The Magazine
September/October 2012
Articles
Feature
Alternative ending
Bruce R. Brugmann, one of the last of the alt-weekly lions, is calling it quits. Sort of.
By Danelle Morton Sep 20, 2012 at 11:55 AM
Bruce B. Brugmann is a stubborn guy who sticks to his point of view, even as the world he... More
Feature
The oys of October
A longtime Boston Red Sox fan asks, Why does hometown coverage of the troubled team sound so damn gleeful?
By Jesse Sunenblick Sep 18, 2012 at 11:00 AM
“I don’t even go outside anymore,” David Ortiz, the slimmed-down slugger for the Boston Red Sox, was telling an... More
Feature
No habla Español
The new Latino media universe is young, political, and all-American
By Ruth Samuelson Sep 13, 2012 at 11:24 AM
Lalo Alcaraz has always embraced the word pocho. It refers to Mexican-Americans who have lost their Mexican culture and... More
Cover Story
Will the Daily Bugle survive?
How the most endangered journalism species — the newspaper — might prevent extinction
By Stephen B. Shepard Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Excerpted from Deadlines and Disruption, by Stephen B. Shepard, published by McGraw-Hill, © 2012 With the traditional business model collapsing,... More
Cover Story
Failing geometry
The once-mighty triangle of publisher-audience-advertiser, long the basis for success in the media business, is now shaky. So let’s consider transformation …
By Clay Shirky Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
In 1830, a publisher named Lynde Walter launched a Boston paper called The Boston Evening Transcript. Transcript’s most important... More
Cover Story
Long may it wave
The traditional banner ad isn’t dead; it just transforms to fit the latest digital fashions — and the demands (lots of demands) from marketers
By Simon Dumenco Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Fifteen years ago, when I was an editor at New York magazine, I had a little side project: I got... More
Cover Story
Made for you and me
In Tulsa, This Land Press is defying news-startup orthodoxy and betting that its community will pay for quality journalism — not eventually, but right now
By Michael Meyer Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Across the street from a Fastenal hardware store in the shadow of Tulsa’s aging art-deco skyline, the staff of... More
Cover Story
What’s the best model for a digital news business?
Let’s compare three well-funded local news startups - with very distinct fates
By C.W. Anderson Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Too often, conversations about the evolution of media seem to pit defensive, old-school journalists against arrogant, tech-savvy upstarts. But in... More
Cover Story
The genuine article
What is the atomic unit of journalistic storytelling?
By Kira Goldenberg Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
The news story is suffering an identity crisis. For a century at least, it was secure in the knowledge that... More
Cover Story
Murder Inc.
A crime-news website tells the story of every DC homicide
By Brent Cunningham Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Laura Norton Amico spent the summer trying to find a newsroom in Washington, DC, to take over Homicide Watch,... More
Cover Story
Journalism by numbers
It’s time to embrace the growing influence of real-time data on the media business
By Emily Bell Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Everywhere we go, everything we do, we send signals. Simple acts create streams of data, whether it is crossing... More
Cover Story
By the people
For better and worse, the Sacramento Press lets the readers write the news
By Sara Morrison Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Thirty-one-year-old Ben Ilfeld launched Sacramento Press in October 2008, with the goal of making hyperlocal news and information an interactive... More
Cover Story
Perks, not paywalls
The Voice of San Diego’s new membership strategy ties funding to “family”
By Hazel Sheffield Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
According to its motto, the Voice of San Diego is “irreverent, honest and engaging” in its pursuit of community news.... More
Cover Story
App pupil
USC Annenberg journalism professor Robert Hernandez rounds up great tools for gathering and presenting news
By Robert Hernandez Sep 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM
Robert Hernandez may be a professor, but he considers himself “a hackademic” who encourages digital journalists and technologists to share... More
Feature
The boy in the bubble
Ezra Klein rewrites the role of Washington wunderkind
By Matt Welch Sep 4, 2012 at 12:26 AM
He’s impossibly young, infuriatingly accomplished, and impressively wonky. In a town full of journalistic flop sweat, he glides instead... More
Departments
Currents
The Lower Case
Headlines that editors probably wish they could take back
By The Editors Oct 9, 2012 at 11:15 AM
- Erie Times-News, 6/13/12 - BBCNews.com, 6/12/12 - The Des Moines Register, 7/5/12 - Brand Republic News, 7/5/12 - Bellingham... More
Darts and Laurels
Darts and Laurels
That’s sick
By Hazel Sheffield Oct 8, 2012 at 11:00 AM
The Daily Caller drew some odd conclusions from a June survey of physicians, when it published a report with... More
Currents
Beyond ‘Deep Throat’
Reporters find themselves in odd situations
By Marla Jo Fisher Oct 4, 2012 at 11:00 AM
Eric Zorn, columnist, Chicago Tribune I covered a nudist convention for the Tribune in a health club. Going with... More
Currents
Last lick?
