Further Media Cut-downs
Here in the east (as well as in the UK) it's reported that a lot of the reporting is being cut. Yes, there's something recursive in nature about it - the media reporting about the media being cut, sort of like slop about slop.
Earlier today in IRC we linked to a report that said: "Editorial restructure proposes 321 redundancies and 135 new roles."
Way to say what the headline says better: "Reach to cut editorial headcount by 186 in ‘biggest reorganisation’ yet" (not too long ago they said they were doing great).
They don't explain the reasons - not upfront anyway - but we dare guess that over-reliance on Google (and maybe "apps", Social Control Media etc.) doomed them. Then there's slop, which Google helps promote at the expense of the sites that slop is plagiarising.
In the case of Linux, one needn't look too far. We'll probably have Slopwatch some time tomorrow, but for now this one will do:
It does not even remotely look real.
If surveys are true, people grew tired of slop and increasingly sick of sites that use it. Even companies move away from it, so "peak slop" is behind us already. The issue is, before it goes away a lot of damage will have already been done; many journalists will have lost their roles (or jobs). There will be less news after that. █