Roy Greenslade and the West Seattle News

One must walk on eggshells here of course but Roy Greenslade's Subeditors: another attempt to explain why they are becoming redundant nevertheless makes for interesting reading (although the subtext can be reduced to: we have to save money somewhere; where else are we going to save it?).

Meanwhile over in the US of A arrogance or desperation leads the West Seattle News to publish an editorial explaining why their newspaper is vastly superior to the local bloggers who can offer more detail and faster along the way containing gems such as:

Professional journalists don't waste your time. [...] Instead of 3000 (sic) words about a community council meeting that was 'live blogged' with updates every seven minutes, wouldn't you honestly prefer 300 words that tell you what happened and what was decided?

which, of course, is an utterly pointless question. As the blog herald responds:

Let’s say I’m really interested in local politics but can’t attend, then the live blog is a great way to keep up to date as it happens. Is it the perfect way to cover a council meeting? No, of course not, but it is live and happening right now.

Another question (presumably intended to be rhetorical):

Do you seriously want to simply be referred to a series of links where you must delve deeply into issues spending hours of time to glean the facts?

Ummm. Yes. Of course. I always want the option to go and get more information elsewhere.

Anyway, the connection to the Greenslade piece is this comment attached to the WSN editorial from a reader which made me lol.

"Professional journalists don't waste your time"
Yeah, but the blogs can use a spell checker, and have a basic sense of grammar. Have you even read your own paper? It looks as if it was written by a 3rd grade special ed class.

Whether the West Seattle News rcently jettisoned all its sub-editors I do not know.