SevenQuestions: G. Beato, scoop be damned

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Seven Questions

G. Beato is a San Francisco-based free-lancer who specializes in writing about the media. A frequent contributor to suck.com, he has a bunch of his writings posted at soundbitten.com, his personal site where you must drop by to figure out what he means by such choice nibbles as "newzak" and "shopaganda." 17 Aug. 1998

1 You once wrote that the profusion of news is so constant, pervasive and temporary that the concept of a scoop has become irrelevant. Has anything happened to change and/or reinforce that perception? Back to the 7Q index

At this point, it seems that the "scoops" that make the most news are those that are discredited for whatever reasons.

That is, it's a popular story now to say that the rush to be first is ruining journalism. So the only way a scoop achieves a lasting identity, i.e., the only time a particular media outlet is permanently identified as the originator of a particular story, is when the story receives a lot of coverage for being somehow flawed.

The originators of most of the scoops that prove to be right are quickly forgotten, except perhaps by the media itself. Drudge, for example, grew his readership so quickly not because he was publishing so many scoops but because the rest of the media was always giving him coverage because he was publishing so many scoops.

Also, the core reason of why scoops aren't worth it remains: Scoops are expensive to produce, and as more and more media outlets compete for viewers, audience dilution will continue to occur. For most outlets, then, the extra expense of the sort of original, in-depth reporting it generally requires to produce a scoop is simply prohibitive. And I don't see that changing anytime soon.

Finally, I think what Drudge has shown, of course, is that it's not really who reports the story first that is important now, but who delivers it first. What surprises me is that established media outlets like the Times and the Post have not copied his delivery mechanism -- i.e., a mailing list where they push stories to their readers as "circumstances warrant."

2 What's one really great story being ignored by most of the news media?

I think the biggest problem now is not underreporting but overreporting. There's so much news out there, coming from so many different sources, that I'm hesitant to propose any particular story as being "ignored." Because - who knows? The story was probably thoroughly covered somewhere, but I didn't see it.

3 Name a current nonfiction writer whose work you really admire & tell what you like about it.

If I have to pick one, I'd go with Nicholson Baker. His attention to detail borders on the pathological, and yet his prose is never tedious. He writes these really baroque sentences, and many of his word choices and metaphors could potentially come off as overly mannered, but he is such an assured writer that they never do. While he's written more fiction than non-fiction, it's his two non-fiction books -- "U and I" and "The Size of Thoughts" -- that I like best.

4 Have you read any magazine pieces lately that were so good you wish you'd thought of them yourself?

It was about a year ago, so I don't know that that qualifies as "lately," but I thought Po Bronson's piece in Wired on Silicon Valley headhunters was excellent. Plenty of stories have been written about engineers and venture capitalists; his decision to tell a Valley story through a more peripheral sector of its ecology was something I wish I'd thought of. In general, the more peripheral a story, the more compelling I find it.

5 Tell us something about suck.com that isn't common knowledge.

Given that the last half-dozen stories I've read about Webzines haven't even mentioned Suck, I have to assume that it's not common knowledge that Suck is a success. But later this month, it will mark its third anniversary, and according to Joey Anuff, its ad revenues "amply cover" its production, editorial and payroll expenses and have for some time now.

6 Where do you get your story ideas -- specifically, which sources of story ideas are the most productive?

I write mostly about the media, so I get most of my ideas from watching TV, reading magazines, etc. One thing I've gotten away from in the past year or two is the Web itself and technology in general. I'd like to start writing more about the Web again, and that means I'll have to start surfing the Web more again.

7 What happened to the personal Web site trend? Has the steam gone out of it?

It seems as if a lot of specific individuals, including me, have lost steam, but I think new people are always coming along to replace them.

There is still something that's somehow more compelling about reading someone's personal project than reading a professional page. This is true, I think, not only for diary-oriented pages, but for projects like www.newsies.com or www.soundbitten.com.

I think, for example, that Drudge was a lot more compelling when he was just this random guy; now that he's become a media fixture himself, I don't read his reports as much anymore.

