Photo of the Day

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 03:26 PM

The photo below depicts a panel--"Make Media Matter"--convened yesterday at the Newseum, by the Independent Film Channel. The dialogue at... More

The Real World: White House

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 03:06 PM

This is the true story... of several strangers... picked to work in the White House... and have their lives taped...... More

Twitter Threat Level: Red

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 02:53 PM

Miami Herald columnist and journalism professor Edward Wasserman has a new piece up today exploring The Dangers of Twitter. But:... More

What the Heck Do the Senators Mean?

More clues about a public plan

By Trudy Lieberman   May 29, 2009 at 02:44 PM

Right before the holiday weekend, Ohio senator Sherrod Brown and twenty-seven other Democratic senators introduced a sense of the Senate... More

Mark Mahoney, Open Government Wrecking Ball

More on the Glens Falls Post Star’s Pulitzer Win

By Clint Hendler   May 29, 2009 at 11:43 AM

Yesterday, at the annual Pulitzer Prize banquet, Mark Mahoney laughed and pressed his forehead to the table as he and... More

The Economy Today: Wait, How Much Did We Spend?

Headlines from New Mexico, Tennessee, Maine and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 29, 2009 at 10:26 AM

The New York Times reports that, earlier this month, the Obama administration overstated (by “roughly a third”) how much of... More

WSJ Keeps a Close Watch on the Wall Street Lobby

By Ryan Chittum   May 29, 2009 at 09:43 AM

The Wall Street Journal scoops that Wall Street is up to its old tricks. It's lobbying against greater transparency rules... More

Citizen Journalism? There’s an App for That

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 09:09 AM

UK news outlet Sky News launches an iPhone app that includes an interface enabling citizen journalism--"simply fill out your location... More

Because It’s Friday

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 09:08 AM

Here's chanteuse Jill Sobule serenading Rupert Murdoch at a recent conference: More

Watching Sotomayor, Part II

If it’s a fight, define the sides better

By Jane Kim   May 29, 2009 at 09:07 AM

We had our fingers crossed that coverage of Sonia Sotomayor’s SCOTUS nomination would manage to skirt the sort of reaction... More

Stuff Journalists Like

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 08:57 AM

Hot (or, uh, lukewarm) on the heels of the blink-and-you'll-miss-it Internet meme known as Stuff White People Like, two Colorado-based... More

My Buddy Personalized Newsletter and Me…

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 08:52 AM

Next week, for the first time, the MediaNews Group will begin printing personalized newsletters to be distributed to consumers' homes.... More

Giving and Receiving, Press Corps Giggles Edition

By Megan Garber   May 29, 2009 at 08:36 AM

Robert Gibbs doesn't merely evoke chuckles among the White House press corps (an average of ten a day, if we're... More

Pearlstein Hammers the OCC

By Ryan Chittum   May 28, 2009 at 05:57 PM

Steven Pearlstein wrote a brutal column yesterday on John Dugan, the Comptroller of the Currency. Dugan is complaining that FDIC... More

Polar Distress

Cass Sunstein on the dynamics of extremism

By Megan Garber   May 28, 2009 at 04:35 PM

Going to Extremes: How Like Minds Unite and Divide By Cass R. Sunstein | Oxford University Press | 208 pages,... More

“Green Shoots” Are About to Get Swamped

A second wave of foreclosures is coming, and the media need to watch out

By Ryan Chittum   May 28, 2009 at 02:12 PM

I get the sense that the press is becoming a bit too sanguine about the economy's prospects, something that could... More

Openness Ombudsman: Lucy Dalglish on the OGIS and FOIA

An interview with the RCFP’s executive director

By Clint Hendler   May 28, 2009 at 11:50 AM

Lucy Dalglish is the executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. Earlier this year, CJR spoke... More

Talking Shop: Dennis Roddy

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reporter talks about the recession’s effects in western Pennsylvania

By Katia Bachko   May 28, 2009 at 11:34 AM

Dennis Roddy knows Pennsylvania. He’s been a general assignment reporter at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette since January 1993; before that, he... More

Reporters “Waiting for Weezy?”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 28, 2009 at 10:24 AM

Via HuffPo: Wanda Sykes made fun of the media skirting the race issue when talking about Michelle Obama during an... More

The Economy Today: Weathering the Storm

News from Colorado, Utah, California and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 28, 2009 at 10:19 AM

USA Today leads with a story about how stimulus projects are bypassing the hardest-hit states. Of the nearly $4 billion... More

ABC News Denied Access to Senatorial Spin Class?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 28, 2009 at 10:18 AM

A tweet just now from ABC News's Jake Tapper: Congress denied ABC News' request to film the House/Senate gyms that... More

A Mightn’t Wind Blows at the Journal

By Ryan Chittum   May 28, 2009 at 09:53 AM

There's a noticeable tic showing up in Wall Street Journal copy in recent months. All of a sudden, the very... More

Getting Giddy With Gibbs

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 28, 2009 at 09:50 AM

If you watch the White House press briefings with any regularity, chances are you've noticed (and, in my case, been... More

Prepare to Pay?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 28, 2009 at 09:27 AM

From The Atlantic's James Warren: Shhhh. Newspaper publishers are quietly holding a very, very important conclave today. Will you soon... More

Nut Says Moon Is Made Of Cheese, Bloomberg Reports

By Ryan Chittum   May 27, 2009 at 04:39 PM

The investor-guru story is an annoying staple of business journalism. These piece often report that "Bill Gross says this" or... More

“So Far.” NYT Mag’s Bill Clinton Profile

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 04:20 PM

It's not until some 1,300 words in to Peter Baker's several-thousand-word profile of Bill Clinton in this coming Sunday's New... More

Why “Conservatives” Should Root For the NYT

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 02:39 PM

Per Francis Wilkinson, executive editor of The Week: If conservatives were to look up from hammering nails in the Time’... More

An Inoculation for Wall Street Outrage Fatigue

By Ryan Chittum   May 27, 2009 at 01:24 PM

After all we've learned in the last couple of years, are you still capable of being astonished at the behavior... More

Geraldo Got Goosebumps

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 01:24 PM

Gail Shister interviewed Geraldo Rivera (last seen offering to buy Blagojevich dinner) on his personal reaction to yesterday's Sotomayor news... More

On Fox & Friends, Miss California Subs For Miss America

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 12:15 PM

The day after the California Supreme Court upheld the state's ban on gay marriage, proponent of "opposite marriage," Carrie Prejean... More

On Gatekeepers and InfoValets

By Megan Garber   May 27, 2009 at 11:29 AM

Going on now: "From Gatekeepers to InfoValets: Work Plans for Sustaining Journalism," a future-of-journalism conference in Washington, DC. Convened by... More

Sounds… Familiar?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 11:05 AM

Per the AP: Twitter Inc.'s co-founders say the rapidly growing online communications company will eventually charge fees for its services,... More

Here You Go, Jeffrey Rosen

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 10:40 AM

The New York Times, on its Web site, has posted "Selected Cases of Judge Sonia Sotomayor" (516 pages, pdf) for... More

Climate Bill Cacophony

With so much back-and-forth on news pages, papers need more editorials

By Curtis Brainard   May 27, 2009 at 10:15 AM

Last week, the House Energy and Commerce committee approved energy and climate legislation that could put the first national cap... More

Gibbs: You Didn’t Mind Anonymous Sources Before

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 10:08 AM

The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz has a piece today about, in part, how some reporters have protested background briefings like... More

The FT’s Kay Takes on “Too Big to Fail”

By Ryan Chittum   May 27, 2009 at 09:39 AM

Financial Times columnist John Kay writes one of the best-reasoned explanations I've seen for why "too big to fail" can't... More

Jon Friedman, MoDo, Glass Houses

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 27, 2009 at 09:14 AM

MarketWatch media critic Jon Friedman weighs in on last week's Maureen Dowd controversy by skating around the most relevant issues... More

The Economy Today: Songs of Recession

Headlines from California, Tennessee, Florida, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 27, 2009 at 09:04 AM

Grilled chicken and lasagna are the latest signs of the recession, USA Today reports. Chain restaurants such as KFC and... More

A Slap-Your-Head Bloomberg Column on Newspapers’ Decline

By Ryan Chittum   May 26, 2009 at 10:54 PM

Kevin "Dow 36,000" Hassett, somehow has a column at Bloomberg. Occasionally I read it. As a media critic who writes... More

Watching Sotomayor

How Day One coverage of the Supreme Court pick fared

By Jane Kim   May 26, 2009 at 04:45 PM

With the announcement that President Obama has nominated federal appeals court judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court to replace... More

Kaiser Heads to Hillman Foundation

Here’s a complete archive of his CJR columns

By The Editors   May 26, 2009 at 04:35 PM

Charles Kaiser's Full Court Press column has moved to the Web site of the Sidney Hillman Foundation. This is a... More

Froomkin’s “From Scratch” Online Newspaper

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 04:33 PM

For the Nieman Journalism Lab, Dan Froomkin imagines what a "from scratch" online newspaper started "today" might look like. It... More

Lapham’s Quarterly: Utne’s “Best New Publication”

By Megan Garber   May 26, 2009 at 03:26 PM

Congrats to Lapham's Quarterly, Lewis Lapham's journal of history, which was awarded "Best New Publication" at the 20th Annual Utne... More

Sotomayor Has Been “Blessed”* In Many Ways…

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 03:21 PM

.... but "blessed" with children is not, as far as we know, one of them. Until this morning. When Politico's... More

The Gray Lady Talks Twitter

By Megan Garber   May 26, 2009 at 03:06 PM

So today is, apparently, Social Media Day at The New York Times. In addition to announcing Jennifer Preston as its... More

Beach Reading

What book would you recommend that journalists read this summer?

