, versus the content of the mass, if your very layout looks like it harkens back to yesteryear.
The Latin Mass magazine is about as 'arty' in any shape or form as are OSV publications. Both look like they were mocked up decades ago by the USCCB.
Thankfully three enterprises are making fine exceptions: Ignatius Press, Zaccheus, and Baronius. Pretty much all other printed matter in the Church right now is a designer's nightmare.
would a conservative survive journalism school?
In medical school, the pressure to be pro abortion was very steep...not conforming got one ridiculed as a brainwashed Catholic or protestant. I suspect a similar feeling of being an outcast would discourage a conservative in Journalism.
However, there are lots of conservative Blogs...
Actually, Tom has hit the nail on the head in his analysis.
The days of the print Catholic publication are numbered. Two years ago, I started writing for The Wanderer because I saw there was very little real reporting going on. You know, real journalism where a reporter takes the time to interview someone, or multiple people. Of course it is much easier to sit back and pontificate, and for what these journals pay (or don't pay it), it is no wonder that very few true journalists are going to take the time to do reporting, in addition to what they do in their regular career.
However, I have attempted to fill this non-reportorial void, now with The Remnant, Inside the Vatican and some others.
I hope I am wrong, but I too think the immediacy of the Internet will drive the print page into oblivion.
For some sample reporting from original sources, check here.
http://www.renewamerica.us/colum...columns/
mershon
I would personally hate to see the Internet drive hard print media out of business altogether. There's definitely something I prefer about reading a magazine or book I can hold in my hands and whose pages I can mark up and to which I can return again and again, as opposed to a cached page called up on the Internet for electronic viewing. Still, I understand the economics involved.
Brian makes a good point about the potential demise of Catholic print media. Many smaller journals simply cannot keep up with the rising costs of production, and especially lately, mailing. The future would appear to be one like that of New Oxford Review, which allows for a "web only" option. But lovers of print can take heart. InsideCatholic.com, the online successor to Crisis Magazine, has a downloadable "InsideDigest" available. I have found it quite handy.
On the other... uh, hand, I also have a "web only" subscription to The Wanderer. Their penchant for being out-of-date carries over even here, as the interface for the web edition is notoriously clumsy. It took me weeks just to get the subscription in the first place, and two or three days to get someone to answer the phone to take care of it. But all is well now, and I print it out on 11 x 17 every week.
But what of the demise of genuine reporting in favor of pontificating? We've been inundated by the 24/7 news channels, most of which do very little real reporting, so much as "analysis," which is another word for spouting one's own opinion. Fortunately, I never pretended to be a reporter when it comes to my own weblog.
I just pretend to be a writer.
I found myself transitioning to a preference for new media on the basis that there is a certain economy and "checks and balances" system to the blogosphere.
An oft repeated warning of the ability of "Joe Blogger" to disseminate knowingly or unknowingly information of questionable veracity or outright untruth seems to ring hollow when it is examined how things "really work".
To be sure, there is nothing to present the self-styled Patriarch of Akron, Ohio from creating a blog that espouses flat-earth geo-centrism. In fact that sort of thing is out there. In fact it is also the case that no one pays much attention to it and when it DOES pop up on the radar, it will also appear in the cross-hairs of about 1000 other bloggers who will not suffer the indignity of being lied to.
I have also found that when I do read print media, I don't like to be far from the web! Given the linear limitations of the print media versus the exponetial possibilities of new media, if I want more info on a subject matter, I can click on a hyperlink and explore it, rather than counting on "getting all I need to know" based on the judgement of the author, the editor, and space limitations.
You also run into the issue of certain news considered "too niche market" to recieve column inches.
For example, days ago a bishop and 3 dozen clergy from the Assyrian Church of the East - which has been out of communion with the Apostolic See for 16 centuries - have made their intention clear - they seek full communion with the Catholic Church and to be united to the Chaldean Catholic counterpart.
It has been through the blogosphere, including the bishop's own webpage http://www.marbawai.com - that much of this has been disseminated.
Especially on Eastern Christian/Eastern Catholic issues, I have little faith or trust in most print media sources to get the matter right! 10 years ago, the respectable Catholic World Report in an article on Eastern Catholic churches mentioned "Spanish Eastern Catholics" apparently misunderstanding the Greek Catholics of "Galicia" to be from "Galiza" in Spain rather than the region "Галичина/Galicja" in central Europe divided between Ukraine and Poland.
And those were the reliable, professional, well edited, fact checking print media men! But we don't expect every print outlet to have experts from every field on the payroll and writing for them. Sometimes the "amatures" have to step up.
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