News is a process, not a finished product
Cory Bergman November 15th, 2007
We’ve written a lot about the success of TMZ.com, and Terry Heaton uses the entertainment site as an example of the shift from “news as a finished product” to “offering pieces of stories as stories themselves.” In other words, TMZ.com doesn’t wait to put together a story on something — it blogs every piece of a story as it comes in. TMZ.com calls it “continual iteration.” While this idea may fly in the face of traditionalists (can you post one side of a story now and follow up with the other side later?), you have to admit it’s a very compelling presentation. IMHO, we’ll see more of the approach gravitate to online news in the months and years to come.
Adds Rick in comments: “…TMZ does get things right. But it often gets them wrong. And even more frequently, it offers up a series of posts that are obviously coming from one side of a celebrity story.”
2 Comments Add your own
1. Rick Ellis | November 15th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
The real secret of TMZ is that it was able to combine the deep pockets of its owners with a deniability that makes it almost impossible for news channels and online news operations to ignore.
It’s common practice for otherwise careful journalists to use TMZ.com as an easy way to introduce unsourced, salacious celebrity news. Using the phrase “TMZ reports” offers up denialability to every Britney Spears tidbit or Paris Hilton sighting.
Yes, TMZ does get things right. But it often gets them wrong. And even more frequently, it offers up a series of posts that are obviously coming from one side of a celebrity story.
Okay, I’m going to stop ranting now….
2. Brink | November 15th, 2007 at 5:07 pm
Just another example of how we legitimize sloppy coverage of news on the internet.
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