Metal Machine Music

Like Lou Reed on that historically awful album, reporters are obsessed with feedback. The comments are a welcome distraction to work, occasionally even funny or insightful. But, as is the case when someone becomes so involved in a mindset that most people don't care about (ie, newspapers), these anonymous postings from a vocal minority can set people off.

Reporters spend a lot of time on a project and, by virtue of being in the profession, want to serve the greater good. The more altruistic ones, being obsessed with truth and all, desperately want the feedback to make sure the most accurate information is out there, even at the expense of a correction. The average journalist probably just cares what people think of the story, and that's fine too. Both sides, however, can get pretty weird.

If there were any doubt, the Lancaster Sunday News will erase it. Linked below is a massive, 97-inch and 2,849-word piece (it also ran A1, main section, 6 columns) from last summer covering the forums hosted on its own site. Seriously, my local paper devoted an epic piece entirely to anonymous posters who comment on its own stories. I remember picking up that paper and being, well, I suppose proud of the undeniably thorough job done by Suzanne Cassidy, but rather disappointed that this thing exists. At least Lou Reed said of his over-indulgence on feedback, "Well, anyone who gets to side four is dumber than I am."

In Cassidy's defense, TalkBack is one of the more popular forums to discuss Lancaster County as a whole, but I still don't believe it warrants going to the mayor for his thoughts. The posters are given various forms of anonymity in the paper to basically say they enjoy going on a forum and discussing how the paper is a bit of a monopoly. That's not interesting, at all. Topics with such a limited audience should not receive anything, and I mean anything, more than 30 inches.

Any time a newspaper covers itself, the reporting and conclusion will be inevitably suspect to many readers, absolutely regardless of how well those things are done. Richard Perez-Pana has continued to do great work for The New York Times covering his own company ruthlessly attempt to sell The Boston Globe, but even at the Times it's tough to see pure objectivity when writing about one's own employer. And that's the case here with this obsession of feedback.

The Sunday News is far from alone on reporting on those who comment on them. Many columnists have spoken out on the issue, mostly to say they don't put much stock in the arm-chair reporters (if the writer is nice) or "45-year-old virgins in their mom's basement (if the writer is equal parts mean and uncreative), but I don't buy that for a second. I've seen reporters pretty distraught over purely hateful comments on our Web site, a category I've unfortunately been in as well, and it's disheartening for at least a little while when told that your best reporting isn't good enough for BoBcatFan88.

Luckily, there's not much lasting sting that BoBcatFan88 can leave.

-30-
Witness, 97 inches of coverage to an internet forum hosted by the newspaper covering it.