Here is one way the new media are changing the way we learn about things.
Suicide has always been one of those subjects the press tiptoes around. If someone killed himself at noon on Main Street, the thinking was, that was news. If he did it in the privacy of his home, that was a quiet family tragedy we did not want to intrude upon. Sometimes "newsworthiness" factors came into play -- the victim was a public figure, for example, or had been involved in public events. But there was a dividing line, and a sense that suicide was a delicate subject.
You can see that in this News-Sentinel account of the death of Richard H. Blaich. Read the first couple of paragraphs carefully:
The former president of the nonprofit Schwab foundation, who was being investigated by the state attorney general's office, died in his home in the 9900 block of Kress Road on Monday.
An autopsy today determined Richard H. Blaich, 59, of Roanoke, died of carbon monoxide poisoning, according to the Allen County coroner's office. The manner of death has not yet been established.
It's pretty clear from that story what the writer think happened, and the very first sentence even offers a reason it might have happened. But everything is just hinted at; you have to read between the lines to get it. That's the old-media approach.
Now, consider how the subject is being handled in a couple of local blogs (here and here). Not only is suicide directly mentioned, but there is the suggestion that he might have tried to make it look otherwise, a hint that he might have lied about having cancer, "questions" about people at Parkview Hospital in his circle.
I'm not making a value judgment here, just saying that things are changing. News consumers (neither readers nor viewers and listeners seem appropriate any longer) are going to have things thrown at them faster and faster. (For that matter, the distinctions among news producer, news consumer and news subject are fast blurring.) The few gatekeepers, who sorted through all the information and used their own value systems to decide what to let through, are being replaced by the many independent agents, many of whom consider that their mission is to reveal, not filter.
"News is whatever we say it is," journalists used to say. That was not arrogance, just a statement of the way things were. Only when someone decides to report it does a particular piece of information among the millions of pieces available become "news." Now, we are all potential journalists. That fact changes the very definition of news -- and how we will have to deal with it.
UPDATE: There's no official ruling yet, but the coroner's office says the death is being investigated as an accident. That means, I'm guessing, that any further newspaper accounts and maybe even the TV reports won't go near the term "suicide." In the old days, that would have been it, except for people's unreported speculations and discussions. But now, nothing goes unreported.
