The Magazine
May/June 2012
Articles
Feature
Postage due
The USPS is running out of money. Where does that leave magazines?
By Lauren Kirchner May 14, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Early on a February morning, in a glass-walled conference room high up in the Hearst Tower in Manhattan, Postmaster General... More
Feature
Encryption is your friend
Four easy ways to protect yourself and your sources
By Matthieu Aikins May 7, 2012 at 07:00 AM
• Depending on whether you use Windows, Mac, or Linux, there is a variety of built-in or free software for... More
Feature
Meanwhile, in the land of the free…
In the US, you can still say almost anything, but someone just may be listening in
By Dan Gillmor May 7, 2012 at 07:00 AM
In December 2010, the major payment systems used to buy goods and services online decided that Wikileaks was no longer... More
Feature
Beyond encryption
Hold the phone! And other security strategies
By Dan Gillmor May 7, 2012 at 07:00 AM
Encrypted messaging is just one of many techniques that journalists should be deploying in the digital age. I asked Christopher... More
Feature
Censory overload
How a reluctant journalist used his software skills to aid the Arab Spring
By Walid Al-Saqaf May 4, 2012 at 06:00 AM
January 26, 2011, was just another cold winter day in Sweden, where I attend graduate school. I returned to... More
Feature
The reporter who saw it coming
Mike Hudson thought he was merely exposing injustice, but he also was unearthing the roots of a global financial meltdown
By Dean Starkman May 3, 2012 at 10:05 AM
Mike Hudson began reporting on the subprime mortgage business in the early 1990s when it was still a marginal,... More
Feature
The spy who came in from the code
How a filmmaker accidentally gave up his sources to Syrian spooks
By Matthieu Aikins May 3, 2012 at 09:56 AM
Last fall, “Kardokh,” a 25-year-old dissident and computer expert in the Syrian capital of Damascus, met with British journalist and... More
Feature
Sino the times
Can China’s billions buy media credibility?
By Sambuddha Mitra Mustafi May 2, 2012 at 06:00 AM
Locals call it da kucha, or “big boxer shorts,” because of its shape. China Central Television’s future headquarters in Beijing... More
Feature
Muscovy pluck
How long can Ekho Moskvy radio get away with pooh-poohing Putin?
By Paul Starobin May 1, 2012 at 06:00 AM
In Vladimir Putin’s Russia, there is no more persistent reproach to his autocratic rule than the country’s oldest independent... More
Feature
The reporter who saw it coming
Mike Hudson thought he was merely exposing injustice, but he also was unearthing the roots of a global financial meltdown
By Dean Starkman Apr 22, 2012 at 03:33 PM
Mike Hudson began reporting on the subprime mortgage business in the early 1990s when it was still a marginal,... More
Cover Story
Six degrees of aggregation
How The Huffington Post ate the Internet
By Michael Shapiro Apr 16, 2012 at 05:15 PM
Of the many and conflicting stories about how The Huffington Post came to be—how it boasts 68 sections, three... More
Departments
Language Corner
Language Corner
Basis Points
By Merrill Perlman May 31, 2012 at 06:50 AM
“On a case-by-case basis.” “On a regular basis.” “On an urgent basis.” Each of those base expressions, from The Associated... More
Currents
Sree Tips
Social-media etiquette for journalists
By Sree Sreenivasan May 30, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Q: I just came back from a conference; what’s the best way to use LinkedIn to connect with people... More
Currents
Open Bar
The Press Room
By The Editors May 29, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Year opened 1995 Owner James “Raff” Rafferty (born in Manchester, England) Distinguishing features Next door to the Santa Barbara... More
Darts and Laurels
Darts and Laurels
Not going the distance
By The Editors May 25, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Much ado On March 21, The Orange County Register published a blog post, based on the sworn affidavit of... More
Currents
Title Search
User Experience (UX) Designer
By Jay Woodruff May 18, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Susan Rits is a User Experience (UX) Designer who worked at Time Warner, Fox, and Google. She is founder... More
Currents
Hard Numbers
Retracting “Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory”
By The Editors May 17, 2012 at 06:50 AM
888,000 downloads of “Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory,” the January 6 This American Life episode based on Mike Daisey’s... More
Currents
How I got that story
RealRural
By The Editors May 16, 2012 at 06:50 AM
In March 2011, Lisa M. Hamilton, a writer and photographer, began a series of road trips around rural California.... More
Currents
What’s in My…
Dean Takahashi from GamesBeat unpacks
By Tyler Orsburn May 11, 2012 at 06:50 AM
It’s fitting that veteran tech journalist Dean Takahashi, who grew up a self-described “arcade rat,” weaned on classics like... More
Letters to the Editor
Notes from our Online Readers
Readers weigh in on Ron Howell’s “The New York Times Goes to the Dogs”
By The Editors May 9, 2012 at 07:00 AM
In a March piece, Ron Howell wrote about the increase in stories about dogs in The New York Times since... More
Editorial
Aggregated assault
Whose work is it, anyway? A plea for standards.
