Working Title: The Fourth Estate

-- By AndreiVoinigescu

Table of Contents

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Introduction

The changing face of the media and implications for free speech policy. Newspapers, Broadcasters used to be able to make 20, 30% profits because of monopoly power/local advertising appeal; this allowed them to invest in investigative journalism and over-seas reporters and local stories. These are the first things that get cut once media starts loosing money because technological change has destroyed their monopoly on advertising. Citizen bloggers can cover local and state-level issues. Citizens bloggers are both more vulnerable to free speech chilling effects but also more resistant to outright censorship.

Signs of the death of print and broadcast media are everywhere these days:

The Fourth Estate: Media as watchdogs

Push beats pull and the death of the captive audience

A future full of news no one pays attention to?

Conclusion

Working Section

Is investigative journalism essential to our political system? Can investigative journalism be done outside traditional commercial newsgathering organizations? What will happen to investigative journalism as print newspaper become unprofitable? Is the copyright system essential to producing sustained works of effort like investigative journalism? In copyright law's current form? What about broadcasting monopolies? Are they essential? Can other actors step in to subsume the role of investigative journalism? Publicly sponsored? By government taxes? By charity? By patrons? What can be learned from the credit agencies' failure? Credit ratings are sometimes referred to as "the shortest editorial." Is investigative journalism a similarly flawed system?

The net has lowered the cost of collaboration. Has the net lowered the cost of investigative journalism?

Perhaps what is needed for investigative journalism isn't money -- it's the concentrated power of the media company behind the investigator? This leads to potential 'coupling' between media and those in power.

The credibility came from the name of the organization -- they engaged in 'reporting'. You trusted them. Pre-publishment screening vs post-publishment 'digg' style sorting.

The news media put people into power. Television was the most power-concentrating medium in the world because there was no answering television without your own license to broadcast.