It wasn't by design. It wasn't the result of a summer vacation spent in far-off exotic countries (that's still to come). I wasn't in a coma. I was just insanely busy doing actual work and kind of lost the plot on the whole blog thing. But hey, no biggie, right? It's the summer and nothing happens. Nobody dies. People go away on boring trips. They putter uneventfully around their own houses. Cultural and political discourse slows to a heat-induced crawl.
Truth be told, I'm now a bit rusty when it comes to the whole arrow-splitting business. But I'm happy to say that one of the contributing causes was an unusually juicy story I got to work on in an official, non-blog capacity. The story, which you can read here, concerned accusations of ethical misbehaviour by an ad agency and car company in a recent contest.
In following the aftermath of the story, I've come to realize how its central point - that companies have to be wary of how social media tools allow for a frenzy of negative opinion about brands to brew up quickly and powerfully - applies to me and my profession. In years past, a journalist might expect even his most controversial work to yield a few impassioned letters to the editor and not much more. Not the case any more. As I've recently discovered, the social media age means that I'll probably encounter statements like this one, which I found on the comments section of a blog operated by one of the upset contestants from the car contest, more often:
"Semansky, like so many writers in recent years, is masterful at appearing to be a journalist whilst at the same time infusing articles with subtle sheep-factor propaganda."
Ouch. On one hand, it should be easy to dismiss this kind of thing. On the other hand, I have to admit that reading this comment activated a strong self-defence instinct. Not that I responded, or should have responded. But the whole situation was humbling because it brought into sharp relief the fact that, as my career moves on, I'll have to be more cognizant of the "two-way conversations" that accompany my stories.
Which is good. If the media's job is, in part, to call bullshit and speak truth to power, it's only fair that everyone else can call bullshit, if they see fit, on the media.
http://arrowsplitter.blogspot.com
