The Newsroom is a television drama about
people that get paid to tell other people what they need to know. The guy that
wrote it likes to make a lot of shows covering the same topic, but with
different, backdrops, set pieces, and characters.
Honestly, he makes the same show every time, which pretty
much goes, "Person loves [x], [x] isn't what it used to be anymore, but
not many others seem to care. Person wants [x] to be what it used to be, so
person pushes [x] uphill against all odds. Person achieves Pyrrhic victory,
person and those around said person feel better. [x] continues to be [x].
A lot of people see that as lazy writing, which is
understandable. I see it as him being stubborn, as in, "I will just keep
doing it over and over until people understand what I am trying to say, why I
think it's important, and maybe do something about it if there is still time.
And if it doesn't change, well fuck... man, I still had to do it,
because we both know it's broken, and only getting worse." Art imitating
life, as it were.
It's a wrap for
newspapers,
and everybody knows it. The tech flood is here, and the televised daily's as we
know them are next. The news cycle is a mechanical bull in a china shop, and no one can
feed a beast
with an inexhaustible appetite, a self sustaining power supply, a pattern
of wants at odds with what the system was designed to do, and a penchant for killing the messenger cause the beast
don't like
their face.
"If you can't swim, then you bound to
drizzown." Or, "If you think swimming is beneath you, then you probably underwater." These days it seems more important to like the person
telling you things, than if the things they are telling you are true.
Everybody knows what people
call personalized flash news and blogging today will be the norm
of tomorrow, even though everyone makes fun of the platform.
That's embarrassing for everybody, a sinking ship harrumphing at a
jet plane on autopilot. [x] continues to be [x].
