Last week CNN asked me how I explain the downturn in the news industry: big layoffs, scant investment, no recovery in sight.
A list of factors is not an explanation, I said. But that is what I have.
So here's my thread. None of it should be news to people in the business. 0/
The sense is that in the fairly recent past there were social narratives that were both fulfilling and rewarding to participate in, but that for our generation and seemingly subsequent generations to come, it is becoming harder and harder to find and buy into a compelling shared telos. This is the sense of meaninglessness that prompts some people... See more
“It’s a post-Snowden and post-WikiLeaks generation that throws its hands up in the air and says, ‘we don’t care about the Chinese spy, everyone has our data,’” Elizabeth Ingleson, an international history professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science told Semafor.
Joshua Citarella argues that Gen Z and Millennials used irony as a defense mechanism against late capitalism’s perceived betrayals, from a soaring cost of living to the increasingly precarious nature of labor. “Irony as culture became: ‘The band I like will sell out, so I’ll buy-in early.’ Irony as politics became: ‘Movements get corrupted, so I’ll... See more