Discuss “Britney Spears does not qualify as actual news”

Big things have been happening in the world lately — Kosovo declared independence, Castro resigned, North Korea let American news sources into its nuclear weapons plant — and let’s not forget about domestic issues like the presidential race. Although these stories are clearly important and deserving of news coverage, one of the biggest stories infiltrating mainstream news sources like www.cnn.com is the source of all things newsworthy, Britney Spears, and her visit with her kids.

It used to be the case that these supposedly formal news media sources, like The New York Times and CNN, would cover serious and important stories, and that celebrity gossip news was limited to being written about in celebrity gossip magazines. Serious journalism...