hasn\u2019t covered itself in glory recently<\/a>. People of my generation longed for it to return to its prime, when it was a vital element of being a fully-informed fan of sports. That was never going to happen. With the NFL exploring buying into ESPN, and the NBA and MLB likely to do so soon after, SI could have carved out a new niche as an alternative to ESPN\u2019s online presence, a home for sports journalism that was free of constraints put in place by one league or another. Instead the private equity ghouls that run it chose to strip it to the bone and let it fade into obscurity.<\/p>\nFinally, the Los Angeles Times laid off a large chunk of its workforce, including some great sports writers with national reputations. The Times seemed like one of the last big papers that would be able to thrive in the current climate. Once again, ownership is more interested in squeezing profit from the paper than viewing it as a public necessity.<\/p>\n
As a former member of the media this is just more very sad news. There are fewer and fewer independent media outlets that create original and interesting content. Major media outlets are focused on conflict and who is winning\/losing. Local media often seems more like advertising than informative news. AI is going to dramatically change news in the next decade.<\/p>\n
I never had great illusions about being able to match the money I made in the corporate world as a journalist, not that that was all that much. As the avenues to make a reasonable wage writing dry up and more and more experienced journalists get thrown out of their traditional jobs, I don\u2019t think there is any chance I could ever get back into the semi- or fully employed writing game.<\/p>\n
Which I guess means more blogging, so good for my loyal readers I guess?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NFL Because of basketball (KU and CHS) and some other activities, I didn\u2019t get to see much of the four playoff games last weekend. San Francisco is very lucky to advance, and does not seem like the same team that ran roughshod through their opponents during stretches of the regular season. Jordan Love\u2019s final pass for Green Bay might have been the worst choice\/throw in a big moment in a long time. Good for Detroit for advancing again. A damn shame the NFC title game won\u2019t be at Ford Field. That scene would have been wild. I\u2019ve written many times that no team, player, coach, or fanbase deserves success because they\u2019ve had years of bad luck and tough breaks. That\u2019s not how sports work. You can play hard, follow the rules, be a good teammate, etc and sometimes the other team is just better and\/or luckier. But, man, Buffalo losing because their kicker pushed a field goal wide right seemed like an especially cruel ending to their game. That wasn\u2019t the real reason the Bills lost – they lost because of a couple bad throws, a terrible drop, and their defense wilting – but it was the final gut punch you kind of knew was coming. Of course I, like about a million other people, said even if the Bills made that kick, the Chiefs still would have found a way to win, either in regulation or overtime. As cruel as having to watch a postseason game end on a kick sailing wide-right again, maybe it was better than losing at the final gun, or in overtime. Poor Buffalo. Pacers Hey, the Pacers made a trade! And it was a big one, grabbing Pascal Siakam from Toronto for a bench player and three first round picks. At first glance three picks seemed like a lot for a player on an expiring contract. Those picks – two this year, the third in two years – will likely be in the 20s, though, so the Pacers likely aren\u2019t giving up franchise-changing draft opportunities. And most NBA insiders suggest that Siakam is open to re-signing with the Pacers this summer. It\u2019s tough to gauge the trade since Tyrese Haliburton has only played one, injury-affected game with Siakam so far. While he isn\u2019t perfect, and isn\u2019t playing quite as well as he did three years ago, Siakam is a terrific match for what the Pacers do on offense, and a big upgrade on the defensive end. It\u2019s tough to get top tier players to come to Indiana. In the last three winters they have traded for Haliburton and Siakam. That\u2019s pretty good. Even after that trade the Pacers remain in good position to make another move, should the right opportunity arise. Or just play out this season, re-sign Siakam, and tweak the roster over the summer to make a real run next season. Now Haliburton just needs to get healthy again. Media A rough week for people who write for a living. First, Pitchfork got absorbed into the GQ brand. No one is sure what that means short term, but long term you have to think it signals the end of one of the most important music journalism outlets of the internet era. I\u2019ve always been more of a Stereogum fan, but I\u2019ve read plenty of pieces on Pitchfork over the years. The next day it was announced that all of Sports Illustrated\u2019s staff had been laid off. SI has been a joke for a long time, and hasn\u2019t covered itself in glory recently. People of my generation longed for it to return to its prime, when it was a vital element of being a fully-informed fan of sports. That was never going to happen. With the NFL exploring buying into ESPN, and the NBA and MLB likely to do so soon after, SI could have carved out a new niche as an alternative to ESPN\u2019s online presence, a home for sports journalism that was free of constraints put in place by one league or another. Instead the private equity ghouls that run it chose to strip it to the bone and let it fade into obscurity. Finally, the Los Angeles Times laid off a large chunk of its workforce, including some great sports writers with national reputations. The Times seemed like one of the last big papers that would be able to thrive in the current climate. Once again, ownership is more interested in squeezing profit from the paper than viewing it as a public necessity. As a former member of the media this is just more very sad news. There are fewer and fewer independent media outlets that create original and interesting content. Major media outlets are focused on conflict and who is winning\/losing. Local media often seems more like advertising than informative news. AI is going to dramatically change news in the next decade. I never had great illusions about being able to match the money I made in the corporate world as a journalist, not that that was all that much. As the avenues to make a reasonable wage writing dry up and more and more experienced journalists get thrown out of their traditional jobs, I don\u2019t think there is any chance I could ever get back into the semi- or fully employed writing game. Which I guess means more blogging, so good for my loyal readers I guess?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[31,67,41,27,36,66],"class_list":["post-12481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-basketball","tag-football","tag-indiana-pacers","tag-media","tag-nba","tag-nfl"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12481"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12483,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12481\/revisions\/12483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}