By The Editors   May 26, 2009 at 02:26 PM

With the Memorial Day weekend just past, it's official: summer is upon us. And the season of picnics and parades... More

A Sin of Omission, Part Two

By Ryan Chittum   May 26, 2009 at 01:55 PM

New York Times reporter Edmund Andrews responded to criticism of his book, and the issue made it to the paper's... More

The Public Editor and the Internet: The Match Game!

Clark Hoyt builds up the case of The Times v. The Bloggers

By Megan Garber   May 26, 2009 at 01:22 PM

Here's a little game for you on this post-holiday Tuesday. See if you can identify which phrases, taken from New... More

NYT Introduces (Explains) New “Social Media Editor”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 12:34 PM

From the internal New York Times memo introducing Jennifer Preston, the paper's "Social Media Editor" (h/t, NiemanLab): Jennifer will work... More

Matthews Sees “A Campaign”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 11:34 AM

On MSNBC Chris Matthews has been excitedly characterizing this morning's official Sonia Sotomayor Supreme Court nomination announcement as the start... More

Brooksley Born, Finally on the Record

By Ryan Chittum   May 26, 2009 at 10:52 AM

The Washington Post gets the first interview with Brooksley Born since the crisis started and gives it a good run.... More

MSNBC Quotes “Unnamed Former Clarence Thomas Clerk…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 10:45 AM

...and so it begins, writes HuffPo's Jason Linkins in "How the Media Will Smear Sotomayor." More

An Actual WSJ Article

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 10:03 AM

As a co-worker said just now: you gotta hand it to The Wall Street Journal for their dogged pursuit of... More

The Economy Today: Governments at Work

Headlines from New Hampshire, California, Montana, Arizona, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 26, 2009 at 08:47 AM

This morning, economic news takes a distant backseat to the big news about North Korea. The Washington Post offers a... More

The Times’s Lips, Wikipedia’s Ears

By Megan Garber   May 26, 2009 at 08:41 AM

The New York Times home page just announced, literally one minute ago, that Obama has chosen Sonia Sotomayor as his... More

Hoyt: On Rules and Internet Rough-Ups

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 26, 2009 at 08:17 AM

In Sunday's New York Times, public editor Clark Hoyt touched on some recent situations involving some of the paper's big... More

Identity Crisis

The Wall Street Journal steers away from what made it great

By Liza Featherstone   May 25, 2009 at 05:00 PM

In December 2008, a year after* Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. purchased The Wall Street Journal, the paper had a holiday... More

Waiting for CNBC

A tragicomedy in one long act

By Maureen Tkacik   May 24, 2009 at 08:00 AM

“But eight point one percent. . . . Uh, that’s what you said, right, Zandi?” “I said eight. I said eight. Eight point one... More

A Matter of Trust

One story from Gaza and what it says about the coverage of Israel

By J.J. Goldberg   May 23, 2009 at 08:00 AM

On Thursday morning, March 19, Israelis woke to find a story on the front pages of two leading daily newspapers... More

Tortured Logic, “Dueling Speeches” Edition

Media overplay, under-analyze yesterday’s torture arguments

By Charles Kaiser   May 22, 2009 at 05:44 PM

“Democrats and Republicans, politicians, journalists, and citizens fell silent. In other words we went off course.”–President Barack Obama “I want... More

A Sin of Omission

The Atlantic finds an NYT memoirist withheld relevant information

By Ryan Chittum   May 22, 2009 at 04:25 PM

Megan McArdle of The Atlantic digs up some embarrassing information on The New York Times's Edmund Andrews, and the scoop... More

Twelve Columns

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 03:00 PM

Alexander Shaw, who spearheaded the redesign of Talking Points Memo's home page, describes the logic behind TPM's new look. More

Photo of the Day

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 02:30 PM

The photo below comes courtesy of The New York Times's write-up of yesterday's so-called Dueling Speeches!™. It depicts the crowd... More

Hot Hot Heat

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 02:23 PM

The day has finally come: sriracha chili sauce, that piquant Nectar of the Gods--aka Tuong Ot Sriracha (or, per its... More

“Notables” at the Chronicle

By Jane Kim   May 22, 2009 at 02:08 PM

The San Francisco Chronicle has been asking some of "the local notables that make the Bay Area what it is"... More

McClatchy Fact-Checks Cheney

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 02:05 PM

McClatchy—one of the few major news outlets that demonstrated skepticism about now-discredited intelligence reports during the run-up to the Iraq... More

A Story About Poor People!

By Brent Cunningham   May 22, 2009 at 01:47 PM

Kudos to DeNeen Brown and The Washington Post for this piece in Monday's paper on the hidden costs of poverty.... More

Boxer Rebellion

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 01:25 PM

It's rare that heartwarming stories come out of the war zone in Afghanistan. But serendipity, and a quick-reacting AP photographer... More

Single-Payer Advocates Finally Get Their Say

Montana papers lead the way

By Trudy Lieberman   May 22, 2009 at 12:56 PM

Twice this month, Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) has tossed single-payer advocates out of his finance committee hearings on health reform.... More

New Yorker Under Siege

How the magazine found itself in the crosshairs of a $10-million lawsuit

By Craig Silverman   May 22, 2009 at 12:52 PM

The story has everything: murder, tribal warfare, a famous writer, and a lawsuit involving him and one of the world’s... More

Probability Problems

Clumsy numbers in coverage of MIT’s “Greenhouse Gamble” study

By Curtis Brainard   May 22, 2009 at 11:45 AM

A study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, which found... More

A Vision in the Desert

The National tries to lift journalism in Abu Dhabi

By Andrew Mills   May 22, 2009 at 11:40 AM

It’s 11 a.m. in mid-June and ten section editors have crowded around the table at the center of The National’s... More

Welcome to the Jungle

Journalists, meet the all-or-nothing job market

By David Cay Johnston   May 22, 2009 at 11:20 AM

Reporter Dan Browning's piece on coming newsroom cuts at the St. Paul Pioneer-Press contains a curious detail that perhaps will... More

The Economy Today: More Stimulus Money for Your Mansion?

News from Montana, Utah, New Mexico, and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 22, 2009 at 10:35 AM

Washington is considering a new agency that would protect consumers of financial products, Reuters reports, as part of an effort... More

Bloomberg Shines on TARP Repayments

By Ryan Chittum   May 22, 2009 at 09:54 AM

This is why you've got to love Bloomberg's Mark Pittman. He takes a story, grabs on to the taxpayer angle,... More

Jilted, Not Wilted

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 09:15 AM

Behold, JiltedJournalists.com: a site run by laid-off journalists, for laid-off journalists (motto: "We refuse to let our story end. --30--").... More

Larry King: “I Am Unfeared…I Am Brave and Forceful”

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 08:51 AM

One more nugget from Stewart: Larry King delivers what surely must be one of the most awkward--and oddly delightful--interviews in... More

“Conflict, Easily Juxtaposed!”