By Cyndi Stivers May 9, 2012 at 07:00 AM
“There’s nothing new under the sun.” Thus spake my high-school teacher, then nearing retirement, and if I remembered nothing... More
On the Job
An unflinching witness
Long Island native Marie Colvin spent her career chronicling the horrors of war and oppression, from Sri Lanka to Syria. She wanted the world to see what she saw.
By Jon Swain May 8, 2012 at 12:10 AM
Marie Colvin, who was killed in Syria on February 22, represents a great deal that is excellent about the... More
Letters to the Editor
Letters to the Editor
Readers respond to our March/April issue
By The Editors May 8, 2012 at 12:10 AM
Patch work Excellent piece (“The constant gardener” by Sean Roach, CJR, March/April), and even though I didn’t join Patch until... More
Opening Shot
Opening Shot
The Instagram campaign
By The Editors May 2, 2012 at 06:00 AM
Every presidential campaign produces its share of iconic images, but never before have we been able to see trail... More
Editorial
Editor in Chief’s Note
CJR’s 50th birthday party continues
By Cyndi Stivers May 1, 2012 at 06:00 AM
Perhaps the best thing about turning 50 is that people tend to toss you more than one party. Christie Hefner,... More
Ideas & Reviews
The Lower Case
The Lower Case
Headlines that editors probably wish they could take back
By The Editors Jun 1, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Mother arrested after drowning —Houston Chronicle, 10/18/11 173 animals seized; 2 face cruelty charges —Bellingham (WA) World, 9/23/11 La. chimpanzees... More
Review
Brief Encounters
Short reviews of Hitlerland and Yazoo
By James Boylan May 28, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Hitlerland: American Eyewitnesses to the Nazi Rise to Power | By Andrew Nagorski | Simon & Schuster | 385 pages,... More
The Research Report
Guiding Starr
Freedom of expression is not freedom of the press
By Michael Schudson and Katherine Fink May 24, 2012 at 11:35 AM
Paul Starr’s short essay, “An Unexpected Crisis: The News Media in Postindustrial Democracies” in the International Journal of Press/Politics (2012),... More
Review
A master’s missteps
Fixated on Kapuscinski’s flaws, a new biography misses the point
By Ted Conover May 23, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Celebrated for his reportage about world-changing events and leaders of his day—the Iranian Revolution, Che Guevara and the Cuban Revolution,... More
Q and A
Exit Interview
C-SPAN’s maestro exits the stage
By Erika Fry May 22, 2012 at 06:50 AM
In 1979, Brian Lamb, then the head of Cablevision’s DC bureau, achieved what now seems unimaginable: He convinced Congress... More
Review
The re-entry problem
America’s tough-on-crime policies didn’t work. Now what?
By Alan Prendergast May 21, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Over the course of eight days in 1978, a 15-year-old terror named Willie Bosket managed to satisfy his curiosity about... More
Review
The astroturf Cassandra
Why hacks like Andrew Keen really fear the social Web
By Maureen Tkacik May 15, 2012 at 06:50 AM
Long before Facebook or Foursquare, men like the late management consultant Martin Jay Levitt were connoisseurs of social networks. At... More
Second Read
Laboratory confidential
The Double Helix’s warts-and-all portrayal of scientific pursuits shook up the formal world of science writing
By Jonathan Weiner May 10, 2012 at 06:50 AM
W hen The Double Helix appeared in the winter of 1968, I reviewed it for The Laureate, the literary magazine... 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.
