Too much information or not enough?

The Atlantic recently published a piece by Conor Friedersdorf lamenting the fall of local newspaper coverage. His piece was a response to Matt Yglesias’ piece on Slate glorifying the state of today’s news media.

Yglesias’ general premise is that because of the internet, mobile phones, and other technologies, we have access to more information than ever. Newspapers online don’t have space constraints and therefore can provide more stories and don’t have to cut words, limiting the information we get from what they do publish. Fair enough. He frames this around the bank bailout in Cyprus and sites many websites to get the story from every point of view and where to find interactive features that let you make decisions and see what (theoretically) will happen.

Friedersdorf’s counter argument is that while the information available on the Cyprus bailout is astonishing, it’s not exactly useful to the average American. Friedersdorf argues that we should be judging the new media on: “How well does it provide citizens the information they need to govern themselves? How effectively does it fulfill its role as a watchdog?” To meet those standards, newspapers need to provide better local coverage, something that Friedersdorf asserts has been decimated by the internet age (interestingly, less than a week after Ygelsias published his piece extolling the glories of journalism he published this piece about local news).

I’m inclined to agree with Friedersdorf. The coverage of the bank bailout on the other side of the world gives me, an unemployed 26 year old female in California, no useful information. How does that help me to understand what is plaguing the California job market? What information is there that could help me to determine what measures I should vote for in November to aid my local economy? What does that tell me about the state of my local schools, and should I be voting for a bond measure to increase funds for them? 

Another thing noted by Friedersorf is the news media’s role as the watchdog, not just informing citizens, but protecting them. A few years ago, a couple of local beat reporters for the LA Times uncovered fraud with a capital F in Bell, CA. Citizens were being screwed to the wall to fatten the wallets of city administrators and council members and no one did anything about it. According to former CA Attorney General and current CA Governor Jerry Brown, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System knew what these guys were earning and didn’t question it. Brown says that “CalPERS should have told someone, and the attorney general’s office would have been a good place to start.” Would the Economist or the BBC have done the investigative legwork required uncover that information? No, it took a couple of reporters that focused on local news.

While Yglesias is right, and we do have access to more information than we could have ever thought possible, having to access to relevant information is more important. And, unfortunately, this is what is declining. And it’s not all the internet’s fault. Newspapers have been padding their issues with wire stories and cutting local stuff for years.  It was in 2005 when Mitchum Huntzberger told the editor’s of the newly acquired Stamford Eagle-Gazette to stop relying on wires and start increasing local coverage on Gilmore Girls. I remember the first time I opened the local paper in Eugene, Oregon, probably in 2006, and there was very little written by staff reporters. Most of the paper was wire stories, without so much as a local bent on the story. I think that if a newspaper is going to run a wire story, it probably makes sense to figure out why I should care.

Don’t get me wrong, I support open access to information. I do think that Yglesias is right and new technologies have led to more in depth coverage and in many ways a more complete picture. The problem is that we see the benefits of this on really a small number of national stories. We need news outlets, whether they be papers, television or online, to dedicate more of this type of reporting to stories that will actually inform the public of the things that matter to them.