What's News: Mel Gibson's Arrest or Who Broke The Story?

What's bigger news? Mel Gibson's recent drunk driving arrest and the surrounding anti-semitic fallout? Or is it TMZ, the site that broke the Gibson story? Newsweek's top feature today about AOL/Telepictures' joint venture TMZ makes this seemingly black and white question much more grey. The Newsweek piece is only the latest example in the media world's ongoing and rapid migration from traditional journalism to straight-up entertainment.

In the piece, Newsweek says that TMZ "has the look and feel of a blog with a journalistic pedigree. A typical day includes updates on the marital status of Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock, video footage of Ashlee Simpson arriving at a Hollywood hotspot and whether Ben Affleck caught a Red Sox pop fly launched into his section at Fenway Park."

Not sure where the "journalistic pedigree" is in this typical TMZ "news" day, but clearly Newsweek has joined the migration. They've probably realized that the model TMZ copied and refined from sites like Gawker and The Smoking Gun has taken over. Site editor Harvey Levin says that TMZ is a news site. He says it simply depends on how you define news. Seems Newsweek's definition of news is no longer coverage of breaking stories but rather coverage of who's breaking the stories.