Dave Marash beats around the bush a lot, but eventually he explains, more or less, why he left Al Jazeera English [e.a.]:

Just as Al Jazeera Arabic can rightfully claim to be a first-class news organization with high professional standards, but one that authentically represents the point of view and interests of the region defined by the Arabic language, less defined by but certainly involved in the Islamic faith, and most particularly the gulf region, I think that Al Jazeera English is a very competent, very professional news organization that does a particularly great job south of the equator, but tends to report almost everything from the point of view of either the Arabic-speaking world or at the very least what you might call the post-colonial world. And since I’m not authentically those things, I don’t belong there.

Huh?

Marash notes a shift in perspective, dating to the flexing of the Saudi Arabian muscle during the time of the Mecca Agreement (last year), when, Marash suggests, there was a shift in the balance of power in the region [e.a.]:

BC: What changed?

DM: I think that the world changed about nine, ten months ago. And I think the single event in that change was the visit to the gulf by Vice President Cheney, where he went to line up the allied ducks in a row behind the possibility of action against Iran. And instead of getting acquiescence, the United States got defiance, and instead ducks in a row the ducks basically went off on their own and the first sort of major breakthrough on that was the Mecca agreement, which defied the American foreign policy by letting Hamas into the tent of the governance of the Palestinian territories. This enraged the State Department and was one crystal clear sign that the Mideast region was now off campus, was off on its own. And it is around this time, and I think not coincidentally, that you see the state of Qatar and the royal family of Qatar starting to make up their feud with the Saudis, and you start to see on both Al Jazeera Arabic and English a very sort of first-personish, “my Haj” stories that were boosterish of the Haj and of Saudi Arabia. And you start to see stories of analysis in The New York Times where regional people are noting that Al Jazeera seems to be changing its editorial stance toward Saudi Arabia. I’m suggesting that around that time, a decision was made at the highest levels of [Al Jazeera] that simply following the American political leadership and the American political ideal of global, universalist values carried out in an absolutely pure, multipolar, First Amendment global conversation, was no longer the safest or smartest course, and that it was time, in fact, to get right with the region. And I think part of getting right with the region was slightly changing the editorial ambition of Al Jazeera English, and I think it has subsequently become a more narrowly focused, more univocal channel than was originally conceived.

Marash also explains what drew him to the concept in the first place:

[T]he thing that I loved best about the original concept was the sort of fugue of points of view and opinions, because I think that’s what desperately needed in the world. We need to know, for example, in America, how angry the rest of the world is at Americans. Our own news media tend to shelter us from this very unpleasant news. So if you watched and every piece seemed tendentious and pissed you off, and I don’t think that would be the case, but even if worst case the channel turned shrill and shallow, you would still want to watch them on the principle that millions—tens of millions—of people watch them every day and you need to know what’s going on in their brains.

Know thine enemy. Marash got closer than most.

Every day brings grim news to every sector of the old media businesses. Rupert Murdoch, whose reputation for swimming with the pond scum tends to overshadow his extraordinary business acumen and long-term success (compare and contrast with, say, Ted Turner, who was long hailed as a genius), is always interesting to listen to on this topic.

Here’s the heart of a recent speech he gave on the future of media [e.a.]:

In his speech, he said technology’s effects have permeated every aspect of News Corp., from the social networking on MySpace to the type of articles printed in local newspapers.

Consumers, especially the younger generation, have a chance to shape the inevitable changes by demanding content based on personal preferences, he added.

“Unlike traditional media, choices in the future will be generated from the bottom up, not top-down,” Murdoch explained. “A 13-year-old girl in Delhi is not going to want the same news and entertainment as a 50-year-old executive in Chicago … Our challenge is to personalize the experience for these people so we can reach them both.”

Murdoch foresees the end of traditional mass media with consumers receiving news and entertainment from limited sources. Media companies need to diversify to survive, which is one reason his company purchased MySpace in 2005, he said.

Perhaps that was the thinking (if indeed there was thinking involved—or maybe it’s a new “try anything!” ethos) behind a  new venture at NewsCorp’s HarperCollins book division, announced thus in the New York Times (and thus certain to have caused much agita in executive offices across New York City):

New HarperCollins Unit to Try to Cut Writer Advances

HarperCollins Publishers is forming a new publishing group that will substitute profit-sharing with authors for cash advances and will try to eliminate the costly practice of allowing booksellers to return unsold copies.

Roger L. Simon was unimpressed, and he had a question:

[W]hat interests me here is the second part of ths strategy - that the publisher will pay little or no advance and go into partnership with the author on potential profits with sales focussed, evidently on the Internet.

My question then is - what’s the point of the publisher?

Well, there’s editing (which one can get elsewhere) and the fancy publishing house imprimatur, maybe a little help with production and publicity (again available elsewhere - many authors pay for their own publicists anyway). It this really enough? The author can do much better on percentages, I am sure, by self-publishing. And that same author may know his or her way around the Internet better than the publisher, when it comes to publicity. So I am skeptical of this model.

I don’t blame Simon for being skeptical. Nevertheless, the point of the publisher—for now, at least—is the brand.  Until other brands develop to rival what the traditional publishing houses bring to the equation (professional experience, connections, and judgment), authors still have something to gain from trying to collaborate with publishers in this brave new media world.

But Simon is right on the money about one thing [e.a.]:

But I’m not surprised that it is happening - it is another symptom of the huge shakeout in the arts and letters instigated largely by the online world.

A lot of people are still clueless about the changes rocking their world. They’re still “comfortably numb.”

Time to wake up,