Rob Fishman over at the Huffington Post performed an interesting experiment after yesterday’s Michael Wolff column on Newser.com attacked New York Times media columnist David Carr. (This is also after Gawker sagely pointed out that Wolff probably mostly hates Carr for his negative review of Wolff’s latest book in The New York Times Book Review.) What, exactly, would Wolff or his own Newser.com do without the newspapers he so constantly decries? So far in 2009, Wolff has written sixteen columns for Newser, making at least 46 factual citations. None of them have been from his own research or interviews (compare that to Carr, for example, who does plenty of research and interviews, or relies on ones from his own publication). “In relentlessly attacking the Times in column after column, Wolff implicitly rejects the premise of his own website — ‘that the Times … no longer puts out a necessary newspaper’ — by almost exclusively relying on the Graying Lady to make his point,” writes Fishman. This is something we’ve often considered — Arianna Huffington, at least, is attempting to develop her own reporting sources. For someone who is constantly predicting the demise of other media, how long can Michael Wolff go on without sacking up and creating his own content?
Will Newser End Without Newspapers? [HuffPo]
