Lots of Journalists are turning their customers off - Right, Michael Kitch? - Granite Grok

Lots of Journalists are turning their customers off – Right, Michael Kitch?

We Groksters have created a new tradition for ourselves in that after doing our GrokTALK! podcasts at the CNHT offices, we walk down the coupla blocks to “Puppy Love” – a hot dog stand I discovered that serves up a mean chili (bean-less – yay!) hot dog.  Today was the same – yum!  However, we “ran into” Michael Kitch of the Laconia Daily Sun and as regular readers know, I’ve had my share of “tiffs’ with this small town reporter but I did great him with “Well, it’s Mr. Kitch!” (notice the use of the proper honorific). His response, just brimming over politeness (/sarcasm), included the diminutive version of my nickname as he hurriedly continued on, seeing that I was not walking alone.
Yet, I continue to be a consumer of his employer’s product – the newspaper.  But, in somewhat lowered (again) regard.

Looks like a whole LOT of people have lowered regards for their town’s, States, and the National level “professional journalists” (emphasis mine):

Perception of Journalist on downward trend“The decline in public views about journalists’ contribution to society since 2009 is more pronounced among women than men. Roughly three-in-ten women (29%) say journalists contribute a lot to society’s well-being, down 17 percentage points from 46% in 2009. Men’s views on this are about the same today as they were in 2009.

The decline in the perceived contribution of journalists cuts across partisan leanings, age and education level. Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents as well as Republicans and Republican-leaning independents all are less likely to say journalists contribute a lot to society’s well-being today (down 8 points among Republicans/leaning Republicans and 10 points among Democrats/leaning Democrats).

…This report is based on telephone interviews conducted March 21-April 8, 2013, among a national sample of 4,006 adults, 18 years of age or older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia (2,002 respondents were interviewed on a landline telephone, and 2,004 were interviewed on a cell phone).

Ten points down in just four years?  Keep this up, Mr. Kitch, and you’ll soon be just as popular as Congress! This seems to mirror the time frame of ordinary reporters thinking they’re job is to change the world and all become editorial columnists in what should be straight news reports.  And correspondingly, their consumers have said “not so much” and subscription rates and stock prices have tanked (but again, regular readers of the ‘Grok already knew that).

Wanna succeed? Give consumers what they want (and the best feature of the Sun is often not his articles but the reader sponsored Letters to the Editor).  And be nice to your consumers – even if you have to grit your teeth in doing so.

(H/T: Pew via Big Journalism)

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