Reasons for Paying Attention

I wrote yesterday about what the reasons might be for people to pay attention to public affairs.

Attention to the news is necessary, according to the traditional argument, in order for people to know what's going on. An informed public, so goes the theory, is vital in a democracy. Let's assume all that (though it makes an interesting argument for a later date as to whether it matters if a public is informed or not).

What are the reasons for paying attention?

There are a lot of reasons to not pay attention.

• There are a zillion TV channels now. You don't have to watch TV news unless you absolutely want to. Many have chosen to do just that.
  
• The news itself -- especially on cable TV -- is often petty, partisan, and particularly focused on the inane.
• I get my news off Facebook ... whatever friends happen to link to.
  
• The source of real news -- newspapers -- is often presented in a dull, dry manner.
• It's so easy to just be entertained. Or if you want to feel informed while being entertained, there's always The Daily Show or Colbert Report.

I'm sure there are other reasons to not pay attention. But what are the reasons to pay attention?

• It's your responsibility in a democracy
• Take your medicine; it's good for you
• Being informed is fun!

Yeah, the reasons to pay attention, they kinda suck. Responsibility? Pfffft. I'm sure there are other reasons people should pay attention, and they do when a major story breaks, when things get serious (and when that happens, funny how CNN's audience shoots up compared to Fox News. Just saying).

So Jon Stewart has taught us an important lesson. For many, the news has to be entertaining. And Bill O'Reilly has taught us that, for many, the news has to be highly partisan. And Rush Limbaugh has taught us that, for many, the news can even be on radio. And the Internet has taught us that, for many, the net is for porn.

I'm being a bit of a pessimist here. The NYTimes and Wall Street Journal prove that, for many, quality serious news will sell. At the hyper-local level, people will pay attention if you cover your community in a way that rings true to them, stories that seem real and not artificially distanced from the communities they strive to describe. People will also pay attention if you somehow manage to work sex into the story, but that doesn't always work, so it's a challenge for many types of news stories.

Ultimately, getting people to pay attention to what's happening the world, that's not so hard. Getting them to pay attention to News, that's a bit harder. Getting them to pay for News, that's even more difficult. And thus we come to the core of the problem -- that journalism is expensive, at least the way we've been doing it for decades, and the revenue models are unraveling in some ways.

We've got to come up with ways to convince people to not only pay attention, but to pay for paying attention.

Reasons for Paying Attention

Citizens do need to be more engaged in politics, but the reasons for paying attention need to be clearer to them, the benefits of stronger citizenship must be more evident, and the opportunities to learn about politics more frequent, timely, and equitable.

- Michael X. Delli Carpini & Scott Keeter
What Americans Know About Politics and Why It Matters

The quote above, from an excellent book I've had shamelessly checked out of the university library now for a million years, gets right to the point I'll be addressing for the next few days -- the reasons for paying attention. For the average American, what are they? Do they still work? What does this mean for news, and for journalism? For democracy? Are we -- to steal a great book title -- Amusing Ourselves to Death?

This is serious stuff. I'll summarize much of what I've blogged about before, look at some of the more recent research, and ask why someone should even want to pay attention to the business of public affairs.

Stay tuned, or clicked, or whatever the hell it is you do for a blog.

Rational Inattention

Here's a brief blog post with a nifty title: Rational Inattention to Politics. This is not a new idea -- it's been outlined and discussed and formulated by scholars for decades (see Downs, for example, back in 1957). But it deserves a shout-out, especially on a day when I'm pressed to keep up with the readings in the Public Opinion seminar I teach in three hours. In other words, this pretty much sums up my blog for the day. Sorry.