Just For Today

newsweek:

joepompeo:

“I worked at Newsweek for five years. Reporters would write stories with a whole bunch of ‘tk’s so a fact checker could go do it. What kind of accountability is that? $100,000-a-year people depending on someone making $25,000 to get their story right.”

— He has a good point here. But still?

tk tk tk tkt tk tk tumblr intern fill in response here. 

whoa, way too much back-patting going on here. i worked at Forbes for 4 years, including ~3 as an assistant/fact-checker (this was before DVorkin’s entrance). Forbes writers also left tks up to fact-checkers. Let’s not get all choked up about process or efficiency, or point fingers. Fact-checking at Forbes was essentially eliminated because they laid off all the fact-checkers.

this Poytner piece is all well and good…for a big, fat sloppy blowjob that misses the point. Forbes exists today, not as a model of journalism, but of content. there is a difference. 99% of what’s on that site would’ve never made it into the site years ago, nor would it make into print today. The site is riddled with stories that generate traffic from trending topics and buzzy pieces from other news outlets. Often, it’s just smart aggregation. Great for traffic, smart curation, but not journalism. 

And while there’s no traditional fact-checking, there is a lot of after-the-fact checking. “The audience spots issues a lot,” DVorkin said. “The audience is as much your editor now as an editor is your editor.”

Asserting that the audience now functions as a fact-checking entity and an editor should be a punchline. Seriously, is this a parody? A “newsroom” so concerned with churning out as much copy as possible with as many unpaid, unedited writers as possible in order to garner as many eyeballs as possible on disposable content that’s unreliable is not the hallmark of the next great model of journalism. it’s a content farm.

to be clear, kudos to Forbes for finding a way to make money in a bleak business. let’s just not call it “journalism” or gild it as an improvement. 

i’ve been trying for weeks to put into words what i thought about the Schiaparelli/Prada exhibit at The Met. Words beyond the immediate that come to mind (it’s phenomenal).

i took out Lola today, my sewing machine that i’ve left in her box since moving to Montague Street. i took the table that took up too much room to the curb, to make room for making stuff again.

i thought about the way things are considered…by seasonal collection, by book, by movie. Prada’s jolie-laide shoes placed end-to-end in a museum are still listed by the season they were released for consumption. The moment they were new is their defining moment, whether they have become classic or forgotten, whether they’ve become a valuable part of an designer’s oeuvre (as they have) or relegated to the island of unfortunate trends.

the task of trying to relish the present seems overwhelming sometimes. it’s easier to say yes than no, easier to buy the skirt i’ll hate in three months than to make one i’ll wear for years if only because there was direct labor involved. it’s a change to experience clothing as a process rather than a transaction. this is a silly emotional over-reach, but in thinking about clothing, just as a job or a relationship, it seems impossible to adore something without wanting to adore it always.

tylercoates:

I guess it just gets to a point that when people shit on things that you like a lot, and because you relate to the fictional world that they find so repulsive, you sort of lose your mind a bit because obviously you just assume that they would find you just as repulsive. Also, I’m just really tired tonight.

perhaps this the less asshole/more rational logic that relates to the feeling of late that i will never care deeply for someone who fails to see the merit in certain series (read: Mad Men) because obviously i just assume that he/she is immune to the fine arts of character development and allegory. i’d just rather not make time for people who don’t make time for good tv.