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Copyright 1998, Thomas L. Mangan >Back to SevenQuestions

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G. Beato is a San Francisco-based free-lancer who specializes in writing about the media. A frequent contributor to suck.com, he has a bunch of his writings posted at soundbitten.com, his personal site where you must drop by to figure out what he means by such choice nibbles as "newzak" and "shopaganda."		17 Aug. 1998
1	You once wrote that the profusion of news is so constant, pervasive and temporary that the concept of a scoop has become irrelevant. Has anything happened to change and/or reinforce that perception?	Back to the 7Q index
	At this point, it seems that the "scoops" that make the most news are those that are discredited for whatever reasons. That is, it's a popular story now to say that the rush to be first is ruining journalism. So the only way a scoop achieves a lasting identity, i.e., the only time a particular media outlet is permanently identified as the originator of a particular story, is when the story receives a lot of coverage for being somehow flawed. The originators of most of the scoops that prove to be right are quickly forgotten, except perhaps by the media itself. Drudge, for example, grew his readership so quickly not because he was publishing so many scoops but because the rest of the media was always giving him coverage because he was publishing so many scoops. Also, the core reason of why scoops aren't worth it remains: Scoops are expensive to produce, and as more and more media outlets compete for viewers, audience dilution will continue to occur. For most outlets, then, the extra expense of the sort of original, in-depth reporting it generally requires to produce a scoop is simply prohibitive. And I don't see that changing anytime soon. Finally, I think what Drudge has shown, of course, is that it's not really who reports the story first that is important now, but who delivers it first. What surprises me is that established media outlets like the Times and the Post have not copied his delivery mechanism -- i.e., a mailing list where they push stories to their readers as "circumstances warrant."
2	What's one really great story being ignored by most of the news media?
	I think the biggest problem now is not underreporting but overreporting. There's so much news out there, coming from so many different sources, that I'm hesitant to propose any particular story as being "ignored." Because - who knows? The story was probably thoroughly covered somewhere, but I didn't see it.
3	Name a current nonfiction writer whose work you really admire & tell what you like about it.
	If I have to pick one, I'd go with Nicholson Baker. His attention to detail borders on the pathological, and yet his prose is never tedious. He writes these really baroque sentences, and many of his word choices and metaphors could potentially come off as overly mannered, but he is such an assured writer that they never do. While he's written more fiction than non-fiction, it's his two non-fiction books -- "U and I" and "The Size of Thoughts" -- that I like best.
4	Have you read any magazine pieces lately that were so good you wish you'd thought of them yourself?
	It was about a year ago, so I don't know that that qualifies as "lately," but I thought Po Bronson's piece in Wired on Silicon Valley headhunters was excellent. Plenty of stories have been written about engineers and venture capitalists; his decision to tell a Valley story through a more peripheral sector of its ecology was something I wish I'd thought of. In general, the more peripheral a story, the more compelling I find it.
5	Tell us something about suck.com that isn't common knowledge.
	Given that the last half-dozen stories I've read about Webzines haven't even mentioned Suck, I have to assume that it's not common knowledge that Suck is a success. But later this month, it will mark its third anniversary, and according to Joey Anuff, its ad revenues "amply cover" its production, editorial and payroll expenses and have for some time now.
6	Where do you get your story ideas -- specifically, which sources of story ideas are the most productive?
	I write mostly about the media, so I get most of my ideas from watching TV, reading magazines, etc. One thing I've gotten away from in the past year or two is the Web itself and technology in general. I'd like to start writing more about the Web again, and that means I'll have to start surfing the Web more again.
7	What happened to the personal Web site trend? Has the steam gone out of it?
	It seems as if a lot of specific individuals, including me, have lost steam, but I think new people are always coming along to replace them. There is still something that's somehow more compelling about reading someone's personal project than reading a professional page. This is true, I think, not only for diary-oriented pages, but for projects like www.newsies.com or www.soundbitten.com. I think, for example, that Drudge was a lot more compelling when he was just this random guy; now that he's become a media fixture himself, I don't read his reports as much anymore.
Back to SQ index Copyright 1998, Thomas L. Mangan		>Back to SevenQuestions