You will pay the price for Grant's lack of vision (unless you go to the library and get it for free)
The future isn't what it used to be. At least, not in Mira Grant's post-zombie-apocalyptic vision.
Ostensibly, Feed takes place in 2039-2040. Everything about the setting, however, screams "five minutes from now."
You might be able to explain away some things, like most of the pop culture references being to things from the early 2000s at the latest. If something like a third of the world's population died in 2018, it would be completely plausible not to have a lot of Hollywood blockbusters or major television shows produced for a while, and so probably people would make more references to Buffy the Vampire Slayer or George Romero movies than you otherwise might expect. (Though halfway through the book, I'm puzzled by the dearth of references to other zombie movies. Even with a character named Shaun, I haven't seen any Shaun of the Dead jokes, or 28 Days Later, or... anything except Romero.)
But when you start trying to figure out where this brave new zombified world draws the line between "blogger" and "traditional mainstream journalist," things start to get confusing.
It isn't that future!bloggers are independent agents, answering to no one and nothing, able to just set up on whatever the future has instead of WordPress or [insert blogging platform of choice here/buy a domain name for $5]. They have to register and get press passes (and firearms licenses) just like other journalists to count as "real" bloggers, it seems. I might have missed whether they register to declare themselves e-journalists and register their biases at separate locations, but based on Rick's story, if you switch from traditional journalism to blogging, you have to change your registration. It's all very formal and official.
It isn't that bloggers have less or no editorial oversight. George mentions that she fact-checks everything her brother puts out, Buffy publishing some news while George and Shaun are asleep goes against their usual protocol of running things by editor George first, and so on. Also, George tells us that back in 2018, the zombie outbreak was sparked in part by irresponsible reporting by someone at the New York Times who apparently didn't get enough editorial oversight (well, maybe he had a really terrible editor - it wasn't entirely clear to me).
It isn't that they're more opinion-oriented or personal or what have you. George tells us that Newsies (the factual reporting-oriented bloggers) are very careful about presenting lots and lots of facts with evidence and trying not to mix it with opinion. (There are four other clearly delineated kinds of bloggers, such as the daredevil Irwins and the gossip-and-recipes Aunties. Very organized, these bloggers.)
So what distinguishes blogger journalists from original flavor in this future? Is it just that they're newer, smaller organizations not yet swallowed up into some vast media conglomerate?
Well, there is one other possibility. When blogger Rick, attached to an opposing political candidate, jumps ship to George and Shaun's team, they discover that he only shows blogging credits back two years - because until them, it turns out, he worked in print journalism.
Print. Print, presented as the face of traditional journalism in 2040.
This finally explains George's puzzling infodump near the beginning about how the bloggers rose to become the most trusted source for journalism. She said that traditional news media couldn't respond fast enough, that they had all these procedures to follow before they could really report stuff (except that guy at the NYT, I guess?), that anchors were joking about kids horsing around in zombie costumes while the daring bloggers were posting zombie-fighting tips online and saving lives, and everyone blamed traditional journalists for getting people killed. Except (a) even here in 2013, the traditional news folks are getting faster and faster at posting news online, often incorporating information gathered from social media, and I'm pretty sure this blurring of the lines wasn't unimaginable in 2010 either,* and (b) with all the bloggers' registering and official pass-holding in 2040, Grant explicitly has the crossover going in the other direction as well.
(*I even hear that traditional news outlets have their own blogs and Twitter accounts these days, as do government agencies like the CDC. Kids! What will they think of next! Who would have seen that coming except absolutely everyone.)
So why on Earth are "traditional" journalists in 2040 still supposedly sharply demarcated from bloggers, associated with print (or cameras in studios), and snooty about it to boot? You would think that a logical extrapolation from 2010 conditions would have "traditional" journalists working mostly online by 2018, just for starters. And with the future bloggers as organized and editorially controlled as they are, it's hard to see how they would be any faster to respond to events than the mainstream-but-also-online press by 2040. Positing that the line between "journalist" and "blogger" would be blurred or non-existent by 2018 isn't much of a stretch, never mind post-apocalyptic 2040, when you would expect most of the traditional journalists to have been nommed on already, hastening the opening of their profession to all the indie newcomers.
It might have been simpler just to posit that in the future, the distinction between "journalist" and "blogger who focuses on news" is dead and leave it at that. It isn't even like the supposed chasm between them has really mattered to the plot so far. All it's done is let the candidate get a point for reaching out to the younger crowd/accepting where the future lies/blah blah blah whatever. Or alternatively, have the bloggers actually be different, not organized and registered and already carrying press passes. George said there were grassroots zombie-killing bloggers in 2018, but halfway through the book, I haven't seen grassroots anybody in 2040. Even most of the zombies appearing onscreen are infected as part of an assassination plot rather than the grassroots efforts of ordinary zombies on the street!
Incidentally, it's also terribly disappointing that in 2040, we apparently still have to type passwords in to get at our stuff. No tiny subcutaneous chips that send encrypted broadcasts of our identities to our devices? (Maybe they could self-destruct when they handwavily sensed that a body reached a certain deadness level, so a person not broadcasting an identity meant "shoot on sight.") No thumbprint scanners, even? We have invented nothing cool by 2040 or even 2018 (if you assume a technology freeze) that could replace passwords?