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 08:41 AM

Jon Stewart takes on the Massive, Dramatic, and Juicily Conflict-Laden Smackdown between Barack "the Prez" Obama and Dick "9/11 needs... More

Couric, Toasted and Roasted

By Megan Garber   May 22, 2009 at 08:26 AM

The dark, humorless days following the White House Correspondents' Association dinner are...challenging. No more genial hobnobbing. No more awkward small... More

CJR on Gaza

Our package of magazine and Web articles about the conflict in the Middle East

By The Editors   May 22, 2009 at 08:00 AM

This month, the Columbia Journalism Review is offering three perspectives on the coverage of the fighting in Gaza. J.J. Goldberg,... More

Parsing Obama on State Secrets

Obama promises only “cosmetic” changes

By Clint Hendler   May 21, 2009 at 04:40 PM

This morning, President Barack Obama stood before the Constitution at the National Archives and gave an hour-long speech on the... More

Life and Death

Profiling Krishna Andavolu, managing editor of Obit

By Justin Peters   May 21, 2009 at 03:57 PM

Krishna Andavolu is the managing editor of Obit (www.obit-mag.com), an online magazine intended for those interested in obituaries, epitaphs, elegies,... More

Monkey in the Middle

By Megan Garber   May 21, 2009 at 03:15 PM

Wonder of the Web #2,567: if you write something stupid in a small, local paper, that fact has a much... More

Channel Surfing in Riyadh

The combustible politics and morphing media of the Middle East

By Paul McLeary   May 21, 2009 at 03:12 PM

The Media Relations Department of Hizbollah Wishes You a Happy Birthday: Unexpected Encounters in the Changing Middle East By Neil... More

breakingviews, Broken Logic

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2009 at 02:54 PM

This breakingviews column just can't seem to make up its mind how to back up its assertion—perhaps because that assertion... More

Tracking the Money: Craig Jennings on Bailout Transparency

CJR talks with the OMB Watch analyst

By Clint Hendler   May 21, 2009 at 12:05 PM

Craig Jennings is a federal fiscal policy analyst at OMB Watch, a non-profit advocacy and research organization that promotes government... More

Sports Center

A hall of fame for sportswriters? Pass the press-box bratwurst, please

By Steve Daley   May 21, 2009 at 11:48 AM

News that the Associated Press Sports Editors is establishing a national headquarters and a “Hall of Fame” at Indiana University’s... More

Cheney: NYT “Damn Sure Didn’t Serve…Safety Of Our People”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 21, 2009 at 11:31 AM

Just now from former VP Cheney's speech (think this will make it into any of the post-speech coverage/chatter?): Our government... More

Former Head of Pension Insurer Pleads the Fifth

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2009 at 11:14 AM

Wow. The former head of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, Charles E.F. Millard, has pleaded the Fifth Amendment to a... More

Tapper Tweets Objections to Obama Speech

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 21, 2009 at 11:11 AM

ABC News's Jake Tapper Twitters his objections to President Obama's "media" mentions* in his speech: second time POTUS bashes media... More

California Knockout

Reports focus too myopically on the battle between guv and voters

By Jane Kim   May 21, 2009 at 11:09 AM

On Tuesday, California residents voted down—with huge margins—all but one of six bundled ballot measures intended to help alleviate the... More

The Economy Today: Superheroes and Coupon Queens

News from California, Maine, Colorado, and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 21, 2009 at 10:32 AM

In national headlines, The New York Times reports on the new credit-card measures that Congress passed yesterday, which will increase... More

“Massive Foreign Press Presence…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 21, 2009 at 10:13 AM

... awaiting former Vice President Cheney's speech at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., according to Ana Marie Cox,... More

Excluded Voices

An interview with Jonathan Oberlander

By Trudy Lieberman   May 21, 2009 at 10:05 AM

This past year’s health discussion has been remarkable for the narrow range of ideas and opinions that have floated down... More

Obama WANTS YOU to comment on the Open Government Directive

By Clint Hendler   May 21, 2009 at 10:01 AM

A request for public comment on the Obama administration’s Open Government Directive has just been published in the Federal Register.... More

State Farm Is There (for Your Blog)

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2009 at 09:45 AM

The Journal looks at what's becoming an increasing issue: Bloggers getting sued for what they write. And it's not just... More

Professor: “Journalists Deserve Low Pay”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 21, 2009 at 09:44 AM

Journalists should not be paid well, argues Robert G. Picard, a professor of media economics at Sweden's Jonkoping University, for... More

Be Big in Somalia

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 21, 2009 at 09:25 AM

Out-of-work cartoonists: want to draw for and about Somalia, being "humorous where possible" about such things as "persistent insecurity, natural... More

Colbert on Newspapers

By Katia Bachko   May 21, 2009 at 08:00 AM

Stephen Colbert weighed in on future of journalism right now, taking a side in the debate over the role of... More

The Smell of Paradise

Under pressure in Gaza: a reporter’s notebook

By Taghreed El-Khodary   May 21, 2009 at 08:00 AM

First Day It is 10:40 on a sunny and warm Saturday morning, and time for my walk through Gaza. I... More

The Audit on the Radio

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2009 at 04:57 PM

Audit host Dean Starkman makes an appearance on NPR's Talk of the Nation to discuss his giant story "Power Problem,"... More

BW Catches the Press Recycling Obama’s “News”

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2009 at 04:24 PM

BusinessWeek has a smart piece of analysis on how the Obama administration's message control is playing out in the press.... More

Not a Showdown

Politico, MSNBC, Time hype Obama vs. Cheney non-controversy

By Katia Bachko   May 20, 2009 at 04:08 PM

As we’ve noted before, nothing gets media juices flowing like a tasty conflict. A few months back, it was Limbaugh... More

The Times Gets It Right (Today) on Credit Cards

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2009 at 01:32 PM

Gary Weiss notices that the Times shifts course on credit cards on page one today. It's a good thing they... More

There’s An App For…What?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 20, 2009 at 12:25 PM

Folio reports on iPhone applications developed thus far by magazines (often "monetized" by ads or corporate sponsorships). "In February, Lucky... More

Your Local TV News (Soon With More Snuggie Ads)

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 20, 2009 at 11:46 AM

The Philadelphia Inquirer's TV critic, Jonathan Storm on how "local TV broadcasters, both in Philadelphia and across the country, [are]... More

“Is Anyone Okay?” Tweeting the Quake

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 20, 2009 at 11:33 AM

Two accounts of how the Orange County Register newsroom used Twitter (handle: OCReggie) during the May 17th earthquake in Southern... More

The India Beat

Advice to young journalists: go east

By Samantha Fields   May 20, 2009 at 10:29 AM

There is a rather unconventional bit of wisdom being doled out to young journalists in the United States these days:... More

“Controversy” and Candor On Cable

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 20, 2009 at 10:24 AM

Heard earlier this morning on MSNBC, accompanying the headline: "TEEN BIRTH 'SHOCKER,' YouTube pulled graphic viral ad, but it is... More

The Economy Today: Vetoes and Woes

Headlines from South Carolina, Colorado, Maryland, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 20, 2009 at 10:09 AM

Consumer economics are big news in the national papers this morning. The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration may... More

Obama Listens to Elizabeth Warren Even if the Press Does Not

WaPo scoops that a consumer regulator is in the works

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2009 at 09:50 AM

The Washington Post gets a nice scoop this morning on an actual good idea emanating from Washington: Setting up a... More

From WaPo to HuffPo

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 20, 2009 at 09:36 AM

"Will P.R. pros take the baton of investigative journalism?" wonders Tim Cavanaugh at Reason, arguing that such a baton-pass wouldn't... More

Covering Gaza from Israel

What Israelis wanted to know about the war

By Lisa Goldman   May 20, 2009 at 08:00 AM

During the first week of Israel’s winter military operation in Gaza, a broadcaster for ChanNel 2, which has the highest... More

Today on the Frugality Beat

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 19, 2009 at 03:43 PM

Last month, the New York Times told us about people who don't really have to penny-pinch but choose to spend... More

Crash Course

How to cover a car wreck

By Tom Vanderbilt   May 19, 2009 at 03:42 PM

The fatal car crash is, unfortunately, an all-too-familiar staple of local journalism. Each of us can summon a grim collage... More

“The Mediacene Age”

Ancient primate fossil inspires an unusual press blitz, but will it work?

By Curtis Brainard   May 19, 2009 at 03:31 PM

On Tuesday, The New York Times ran its second article about a 47-million-year-old skeleton that is being described as “the... More

Do You Work For A “Magazine?” (How To Tell)

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 19, 2009 at 02:34 PM

Folio's Tony Silber lists the following "six key properties for what a magazine is," quoting Bob Sacks, a "publishing consultant"... More

Dowd’s Deed

How should high-profile columnists process and relay information?

