The Magazine
July/August 2009
Articles
Feature
Expensive Gifts
What does free culture cost?
By Alissa Quart Jul 24, 2009 at 08:30 AM
One evening in February 2009, the artist Shepard Fairey spoke at the New York Public Library. He was discussing his... More
Feature
What’s a Fair Share In the Age of Google?
How to think about news in the link economy
By Peter Osnos Jul 23, 2009 at 08:00 AM
The buzz inside Google is overwhelmingly positive about what the company does and how we will all benefit from the... More
Feature
Open for Business
If you want readers to buy news, what exactly will you sell? The case for a free/paid hybrid.
By Michael Shapiro Jul 22, 2009 at 08:00 AM
In the dark winter and spring of 2009, as dispatches from the news business grew ever more grim, as Jim... More
Feature
Build the Wall
Most readers won’t pay for news, but if we move quickly, maybe enough of them will. One man’s bold blueprint.
By David Simon Jul 21, 2009 at 08:00 AM
To all of the bystanders reading this, pardon us. The true audience for this essay narrows necessarily to a pair... More
Feature
Leap of Faith
Inside the movement to build an audience of citizens
By Megan Garber Jul 20, 2009 at 08:00 AM
What inspired you to become a journalist? I always liked writing, and I was also into photography. And I knew... More
Feature
A Man in Full
Four years after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans broadcaster Garland Robinette is still fighting mad
By Douglas McCollam Jul 17, 2009 at 04:13 PM
It was the birds that tipped him off. Two days before Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, while the storm was... More
Feature
One of Us
A soldier chooses journalism, but his old boss won’t let go
By Matt Mabe Jul 16, 2009 at 02:50 PM
On what I thought was my last day in the Army in May 2007, my battalion commander gave me some... More
Feature
Groundhog Day
Why this year’s health-care debate sounds like the one in 1993
By Trudy Lieberman Jul 15, 2009 at 08:00 AM
Last fall, soon after Barack Obama was elected president, Sheila Burke was waiting to discuss Obama’s campaign promises, via Webcast,... More
Cover Story
No Free Lunch
Who will pay for news? CJR presents four stories searching for journalism’s economic model
By The Editors Jul 9, 2009 at 08:30 AM
Journalists tend to move in packs. Not long ago we thought that the key to the business model of the... More
Departments
Editorial
The Grave Dancer’s Folly
Blaming newspapers for their plight is a waste of precious time
By The Editors Jul 21, 2009 at 08:00 AM
Despite the tedious posturing of both Web triumphalists (Jeff Jarvis to the Newspaper Association of America: “You blew it!”) and... More
Short Takes
Global Village
Are regional columnists under pressure to think locally?
By Connie Schultz Jul 20, 2009 at 04:22 PM
Let’s not call this a trend. Not yet, please. In April, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the paper that championed civil rights... More
Short Takes
A Kind of Victory
Remembering El Salvador’s struggle and those who covered it
By Jacques Menasche Jul 17, 2009 at 04:36 PM
“El Salvador is now the most dangerous country in the world for foreign journalists,” NBC's John Chancellor told viewers on... More
Short Takes
Into the Fold
How the online sports community has become part of the mainstream
By Robert Weintraub Jul 16, 2009 at 04:39 PM
Regular watchers of ESPN —that is, all sports fans—may have noticed the network has begun allotting more airtime to the... More
Darts and Laurels
Darts and Laurels
Send tips and suggestions to [email protected]
By Katia Bachko Jul 15, 2009 at 12:49 PM
Laurel to The Arizona Republic for “Perfectly Legal,” a series of six articles, published in May, that exposed a network... More
Ideas & Reviews
Second Read
‘The Greatest Liar’
Is Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year a work of journalism?
By Nicholson Baker Jul 28, 2009 at 08:00 AM
I first read Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year on a train from Boston to New York. That’s... More
Essay
Why John Lennon Matters
The case for professional pop-music critics in an amateur age
By Jacob Levenson Jul 15, 2009 at 04:43 PM
A John Lennon song floated over our rental-car radio as my father and I wound our way past silos and... More
Review
Brief Encounters
Short reviews of books on campaign bloggers, tabloids, and a collection of Henry Fairlie’s essays
By James Boylan Jul 14, 2009 at 12:38 PM
Bloggers on the Bus: How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press By Eric Boehlert Free Press 280 pages, $26... More
Review
Heart of Stone
A distinguished new biography of a career contrarian
By Robert G. Kaiser Jul 13, 2009 at 08:00 AM
American Radical: The Life and Times of I. F. Stone | By D. D. Guttenplan | Farrar, Straus, and Giroux | 224... More
The Research Report
Edifice Rex
How newspapers lost their spots in the skyline
By Michael Schudson & Danielle Haas Jul 10, 2009 at 12:45 PM
It was billed “The Fight of the Century” before a single punch was thrown: Jack Johnson versus Jim Jeffries, black... 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.
