

"This is how TechCrunch works..." - galactus
http://www.scripting.com/stories/2009/11/08/paulCarrsPieceIsRubbishAnd.html

======
crux
This article deals with Carr's in only the most superficial manner. Carr
clearly wasn't saying, 'these two people had mobile technology, therefore
people with mobile technology are heartless.' The two people in his examples
used mobile technology in the same way, and were both enabled and (according
to Carr), motivated by 'citizen journalist' technology to act unethically.

You can argue that link, or even argue that it doesn't apply in all cases, but
Carr clearly argued for a substantive causal link, a meaningful thread running
through: the sort of technologies that involve instantaneous broadcast, the
sort of audience and expectations that grow up around those technologies, the
behaviors that people develop to fulfill those expectations (and to satisfy
their own desires regardless of any audience---the look-at-me-looking-at-this
syndrome), and the people who acted unethically in his examples.

You may agree or disagree (myself, I think the issue is more cultural, and it
may just as well have been a Fox News crew rushing to get a great shot of the
suffering)---but Winer is being deeply disingenuous by claiming that Carr's
thesis is as simple as his absurd, clumsily constructed Christian-British-
Homosexual analogy. I won't claim he's being disgusting, because the step from
logical criticism to righteous moral judgment is a precipitous one.

~~~
amackera
Well said, sir. Well said.

------
catone
The problems with Carr's piece are:

1\. That he points out a problem with mainstream journalism (failing to vet
sources), not one with citizen journalism, as he says. (Note: citizen
journalism has that problem too, but not here.)

2\. His definition of "citizen journalism" is far too wide, in my opinion.
Moore isn't a citizen journalist. She's just a person who happened to be
talking to her friends about an event as it happened.

If we accept the "everyone is now a journalist" definition that Carr seems to
use, then journalism becomes something of very little value. Journalism is
removing the signal from the noise, and his first example (Moore) demonstrates
a failure on the part of trained journalists to do that properly.

His second example (the video of the Iranian protesters death) is tragic, but
again, not a failure of journalism or journalists. It's a failure of human
decency, perhaps (and one that's certainly debatable)... but that's another
topic altogether.

~~~
axod
Surely his point wasn't that 'citizen journalism' is bad, but that sorting the
signal from the noise is extremely hard, and no one has really solved that
yet. Certainly not twitter.

Also the other point that I got was that people are often more interested in
whipping out their camera/twitter client/etc than actually helping/enjoying
something/participating etc.

Personally I thought those two points were valid and worth making. Also
thought it a bit sad that pg killed the discussion on HN, because I think it
would have been interesting.

~~~
catone
I'll grant you the second point, though I think you developed it further in
once sentence here than Carr did in his piece. (By which I mean to say, the
correlation between that observed phenomena and the rise in emphasis on
citizen journalism may be valid, and would have fit with the topic Carr was
editorializing on, but he didn't do a very good job developing that supposed
link.)

But to the former, I don't think Carr was trying to say citizen journalism is
bad, but I do think he was trying to say it often fails us. Unfortunately (for
his argument), the example he picked was one of a citizen's voice (not a
citizen journalist's) being amplified by a mainstream press that had failed to
properly vet those reports. So that failing was with the traditional media,
rather than new media, imho.

------
dpcan
"They write something stupid, then people write rebuttals explaining how it's
stupid, building flow and page rank"

37Signals is also guilty - however proving that the system works brilliantly.

Too bad all the rebuttals are typically incoherent nonsense making the
original nonsense seem even more important and profound.

(edit: Thank you, I accept your down-vote as proof that the link baiting works
and that you agree 37Signals and TC are both brilliant marketers as well as
writers.)

~~~
crux
Actually, I suspect you're getting downvoted because the article has nothing
to do with 37Signals, and thus your comment was wildly off-topic.

~~~
swombat
That was actually one of my first thoughts upon finishing Carr's article:
"sounds just like 37-signals". Attack random people, make controversial points
(even if you contradict an earlier post), do anything to generate noise and
traffic.

------
tptacek
What's that video game where you pick the locks on the doors by solving a
puzzle routing fluid through pipes? Same deal. Here, TechCrunch is the source.
Maybe Scoble's the sink? Winer's once again piping the goo from place to
place. But it's all the same sewer.

~~~
warfangle
Bioshock was a modern one that did it. There was probably a precursor.

~~~
gloob
Pipe Dream on my old Windows 3.1 was the first incarnation I saw.

------
technomancy
What a conundrum! Dave Winer is ranting against Techcrunch, so is the enemy of
my enemy my friend? I'm thinking odds are low: <http://www.penny-
arcade.com/comic/2007/03/05/>

------
fuzzmeister
MG Siegler's response: [http://parislemon.com/2009/11/on-citizen-journalism-
the-degr...](http://parislemon.com/2009/11/on-citizen-journalism-the-
degradation-of-society-and-bitchmemes.html)

------
JoachimSchipper
It's important to note, though, that a television crew typically _also_
records what is happening without interfering.

Which is not to say that I disagree with his point, just that the
intervene/record dilemma isn't exactly new.

------
wmeredith
Gadgets and tech don't make people evil; they're just empowering the voyeurs
and gossips along with everyone else. This all seems like much ado about
nothing.

------
petercooper
So Dave bitches about Paul Carr using two articles to prove a trend by using
one article to prove a trend? :-)