By The Editors   May 19, 2009 at 02:27 PM

You’ve heard the buzz about Maureen Dowd’s Sunday column for The New York Times, the one in which she reproduced,... More

The Times Gives Card Companies Too Much Credit

By Ryan Chittum   May 19, 2009 at 01:55 PM

The Times's front page story on the coming credit-card crackdown doesn't really do it for me. The consumer-advocate response is... More

Expert: Women Buy Bags, Men Buy Cars

By Katia Bachko   May 19, 2009 at 01:44 PM

Time magazine has an enticingly headlined column, "How Shoppers Make Decisions in a Recession," which turned out to be a... More

Marshall Law

Notes from Josh Marshall’s speech at Columbia

By Megan Garber   May 19, 2009 at 12:39 PM

There was no mention of MoDowd. Instead, Josh Marshall, speaking at Columbia's Journalism Day ceremony this morning, exhorted journalists entering... More

Somalia? Sri Lanka? “Good Luck” Finding Coverage

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 19, 2009 at 12:19 PM

"Two recent situations show us exactly what the world will be like when there are no regular foreign correspondents left,"... More

The Psychology of Collections

NYT Magazine humanizes credit card companies instead of consumers

By Katia Bachko   May 19, 2009 at 11:00 AM

Reporting on how credit card companies are coping as the number of customers in default grows, The New York Times... More

Sick-Out

What do you say when you call?

By Merrill Perlman   May 19, 2009 at 10:54 AM

You’re not feeling well. Maybe it’s the swine flu—or the Mexican flu or H1N1—but you don’t want to take any... More

BlackRock Gets a Bruising from WSJ, NYT

By Ryan Chittum   May 19, 2009 at 09:46 AM

BlackRock gets a double scoop of (deservedly) bad press this morning on page one of The New York Times and... More

The Economy Today: Gambling on Tomorrow

Headlines from Nevada, Mississippi, Texas, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 19, 2009 at 09:46 AM

All the national papers lead with Obama’s tightening of emissions and gas mileage rules. The Times also sees signs that... More

Hints of an Explosive Wall Street Story from FT’s Tett

By Ryan Chittum   May 18, 2009 at 11:05 PM

There's an interesting bit of reporting buried deep in this good Gillian Tett column in the Financial Times last week... More

No Jump for Nomura in the Journal

By Ryan Chittum   May 18, 2009 at 07:55 PM

This Journal story on Nomura Holdings upping its U.S. presence is a bit off. First of all there's the headline:... More

“The Big Story Starting Off The Week…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 03:03 PM

... says Josh Marshall (or was it Maureen Dowd's friend?): Robert Draper's GQ piece. Draper contributes all kinds of memorable... More

Fortune: The TALF Plan Has Wall Street Salivating

By Ryan Chittum   May 18, 2009 at 02:30 PM

The TALF bailout is coming online, and Fortune takes a good look at exactly how it works for the big... More

Because Papier-Mâché Is Always Funny

By Megan Garber   May 18, 2009 at 02:26 PM

The Boston Globe lists eleven sad realities about A World Without Newspapers, courtesy of humor columnist Beth Teitell. These include:... More

Groundhog Play

By Megan Garber   May 18, 2009 at 01:49 PM

Things that will, apparently, never leave us: 1. Cockroaches 2. Styrofoam 3. The simple poetry of children's laughter 4. Columns... More

Framing the News

By Megan Garber   May 18, 2009 at 12:30 PM

The New York Times today launches Lens, a photojournalism blog "presenting the finest and most interesting visual and multimedia reporting... More

Top Secret: Bill Leonard on Classified Documents

An interview with the former head of the Information Security Oversight Office

By Clint Hendler   May 18, 2009 at 12:29 PM

From 2002 to 2007, Bill Leonard served as director of the Information Security Oversight Office, a division of the National... More

Where Will the Money Come From Redux

Maybe not from us, say health care special interests

By Trudy Lieberman   May 18, 2009 at 12:18 PM

The president scored a big one last week when he appeared on national TV with representatives of six big stakeholders... More

Carr on “What’s Going to Happen To” NYT

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 12:10 PM

In a nutshell: the New York Times's David Carr doesn't know. The Times "probably" has "the wherewithal to operate into... More

You Know Your Profession Is Doomed When…

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 12:03 PM

..."just three of the 16 graduating seniors who were on the [Harvard] Crimson executive board in Cambridge, Massachusetts, are seeking... More

Dead Reckoning

Manchester’s flawed, essential chronicle of the JFK assassination

By Thomas Mallon   May 18, 2009 at 11:51 AM

The first printing of William Manchester’s The Death of a President ran to a half million copies and reached stores... More

A “CNN For Harlem”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 10:54 AM

Joseph Hayden explains to the New York Times what helped motivate him to start Still Here Harlem Productions, a news... More

Disappearing Ombuds

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 09:59 AM

Per the Washington Post's ombudsman, Andy Alexander, "at least 14 U.S. news ombudsmen have lost their jobs since the beginning... More

The Economy Today: Gold Coins and Gardening Seeds

News from California, Minnesota, Ohio and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 18, 2009 at 09:53 AM

In national headlines, The Washington Post runs a big story on the cost of being poor, writing, “The poorer you... More

Deposed Trump Looks Very Bad in the Journal

By Ryan Chittum   May 18, 2009 at 09:46 AM

The Wall Street Journal has a hilarious story today using Donald Trump's lawsuit against The New York Times editor Timothy... More

Took The Words Right Out Of…

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 09:42 AM

The New York Times's Maureen Dowd didn't intend to include in her column* yesterday, unattributed, a passage written by TPM's... More

Tucson Citizen: “This Is It”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 18, 2009 at 09:23 AM

The Tucson Citizen's Jennifer Boice writes the 138-year-old paper's (probable) "epitaph:" About 65 talented Citizen staffers are being shot into... More

Heresy on the Right

A handful of new Web sites try to rewire conservative media

By Ben Adler   May 18, 2009 at 08:00 AM

Electoral defeat tends to spawn bouts of ideological tinkering—when the Democrats lost the presidential election in 2004, a clutch of... More

Live and Learn

How the meritocratic assembly line has let us down

By Ross Douthat   May 16, 2009 at 04:15 PM

Lost in the Meritocracy: The Undereducation of an Overachiever | By Walter Kirn | Doubleday | 224 pages, $24.95 How... More

Brief Encounters

Short reviews of books about William Randolph Hearst and the Arkansas Gazette

By James Boylan   May 16, 2009 at 04:05 PM

The Uncrowned King: The Sensational Rise of William Randolph Hearst | By Kenneth Whyte | Counterpoint | 546 pages, $30... More

The News Deficit

Public television’s role in informing Americans

By Michael Schudson & Danielle Haas   May 16, 2009 at 03:55 PM

A Yank, a Brit, a Dane, and a Finn walk into a bar. . . . You’ve heard this one? Well, not the way... More

All Together Now

Journalism’s collaborative future

By The Editors   May 16, 2009 at 08:00 AM

Over the last year, a number of news outlets have done what has traditionally been anathema to journalists: collaborate with... More

Globe Pension-Insurer Story Gets Juicy

By Ryan Chittum   May 15, 2009 at 04:53 PM

Remember that pension insurance fund story I said to watch a couple of months ago—the one broken by The Boston... More

Scribe Chronicles

By Jane Kim   May 15, 2009 at 01:20 PM

Author Frances Dinkelspiel notices a silver lining despite the gloomy fact that the San Francisco Chronicle has laid off dozens... More

Freelance-A-Lot

Defining the terms of employment

By Merrill Perlman   May 15, 2009 at 01:05 PM

What happens to many journalists who are laid off? in many cases, they become “permalancers,” sometimes even for their previous... More

Where Will the Money Come From?

And who will be left out of health reform?

By Trudy Lieberman   May 15, 2009 at 12:45 PM

This week, The Economist zoomed in on an issue that the press has overlooked of late: the details of where... More

WaPo Sees an Incipient Trade War with Canada

By Ryan Chittum   May 15, 2009 at 12:13 PM

The Washington Post reports that the trade-war issue, which flared up briefly after "Buy American" clauses made it into the... More

Bull’s-Eye

Will targeted Web advertising save newspapers?

