In his latest Buzzmachine post, the author/academic/consultant Jeff Jarvis asks if journalism is really storytelling any longer.
He has a great point. So much of what constitutes information today doesn't necessarily get framed in a story. It might be data, an image, a searchable file, any kind of media that doesn't get told as much as used.
Jarvis laments the sense of possession journalists convey when they talk about how they're storytellers, when so much information today is crowd-generated, augmented, shared and reworked.
Jarvis believes that, in ringfencing storytelling as journalism's function, it limits options and closes necessary doors. I've usually preferred the line that journalism is about getting people to talk to each other; that seems to me to open us to platforms, modes and formats of all sorts.
He has a great point. So much of what constitutes information today doesn't necessarily get framed in a story. It might be data, an image, a searchable file, any kind of media that doesn't get told as much as used.
Jarvis laments the sense of possession journalists convey when they talk about how they're storytellers, when so much information today is crowd-generated, augmented, shared and reworked.
Jarvis believes that, in ringfencing storytelling as journalism's function, it limits options and closes necessary doors. I've usually preferred the line that journalism is about getting people to talk to each other; that seems to me to open us to platforms, modes and formats of all sorts.
