Somebody File A Missing Persons Report!

The NY Times takes a long look at bloggers as media trophy-hunters in a story that graces the front page of the Business Section.

Jeff Jarvis helps keep you upright through their funhouse slant.

And quick, somebody file a Missing Persons report!  In the course of emphasizing that the Eason Jordan lynching was engineered by a right wing mob, the Times somehow drops from this story (a) Howard Kurtz of the WaPo, who offers some relatively real coverage here; Rep. Barney Frank, D, MA, who made a cameo appearance in the audience in the Times' Saturday story (yes, of course he was on the panel); and Sen. Chris Dodd, D, CT, who has now failed to appear in both of the stories offered by the Times, despite his expressions of outrage and calls for the release of the videotape.  What does a Democrat from neighboring Connecticut need to do to break into the Times?

And there is one more Missing Person, who may simply be trapped in re-write.  In a nod towards "fair and balanced", or something, the Times seems to have the idea that in this story they will also discuss the "Jeff Gannon" outing.  They were quite excited last Friday, when they led with the news that "Gannon" had a connection to the Valerie Plame leak.

Today, however, they can only muster enough enthusiasm for one sentence in the second paragraph:

Moreover, last week liberal bloggers forced a sketchily credentialed White House reporter to quit his post.

Well.  We do not yet know whether their diminished ardor for their once-big story may be tied to the fact that there seems to be scant evidence backing it.

However, one might almost conclude that the Times is inclined to dismiss "right wing" bloggers as a lynch mob for trying to ascertain the facts about the statements made by Eason Jordan, while at the same time credulously reporting the most exuberant fantasies of the left-wing blogs.

And, due no doubt to space constraints, the Times lacked space for this type of summary of the "Gannon" outing, as described by Howard Kurtz:

They disclosed his real name, James Guckert, raising questions about how he gained access to the White House and whether he was a fake reporter with a partisan mission. They discovered that he had registered such Web addresses as hotmilitarystud.com for a previous business, though the sites were never launched, and circulated an online photo of Gannon posing in his underwear. Gannon resigned Wednesday, saying he was concerned about threats and hate mail as well as harassing calls to his mother and brother.

Well.  Which is the lynch mob?  I'm just wondering, but Times readers are not - how would they know?

MORE:  What did the WaPo do with the Plame Connection?  Kurtz ignored or overlooked the Valerie Plame angle on Feb 9; Dan Froomkin eventually noted it as a Lost Kos Comedy Club rumor; and Kurtz skipped it again in his latest.  What is happening at the Times?

Comments

[Max Sawicky]

Just don't be posting any pictures of yourself in your skivvies.

[Mick Wright]

What is happening at the Times?

Not sure, but I can tell you a bit about what's going on in the mind of the person in charge. Here are notes I took last month during a speech by Janet Robinson, President and CEO of the New York Times Co., on trends in the media.

Bascially, the Times imagines an ideal world in which information is shared around the globe in real time. Of course, we already have that, in the form of blogs. So the amendment to that, as we see here, is that the Times wants to edit and filter the blogs for the public. Which is what they're doing, or trying to do.

[TM]

Just don't be posting any pictures of yourself in your skivvies.

Darn, two hours of Photoshop, wasted. And Howard, Chris and I were looking pretty good together, too.

[TM]

We love this game. Now, the NY Times changes the headline.

Old:
http://www.memeorandum.com/05/02/14/#nyt--resignation_at_cnn_shows_the_growing_influence_of_blogs
New:

http://www.memeorandum.com/05/02/14/#nyt--resignation_at_cnn_shows_the_growing_influence_of_blogs

[Neo]

Given the "right wing mob," one is left to wonder exactly where the political center resides, given that Frank and Dodd seem to now live on the "right."

[Stephen]

Dodd's a Democrat? It's hard to tell the parties apart in New England.

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