By Jane Kim   May 15, 2009 at 10:55 AM

In CJR’s March/April issue, David S. Bennahum, who runs the Center for Independent Media, made the case that targeted Web... More

The Economy Today: Running on Wind

News from Sacramento, Baton Rouge, Medicine Bow, and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 15, 2009 at 10:24 AM

National economic headlines include word from The New York Times that Mexican immigration to the States has declined sharply, which... More

The Wrath of Khan

Hell hath no fury like a Trekkie scorned

By Craig Silverman   May 15, 2009 at 10:20 AM

Hell hath no fury like a Trekkie scorned. Or a comic book collector scorned. Or a Star Wars geek scorned.... More

WSJ’s Weak Hedge-Fund Story

By Ryan Chittum   May 15, 2009 at 09:56 AM

This Journal story today is frustrating. Investors in a fund run by hedge-fund impresario James Simons are ticked off that... More

By Its Cover

The Internet and the ever-growing book title

By Sacha Evans   May 15, 2009 at 09:32 AM

Remember when a non-fiction book could get away with a short, ambiguous title? Walter Lippmann’s Public Opinion and Ernie Pyle’s... More

Cad Call

A journalist’s stutter is a curse and a blessing

By Jonathan Rowe   May 15, 2009 at 08:57 AM

A stutter is not something I’d wish upon anyone (though I could be tempted). Mine is blessedly behind me, for... More

Stewart on Obama’s Photo Flop

By Megan Garber   May 15, 2009 at 08:18 AM

Stewart takes on the Obama administration--and Obama himself: The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10cMoral Kombatthedailyshow.comDaily... More

Palate Cleanser

By Megan Garber   May 15, 2009 at 08:02 AM

Frank Bruni, New York Times political reporter turned restaurant critic, leaves the food beat to become a writer-at-large for the... More

Minority Report

A hybrid of national and local census coverage would be the ideal

By Jane Kim   May 15, 2009 at 08:00 AM

The 2008 census results are out! And scanning local headlines, it looks like minority populations are growing at warp speed.... More

The Newt Republic

By Megan Garber   May 15, 2009 at 07:53 AM

So we learn today that Newt Gingrich has officially joined the Has-Been Politician with a Newspaper Column Club, via a... More

The Wintour’s Tale

By Megan Garber   May 15, 2009 at 07:12 AM

Vogue editor Anna Wintour made a rare speaking appearance at the 92nd Street Y in New York City earlier this... More

Trek Tech

Reporters use mega-movie release to explore innovations

By Katherine Bagley   May 14, 2009 at 05:13 PM

I am not a Trekkie, despite my older brothers’ countless attempts to make me one. But the first time I... More

Bloomberg’s Weil Keeps the Goldman Settlement Story Alive

By Ryan Chittum   May 14, 2009 at 05:13 PM

The press mostly stuffed the big news the other day that Goldman Sachs agreed to a $60 million settlement with... More

Dangling Modifiers

When writing about foreclosures, don’t forget their human context

By Katia Bachko   May 14, 2009 at 05:02 PM

As record numbers of foreclosures make headlines around the country, the Obama administration’s plan to help homeowners modify their mortgages... More

So That’s Why the Press Won’t Cover Elizabeth Warren!

NPR badgers oversight panel chair over her legitimacy

By Ryan Chittum   May 14, 2009 at 03:03 PM

A couple of times in the last few months I've taken the press to task for ignoring the Congressional Oversight... More

Darts & Laurels 

Send tips and suggestions to dartsandlaurels@cjr.org

By Katia Bachko   May 14, 2009 at 01:46 PM

Dart to the Deseret News for dereliction of journalistic duty in its coverage of the Mormon Church and the Church’s... More

But We Won’t Do That

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 14, 2009 at 11:04 AM

Newspapers and the AP are patting themselves on the back for passing on interviews with Elizabeth Edwards (who is, in... More

The Economy Today: Three Feet Deeper

News from Portland, Helena, Sioux Falls and more

By Jane Kim   May 14, 2009 at 10:48 AM

Nationally, The Washington Post reports that the $75 billion foreclosure prevention program, Making Home Affordable, has thus far been “implemented... More

How Much Would You Pay to be a HuffPo Intern?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 14, 2009 at 10:10 AM

Just last week, we asked readers: "Given everything that we know about unpaid internships, is this practice fair now? Was... More

WSJ “Hears” Another False Note from Wall Street

By Ryan Chittum   May 14, 2009 at 09:40 AM

The Journal has a solid "Heard on the Street" this morning about how all the TARP carping by banks doesn't... More

Q & A with Martin Reynolds

Oakland Tribune editor talks about The Chauncey Bailey Project

By Jane Kim   May 14, 2009 at 09:30 AM

Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism recently awarded the 2009 Paul Tobenkin Memorial Award for Best Reporting of Racial Bias... More

The Garbage Gauge

The silver lining in the weak retail numbers

By Katia Bachko   May 14, 2009 at 09:00 AM

Customers are still cutting their spending, according to the April retail sales report that sent the financial indexes falling by... More

Power Problem

The business press did everything but take on the institutions that brought down the financial system

By Dean Starkman   May 14, 2009 at 07:00 AM

“The government, the financial industry and the American consumer—if they had only paid attention—would have gotten ample warning about this... More

Kindle Is Just Another Way for Papers to Lose Money

By Ryan Chittum   May 13, 2009 at 06:47 PM

I wrote the other day about why the Kindle—at least in its current incarnation—isn't going to save the newspaper industry.... More

Four More Years?

Photos send Obama looking for a new FOIA exemption

By Clint Hendler   May 13, 2009 at 05:40 PM

In an unexpected policy reversal, the Obama administration today announced it would not release forty-four photos depicting prisoner abuse in... More

Supreme Reporting

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 04:31 PM

A super-illuminating SupremeStakes report from the Washington Post: President Obama told senators at a White House meeting today that he... More

Aspiring Reporters Find Voice at Homeless Shelter

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 03:18 PM

Through the South Florida Chapter of The Society of Professional Journalists, 25 college journalists from five Florida schools recently "took... More

“Good Deeds, and Good Works”

In memoriam: Eden Ross Lipson

By Charles Kaiser   May 13, 2009 at 03:11 PM

Eden Ross Lipson, an author-editor-activist-journalist who had a huge, mostly-unseen impact on American literature and American life, died early yesterday... More

Couric “Annoys” Traveling Press

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 01:21 PM

Katie Couric, with her Flip cam, used her interview skills on some of the other members of the traveling press... More

McChrystal Clear

What will new Afghanistan commander’s confirmation hearings reveal about JSOC?

By Kathy Gilsinan   May 13, 2009 at 01:14 PM

On Monday afternoon, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that Defense Secretary Robert Gates Army General asked the top American commander... More

Milbank’s Readers Help Him “Sketch”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 01:03 PM

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank continues to ask readers to help him write his columns (ledes and other input), even... More

Baucus Watch, Part IX

The senator ejects single-payer advocates—again

By Trudy Lieberman   May 13, 2009 at 12:58 PM

As chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Max Baucus holds the keys to health care reform; any health care... More

But Will the Bankers Go Galt?

By Ryan Chittum   May 13, 2009 at 12:20 PM

The Journal scoops that Obama is formulating a broad plan to regulate pay in the financial industry to make sure... More

Meacham Is “The Ultimate Thinking Person!”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 12:06 PM

Last week, I noted the Newsweek faux-cover/cover-wrap congratulating editor Jon Meacham on his Pulitzer win and dubbing Meacham "The Ultimate... More

The Science of Art…

And other reflections on the fiftieth anniversary of “The Two Cultures”

By Curtis Brainard   May 13, 2009 at 11:38 AM

Last Thursday was the fiftieth anniversary of C.P. Snow’s famous lecture, “The Two Cultures,” which described a divide between scientists... More

Shadows and Light: Dan Metcalfe on Government Transparency

Former Justice official talks about the Bush era and discretionary disclosure

By Clint Hendler   May 13, 2009 at 11:26 AM

Daniel J. Metcalfe served as head of the Justice Department’s Office of Information and Privacy from 1981 to 2007. He... More

Getting Carded

Time magazine blames credit card consumers

By Katia Bachko   May 13, 2009 at 11:07 AM

Credit cards are on the agenda this week for the Senate Banking Committee, which is considering a bill that “would... More

WSJ Rules For Twittering and Other Online Activities…

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 10:45 AM

...include (h/t, LAObserved's Kevin Roderick): Base all comments posted in your role as a Dow Jones employee in the facts,... More

The Economy Today: On Schedule?

Headlines from Maryland, Texas, Arizona, Wisconsin, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 13, 2009 at 10:12 AM

This morning, The New York Times observes that only a small portion of the stimulus funds has actually “reached state... More

Friedman Returns $75K Speaking Fee

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 13, 2009 at 10:12 AM

The LA Times's James Rainey, upon learning that New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman received $75,000 for speaking recently to... More

WSJ: Conflicts at Goldman

By Ryan Chittum   May 13, 2009 at 09:37 AM

The Journal's piece on conflicts of interest at Goldman Sachs's commercial real estate funds is a good look at yet... More

The Other Banks

By Jane Kim   May 12, 2009 at 06:03 PM

The New York Times has an article about community banks dealing with bad reputations because of the bank bailout. And... More

To Report or Repeat?

Finding that press releases hype research does not diminish journalists’ responsibility

By Earle Holland   May 12, 2009 at 04:31 PM

It’s hard to agree with a study last week that claimed academic medical centers hype their research through their press... More

Obama’s “Early Warning Sign”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 12, 2009 at 03:57 PM

Add this, from Vanity Fair's Todd Purdum, to the list of Important Observations Made at Saturday's White House Correspondents Dinner:... More

The Times Overdraws on Community Banks

By Ryan Chittum   May 12, 2009 at 03:55 PM

I wanted to like this New York Times story today on small banks and how they've far outperformed their bigger... More

Will Health Care Providers Really Reduce Spending?

