Hugh Hewitt writes that legacy media meltdowns such as Nick Coleman and Michael Hiltzik signify that we're entering "the second of five stages of old media death":

I really don't feel any need to respond to being labeled an "ignorant partisan trope" by a largely unknown blogger no matter where he has a desk. I have been attacked by much more serious people and for much more serious reasons, and dismissed those slams as similar cries for attention and traffic. If Hiltzik wants attention and traffic, he should earn it, not borrow it from successful bloggers like Patterico who earned their respect, and did so without the tremendous built in advantages of the vast resources of the Tribune Company.

The reason I write about this at all is because it is the latest example of a growing volume of MSM attacks on NM, which don't matter as to their substance --they have little-- but rather do underscore that old media has figured out that are getting flayed daily by new media, and that they are bleeding out circulation and credibility as a result.

We are now in the second of five stages of old media death. First there was denial, and now there is anger, with Hiltzik's childish tantrum just the most obvious of many similar outbursts. Soon there will be bargaining --I'll be nice to you if you are nice to me-- and then depression and acceptance.

And then, perhaps, MSM will get back to putting out non-agenda driven news from a balanced newsroom, transparent in its ideological biases, and full of young and talented graduates as opposed to tenured and bitter time-servers.