It’s a fast-paced world and it’s only getting more hectic.
Where once deadlines were the problem, getting stuff to print before the mysterious guys at the printers’ place had yet another reason to complain, the online world has changed things. In a place where there are no deadlines, you’d think there’d be more time but there’s less time now. There’s no time.
It’s the biggest criticism of online journalism at present, the idea that content is just being churned out with more emphasis on speed and quantity than the actual quality of what’s being presented.
That’s never better demonstrated than it is at a live event – well, the volume of things at least.
Everyone’s rushing to be first and then first with the second piece, then the reaction pieces, then everything else that follows.
By the time you’ve written your fourth or fifth or sixth article from a game, your report’s already out in the world and so too are your player ratings and there’s no taking them back.
When you watch replays and different shots, slow motions and analyses, your thinking can be completely altered on either players performances, flash points, and all the big and small talking points.
It’s a question Ronan O’Gara put to everyone on the latest episode of SportsJOE Live, sponsored by Screwfix.ie.
“If you’re looking to report or write accurately on it, I can’t believe how you can report accurately if you’re there,” the Ireland legend said.
“For me, I’d have to watch the game three or four times from three or four different angles.
“You’re giving a perception of what you thought but if you watch the video over, it’s completely different sometimes.
“Are the journalists going home and watching the game for eight hours, staying up overnight to do their report for the morning? I doubt it.”
But then maybe that’s part of it – reporting live, the real-time feelings, the emotions and rawness of what has just happened. Then you let the dust settle and scrutinise everything all over again.
Perhaps there’s appetite for both. Not in O’Gara’s world.
Watch his thoughts from 33:43 below.
