The Magazine
March/April 2011
Articles
Feature
The Cancer Report
Journalists who wrote on—and through—their disease
By Joel Meares Mar 22, 2011 at 06:00 AM
Followers of Leroy Sievers’s “My Cancer” blog knew its expected end approached when Sievers published an entry titled “The... More
Reports
Hiding the Real Africa
Why NGOs prefer bad news
By Karen Rothmyer Mar 17, 2011 at 09:45 AM
And now for some good news out of Africa. Poverty rates throughout the continent have been falling steadily and... More
Feature
Unnecessary Secrets
Opening government, from Ellsberg to Manning
By Sanford J. Ungar Mar 10, 2011 at 10:00 AM
Back in 1999—simpler times, perhaps—there was a little-noticed brouhaha in federal court over an effort to get several secret... More
Cover Story
Tested
Covering schools in the age of micro-measurement
By LynNell Hancock Mar 8, 2011 at 06:00 AM
Eleven New York City education reporters were huddling on e-mail last October 20, musing over ways to collectively pry... More
Feature
CJR Column Mentions The Simpsons
A second look at SEO
By Karen Stabiner Mar 3, 2011 at 06:00 AM
In the beginning was the word—and the headline writer, who worshipped at the church of the active verb alongside... More
Reports
Sunrise on the Nile
Egypt’s news media enter a new era
By Stephen Franklin Mar 1, 2011 at 10:00 AM
As Egyptians tried to shake loose nearly thirty years of darkness, the Egyptian press stumbled toward the sunlight, too. The... More
Feature
The Fixer
Meet Greg Scott, your guide to Junkieville
By Don Terry Feb 23, 2011 at 04:33 PM
Greg Scott is a fixer. In Chicago, where Scott plies his trade, the title is traditionally tapped for the slick... More
Feature
Open Mic
A popular radio host tests press restrictions in Azerbaijan
By Amanda Erickson Feb 23, 2011 at 04:31 PM
Khadija Ismayilova commands an audience. It’s the first thing you notice about her, in a country ruled overwhelmingly by men,... More
Reports
Mark Cuban’s Business Model
A media maverick on the news industry
By Terry McDermott Feb 23, 2011 at 04:29 PM
Mark Cuban is well known as the brash, combative owner of the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team, the guy who... More
Departments
Currents
The Hacker, Off the Couch
Brian Boyer and the rise of “hacker-journalists”
By Bret J. Schulte Mar 30, 2011 at 10:45 AM
Back in May 2007, Brian Boyer was just another computer guy short-circuiting from ennui sitting on a friend’s couch,... More
Darts and Laurels
Darts & Laurels
The Portland Press Herald blurred an important line with its donation of ads during an election
By Lauren Kirchner Mar 29, 2011 at 09:00 AM
The importance of a daily newspaper’s role in local politics is undeniable. Ideally, it reports the issues impartially, then makes... More
Editorial
Members Only
Two cheers for high-cost subscription journalism
By The Editors Mar 24, 2011 at 10:10 AM
Washington beckons as a land of opportunity for journalists today, at least in the realm of high-cost subscription news. We’re... More
Letters to the Editor
Notes from Our Online Readers
A reader’s response to a CJR.org post about Congresswoman Giffords
By The Editors Feb 23, 2011 at 05:37 PM
In our January 11 News Meeting, we asked our readers, are the kind of errors that followed the shooting of... More
Currents
Hard Numbers
Some stats and figures on the news industry
By The Editors Feb 23, 2011 at 04:26 PM
14 percent of coverage given to former press secretary Scott McClellan and his book, What Happened: Inside the Bush White... More
Language Corner
Mentee Fresh
Some notes on “protégés,” “mentors,” and manatees
By Merrill Perlman Feb 23, 2011 at 04:23 PM
When you have a “mentor,” what are you (aside from in need of advice)? Before the sixties, you probably would... More
Currents
Hungarian Chill
A Q & A with Eva Simon of the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union on press freedom
By Amy Brouillette Feb 23, 2011 at 04:20 PM
Hungary’s conservative government stirred international outrage when tough media regulations went into effect January 1, the same day the country... More
Letters to the Editor
Letters to the Editor
