Welcome to the blog of Stefanie Vermeulen and Jaap van 't Kruis.
I recently discovered this American geezer called Michael Rosenblum. He has got very fresh ideas about how journalism should evolve in the internet driven world. Read his latest column:
schlepper
Hollywood Reporter last week said that “TV viewing in the home is at an all-time high, averaging 5.13 hours per viewer per day during fourth-quarter 2009 and more than eight hours a day for the entire household…”
More than 5 hours a day, every day. For your entire life.
That is in itself an astonishing number.
But it also says something about our culture.
We are extremely image-driven.
The images you see in the movies or on TV become, in our minds, the ideas we take to identify a person or a profession.
Think TV anchorman and you think Peter Jennings or Ed Murrow or Brian Williams. It doesn’t matter, they’re all the same person – or at least they’re all playing the same character.
Think airplane pilot and you get Sully Sullenberger or Chuck Yeager. Doesn’t matter. Same character.
Now, think ‘journalist’ and you get Russell Crowe, starring in State of Play or Dustin Hoffman as Carl Bernstein in All The President’s Men.
Messy.
Unshaven.
Hung over.
Crap car.
Crap life.
Dresses like a schlepper.
Look at Russell Crowe in the photo above.
Schlepper!
OK. Smart, honest, driven, dedicated, truth-seeking.. but schlepper.
We LOVE this image. It is us.
How important are media images?
