Today's poster child for not getting it
Once upon a time the smell of fear, dear readers, is something only dogs and predators could detect. Now it so pervades my world that I cannot escape it, the weak and entitled in the establishment are losing a war and instead of understanding how we got to this tipping point and not realizing that we can coexist and prosper together, they are lashing out at the very audience that made them and can now unmake them.
What the hell am I talking about? The explosion of alternative media everywhere has establishment media figures braying for protection like sheep in an open pen, the effort to delegitimize spots blogs, fan sites, citizen journalism, user generated video and multimedia as nothing more than the collective masturbatory coffeebreath rantings of social outcasts virtually united in high tech isolation reaches a new low with hilarious regularity.
Today's entrant, Bob Costas, thanks to Jeff Dufour and Patrick Gavin at the DC Examiner. In an interview Monday at the National Press Club in Washington DC for George Washington University's series on media and publi policy The Kalb Report, when asked about the
[P]roliferation of of call-in sports radio shows and sports blogs: Much of it is now directed at "drunks" and "bitter" members of society who "haven't held a job for more than six weeks in their entire lives."*
Bob, and now I am channeling Leitch from Deadspin here, do we really need to go over this again again?
This is not the first time Bob Costas has gone out of his way to insult sports fans. Back in March of this year in a story that ran in the Miami Herald (that link is expired) and picked up by The Big Lead, Bob hit all the krazy karicature talking points in condemning alternative media, the creators and maintainers thereof and by extension any person that would frequent them and *gasp* take them seriously or allow them to contribute to the formation of opinions:
...from their mother's basement in Albuquerque...pathetic get-a-life loser...can piggyback onto someone that actually has some level of professional accountability...grants a forum to somebody that has no particular insight or responsibility. Most of it is a combination of ignorance and invective...It's just a high-tech place for idiots...That doesn't mean anyone with half a brain should respect it.
And now Monday's interview, a clear pattern is established. Attacking your customers has never been a great strategy, just ask the music business how CD sales are doing.
The Big Lead you may recall was the specific target of some petulant establishment anger back in April 2007. As my former co blogger wrote at the time:
Sports bloggers and the traditional sports media are on a collision course. The quantity of sports blogs means that mainstream sports media outlets are getting an ever-shrinking slice of the audience pie. The quality of the writing on many of these sites rivals or surpasses the writing on many mainstream sites. To use a cheesy metaphor, the playing field is getting mighty crowded, and I can see how personalities like Colin Cowherd could feel extremely threatened by a site like The Big Lead or any other quality sports blog...
Sports blogs, at least for now, can get away with things that the mainstream media simply cannot. Sports bloggers make liberal use of humor, satire, sarcasm and parody, devices that are generally off limits to ESPN and its ilk. Freedom from editorial control and obligation to corporate interests lets us spout off about pretty much anything as long as we don't blatantly threaten or defame the subjects of our rants.
There is also zero barrier to entry to becoming a sports blogger. All you need is internet access and a knowledge of sports. This means that there are literally thousands of sites capable of producing content that is as good or better than the content available through MSM outlets. Actually, the quality doesn't really have to be good as long as it's outrageous enough to pull in a bunch of eyeballs. Really, what does [REDACTED], who works for one of the most prolific sports outfits in the world, offer to sports fans that even an average sports blog cannot? Not a thing.
I'm not saying that sports blogs will ever eclipse traditional media sites. Sports blogs simply could not exist without the source material their mainstream counterparts provide...
The traditional media can either fight us and lose (the [REDACTED] approach) or embrace us and add significant value to their content.
Do I really need to remind Bob and anyone else from the establishment that the creators and readers of alternative sports media are also the same mouthbreathers that tune into the radio and TV programs that serve as the primary sources for the secondary reporting and opining that is the world of alternative media, a world that is different from the mainstream world in no meaningful way.
Bob: reads a script on the set of Football Night in America, that script input is based on a first hand account of the game and very likely some second hand analysis from NBC Sports and or anything the producer can find on the internet in time for the broadcast.
Me: composes material for Curly R based on my first had account of the game and very likely some second hand analysis from the Washington Post and or other traditional media outlets and or one or more alternative media outlets.
And continuing to channel Leitch at Deadspin from March (op. cit.), Bob why are you the tastemaker? Is it the NBC badge in your pocket that makes you superior? Sure, tune out the nuts, I certainly do. Then dig deeper. Greg Trippiedi at Hog Heaven (two examples) and Dillweed at Post Game Heroes (two examples) put together some of the most insightful and comprehensive game tape analysis anywhere. Cold Hard Football Facts and Football Outsiders started from the ground and have partnered with traditional outlets because their shit is so damn good. Pro Football Talk gets all the NFL happenings and rumors as fast or faster than ESPN.
And now here is where I bust out the famous quote by Mohandas Ghandi that I will once again trivialize as an aphorism of the rise of alternative media and the decline of traditional media: first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
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Is there anyone more beige, more drab, more neutral in sports media than Bob Costas? With barely a portfolio anymore, Bob represents the end of down the middle reporting of sports.
* Note: the print edition actually says quote call-in sports radio shows and sports blogs unquote while the online version says sports radio shows and internet sites unquote. I have no idea why the Examiner would edit itself in this matter.
Asshat Bob Costas: Louis Lanzano / AP photo from here.
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