Future, you used to be so much more awesome. What happened?
Ostensibly, Feed takes place in 2039-2040. Everything about the setting, however, screams "five minutes from now."
You might be able to explain away some things, like most of the pop culture references being to things from the early 2000s at the latest. If something like a third of the world's population died in 2018, it would be completely plausible not to have a lot of Hollywood blockbusters or major television shows produced for a while, and so probably people would make more references to Buffy the Vampire Slayer or George Romero movies than you otherwise might expect. (Though halfway through the book, I'm puzzled by the dearth of references to other zombie movies. Even with a character named Shaun, I haven't seen any Shaun of the Dead jokes, or 28 Days Later, or... anything except Romero.)
But when you start trying to figure out where this brave new zombified world draws the line between "blogger" and "traditional mainstream journalist," things start to get confusing.
It isn't that future!bloggers are independent agents, answering to no one and nothing, able to just set up on whatever the future has instead of WordPress or [insert blogging platform of choice here/buy a domain name for $5]. They have to register and get press passes (and firearms licenses) just like other journalists to count as "real" bloggers, it seems. I might have missed whether they register to declare themselves e-journalists and register their biases at separate locations, but based on Rick's story, if you switch from traditional journalism to blogging, you have to change your registration. It's all very formal and official.
It isn't that bloggers have less or no editorial oversight. George mentions that she fact-checks everything her brother puts out, Buffy publishing some news while George and Shaun are asleep goes against their usual protocol of running things by editor George first, and so on. Also, George tells us that back in 2018, the zombie outbreak was sparked in part by irresponsible reporting by someone at the New York Times who apparently didn't get enough editorial oversight (well, maybe he had a really terrible editor - it wasn't entirely clear to me).
It isn't that they're more opinion-oriented or personal or what have you. George tells us that Newsies (the factual reporting-oriented bloggers) are very careful about presenting lots and lots of facts with evidence and trying not to mix it with opinion. (There are four other clearly delineated kinds of bloggers, such as the daredevil Irwins and the gossip-and-recipes Aunties. Very organized, these bloggers.)
So what distinguishes blogger journalists from original flavor in this future? Is it just that they're newer, smaller organizations not yet swallowed up into some vast media conglomerate?
Well, there is one other possibility. When blogger Rick, attached to an opposing political candidate, jumps ship to George and Shaun's team, they discover that he only shows blogging credits back two years - because until them, it turns out, he worked in print journalism.
Print. Print, presented as the face of traditional journalism in 2040.
This finally explains George's puzzling infodump near the beginning about how the bloggers rose to become the most trusted source for journalism. She said that traditional news media couldn't respond fast enough, that they had all these procedures to follow before they could really report stuff (except that guy at the NYT, I guess?), that anchors were joking about kids horsing around in zombie costumes while the daring bloggers were posting zombie-fighting tips online and saving lives, and everyone blamed traditional journalists for getting people killed. Except (a) even here in 2013, the traditional news folks are getting faster and faster at posting news online, often incorporating information gathered from social media, and I'm pretty sure this blurring of the lines wasn't unimaginable in 2010 either,* and (b) with all the bloggers' registering and official pass-holding in 2040, Grant explicitly has the crossover going in the other direction as well.
(*I even hear that traditional news outlets have their own blogs and Twitter accounts these days, as do government agencies like the CDC. Kids! What will they think of next! Who would have seen that coming except absolutely everyone.)
So why on Earth are "traditional" journalists in 2040 still supposedly sharply demarcated from bloggers, associated with print (or cameras in studios), and snooty about it to boot? You would think that a logical extrapolation from 2010 conditions would have "traditional" journalists working mostly online by 2018, just for starters. And with the future bloggers as organized and editorially controlled as they are, it's hard to see how they would be any faster to respond to events than the mainstream-but-also-online press by 2040. Positing that the line between "journalist" and "blogger" would be blurred or non-existent by 2018 isn't much of a stretch, never mind post-apocalyptic 2040, when you would expect most of the traditional journalists to have been nommed on already, hastening the opening of their profession to all the indie newcomers.
It might have been simpler just to posit that in the future, the distinction between "journalist" and "blogger who focuses on news" is dead and leave it at that. It isn't even like the supposed chasm between them has really mattered to the plot so far. All it's done is let the candidate get a point for reaching out to the younger crowd/accepting where the future lies/blah blah blah whatever. Or alternatively, have the bloggers actually be different, not organized and registered and already carrying press passes. George said there were grassroots zombie-killing bloggers in 2018, but halfway through the book, I haven't seen grassroots anybody in 2040. Even most of the zombies appearing onscreen are infected as part of an assassination plot rather than the grassroots efforts of ordinary zombies on the street!
Incidentally, it's also terribly disappointing that in 2040, we apparently still have to type passwords in to get at our stuff. No tiny subcutaneous chips that send encrypted broadcasts of our identities to our devices? (Maybe they could self-destruct when they handwavily sensed that a body reached a certain deadness level, so a person not broadcasting an identity meant "shoot on sight.") No thumbprint scanners, even? We have invented nothing cool by 2040 or even 2018 (if you assume a technology freeze) that could replace passwords?
Future, you used to be so much more awesome. What happened?