Life Imitates "The Wire"

Posted by Lindsay Beyerstein, Majikthise at 4:29 AM on April 17, 2008.

The Baltimore Sun Media Group launched a mjb in response to an April 14 post by staff blogger Lori Barrett, wherein Barrett complains that an uplifting anecdote about an foiled armed robbery story got more ink in the local press than a rape/home invasion.

Another commenter, Sun Crime Reporter, gently reminds Ms. Barrett of the facts on the ground: "Um, maybe the fact that YOU ARE SITTING where our Baltimore County crime reporter used to sit has something to do with the newspaper’s “inadequate” coverage."

I feel bad for Ms. Barrett, who has been hired to keep of a steady stream of pithy commentary on what she reads in the paper. No doubt, it's cheaper to hire Barrett to keep up a chirpy running commentary than it would be to cover those beats.

She just started, and already readers are clamoring for her to get out and do her own reporting. The readers don't understand that Barrett's job was created to avoid paying reporters. It would defeat management's purpose if she were to abandon her post on the assembly line long enough to learn new facts, or conduct in-depth research.

Doing more! With Less!

Tagged as: newspapers, baltimore

Lindsay Beyerstein a New York writer blogging at Majikthise.