The press exhibits some skepticism—but more is needed

By Trudy Lieberman   May 12, 2009 at 02:49 PM

Yesterday, six protagonists in Washington’s unfolding health care drama sent a letter to the President saying they have “joined together... More

Murder Ballads

Despite new restrictions, bodies still pile up in Ecuadorian tabloid

By Daniel Denvir   May 12, 2009 at 02:14 PM

On a bright Tuesday morning in Guayaquil, photographer Daniella Vacy and reporter Yadira Yesca slid out of a small four... More

Yoo’s on First

Is John Yoo’s columnist status an asset or an insult to democracy?

By The Editors   May 12, 2009 at 01:17 PM

Today brings a firestorm about the Philadelphia Inquirer's signing of John Yoo—the jurist responsible for authoring the Bush administration's just-released... More

David Shuster Finds His Katrina?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 12, 2009 at 01:17 PM

Some cable personalities have their issues. And by that I mean a topic that gets them riled, works them into... More

Brown and the “Brave Blue Cardigan”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 12, 2009 at 12:00 PM

Like http://www.cjr.org/the_kicker/modo_on_the_shiny_slot_machine.php">MoDo before her, Tina Brown does not approve of Elizabeth Edwards's visit with Oprah last week ("the ghastly car... More

Extreme Makeover: NewsHour Edition

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 12, 2009 at 10:39 AM

A team in need of a "livelier look?" Well, Bus driver: Move! That! Bus! because PBS's The NewsHour With Jim... More

NYT Launches Times Wire

By Megan Garber   May 12, 2009 at 10:32 AM

After launching, just yesterday, its Times Reader 2.0--an update of the visually sectionalized version of its online newspaper--The New York... More

The Economy Today: Fares and Fires

Headlines from Arkansas, Delaware, New York City, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 12, 2009 at 10:14 AM

Both USA Today and The Wall Street Journal see signs of how the recession is affecting big businesses. In the... More

Unfortunate Typo of the Day

By Megan Garber   May 12, 2009 at 09:59 AM

Ross Douthat's latest Times column--on the subject of, yes, the culture wars--features a small typo: a missing period in the... More

Goldman Settles Mortgage Probe, But the Press Buries It

By Ryan Chittum   May 12, 2009 at 09:47 AM

Seems to me that the press is underplaying the news that Goldman Sachs agreed to a $60 million settlement with... More

In Which ‘BriTunes’ Enters Our Lives

By Megan Garber   May 12, 2009 at 08:09 AM

At first glance, BriTunes--the online-only music-interview series hosted by NBC News's Brian Williams--seems to be an elaborate, and rather masterful,... More

Kicking the Tires at The New York Times Company

By Ryan Chittum   May 11, 2009 at 04:45 PM

Fortune has some fascinating reporting on the future of The New York Times as a business. It scoops that David... More

Senate Goes XML

A quiet shift is hailed

By Clint Hendler   May 11, 2009 at 04:26 PM

Last week, the Senate took a small but significant step into the twenty-first century when it started providing voting data... More

From the Annals of Irrelevancy

By Katia Bachko   May 11, 2009 at 04:21 PM

Exhibit 05092009, from The New York Times, a Sunday front-page profile of Margaret Chan, the director-general of the World Health... More

StikiQuote

Enough with the misuse of the Jefferson-on-newspapers line

By Megan Garber   May 11, 2009 at 04:00 PM

You know that quote from Thomas Jefferson? The one invoked in so many defense-of-newspapers essays of late--the one in which... More

I Want to Be Alone

Why one transition should disappear

By Merrill Perlman   May 11, 2009 at 03:13 PM

Journalists are pack animals. If someone does a story, others often follow. So it is, too, with words and phrases.... More

What Journalists Can Learn from Frank Luntz

Wisdom from the Republican wordsmith

By Trudy Lieberman   May 11, 2009 at 03:10 PM

Frank Luntz reappeared last week when a tipster slipped Politico a twenty-eight-page document called “The Language of Healthcare 2009” that... More

Kidding?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 02:58 PM

Heard in the halls of CJR: "This has to be self-parody, right?" This Washington Post piece (ok, "essay," by Sally... More

Where Was MSNBC’s Countdown Clock?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 02:02 PM

I thought I could count on MSNBC's on-screen count-down clock. Nine hours, thirty-six minutes and eleven seconds until The Unveiling... More

Suburbs Over Cities

The Wall Street Journal investigates the rural-urban divide

By Katia Bachko   May 11, 2009 at 01:53 PM

As stimulus funds make their way from Washington to state legislatures and beyond, the process and conflicts that arise en... More

NYT “Has Rejected Raising Endowment…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 12:59 PM

...still looking at underwriting content," according to one of many live-tweets from Jennifer 8. Lee from a New York Times... More

NYT Talks Like Montgomery Burns

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 12:19 PM

The New York Times "is a citadel of retrotalk," according to the author of I Love It When You Talk... More

Before (And After) The Main Event

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 11:10 AM

As Megan noted Friday, you can get plenty of Prom News here (headlines like: "Ludacris Looking Forward to His 2nd... More

Spacing Out

By Megan Garber   May 11, 2009 at 10:49 AM

As Liz pointed out earlier this morning, Maureen Dowd's Star Trek-themed Times op-ed this weekend was...a doozy. And while, normally,... More

Dan Baum Twitters About His Ex, The New Yorker

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 10:38 AM

Dan Baum, a staff writer for The New Yorker until he was fired in 2007, is now on a book... More

Dowd’s Other Idea For Saving Newspapers

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 09:44 AM

Maureen Dowd's Solutions For Newspapers range from "why can't Google... just write us a big check for our stories" (... More

Roxana Saberi to be Released

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 11, 2009 at 09:35 AM

Roxana Saberi, the Iranian-American journalist charged with spying for Washington and sentenced in Iran to an eight-year jail term, will... More

The Journal Can’t See Through the Hedges

By Ryan Chittum   May 11, 2009 at 09:25 AM

How do you write about the hedge-fund industry being ticked off at Obama without noting one of the biggest reason... More

The Economy Today: Venturing Capital

News from Portsmouth, Chattanooga, Boise, and more

By Jane Kim   May 11, 2009 at 08:56 AM

National headlines focus on a commitment from groups in the health industry to lower health care costs. By trimming inefficiencies,... More

WSJ’s Bold Plan to Expand Subscription Revenues

By Ryan Chittum   May 11, 2009 at 08:26 AM

Rupert Murdoch of late has been making the boldest noises of anyone in the newspaper industry on the search for... More

Twitter and the Fonz

By Megan Garber   May 10, 2009 at 11:44 PM

In which a celeb-stuffed Twitter jumps the Fail Whale: More

Prom! OMG, Prom!!!!!!

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 05:39 PM

So this is the weekend in which the proud watchdogs of American democracy, the reporters whose broad role was appointed... More

Winners and Sinners

Kaiser on Ifill, Bumiller, Sulzberger, and more

By Charles Kaiser   May 8, 2009 at 05:23 PM

Winners: New York Times economics columnist David Leonhardt and President Barack Obama for a splendidly substantive interview in The New... More

They’ve Got All Their Lives to Live, They’ve Got All Their Love to Give…

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 04:24 PM

The current season of Survivor: American Newspapers has been, put mildly, a doozy. Compared to past seasons, the outback has... More

“I’ve Had Their Flan, and It’s Silkier than a Mermaid’s Hair on Prom Night”

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 03:48 PM

So up until yesterday, the only thing remotely redeeming about the ridiculous teapot-tempest that is SpicyMustardGate was the rare opportunity... More

Another Brick in the (Pay)wall

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 03:43 PM

More from the annals of newspaper pay walls: BBC tech journalist Dave Lee offers up three ideas to make them... More

Capitol Gains

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 02:51 PM

In his seminal future-of-newspapers essay in The New Republic, "Goodbye to the Age of Newspapers (Hello to a New Era... More

Good Vibrations

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 01:41 PM

Good news out of California today: the Center for Investigative Reporting is launching a California-focused reporting initiative. Per a CIR... More

Press Buries the GAO’s Damning Report on the SEC

By Ryan Chittum   May 8, 2009 at 12:43 PM

Speaking of Moe Tkacik: She points out a General Accountability Office report on the SEC that got woefully underplayed in... More

The Wikiback Effect

If you’re a journalist who cribs from Wikipedia, it will get you back

By Craig Silverman   May 8, 2009 at 12:04 PM

At the end of last month, Shane Fitzgerald, a twenty-two-year-old student at University College Dublin in Ireland, performed an experiment... More

