Thanks to the miracle of aggregation and analytics we now have a lot more rankings and crap than we know how to use — so many handy ways to see who has the most authority, influence, power, popularity…
Reminds me a little of Pandora’s Box — eh? One thing hasn’t quite made it out of the jar yet.
Thank you internet.
I began thinking about this when I saw The Atlantic 50. It’s a list of “the most influential commentators” in America. And how did we ever get by without it? The first thing that comes to mind is that it looks like some kind of Cold War-era Olympic showdown – Right vs. Left… Who will be #1?
It’s funny to see people from both extremes (they stand out) all mixed up on the same list — as if they were in direct competition for the same audience. But nobody’s going to say, “You know I used to be a big Glenn Beck fan — but Rachel Maddow has really put in a strong showing lately…”
Right at the top you’ve got Paul Krugman — who waged what was essentially a one-man war against George W. Bush’s policies in that administration’s early years — followed by Rush Limbaugh who needs no introduction. I guess the tradeoff is that Bill O’Reilly is one place ahead of Keith Olbermann; they’re at 19 and 20 respectively.
It’s also interesting to see the mix of old and new media — which, when we’re talking about commentators, is a fairly smooth blend. The pundits are a transcendent bunch. They’re all sort of talking and shouting and smearing shit on each other with whatever means are available.
And then I stumbled on the Mediaite Power Grid…
Let’s start with their “Media Moguls” ranking, which has Rupert Murdoch and Michael Bloomberg in one and two.
Makes sense.
Then Oprah is third… Not exactly the same job description but, ok, counting the wealth factor and whatever I guess Oprah can stay.
Then Mark Zuckerberg is fourth.
Umm… sure, I understand Facebook is changing media — indeed becoming media — but wait, what’s this list for anyways???
It gets more confusing when another old white guy, Sumner Redstone comes up in fifth place — and watch out Zuckerberg, he’s gaining!
Here’s the visual.
Exactly who is supposed to use this list? What are we expected to do with this information? Are there trading cards or action figures for schoolchildren to pit against each other in Mortal Media Mogul Combat?
Ok well nobody really cares who the “#1 Media Mogul” is — except maybe the people in positions # 2, #3, #4, etc…
Admittedly Mediaite is aimed at the industry itself — but if you’re in the media business and you’re ever seriously in the position to ask, “Should we pick Rupert Murdoch or Sumner Redstone?” then chances are you have a pretty damn good idea who you’d pick without an algorithm telling you who’s better.
So much for that. Maybe we can get more value from the rest of the grid.
As it turns out, no. Just more crap.
Does this make any sense to you? Is Tiki Barber really any better (or worse) on the same scale as Anne Coulter? Michelle Malkin of all people manages to make not just that list but the list of top columnists as well — which for variety might as well include a Nobel laureate and a skinny big-haired bowtie-wearing guy who sells zillions of pop psychology books… Oh good, it does.
Finally, the one that really stands out is the top 5 “Print / Online Reporters.” I’ll give you the visual first and you can see what you think.
At the top spot is Ezra Klein — exemplar of the generation of young bloggers getting jobs at old media companies. I read one old newspaperman dismiss him as part of “the juicebox crowd” in Washington. The link wasn’t worth saving. Then Bob Woodward is third — exemplar of the old generation of reporters, as frequently noted for his legendary work on Watergate. Then another blogger (a personal favourite) Felix Salmon gets the fifth spot — great to see but he makes the list even more incongruous because he specializes in finance; I can’t conceive any useful scale on which to compare him with someone like Bob Woodward — or, for that matter, Cory Doctorow from Boing Boing, who lands seventh.
This is where we’re at right now. We’ve lost the means of orienting ourselves in the media landscape using any kind of instrument. The old categories and scales are dissolving and the new ones haven’t formed yet (but they will).
[Update/correction: Ok I realize what Mediaite is doing -- providing meta commentary and analysis on media itself -- and plenty of people in the business will make use of information about which pundits, reporters, etc, generate the most attention, but I see that adding momentum to a vicious cycle... Isn't this sort of bottom-line stats-driven attitude exactly what crippled old media in the first place?]
For now what’s important is to trust our own judgement — and to know who else’s judgement to trust… and exactly how far.
That’s really how it should be anyways. Maybe the web will teach us how truly important trust has always been, and how little it has been exercised in our media habits.
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