Mixtape-Journalismus

The first thing that writers might copy from musicians—even more than they do already—could be called the Free Culture Method. In music, one prong of that is mixtape giveaways. Despite recent miseries in the music business, Lil Wayne, the rap artist, sold more copies of his CD in one week than anyone this year, having built an audience by sending free mixtapes into the ether.

Alissa Quart nennt ihren Essay in der Columbia Journalism Review Music Lessons und denkt darüber nach, welche Parallelen es zwischen der kriselnden Musik- und Medienindustrie gibt. Dabei geht sie beispielsweise auf das sich ändernde (veränderte?) Selbstbild des Journalisten ein …

Journalists these days grin under pancake make-up, speak in emphatic and punchy sentences, and videotape themselves for YouTube. In short, they sometimes succeed when they tear a page from performers’ scripts.

… und beschreibt die neue Zeit als „Too Much Information Age“, für die folgendes bezeichnend sei

Yet some journalists certainly know how to promote their names and personae, and their bylines appear to have multiplied. Images of their faces bob seductively beside their names. In the Too Much Information Age, journalists’ biographies—once not supposed to intrude on the story—have moved toward the center of it.

Insofern ist es nicht verwunderlich, dass sie Aram Sinnreich (Professor für Media Studies in New York) zur Hilfe holt, der feststellt

“Both journalists and musicians must spend a phenomenal amount of time nowadays maintaining a 360-degree cross-media relationship with their fan base.”

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