On-Line Journalism Questioned

Late last week, the Internet took a giant leap forward, or backward, depending on whom you believe. But you're not likely to hear about this development in PC Week or MacWorld magazine.

Rupert Murdoch's Fox News Network announced last week that it had entered into a development deal with one Matt Drudge, a self-proclaimed master of new journalism and one of the biggest celebrities on the Internet. Starting in May, Fox News will be giving Drudge his own weekly news program. If he's successful, his role with Fox could evolve and grow.

Nothing revolutionary about a journalist moving to the small screen from print or other media, you might say. But Drudge is a very unusual journalist, if he is a journalist at all.

Working out of a small apartment in Hollywood, California, Drudge is a one-man news operation, gleaning leads on stories from confidential sources via e-mail, as well as from television and the World Wide Web. Drudge compiles his tip sheet and transmits it both via a free e-mail newsletter and his Web site.

Of course, in the back-stabbing worlds of politics and entertainment, some-one is always looking to leak a story to get back at a rival or boss. As a result, Drudge doesn't lack for content. In the two years since opening the Drudge Report, this vigilante journalist has broken many hot stories, including the selection of Jack Kemp as Bob Dole's running mate and the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

Drudge hasn't made any money off of his free service, but he has earned quite a loyal following among the on-line community. He claims editorial independence from "old media" interests and a dedication to printing hot stories before anyone else. Quite a step up, it would seem, from his former post as manager of the gift shop at CBS's Los Angeles studios.

The Internet is more than a great medium for Drudge's content; his brand of journalism couldn't exist without it. With little money and less experience, Drudge created a small media empire with just a 486 computer and a modem.

Now, Drudge is poised to become more than an Internet phenomenon; he could become the first person to move from new media stardom into mass media acceptance. Does this help give the Internet an acclaimed status as the home for news in the next century? The problem with Drudge is that a Web page is cheap, e-mail is essentially free, and no one checks your resume at the door before signing you up for a domain name. In a wired world, Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw hold no monopoly over the news. Anyone with a connection to the Internet can open his or her own site, be it timely news or unverified gossip.

Yet it is on this last point--the editorial quality of sites like the Drudge Report--that new media faces its biggest test. In a sense, the old cost barriers of journalism implied a veracity of content that didn't exist otherwise.

If you didn't have access to millions of dollars in printing press equipment, or billion-dollar satellite networks and cameras, you had no way to spread views and news to the public. Presumably, the owners of the press used discretion in turning their media channels over to carefully selected and trained reporters.

New media advocates like Drudge argue that the old system was undemocratic because it allowed the Eastern (and Western) Establishments to control the spigot of public information. In part, this is true. And there is something exciting about the idea of a world where every man can be his own editor, publisher and printer, without the old barriers.

But on balance, the lack of editorial standards on the Web makes the value of a good like the Drudge Report hard to determine. An URL does not discriminate; we can't know which of the dozens of Drudge clones on the Web are legitimate, and which are filled with half-truths and whole lies. In short, there's something about the high hurdle to access in the old system that can be reassuring. Notoriety comes from success among peers in the news-room, not a cramped Los Angeles apartment. Internet media may be a great boon for democracy, but it's not ready for prime time, or any other time on television.

Matt Drudge may have a good streak going at ferreting out the truth, although an arguably politically-motivated $30 million libel suit brought by Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal against Drudge may suggest otherwise. But I remain unconvinced that Internet gossiping is any preparation for mass media stardom. If Drudge turns out to be a flash in the pan, or an unreliable reporter, look for a cultural backlash against the same Internet that nurtured his media dreams.

Still, it's good reading. Surf on over to www.drudgereport.com. Another cool gossip site for TV and movie lovers is Harry Knowles' infamous Cool News site, at www.aint-it-cool-news.com.

Kevin Davis is an independent computer consultant and student director of the Harvard Arts and Sciences Computer Service's (HASCS) Advanced Support Team. You can reach him at ksdavis@fas.harvard.edu.