dirtier fingernails & cleaner minds

Link 3
Notes "Writing these extra 375 words per day, to fill in middle management, will 'increase' the 'productivity' of the reporters."

Freda: I grow more afraid by the day.

(via maura)

#journalism

Quote 12
Notes

"If you’re saying that there needed to be scenes of the Internet interacting with journalism and bringing down journalism, I will now write you a scene: Interior, garden apartment anywhere. A white male, mid-30s, sits at a laptop computer in his underwear, linking to a Baltimore Sun story. He then scratches his left testicle until satisfied and continues to type commentary about that story onto his blog. Cut to drug corner, and on to the next scene."

Freda: Speaking of the Wire…and the death of journalism.

Interview with David Simon, creator of “The Wire”; “The Wire” series finale | Salon Arts & Entertainment (via fred-wilson)

#journalism

Quote

"Virtually all the predictions about the death of old media have assumed a comfortingly long time frame for the end of print—the moment when, amid a panoply of flashing lights, press conferences, and elegiac reminiscences, the newspaper presses stop rolling and news goes entirely digital. Most of these scenarios assume a gradual crossing-over, almost like the migration of dunes, as behaviors change, paradigms shift, and the digital future heaves fully into view. The thinking goes that the existing brands—The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal—will be the ones making that transition, challenged but still dominant as sources of original reporting. But what if the old media dies much more quickly? What if a hurricane comes along and obliterates the dunes entirely? Specifically, what if TheNew York Times goes out of business—like, this May?"

Michael Hirschorn writing on End Times in the Atlantic.

#journalism

Link A gruesome autopsy of one of the country's best alt-weelies.

#journalism

Text Harder than it sounds…

…for those of us who aren’t professional spies.

The NY Times travel writer’s policy:

#67. Writers of travel articles must conceal their identity as journalists during the reporting, so that they will experience the same conditions as an ordinary consumer. If the affiliation becomes known, the writer must discuss with a newsroom manager whether the assignment can be salvaged.

#journalism

Link An NPR Reporter Becomes the News

#journalism

Text The Top Ten People Who Should Be Unemployed Come ‘09

Pareene on Jeff Jarvis on his “The Top Ten People Who Should Be Unemployed Come ‘09” listicle. (via maura) :

“The entertainment journalist who got internet famous for blogging about batteries or something is now the official overpaid consultant of saving the newsmedia, even though he doesn’t really know what reporters do (he is pretty sure they should blog about batteries or something). If you give him $1,000 and fly him to Qatar he’ll save your newspaper, with a panel discussion.”

Freda: I like Number 10 because, while many of my favorite people call New York home (and I hope to again someday), the city still has an inflated sense of itself as the center-of-the-universe. Also, I’m fairly sure that Pareen, whoever that is, was cursing himself, his readers and his job. Risky business in the waning days of 2008.

Everyone in New York By “everyone in New York” we mean, obviously, the type of people who actually think they represent “everyone in New York,” which means people in media, finance, the “arts,” publishing, and whatever the hell people who read blogs do all day, for a living. Not the “everyone in New York” that includes people who live in, like Staten Island or whatever. No, the ones who watch Gossip Girl. Basically all of these people should be unemployed, next year.

#journalism

Link Finally, some answers on NPR's cuts.

#journalism

Quote

"[T]he TV industry is scrambling to adjust its business model in a cruel and unforgiving new world, where viewers suddenly expect to watch any show they want, whenever they want it. Like newspapers, book publishing and the music industry, TV networks and cable channels are trying desperately to distribute their shows in new, convenient ways while still delivering the advertising that keeps their multibillion-dollar industry afloat."

Salon’s Heather Havrilesky writing on The year the small screen fell flat.

#journalism

Link 1
Notes All I Wanted for Christmas Was a Newspaper

Freda: I couldn’t have said it better, yet I couldn’t agree more.

#journalism

Quote

"…[E]ven as big papers have become less profitable they’ve arguably become more popular. The blogosphere, much of which piggybacks on traditional journalism’s content, has magnified the reach of newspapers, and although papers now face far more scrutiny, this is a kind of backhanded compliment to their continued relevance…People don’t use the Times less than they did a decade ago. They use it more. The difference is that today they don’t have to pay for it. The real problem for newspapers, in other words, isn’t the Internet; it’s us. We want access to everything, we want it now, and we want it for free. That’s a consumer’s dream, but eventually it’s going to collide with reality: if newspapers’ profits vanish, so will their product…Soon enough, we’re going to start getting what we pay for, and we may find out just how little that is."

James Surowiecki writing on newspapers and getting what you pay for in the New Yorker.

#journalism

Link The misery of a laid-off or bought-out journalist isn't greater than that of a sacked bond trader, a RIF-ed clerk, or a fired autoworker. The only reason we're so well-informed about journalists' suffering is they have easy access to a megaphone.

Freda:

While I take Shafer’s point about journalists and our big, bad megaphones, I disagree with his larger argument. Of course the hardship of an individual unemployed journalist is no more important than that of anyone else. But doesn’t the carnage in newsrooms across the country — the decline in journalism in general — matter more, on a grand scale, than the demise of toll collectors and VCRs? Not on a personal level, but for society.

#journalism

Text 10
Notes Regret the Error’s Corrections of the Year.

Freda, my favorite: In a story about Obama’s plans for a vice presidential pick, AP noted that McCain was considering Sen. Joe Lieberman, “the Democratic vice presidential prick in 2000 who now is an independent.” (Emphasis added.)

alexbalk: “The New York Times: A film review on Sept. 5 about “Save Me” confused some characters and actors. It is Mark, not Chad, who is sent to the Genesis House retreat for converting gay men to heterosexuality. (Mark is played by Chad Allen; there is no character named Chad). The hunky fellow resident is Scott (played by Robert Gant), not Ted (Stephen Lang). And it is Mark and Scott — not ‘Chad and Ted’ — who partake of cigarettes and ‘furtive man-on-man action.’” — Regret the Error selects its corrections of the year.

#journalism

Video

We’re just finishing up Ken Burns’s Civil War.

I fell in love with Foote, then discovered he died three years ago.

I could watch him and listen to his “molasses over hominy” voice for days.

#journalism

Quote

"A new panel of guest columnists is chosen every year, so every January there’s a rebirth with new talent. Unfortunately, when the old ones are done for the year and we kick ‘em to the curbside, it’s hard to say goodbye (although some of them may be thrilled it’s over). Just when you’re getting to know them, they’re gone."

A Chico Enterprise-Record editorial announcing the paper’s new round of columnists. After reading the NYT’s editorial page today, I’m liking the sound of this.

#journalism