I have mentioned this guy in Tokyo has been giving daily updates on the "view from Tokyo", and he makes a number of good observations:
http://www.blogtv.com/People/TokyoCooney

Yesterday he ranted about the Cooper Andersons of the world all looking for "touchy/feely" stories rather than news you could use. He does some work in the Japanese entertainment media, but mentioned that about 5 years ago many of the media Tokyo News divisions were RIF'ed, and many moved to Shanghai as the global economies shifted toward China. Now the main news teams arriving in Japan don't have any staff on hand to do the little and big things that need to get done- things like translators and logistical suppliers. They are going to fill the vacuum or "feed the animals" to use an insiders term with whatever low hanging fruit they can find, even if the "experts" are adjunct professors at the local community college.

The Boulder wild fires last year showed the role social media is playing and changing the game. Reporters may be dialed in urban areas they are familiar with, but often horrible in the wilderness- they were reporting "mountains on Fire" while bloggers/twitterers from an RV club, were saying 'I am camping on that mountain as we speak...not on fire"