Who Will Be at the Table? Part VIII

Baucus evicts single-payer advocates from his hearing

By Trudy Lieberman   May 8, 2009 at 11:56 AM

During the campaign, Barack Obama promised his cheering crowds that, when he rolled up his sleeves to work on health... More

Facebook and Procrastination

Runaway coverage mistakes correlation for causation

By Earle Holland   May 8, 2009 at 10:00 AM

From the start, we knew that the news release we were distributing had a chance for ample news coverage. After... More

The Economy Today: Getting Stimulated

Headlines from Arkansas, Georgia, Arizona, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 8, 2009 at 09:42 AM

National headlines continue analysis of the bank stress tests, which revealed a mixed picture yesterday. Also, the national jobless rate... More

Journal’s Accountability Reporting Gets a Major Scalp

By Ryan Chittum   May 8, 2009 at 09:07 AM

That didn't take long. Stephen Friedman, the New York Fed chairman and Goldman Sachs director shareholder, whose conflicts were exposed... More

Fail Whale, Meet Moby-Dick

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 08:57 AM

So turns out Twitter's "fail whale"--per ReadWriteWeb, a "representation of the community's love for the service and their hope for... More

Low-Hanging Fruit

By Megan Garber   May 8, 2009 at 08:37 AM

The thing kind of satirizes itself, but that doesn't stop Stephen Colbert from having fun with Sean Hannity's "Tree of... More

Above the Fold: The Pentagon Capers

The mainstream media are silent on the Pentagon’s repudiation of its own report

By Charles Kaiser   May 7, 2009 at 06:05 PM

This week the Pentagon took the highly unusual step of withdrawing a report issued by its inspector general one week... More

Center for Public Integrity Puts the Subprime Puzzle Together

By Ryan Chittum   May 7, 2009 at 04:02 PM

The Center for Public Integrity yesterday released a dynamite report on the interconnections between Wall Street and the subprime-mortgage industry.... More

L.A. Youth In Trouble

By Brent Cunningham   May 7, 2009 at 03:13 PM

From the annals of worthy causes: the diminishing fortunes of the Los Angeles Times have hit L.A. Youth, a twenty-one-year-old... More

Murdoch Leads the Charge on Paid Content

By Ryan Chittum   May 7, 2009 at 01:16 PM

Say what you will about Rupert Murdoch (and we have), the guy's a smart businessman. Last week, I reported that... More

Newspaper, Size 4

By Katia Bachko   May 7, 2009 at 12:46 PM

In case lady reporters are still choosing outfits for the upcoming White House Correspondents Dinner, may I recommend this Isaac... More

Hertzberg’s Zeal

New Yorker writer lampoons South, self, in one overly broad stoke

By Lester Feder   May 7, 2009 at 11:00 AM

There are few things less satisfying than beating up on a Self-Satisfied Yankee Elitist who is proud to be a... More

Science Journalism’s Crystal Ball

Whither the expertly reported content of yore?

By Cristine Russell   May 7, 2009 at 10:58 AM

In covering a crisis, it is crucial to quickly separate reliable information from speculation and hype—or, in the case of... More

Memo to Journalists: Move Beyond the Beltway Babble

Men (and women) on the street are foggy about health reform

By Trudy Lieberman   May 7, 2009 at 10:49 AM

At this point in any debate over health reform, journalists inevitably get lost in all the wonk talk, the economic... More

Bingo! Zuckerman’s Solution For Newspapers

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 7, 2009 at 10:12 AM

Granted, New York Magazine got this quote from Mort Zuckerman at Time magazine's Time 100 gala but here we have... More

The Economy Today: Students in the Crosshairs

News from Wyoming, California, Texas, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 7, 2009 at 09:53 AM

The much-hyped and much-leaked bank stress-test results will be released at 5 p.m. today, but already The Washington Post has... More

They Are CNBC

By Ryan Chittum   May 7, 2009 at 09:48 AM

Make sure you don't miss my friend Moe Tkacik's piece on CNBC, hot off the presses in the Columbia Journalism... More

Milbank: “They Came as if To Their Own Funeral”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 7, 2009 at 09:32 AM

...writes the Washington Post's Dana Milbank of fellow reporters who came to observe yesterday's Senate hearing on "The Future of... More

WSJ Compares German and American Safety Nets

By Ryan Chittum   May 7, 2009 at 09:15 AM

I like this Wall Street Journal page-one "leder" looking at the difference in the European and American safety nets and... More

Newsweek’s Wal-Mart Amnesia

The newsweekly forgets about the discount giant’s dubious deeds

By Katia Bachko   May 7, 2009 at 09:00 AM

An all-too-common complaint about Newsweek is that, even though it’s edited by a man who is indisputably The Ultimate Thinking... More

Newspaper Narcissism

Our pursuit of glory led us away from readers

By Walter Pincus   May 7, 2009 at 08:30 AM

American journalism is in trouble, and the problem is not just financial. My profession is in distress because for more... More

Live Blogging “Future of Journalism” Hearing

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 6, 2009 at 03:22 PM

CJR staffers will be live blogging The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation's "Future of Journalism" hearing in the... More

Kindle a Newspaper Life Saver?

By Ryan Chittum   May 6, 2009 at 03:12 PM

Is this the gadget that will save the newspaper? That angle has been, if not dominant, then significant in the... More

Testify

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 6, 2009 at 01:01 PM

This afternoon, The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation's Subcomittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet holds its hearing... More

Bloomberg Squawked, Regulators Balked

By Ryan Chittum   May 6, 2009 at 12:57 PM

Speaking of insider trading of credit-default swaps (you just can't get enough!), Felix Salmon of Reuters digs up a prescient... More

Harrison Redux

The resurrection of a pioneering cultural journalist

By Scott McLemee   May 6, 2009 at 12:42 PM

Book reviewers for newspapers write the first draft of cultural history. Or so we tell ourselves, at times, to lift... More

The Magazinist

Close reading the May 2009 issue of The American Prospect

By Daniel Luzer   May 6, 2009 at 11:58 AM

Every now and then, CJR’s Magazinist delivers an opinionated look at the journals of opinion. The main cover line of... More

The Flu Formerly Known As Swine

Coverage of naming controversy has wasted time

By Katherine Bagley   May 6, 2009 at 11:30 AM

Over the past week, media reports cycled through various names for the 2009 A(H1N1) influenza—swine flu, Mexico flu, North American... More

Hey, New Yorker: “Stop Chasing Skirts and Ambulances”…

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 6, 2009 at 11:24 AM

...and other loving criticisms (and extolments) of favorite print publications from readers of The Morning News. More

MoDo on the “Shiny Slot Machine of Their Mutual Ambition”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 6, 2009 at 10:37 AM

Maureen Dowd seems to have a "thing" about ambition-- in others. Today she writes caustically of the "shiny slot machine... More

The Economy Today: The Summer Season

News from Spokane, Bangor, Gloucester and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 6, 2009 at 09:55 AM

National news looks at the health of banks in anticipation of tomorrow’s stress test results: The New York Times says... More

Credit-Default Swaps: WSJ vs. NYT

By Ryan Chittum   May 6, 2009 at 09:38 AM

Which story about insider trading of credit-default swaps would you rather read? Here's the Journal's C1 lede: The Securities and... More

Ben the Optimist

Papers focus on the sunny side of Fed chairman’s economic-growth statement

By Jane Kim   May 6, 2009 at 09:29 AM

On the heels of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s remarks on the economy to the congressional Joint Economic Committee yesterday,... More

The List

What the business press did (and didn’t do) while the financial crisis was brewing

By Dean Starkman   May 6, 2009 at 08:00 AM

Welcome to the List, a comprehensive catalog of relevant stories produced by major business-news outlets on the lending industry and... More

The Journal After Murdoch

By Ryan Chittum   May 5, 2009 at 05:12 PM

The latest issue of our magazine is out, and the first piece we've put online is Liza Featherstone's look at... More

“Can [WaPo Ombud] Man Up And Step Into [Deborah Howell’s] Shoes?”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 04:30 PM

...asks a Post reader (and apparent Deborah Howell Fan) of Andy Alexander, Howell's successor as the Post's ombudsman, during an... More

Where’s The Beef?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 03:14 PM

President Obama offered to buy burgers today for the journalists covering his spontaneous lunch trip with Vice President Biden to... More

Two Bearded Men

Paul Krugman and Brian Lehrer talk economy at WNYC

By Katia Bachko   May 5, 2009 at 03:12 PM

“TV is a dramatic medium. It doesn’t accommodate nuance. It’s totally about conflict, and if there isn’t any, it has... More

What I Wanna Know: Bevis Longstreth

A former SEC commissioner offers questions

By Bevis Longstreth   May 5, 2009 at 02:58 PM

“What I Wanna Know” is a new series from CJR, in which we invite outside experts to propose questions about... More

Magazine Mayhem

SciAm and ACS cut staff, reposition for the long haul

By Curtis Brainard   May 5, 2009 at 02:40 PM

Last week was yet another turbulent one for science journalism. Scientific American, the United States’s oldest magazine, and the American... More

BizWeek Takes on Confusing Contracts

By Ryan Chittum   May 5, 2009 at 01:53 PM

BusinessWeek uses the administration's plan to crack down on credit-card companies as a jumping-off point to look at how it... More

“Act Like Those Underdog Newspapers of Years Ago…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 01:48 PM

...says Martin Kaiser, editor of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and newly-named president of the American Society of News Editors, in... More

The Eternal Intern-al Debate

Are internships fair? Were they ever?

