(Continued from Part 1).

Rupert Murdoch is no fool and surely realises that the internet is rapidly destroying the traditional journalistic function of newspapers, radio and TV (i.e. to break news stories and tell us what’s going on).

But his speech to the Federal Trade Commission’s Workshop seemed reluctant to admit it.
This is what psychiatrists call “cognitive dissonance”. Cognitive dissonance is when you refuse to accept the impact of new information because it’s too overwhelming.

It’s like the reaction of canal owners to the threat posed by railways in the early nineteenth century. They vigorously opposed rail by every possible means. They lobbied parliament against it, they argued railways were dangerous, they even paid gangs to attack the workers building the new lines.

In short they demonised the railways.

Murdoch’s speech demonised the internet.

Murdoch makes a curious distinction between good journalists (his own “expensive and distinguished journalists who invest days, weeks, or even months in their stories”) and evil “aggregators” (an ill defined, shadowy world of online content thieves, “feeding off the hard-earned efforts and investments of others”.

Only the professional journalists, he claims, create content and he gives examples of hard hitting, exclusive journalism such as the Wall Street Journal’s exposure of a plan by members of Congress to buy themselves corporate jets with taxpayers money.
“The truth is” says Murdoch, “that the “aggregators” need [traditional] news organizations”. And Murdoch uses this distinction to justify the decision to start charging money to access online news content.

But it’s an argument born of desperation because no such distinction exists.
News is not created by professional journalists (not even “expensive and distinguished” ones).

News happens and the job of journalists is simply to communicate it to the public.
Traditionally the sources of news had no means of communicating it directly to the public themselves, so they relied on the media. But the internet has changed that.
Today organisations, businesses, individuals and governments can post their own press releases, videos and information online and communicate directly with the world.
And the world can blog, comment, react and analyse; without relying on traditional media.

It should be fairly easy to test Murdoch’s distinction simply by looking at one of his own newspapers.

Is it full of original, investigative journalistic content? Or is it simply repeating information which the original sources have already made freely available online?
If it’s the former, then Murdoch has a point. And charging us to access his news content online might work.

If it’s the latter, then are Murdoch’s professional journalists merely aggregators themselves? “feeding off the hard-earned efforts and investments of others” (Murdoch’s criticism of the online bloggers and citizen journalists).

Let’s look at today’s copy of The Times, December 3rd 2009.

Front Page Lead; A new report on care homes by the Care Quality Commission. Everything here has already been published on the CQC’s website along with video interviews with and masses of background information.

Front Page story 2; Schemes to cut police red tape have failed. Everything here already published on the Home Office, Police website.

Front Page story 3: President Obama’s Afghan War Strategy Attacked. Everything widely available on websites from the original sources EG Senator John McCain’s website.

Front Page story 4: North Korea devalues its currency. Available 2 days ago on economicpolicyjournal.com and other sites. The Times quotes dailynk.com as a source of its own reporting.

I won’t bore you further except to point out that two of the other big stories in the paper (“Tiger Woods Confesses” and “Climate Change Leaked Emails”) are entirely derived from other media or online sources.

In the case of the Tiger Woods story it’s; “Us Weekly magazine”, “National Enquirer magazine” & “Life and Style magazine” plus a press release on the Florida Highway Patrol website.

In the climate change story, the original emails and a huge amount of comment has been posted on sites such as climateaudit.org.

So are all newspapers and traditional media (including Murdoch’s) doomed?

(Continued in Part 3).

Graham Majin is a former BBC News Producer. He is currently Head of Video Marketing and Video Production at Kent based Kersh Media and KWIKVID kershmedia.co.uk and kwikvid.com