Given the fact that the "fire Ron Borges" emails were still trickling in to at the end of the long MLK weekend, I figure it's time for my final -- and this will be the final one, I promise --comment on the petition drive on Boston Sports Media Watch to create a powerful grassroots uprising against the Globe sports writer.
In some ways, this episode is being framed as a classic new media vs. old media contest with the "fire Borges" crowd representing the vanguard of the new democratized participatory media and Borges -- and anyone who didn't overtly support his firing -- depicted as out of touch media dinosaurs soon to be wiped off the map. (By the way, some of the postings to this site suggest the battle is more along the lines of online "get a lifers" versus big media "pros" who actually get press credentials to major events. That seems to me to be an unduly and unfairly harsh assessment of sports bloggers.)
Since I didn't come out and endorse Borges's dismissal and suggested that his perceived anti-Pats viewpoint might have contributed to the outpouring of fan sentiment on the eve of a playoff game, some folks may see me as one of those mainstream journalists circling the old media wagons --I guess maybe for one last stand. Here's a relevant BSMW passage:
What is disappointing to me, is that the few media members that did comment on the article seem to have missed the point of it completely and were more interested in circling the media wagons than they were in presenting an accurate rendering of the facts of the article. Mike Felger and Mark Jurkowitz in particular seemed more intent on making it seem like the two of us, as well as fans, don't like Borges simply because he doesn't write positive articles about the Patriots all the time.
As someone who served as Globe ombudsman for two years, I can tell you that BSMW didn't invent the idea of pressuring media outlets. That's been around for a long time. I'd get hundreds of complaints whenever the paper switched comic strips and once was presented with a petition (the old fashioned kind, not online) signed by 600 people who were offended by the way a certain article depicted their ethnic group. My recollection was that somewhere in the range of 1,000 people once barraged the paper with complaints over a single controversial page-one photograph. And about 2000 readers sent back a questionnaire -- one that they clipped out of the paper -- asking them to grade the Globe's handling of several controversial stories. Those weren't new media versus old media battles, just examples of good-old fashioned customer feedback, which is how I look at the Borges petition. (The technology that delivers that feedback doesn't imbue it with any special properties or powers.)
So good for BSMW for giving the Globe a piece of its mind and stirring the pot with Boston's always passionate sports fans. It's a tried and true tactic. But at the same time, here's an AdAge.com piece that explains why this new media vs. old media paradigm is overblown.