Chasing rainclouds away with some positive attitude

Recent news about the journalism business has been depressing. I’m sure you’ve noticed. So it’s kind of hard to get jazzed about writing a blog post sometimes. Yoni Greenbaum was feeling the same way, it seems:

… our newsrooms and online operations are being overtly influenced by dinosaurs who are content with seeing their employer struggle and fail and by curmudgeonly young employees who have a warped sense of entitlement and the oft-mistaken belief that they alone have the insight and the answers to change this industry for the better.

Bummer, right? But I don’t want to be one of those public whiners or tantrum throwers Yoni dresses down in his wistful post. (There, I already feel better just because I got to use the word wistful correctly.)

I’d rather be like young Kiyoshi Martinez, who’s telling all the young journalist wannabes to quit crying into their beer and walk up to the plate with their chests puffed out and confidence in their skills and bright new ideas:

We’re in an era where you don’t have to be officially affiliated with “legitimate media” to be a journalist. Start your own on campus blogging network of writers. Find contributors and give your college paper a run for their money online. Break news. Advertise with spray chalk your URL. Post it in classrooms. Use Facebook. Put some of that marketing and advertising you learned about to get students excited about what you’re creating. Become your own part-time publisher.

When you’re in a job interview, you can be one of two people. You can say, “Well, we didn’t have blogs at our college paper,” or you can say, “We didn’t have blogs at my paper, so I decided to leave and create my own publishing network on campus.” Which candidate would you hire? Don’t waste your time waiting for others to catch up, because that’s the kind of thing a traditional newspaper would do and we know how well that’s worked out for them.

Then there’s Howard Owens, pointing us to this invigorating post by Erick Schonfeld, who recently started blogging for TechCrunch (yes, blogging as a real job):

TechCrunch succeeds because its bloggers do very good journalism — gathering lots of stories, getting them online quickly (if not first), and because its bloggers know what the hell they’re talking about, their commentary is respected.

So, Yoni, buck up. I have faith in journalism, and I know you do too. (I think I’m losing my faith in newspapers, though. I’m going to try not to dwell on that, because it makes me feel pretty sad.)

What Kiyoshi and Erick are reminding us of is that journalism is an exciting business, a shot of ink-infused adrenaline shooting through your veins. It’s a job that’s not evil. It’s a calling that can bring about great good, and you can have great fun doing it too. Maybe that’s all gone now in a lot of newspaper newsrooms — but don’t despair! Read Erick’s post and share the excitement.

If you turn up your snobby nose at technology journalism, then sniff out Politico, which is proving to give The Washington Post some real competition in covering issues and not just the horse race (it has a super-slick print edition Monday through Friday). Or watch some “vanguard journalism” at Current TV.

Journalism is not dead — it’s all over the Internet.

Journalism is not newspapers. It’s bigger than that old tree-killing tradition, and sooner or later, someone’s going to figure out how to get it paid for. Not those old dinosaurs, obviously. But someone will — some sharp-toothed little mammals are going to survive the new era and evolve and grow. I’m sure of it.