CON GAMES: You Are The Media

October 26th, 2006 at 06:52am Michael Conniff 2

The much-maligned media is no longer in media res--Latin for literally in the middle of things-- because the center can no longer hold.

But in the place of the media comes something far more powerful and profound: you.

That's right: you are the media now.

If you don't believe me look at YouTube. Or MySpace. Or even Aspen Post, Snowmass Post, and/or Skiing Post. The point being that Web services that allow plain old people to bypass the media are taking off like a rocket. Aspen Post alone has seen its page views triple in the last month, as readers and seekers put in their two cents about the local race for Sheriff.

I was on a panel simulcast last night on KDNK about "Media Bias" at the Colorado Rocky Mountain School (CRMS) in Carbondale. No one--including my fellow panelists Paul Anderson and Frank McShane--gave even a passing glance to the notion that the media might not be biased. And everyone in the audience seemed to agree. When it comes to bias, the media is a lost cause.

You can't count on the media any more to be above fear or favor. All the news that fits to print is really all the news the editor of The New York Times sees fit to spin. Fox News and its ilk in cable news are nothing more than a mouthpiece for a particular political movement.

And so it goes. Investigative reporting is too expensive, too difficult, to dangerous. Real reporting is thankless, time-consuming, and the road to penury for aspiring reporters.

So what's a society to do? It so happens that even as the media has been deconstructing and dissembling before our eyes that a force far more powerful is coming to the fore. That would be you--yes, you, The media, lefty and righty, may be stinking up the joint where their stench but you are the disinfectant.

In some ways, you are more qualified than the media to do the job. You know stuff about things. If you're a car mechanic, you know how to fix a car. If you're a teacher in a high school, you have forgotten more about the youth of America than most of us will ever know. If you're a skier, then you know the best trail on a wintry morn at Aspen Highlands.

More to point, we know who you are. We know your prejudices and your biases, and when you go online with your thoughts you have nowhere to hide. We see you for what you are. You are the media, but we know who you are. That makes all the difference in the world.

One caveat: no more complaining about the media. Because you now have the tools to do The World According To You, you no longer have any reason to complain about the media. They won't cease to exist, but in the coming years they will become less and less and less of a factor, even as you become more important.

Time to suck it up and tell it like it is. If you don't do it, nobody will.

Entry Filed under: Technology, Politics, Media, Aspen, Con Games