My (partial) email count from Thursday (filtering courtesy of Procmail):
%pwd
/home/declan/.procmail
%grep "Thu Feb 7" log |wc -l
1113
%
Previous Politech message:
http://www.politechbot.com/p-03125.html
-Declan
**********
Date: Fri, 8 Feb 2002 11:19:30 +0000
To: declanat_private
From: "Charles Arthur, The Independent" <carthurat_private>
Subject: Re: FC: PressBlaster and the new form of journalism - agriculture
vs hunter-gathering
Hi Declan...
I note Margie Wylie's comments....
>From: Margie Wylie <margie.wylieat_private>
..
>As "the press" it's our job, nay, our duty to take press releases and tips
>from everyone so inclined to send them.
>
>With this territory comes the inane, the irrelevant, the goofy, and, yes,
>my favorite, the cranks.
>
>I am dismayed by the attitude so prevalent these days among reporters that
>people who "can't write a press release" have no business contacting them.
>I am at loss to explain this attitude, but it does seem to be the kind
>thinking that gets us labeled as an "elite" of corporate lapdogs who are
>fed their stories by a professional corps of spinmiesters.
>
>A free press is no use without free access to it.
>
>I hate Spam as much as the next guy, but as long as someone is really
>sending me a press release (even a bulk e-mail press release) and not
>trying to sell me an "amazing new product" or a "secret investment tool,"
>it seems to me that that is a legitimate use of my publicly available
>professional e-mail address.
The problem is, it seems to me, that journalism is moving from being a
hunter-gatherer occupation - where one goes on the hunt for something,
which takes cunning and ability and experience - to being agriculture. Big
area to cover, lot of words, take the seed (press bumf) and spread it and
water it with a little bit of knowledge and a call or two and there you
are, a field (story) filled.
It's competent, and it's filling, but it's also complete PR-driven
rubbish. As a journalist, one really feels the difference between a
hunter-gatherer-style story and an agriculture-style one. It's the
difference between the woman who started looking into Enron's accounts
properly and the one who just reports Enron's claims for their results.
Personally, I think h-g style journalism is really under threat through
tighter deadlines (why does all this tech not give us *more* time to write
and research?), fewer people in the job, and more pointless PR flack spew
pouring out of companies and into our inboxes.
Stuff like PressBlaster, which thankfully I don't seem to be targeted by...
yet... just accelerate that process. People think because they -
particularly their company - have got something to say that you as a
journalist should listen, and be excited because they are. I tend to growl
at such folk. I suspect I have a reputation as the grouchiest tech hack in
Fleet Street. Suits me fine, because not being called up by PR folk
reciting a script about how they sent me an email yesterday and did I
receive it and have I got any more questions gives me time to actually
*think*.
That doesn't stop me getting 200-odd emails a day - and I'd *really* like
to know Declan's strategy for dealing with 1,000 - which I can only handle
at all because I, alone in my office, use Eudora. Everyone else is on Lotus
Notes, in a flat file format, and emails scroll up the screen.
GTG. Phone is ringing...
best
Charles
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The Independent newspaper on the Web: http://www.independent.co.uk/
It's even better on paper
**********
Date: Thu, 07 Feb 2002 18:33:09 -0500
From: "Robin (Roblimo) Miller" <robinat_private>
To: declanat_private
Subject: Re: FC: Technology reporter defends PressBlaster spam software
>I hate Spam as much as the next guy, but as long as someone is really
>sending me a press release (even a bulk e-mail press release) and not
>trying to sell me an "amazing new product" or a "secret investment tool,"
>it seems to me that that is a legitimate use of my publicly available
>professional e-mail address.
But isn't sending the following (PressBlaster) press release to editors at
a publication whose media guide listings all say it covers nothing but
Linux and Open Source software news really just spam? And isn't the lack of
a removal mechanism for people who receive email though alias addresses
rather rude? And isn't the "handful of target media contacts" line
somewhat, um, untrue?
- Robin "Roblimo" Miller
Editor,
NewsForge
Slashdot
and now Linux.com too...
-------------------------------
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# # #
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This Press Release is being sent to a handful of targeted
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