by thenewgreen

FORTUNE -- Oh, good. Another "the Internet is saving journalism" apologia, this time by Matt Yglesias, Slate's economics writer. Yglesias, reacting to the dismal findings of this year's State of the Media report from Pew Research, declared that "American news media has never been in better shape. That's just common sense." As always when somebody cites "common sense," close scrutiny is demanded. In this case, the scrutiny doesn't even have to be close—the argument is inane on the face of it. Usually, this notion that the Internet is improving our news media is couched in quasi-political terms: the "elite gatekeepers" of the "old media" are simply trying to protect their turf while the Internet is giving "the people" power to choose from a whole range of news sources.