News Today and How We Got Here...

Yesterday in my 21st Century Journalism class we were actually talking about this so I figured it made sense if I did a blog post about it!  In class yesterday we watched several clips on youtube.  One was Walter Cronkite's first broadcast where he interviewed John F. Kennedy.  The second clip we watched was a clip from CNN where they were talking about the current tension in Syria and different courses of action to take.  The Cronkite clip was very slow paced compared to the flashing, whirring, buzzing, constantly changing CNN one.  In Cronkite's video, a pre-recorded clip of Cronkite interviewing JFK at his home in the Cape was shown (in its entirety).  It was slow paced, relaxed and the viewer saw the whole interview, which allowed them to really get a sense for the presidential candidate and made him seem more human, especially when he was joking around with Cronkite lounging in adirondacks on the grass.  Contrarily, the CNN clip was full of information overload!  There were changing pictures, quick quotes from officials and sources, dramatic noises and even a tag line at the bottom of the screen recounting what was going on and even predicting the next day's weather.  SO, how did we go from Cronkite's slow and deliberate interview to the flashy and dramatic CNN video?  I'm not 100% sure but I have some ideas... I think, in this age of twitter, facebook, online news, reddit and more, people expect instant news.  They want their news to be quick and to the point so they can get back to the lives ASAP.  Sitting down and watching the news (or reading the news) has become an archaic practice, acceptable only if you are working in the field or retired and have nothing else to do.  In the 21st century where people are constantly moving, news has to be dramatic enough to grab the viewer's attention, quick enough to give them what they need and busy enough to inform the viewer of multiple stories simultaneously.  Personally, I think a lot can be said for the slower paced interview of Cronkite and the romantic idea of reading the paper over a cup of coffee in the morning.