Attention: Top 10 Viral Cat Videos Starring John Oliver

No this isn’t about cats. There aren’t any cat videos here. But now that we have your attention, let’s talk about journalism. John Oliver’s latest episode of his comedy show Last Week Tonight, on journalism losing its agency to consumer behaviours and marketing strategies, is more serious than funny. After all, the purpose of journalism is not mere reportage. It is an act of chronicling events that become history. Watch the episode on the link below.Oliver talks about dying print journalism, as consumers and advertisers flock to the new medium of web journalism, saying that the “newspaper industry today is in big trouble”. While consumers like their news free and available at the tip of their fingers from Facebook or Twitter, with news going digital, there’s a lot of extra demands on journalists. In the words of Marty Baron, executive editor of The Washington Post, it includes traditional reporting, social media, video and and making sure that “wire services are available 24 hours a day.” And an increasing workload isn’t the worst problem (except in India which has the longest work hours in the world). Many online media houses are letting consumer behaviour and advertisements or business strategies in general influence news to get more “clicks”, and as Oliver puts it, that may have severe backlashes.Lack of Funds Meets Desperate PublishersGranted that without availability of funds, neither print nor web journalism can function, but it is precisely puts forth the ironical fix that journalism is currently in.Publishers are desperate, no one seems to have any plan to keep newspapers afloat. One option is to pray that you get bought by a benefactor who can afford to get losses.John Oliver, ComedianOliver ended his segment with a parody of a film on journalism (on the lines of Oscar-winning Spotlight) that stresses importance on the number of “clicks”, which entails giving importance to what is more desirable to the readers.The parody stressed on the point that focusing on what readers want, and not producing what is important, invalidates the credibility of journalism and creates abysmal situations like Trump running for presidency.Determined by the audience’s tastes, most news agencies in America invested maximum coverage to Trump. Trump has been infamous for his ill-informed comments to grab the interest or attention of readers, many news reports stated.Perhaps the biggest of all ironies which will probably make Oliver chuckle, is writing about it on a digital platform.

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Attention: Top 10 Viral Cat Videos Starring John Oliver

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Topics: Journalism John Oliver Cat Videos