A “blizzard of garbage” in business journalism?

David Weidner, a columnist at The Wall Street Journal, writes Thursday about the current state of business journalism and asks whether it has gotten any better since the financial crisis.

Weidner writes, “If there was a single conclusion to be drawn, it is that the financial media are certainly more crowded, if not better.

“Blogs and websites like Business Insider, Seeking Alpha and Yahoo Finance have bulked up and and emerged as players, while established media outlets have expanded. Some examples: Bloomberg View, Dow Jones FX Trader and the New York Times’s Dealbook, to name a few.

“Felix Salmon at Reuters and Joe Weisenthal at Business Insider carved out new audiences and inspired dozens of imitators.

“In addition, social networks such as Twitter and Facebook have changed the way news is delivered. They have become an Everyman’s wire service and front page, respectively. In this new world, trending, popular stories compete with the traditional ‘important’ ones picked by editors.

“Unfortunately, all of this has created a congested mess that readers must sift through. Former Wall Street Journal Managing Editor and current ProPublica Editor-In-Chief Paul Steiger calls it ‘a blizzard of garbage'”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.