A fudgsicle fan can’t escape his past
By The Editors Oct 3, 2012 at 10:49 AM
On a hot August day in 1995, a Baltimore Sun photographer snapped this picture of three-year-old John Boias. It... More
Currents
Hard Numbers
Who do you trust?
By Sara Morrison Oct 1, 2012 at 11:13 AM
193 pages in the Supreme Court’s Affordable Care Act decision 2 pages of the decision CNN and Fox News producers... More
Currents
When Worlds Collide
NPR interns devoured by music-site trolls!
By Hazel Sheffield Sep 28, 2012 at 10:57 AM
Newsrooms tend to shield their interns from the rougher side of the news business. But this summer, two NPR interns... More
Currents
Sree Tips
Social-media etiquette for journalists
By Sree Sreenivasan Sep 27, 2012 at 10:42 AM
Q: What’s the latest thinking on following back everyone who follows you on Twitter? Is this something we are... More
Currents
Why stop there?
Anna Wintour is not the next ambassador to Britain, but …
By The Editors Sep 21, 2012 at 11:15 AM
In June, Anna Wintour was (briefly) rumored to be under consideration by the Obama administration as its next ambassador... More
Currents
Have at it
Can’t draw? No problem
By Brent Cunningham Sep 19, 2012 at 10:47 AM
For years, Nik Kowsar managed to stay out of jail while building a reputation as Iran’s most infamous political... More
Currents
Open Bar
Tom and Jerry’s
By Sang Ngo Sep 14, 2012 at 10:35 AM
Tom and Jerry's 288 Elizabeth Street, New York, NY Year opened 1993 Distinguishing features A collection of mugs and bowls inscribed... More
Letters to the Editor
Letters to the Editor
Readers respond to our July/August issue
By The Editors Sep 12, 2012 at 11:00 AM
Gyno-mite Your list of “40 women who changed the media business in the past 40 years” (CJR, July/August) is impressive... More
Editorial
Tale of the tape … so far
Lessons for a year of scrutinizing campaign coverage
By The Editors Sep 6, 2012 at 10:56 AM
In two months, Americans will elect a president and determine who controls Congress. We’ve been tracking the coverage of... More
Opening Shot
Opening Shot
Drawing attention to the decline in local accountability reporting
By The Editors Sep 4, 2012 at 12:29 AM
The current media revolution has brought many encouraging changes, but also a worrisome decline in accountability reporting, especially at... More
Currents
Language Corner
Few grudges
By Merrill Perlman Sep 4, 2012 at 12:24 AM
“Grudge,” from an old German word meaning “lament,” is a lot of fun to say. The noun “grudge” means “hostility... More
Ideas & Reviews
The Research Report
TMI
How are we managing the daily flood of information?
By Michael Schudson and Katherine Fink Oct 2, 2012 at 10:52 AM
Information overload goes back at least to Ecclesiastes—“of making many books there is no end.” And according to historian Ann... More
Review
Brief Encounters
Short reviews of Anonymous in Their Own Names and At the Fights
By James Boylan Sep 26, 2012 at 11:18 AM
Anonymous in Their Own Names: Doris E. Fleischman, Ruth Hale, and Jane Grant | By Susan Henry | Vanderbilt University... More
Review
The lying game
Is it ever okay to tell a whopper in the name of journalism?
By Jack Shafer Sep 24, 2012 at 10:49 AM
In 2007, investigative journalist Ken Silverstein went undercover to test Washington lobbyists’ taste for sleaze. Using an alias, Silverstein... More
Second Read
Rocky Mountain fever
Gene Fowler’s Timber Line celebrates the chicanery and showmanship of the original Denver Post
By Justin Peters Sep 17, 2012 at 10:50 AM
In the winter of 1907, Denver showed the rest of the nation how to fight a newspaper war. The... More
Essay
Fighting words
How war reporters can resist the loaded language of their beat
By Judith Matloff Sep 11, 2012 at 10:56 AM
Last year, I visited Bogotá, Colombia, to teach a seminar on conflict reporting. Afterward, a soldier missing two legs and... More
Review
Talking trash
What’s more important, human dignity or freedom of speech?
By Aryeh Neier Sep 10, 2012 at 11:00 AM
The lead article in the sports section of the July 1 New York Times was about an Italian football... More
Q and A
Identity crisis
Journatic’s short-lived editorial director Mike Fourcher weighs in
By Hazel Sheffield Sep 7, 2012 at 11:00 AM
In July, just 10 weeks after he started work as the editorial director of Journatic, Mike Fourcher announced on... 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.