By The Editors   May 5, 2009 at 01:47 PM

Intern season is here, reminding us of the perennial ethical hazards attached to this rite of journalistic passage. Unpaid internships... More

Meacham’s Quarterly Weekly?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 01:01 PM

Don't these things usually go inside? Behold, the wrap-around, faux-front cover* of the current Newsweek (the new Newsweek, for "thinking... More

Want the Flyover Photos? FOIA ‘Em.

By Clint Hendler   May 5, 2009 at 12:54 PM

This is just plain annoying. CBS Radio’s White House correspondent Mark Knoller, a prolific twitterer, passes on word that the... More

A Summers Story

Stories about Larry Summers often neglect to mention his Wall Street interlude

By Kate Klonick   May 5, 2009 at 11:06 AM

Exactly one month ago, the White House released financial documents on President Obama’s economic advisor, Larry Summers. They revealed, among... More

Today In White House Press Corps “News”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 10:45 AM

Who's bringing whom, so far, to the White House Correspondents Dinner? According to FishbowlDC's count: the Emanuel brothers are divided... More

The Economy Today: Tough Times for Inventors

Economic news from Oregon, North Dakota, Kansas, and elsewhere

By Jane Kim   May 5, 2009 at 10:26 AM

National headlines focused on Obama’s new international tax overhaul, which would raise $210 billion over the next decade by cracking... More

“Five Good Years Left, If That” For Talk Radio?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 5, 2009 at 09:37 AM

Talkers magazine's Michael Harrison talks about the present and future of AM/FM radio with the Boston Globe's Jeff Jacoby. More

Bloomberg Cuts Through the Corporate-Tax Spin

By Ryan Chittum   May 5, 2009 at 09:19 AM

I like Bloomberg's tack on the Obama corporate-taxes story, reporting on real examples of tax avoidance—ones that counter Big Business's... More

Big Hairy Turnoff

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 04:40 PM

The extent of what I learned from today's Washington Post article, "Getting Their (Wireless) Lines Crossed," the latest in the... More

Caution! Merge Ahead

How two words become one

By Merrill Perlman   May 4, 2009 at 03:50 PM

Two-word expressions often cause trouble when they are combined with yet a third word, becoming compound modifiers. Most journalists have... More

John R. Wilke, Longtime Journal Reporter, Dies at 54

Investigated the nexus between business and politics

By Ryan Chittum   May 4, 2009 at 03:45 PM

Longtime Wall Street Journal reporter John R. Wilke died of cancer this weekend and it's a big loss for financial... More

SupremeStakes Begins

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 02:04 PM

With word that Supreme Court Justice David Souter will soon retire, so begins SupremeStakes 2009 (frenzied press speculation of the... More

Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part II

Does an individual mandate work? Depends on who’s talking

By Trudy Lieberman   May 4, 2009 at 02:01 PM

Three years ago, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts enacted a far-reaching health reform law that politicians and the media hailed as... More

WSJ Exposes the New York Fed Chairman

By Ryan Chittum   May 4, 2009 at 01:57 PM

The Journal fronts a scoop that the chairman of the New York Fed not only held Goldman Sachs shares in... More

Transparency Interview: Jameel Jaffer

The ACLU lawyer who helped uncover the detainee memos says there are more documents to come

By Clint Hendler   May 4, 2009 at 01:37 PM

For over five years, a team of lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union has been waging a sprawling battle... More

Wishful Thinking

Times cheerleads White House’s hope for bank stress tests

By Katia Bachko   May 4, 2009 at 12:20 PM

The results of the long-feared bank stress tests will be announced on Thursday, but that’s too long to wait for... More

8 Minutes In Heaven (Or: Left Behind)

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 12:15 PM

From a Saturday night Associated Press report (emphasis mine): The first couple took full advantage of the cool spring night.... More

Southern Exposure

A South Sudan biweekly seeks the light

By Betwa Sharma   May 4, 2009 at 12:09 PM

When Opoka Christopher Amanjur, twenty-four, joined the Juba Post, a biweekly newspaper in South Sudan, as an editor, he went... More

More Grades

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 11:13 AM

Results from last week's "unscientific" TVNewser poll asking readers to grade the White House press corps for its First 100... More

“Print Media Savior” Coming Soon?

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 10:19 AM

Here it comes to save the day? Large-screen Kindle is on its way. Maybe this week, even, reports the New... More

About Newspaper Readers

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 10:02 AM

According to a study by a "psychographic-research company" called Mindset Media, "personality is often a more effective prediction tool for... More

The Economy Today: Local Agencies Suffer

Headlines from Montana, West Virginia, California, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 4, 2009 at 09:39 AM

In national news this morning, The New York Times predicts that the results of the bank stress tests, which are... More

“Journalistic Ambien…”

By Liz Cox Barrett   May 4, 2009 at 09:29 AM

... is Jack Shafer's assessment of Cokie Roberts's regular Monday NPR Morning Edition"analysis" segments. "Roberts doesn't just voice the conventional... More

Chrysler Cramdown in Context

By Ryan Chittum   May 4, 2009 at 09:17 AM

If you read the coverage of the Chrysler bankruptcy a few days ago in The Wall Street Journal and The... More

Bloomberg Pushes Hard on Credit-Raters Story

By Ryan Chittum   May 1, 2009 at 04:32 PM

Bloomberg has done a good job keeping the credit raters in the spotlight, and its latest story shines a harsh... More

Hating on the Hedgies

Going beyond Obama’s rhetoric on Chrysler’s lenders

By Katia Bachko   May 1, 2009 at 04:20 PM

Announcing the historic bankruptcy plan for one of America’s largest automakers, President Obama had harsh words for the hedge funds... More

WSJ’s Free iPhone App: Rupert “Displeased”

By Ryan Chittum   May 1, 2009 at 04:02 PM

I wrote last week that The Wall Street Journal was screwing up by not charging for its swell new iPhone... More

Because it’s Friday

By Clint Hendler   May 1, 2009 at 03:56 PM

Here's a pretty astounding "debate" between Fox Business host Stuart Varney and Robert Frank, an economist who had the temerity... More

Two-Hour Teaser

By Katia Bachko   May 1, 2009 at 12:00 PM

Cable news is infuriating in its tendency to tantalize and tease viewers by hinting at a juicy story right before... More

Compounding the Error

An error isn’t really corrected if readers can’t understand the correction

By Craig Silverman   May 1, 2009 at 11:40 AM

The first thing you need to know is that Tim Hortons is a Canadian coffee chain. More than that, however,... More

NYT Muni-Bond Story Effects Quick Change

By Ryan Chittum   May 1, 2009 at 11:36 AM

The good Times story on small-town Tennessee losing big on derivatives is getting quick results. The state is planning "revolutionary"... More

Phew! Justice drops the AIPAC case

By Clint Hendler   May 1, 2009 at 11:00 AM

No matter what you might think of the policies AIPAC espouses, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Washington Post’s... More

Not a Bad Month

By Clint Hendler   May 1, 2009 at 10:54 AM

As an aside to the Souter news, a big tip of the hat to NPR’s Nina Totenberg for having the... More

The Economy Today: Big Dreams, No Jobs

News from Virginia, Maryland, Nebraska, and elsewhere

By Katia Bachko   May 1, 2009 at 10:22 AM

The big national news is the continuing saga in the Chrysler bankruptcy. But around the country, federal funds play a... More

Ninth Man Out

By Clint Hendler   May 1, 2009 at 10:05 AM

The big news that Supreme Court Justice David Souter will be stepping down from the court puts a big item... More

The Economy Is Much Worse Than the Numbers Say

By Ryan Chittum   May 1, 2009 at 09:15 AM

Barry Ritholtz of The Big Picture said a couple of days ago that the abysmal GDP numbers, down 6.1 percent... More