Philip Gourevitch reacts to Tristan McConnell’s piece about him, and McConnell responds
By The Editors Feb 23, 2011 at 04:08 PM
The Storytellers Thanks for the excellent piece by Vanessa Gezari (“Crossfire in Kandahar,” CJR, January/February). I wished the story would... More
Opening Shot
Opening Shot
Al Jazeera showed global media how to cover an uprising
By The Editors Feb 23, 2011 at 04:05 PM
>Al Jazeera, the pan-Arab satellite news network, showed global media how to cover a people’s uprising—by getting right into the... More
Ideas & Reviews
Second Read
Not for Laughs
A pathbreaking look at the dark comic genius behind “Skippy”
By David Hajdu Mar 15, 2011 at 06:00 AM
“All cartoonists are geniuses,” wrote John Updike in his introduction to a collection of cartoons by Arnold Roth, a... More
The Lower Case
Girls’ school still offering ‘something special’ — head
Headlines that editors probably wish they could take back
By The Editors Feb 23, 2011 at 04:48 PM
AP Exclusive: Iran invites nations to nuke sites —The Associated Press 1/4/11 Pedestrian deaths largely flat in U.S., Maryland —baltimoresun.com... More
The Research Report
The Public Screen
A study on collective viewing experiences
By Michael Schudson and Julia Sonnevend Feb 23, 2011 at 04:45 PM
The television set had arrived in the majority of American households by 1955. Inspired by the popular ideals of domesticity,... More
Review
Mitford’s Good Fight
A review of Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking
By Abigail Deutsch Feb 23, 2011 at 04:43 PM
Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking by Jessica Mitford | New York Review Books Classics | 274 pages, $15.95... More
Review
Brief Encounters
Short reviews of a new history of NPR, Denys Wortman’s cartoons, and Laurie Hertzel’s memoir
By James Boylan Feb 23, 2011 at 04:38 PM
This Is NPR: The First Forty Years by Cokie Roberts and others | Chronicle Books | 271 pages, $29.95 This... More
Review
The Selfish Bit
Do we rule information, or does it rule us?
By David Shenk Feb 23, 2011 at 04:36 PM
The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleick | Pantheon Books | 544 pages, $29.95 In 1848,... More
New survey reveals everything you think about freelancing is true - Data from Project Word quantifies challenges of freelance investigative reporting
Why one editor won’t run any more op-eds by the Heritage Foundation’s top economist - A reply to Paul Krugman on state taxes and job growth made some incorrect claims
Why we ‘stave off’ colds - It all started with wine
The New Republic, then and now - Tallying the staff turnover at the overhauled magazine
Why serious journalism can coexist with audience-pleasing content - Legacy media organizations should experiment with digital platforms while continuing to publish hard news
Email blasts from CJR writers and editors
The rise of feelings journalism (TNR)
“Bloom engaged in an increasingly popular style of writing, which I’ve discussed on my blog before, which I call “feelings journalism.” It involves a writer making an argument based on what they imagine someone else is thinking, what they feel may be another person’s feelings. The realm of fact, of reporting, has been left behind.”
Things a war correspondent should never say (WSJ)
“The correspondent retelling war stories surely knows that fellow correspondents had faced the same dangers or worse”
The joyful, bloody media circus of bringing down Brian Williams (Bloomberg)
“In the media, we eat our own for sport”
On WaPo trying to interview a cow (National Journal)
“‘I wasn’t milked on the White House lawn by a strange man,’ The Washington Post—the venerable institution that would later come to break the Watergate scandal and win 48 Pulitzers—quoted her, a farm animal, as saying”
Greg Marx discusses democracy and news with Tom Rosenstiel of the American Press Institute
CJR's Guide to Online News Startups
ACEsTooHigh.com – Reporting on the science, education, and policy surrounding childhood trauma
Who Owns What
The Business of Digital Journalism
A report from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
Questions and exercises for journalism students.
