"As the failure of many newspapers looms and public radio cuts its journalistic offerings, the complaint against new media by established journalists gets sharper and sharper. The key rallying cry is that new media can’t provide investigative reporting, that it can only piggyback on the work of the mainstream print and radio media, and that when the newspapers go, there goes investigative work and all the civic value it provided. As a starting point in a conversation about the future, this complaint is much more promising that complaining about how people on the Internet are really mean or stupid. It narrows the discussion down to a central function of journalism, the independent investigation of government, industry and society and the delivery of information from such investigation. " - Chad Orzel

"I know that many of the journalists talking along these lines don’t really mean to throw overboard all the other writing (and jobs supported by that writing) that appears within most major newspapers. But I’m going to take it that way: as a concession that much of the rest of the content of 20th Century newspapers is served either equivalently or better by online media. We don’t need newspapers to have film criticism or editorial commentary or consumer analysis of automobiles or comic strips or want ads or public records." - j1m

"If print journalists want to claim that their saving grace is independent, investigative journalism, they might want to clean house a bit first, because a substantial amount of print journalism doesn’t really live up to that ideal. Getting fed information by a confidential source inside an Administration or inside a business who is using the reporter either to kick a rival in the teeth or as part of a coordinated scheme to float a trial balloon about a hypothetical decision is not independent investigative reporting. It’s a collusive agreement to serve as an unpaid assistant to the public-relations staff of a government or business." - j1m