Dave Winer is exhibiting the “tall poppy syndrom” which drives people to try and tear down anything getting too much attention (he’s been the victim of this as well over the years). He says journalists are giving too much attention to the iPhone and not looking enough at the competitors.
My response is this – successful journalists have an eye for a story that will suck the reader in, and the iPhone is the best example of that in a long time. It drove Engadget’s highest page view day ever, for example. That’s something HTC’s newest phone won’t do no matter how cool it is.
At the end of the day, it is the responsibility of the companies to create sexy and cool products. And the journalists will continue to write about what their readers want to read. Any journalist who strays from this, and tries to hype a less sexy competing product because its more “fair” is just going to be a less popular journalist. And eventually that journalist will fade into the same obscurity as the products he or she covers.
Don’t blame Apple for being cool. And don’t blame journalists for doing what their readers demand.
Sorry I seem to have failed to communicate the point of the piece.
Only a certain group of people have access, and they have to be careful what they say or they lose access. Everyone knows this.
And it leads to spotty reporting. Maybe not everyone knows this.
That was and is the point.
You’re in the middle of this Mike, maybe you haven’t seen first-hand how it works. I’ve been doing this a lot longer than you, and have never accepted any limits on what I will or won’t say. That’s why I don’t have access. That leaves me free to ask whether the people with access are paying close enough attention (answer: they aren’t duh).
It’s so institutional the people who have been doing it for 20-plus years don’t even know they’re doing it.
Let’s hope you never pull any punches to get the access you get.
Well in this case, we didn’t have access. Macworld wouldn’t let me in (TechCrunch doesn’t qualify as press). Our CrunchGear guy literally had to sneak in to be there.
Why don’t we do something to fix this. I’m trying everything I know, but they sort of make the issue personal, if they don’t like what you write about them. I’m sure there are companies that treat you that way. I think there’s got to be a way to break that.
I don’t see the issues as related…Apple doesn’t give me the time of day. And I love their products.
Why did your guy have to “sneak in” couldn’t he just pay like everyone else?
Rick, usually conferences welcome press at events to get coverage. It’s impossible to pay for every event we cover.
I agree with you Mike that it’s silly to say that journalists shouldn’t cover Apple if that’s what readers want. However, readers also want fair coverage, and the sycophancy and dearth of critical reporting is where I side with Dave. The piece in the LA Times about how the Japanese are so far ahead of the US in mobile phone technology is the sort of thing that there should have been more of. Even in Australia our newspapers reported the iPhone on page three, despite the fact that it won’t be out here for at least a year, and it uses inferior technology to the 3G that we’re used to here.
The real problem here is that Apple’s fans, who are overpaid snobs, keep buying Apple’s products even when they are overpriced, underfeatured and overengineered compared to products from competitors. As that LA Times piece said, the Japanese already have iPhone-type devices and they refuse to pay more than US$100 for them, not US$600. Don’t stop covering Apple, but don’t swallow their marketing line either.
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-japanphone11jan11,0,6424968.story
It sucks that Apple doesn’t “give you the time of day”. You’re essentially an evangelist – an Apple fan AND a blogger/journalist with more readers than most magazines. What’s up with that?
As for the story at hand – why not cover Apple? People obviously wanted to hear about it, so why not feed them the story? I think the coverage on Apple was just right, as judged by the people interested.
I understand Mike 8). I run events for a living and your guy should have definitely received a credential But if he “snuck” in instead of paying when denied that was his choice.
Thats all I was trying to say 8).
The dynamic that Dave talks about goes beyond Apple. iPhone is only the most recent instantiation of it. Hollywood press junkets… Woodward and his first two books on Bush and the War… Vista Phoenix Laptops to bloggers… Scoble on the Edwards announcement tour. It’s how the game is played. You have an audience. I have a story. Let’s meet.
In most any field, it’s standard PR practice to try to barter favorable access for prominent coverage. Is favorable coverage an unspoken part of the bargain? Yes. Dave’s right about that.
But Arrington’s is right, too. The access-for-coverage dynamic itself doesn’t explain why some stories explode into to page-view and and blog-post orgies. Why iPhone and not any one of a zillion other stories that get pimped with a promise of an exclusive CEO interview? Why does Techmeme have so many entries about iPhone. Why is the New York Times covering it on Saturday in the business section when the announcement came on Tuesday? Why can’t I stop thinking about it, reading about it, blogging about it, and commenting about it? Why can’t Dave? Why can’t Mike?
Some politicians, some companies, some movies have heat. The media can sense when they’re not simply delivering up their audience, but winning new readers and viewers by covering hot stories.
There must be a there there.
“Why does Techmeme have so many entries about iPhone. Why is the New York Times covering it on Saturday in the business section when the announcement came on Tuesday? Why can’t I stop thinking about it, reading about it, blogging about it, and commenting about it? Why can’t Dave? Why can’t Mike?”
To answer your questions Mike M, most tech bloggers (the people featured on Techmeme) are Apple fans thats why.
I remember attending the blog business summit in October. About 90% of the people blogging the event were doing so on Macs. Whereas 90% of the world uses PC’s.
Like it or not tech bloggers are Apple fans. I could care less about the iphone. All the blog drama about it is interesting in a soap opera kind of way but nothing more than that for most people.
For all the techy talk about “how great” they are most people will never own a Mac. iPod? lots of people love em. A huge win for Apple.
iPhone? maybe. Time will tell.
Dave – what types of things would you consider pulling punches? Would be good to get an idea of what those things are. (you dont have to name names, just wondering)
I have heard that tc requires the startups they write about to give them exclusivity on future news. Since many of the startups are just happy to have coverage they go along with it. I have no idea if this is true (mike can you confirm/or note your policy) but if it is, would that be moving towards what you are talking about?
Mike Cavalier – we certainly do not require exclusives, although they are often offered to us. What we don’t do is cover news when it has been given to others exclusively, then a couple of days later the company approaches us to write about them. I think the best thing is for a company to announce news to all journalists at once.