Archive for April, 2008
All the posts that could have been
Any blogger will tell you that for all the posts that make it an awful lot don’t. Many posts just get deleted, while others morph into something radically different than originally intended. I still have some partially-written posts waiting to be published. I’m not sure if any of them will ever see the light of [...]
NY Times shows the newspaper industry is in trouble
Let this sink in for a minute: The New York Times Company, the parent of The New York Times, posted a $335,000 loss in the first quarter — one of the worst periods the company and the newspaper industry have seen — falling far short of both analysts’ expectations and its $23.9 million profit in [...]
A blogging assignment for all journalists
I’m convinced that most journalists don’t really understand blogs or the power blogs have. So, it’s time for all journalists to start understanding blogs. Yes, it would be great if all journalists experimented with blogging and blogging software, but that is overkill in some ways and just unreasonable given the reality on the ground (we’ll [...]
News is a social event for my generation
I don’t thumb through the newspaper. My generation discovers news in much different ways than previous ones. We don’t stumble upon random stories in a dead tree publication. We share news. No one ever says to me, “did you see that story in the paper yesterday?” No, if someone wants me to read a story, [...]
Journalists probably can’t save most newspapers
This has nothing to do with journalists or journalism. It has everything to do with poor decisions by business staff members. We can talk all we want about how journalists need to make more compelling content or care more about what readers and users want. But none of that matters if a newspaper company is [...]
Today’s Thought: Intellectual curiosity
Are most journalists intellectually curious enough? If they were they wouldn’t be asking for someone to give them training in new skills. Rather they would have already discovered new — in demand — skills, and they wouldn’t be afraid to seek out help to learn new skills on their own. And isn’t an intellectually curious [...]
My advice for would-be journalists
A reader recently e-mailed me asking advice about his sister because she wants to get a graduate degree in journalism from a prestigious university. She has an English degree, hasn’t done journalism before but loves to write. He was concerned, however, that now is not a great time to be entering the journalism field, and [...]
Are Pulitzers and awards important, relevant or worse?
The 2008 Pulitzer Prizes were awarded yesterday, which begs the question: Are Pulitzers good for journalism? Do awards cause journalists to work harder to refine their craft, or do they cause journalists to pander to award committees? Do the Pulitzers even recognize the best work in journalism or do they tend to only honor an [...]
Would I get a graduate degree in journalism? No
People have asked me this question, and it has become a hot topic in the journalism blogging world. I would personally not get a graduate degree in journalism. Journalism is not one of those fields where practicing journalists will see a big benefit from additional schooling. In fact, work experience and skills are what ultimately [...]
Grades (education) matter for journalism (all) students
There is a school of thought that says journalism students should only worry about clips they receive from internships and not about grades. Sure that makes sense if a student is going to work for a newspaper but most students won’t. Most journalism students won’t even work in mainstream media. And, honestly, all students will [...]