An alternative is what I've learned from the geeks I love. "There are no bad users, only bad software." Google got it. Microsoft no so much.

IMO you're absolutely on to something. The entire media universe/system is changing, but the various pieces, parts and players are all evolving at different speeds and directions, so it's not clear what the end game looks like. And some parts of the media universe are more out of sync than others.

I agree with you that it's not helpful to blame individuals for being "bad journalists." Yes, of course there are bad journalists out there — but that's not what's causing the crisis in the industry. So scapegoating individuals is a red herring that keeps you from seeing and addressing the systemic issues that are allowing these multiple failures/lapses to happen (as Edwards Deming would say).

In terms of media professionals as a group: the sad thing is that it might be one of those generational paradigm issues. It's often difficult for people to change their thinking when their world undergoes a paradigm shift. People spend the bulk of their career in a certain industry model, absorbing unconsciously the skills and mental tools of that industry model….like fish don't notice water, people don't even see how their deepest assumptions are no longer applicable. Thomas Kuhn would have said that big paradigm shifts are often generational; you literally have to wait for many of the old guard to retire / die, before the new model/paradigm can fully be adopted and flourish. Which is a bit grim but does often seem to be true (Detroit, anyone?).

My experience is that, of all the traditional media forms, the daily local newspaper is the one that's in failure mode, because its primary purposes are all under attack from new forms/approaches (disseminating "breaking" news; distribution channel for local ads; editorial opinions; local news). Out of all of these — the "breaking" news is now covered by online services. Ad distribution is increasingly online or done by "free" local papers. etc etc.

Local news and needs are being most poorly served at present IMO — so there's a gap there to fill, for deeper stories and deeper editorial content, that won't be filled by the "free" local ad papers. So where will it come from? (given that the current business model for local papers is failing)

I think you're correct that the best mechanism visible to us today, is a local wiki / discussion board (with some strict Slashdot-type screening and ranking tools to help the cream rise to the top).

As an example: I'm reminded of the rumored "National Security Wikipedia" which members of our multiple national security agencies use to pool their expertise and data in real time. It's the place where the breaking news is consolidated as it unfolds — as one example, apparently there was a new wiki page on the Empire-building-airplane strike within minutes of the event, and over the following hour or so, the multiple contributors did real-time research and quickly determined that this was a genuine small plane accident and not a terrorist incident. And of course the NSWiki is also the place for discussion and research consolidation on longer-term security issues, not just breaking incidents. (This is all hearsay on my side, since of course this wiki is off limits to the public.)

I would love to see something like that for local news — like a Yelp for local news, or perhaps done as a Facebook app / attachment or something. But, it's true that a lot of people don't use those types of online services yet (again a generational issue). So we're dealing with very disparate demographic use patterns for consumers of news/info.

Another thought: as the traditional daily newspaper dies — the specialty news magazine / expertise magazines still seem to have success/demand. A few of the big daily metro papers seem to be evolving themselves into the "magazine" format — ie the New York Times with its national Sunday edition, and increasingly the Wall Street Journal daily (as it challenges the Times). NYT Sunday edition basically seem to be in competition with The Economist for providing me with substantive insights into the news. This means those papers have to provide deeper, more substantive content — less emphasis on breaking news and "names-dates" simple facts — more on in-depth research, analysis and well-written summary findings.

CJR and Matt broadened the criteria for judging to ask for the quality of the journalism as a whole. I think wqe have to go much farther than that. The real test, perhaps the only worthy test, is whether it served the public well.

For years I've warned newsrooms against the kind of thinking that led an educator to pronounce, "I was teaching, but they weren't learning." Impossible. And I think we need to embrace a similar responsibility: if 50% of the public still thinks Saddam was involved in 9-11, or that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, journalism has failed. Even if we did everything right, perfectly, by established standards, we have to be judged by the outcomes, not the inputs.

Ours is a sacred charge, but the formats weren't handed down by God through Moses to the ASNE.

Society changes. Journalism must change.