According to Jeremy, New Matilda died because it wasn’t ratty enough. It lacked the ratbag element, the thing that sustained The Nation Review for years past its expiry date. He then goes on to conclude that New Matilda was killed by the “the weight of its own journalistic responsibility and decency”.
Jeremy seems to attribute a degree of rattiness to Crikey yet the relative economic fortunes of Crikey and NM are poles apart. I agree that rattiness is an important element in popular medium, it helps to differentiate your product from the conformist milieu that dominates the landscape and sucks the lifeblood of financial support out of the market.
However I disagree that NM lacked rattiness. I just think it lacked enough of it to attract a high quality lawsuit that would shoot the publication to national notoriety. But then NM was also a creature of the times, financially responsible and earnest in its desire to good. Maybe if NM does a biblical it will return to us free of the need to make a buck and with totally evil intent.
One thing for sure, NM was always a better read than the SMH.
Earnest Matilda is sent a’waltzing.
