March 7th, 2009
This is a depressing little piece, that as far as I can tell originated in the Financial Times in the U.K. (although my link is to another source). It is well-reasoned and cogent. Simply to report on 12 of the worst basket cases does not necessarily represent the entire picture accurately, but I think provides…
January 25th, 2009
I’m torn. A twitter can alert us to breaking news at speeds far faster than any newspaper ever could. Yet with its 140-character limit it surely cannot do much more than create an alert and a quick observation. There’s a huge gulf between a twitter and investigative journalism. In a perfect world, Twitter would eventually…
January 21st, 2009
That’s the title of a perversely amusing story in today’s New York Times. Apparently a certain Mr. Aleksandr Y. Lebedev, whose former career including spying on Britain for the KGB, has seen his personal fortune take a surprising turn for the better. He know owns the National Reserve Bank, 30 percent of the Aeroflot airline…
January 21st, 2009
This week’s New Yorker offers a gem of an article on the historic struggles that newspapers have endured to survive. While the article starts out in the present: “The newspaper is dead. You can read all about it online, blog by blog, where the digital gloom over the death of an industry often veils, if…
December 23rd, 2008
I’ve tried to remain as dispassionate as possible regarding the ongoing screeches over the death of the newspaper. I’m not in denial: I know the situation is serious. When folks like Mr. Zell bankrupt a communications empire, I do not necessarily regard this as a harbinger of things to come. But when the The Detroit…