A reader who helps run a Gannett newspaper website writes about his job: approving requests from readers for permission to comment on stories on the paper's site. "I was told to deny permission to anyone whose e-mail address or user name looked questionable, and to give a hard look at anyone using Web-based e-mail,'' he writes. "Then we keep track of people thrown off the forums (mostly for using profanity or making offensive posts) and refer to these blacklists in case they try to get back on with similar e-mail addresses. Bull. I just approve everyone."Lesson here: There's a real cost in labor to run a website well when you open it to the free-for-all that follows with full reader interaction. As newsroom staffs shrink, something's got to give.
As someone who works in digital media and does that same job, I'd say the lesson to be taken from this shouldn't be "newspapers shouldn't have forums and user-generated content online" but rather "newspapers should just let users moderate their own content and communities".
ReplyDeleteUGC is the web right now and to not do it would be a huge mistake. But this old-fashioned over-control of said submissions by uptight newsroom managers takes too much time and frankly, isn't worth the effort.