Wikileaks, in contrast, is anarchistic journalism. Wikileaks takes the approach of just dumping on the web the actual documents for the rest of us to dig around in. One shot and they are done, which isn’t journalism but IS news. In one sense this is very generous in that anyone with time on their hands can probably dig through that material and find an untold story or two, but from the perspective of a professional journalist it is squandering material for the sake of spectacle.
The newspapers would clearly have preferred to milk the Wikileaks material for Pulitzer Prizes, possibly trading the withholding of a story or two in exchange for getting an exclusive from the White House on something else. It happens all the time. But Wikileaks, the emerging and very scary face of news on the Internet, wouldn’t do it that way.
I get the feeling that a mantle of sorts has been passed.
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Cringe managed to sum-up what I’ve been attempting to put to words when people asked me.
In terms of “degrees of journalism” you have:
Newspapers/magazine == ~100% journalism
Bloggers == ~50% journalism (some do “research” or investigations themselves; a lot supply only a modicum of comment or opinion to other’s publishings)
WikiLeaks == <50% journalism (not sure to the degree they are not bloggers)
The problem arises when calling for some type of sanction or punishment on WL (or Asange) directly – some say you can, other say you can’t.
“Can” camp – WL isn’t a journalism outfit and Asange isn’t published.
“Can’t” camp – WL is protected under potential 1st amendment grounds (free press/free expression), others offer whistleblower protections.
Obvious positions on either side of this debate but with supposedly informed individuals calling for arrest, charges, or sanctions (or worse death) you can’t ignore the potential global impact. (I know, a cop-out closing – sorry.
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TinMan