Parting Thoughts RSS
Fri, 29 Aug 2008
The AJC's Michelle Hiskey
Leaving a job, leaving a family
By Posted at 08:00 AM Comments (3)
Today, August 29, is my final day at the only full-time job I have ever known: writing for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
I’m forty-five. I started here twenty-two years ago, half my lifetime. It’s an uncommon crossroads—federal labor statistics show that a person sticks with a job for about four years.
Newspaper work, though, means far more than a paycheck,... Read More
Wed, 20 Aug 2008
Parting Thoughts: Chris Ison
A note to editors: talk journalism, and win back the newsroom
By Posted at 11:43 AM Comments (6)
It was one of the first management meetings in my career as an assistant managing editor, and our boss was talking about “aligning our values.” I was resisting drinking the management Kool-Aid, and I peeked around the room to see how the more experienced editors were taking in the message.
They looked pretty serious, so I refrained from the... Read More
Thu, 14 Aug 2008
Parting Thoughts: Clarissa Aljentera
'There's a goodness in newsrooms, in journalists'
By Posted at 12:12 PM Comments (2)
In my idealistic mind, good journalism could save the world. As a high school senior, I believed that journalists were the best storytellers. I still do. We can turn a magnifying glass to governments and schools. We can turn it on our neighbors and ourselves. Our words can sting, and soothe.
And in these difficult economic times it hurts to... Read More
Tue, 5 Aug 2008
Parting Thoughts: Tracy Fox
‘I decided to become a nurse’
By Posted at 02:33 PM Comments (1)
I remember the exact moment it struck me. I was lying on a couch bed in Connecticut Children's Hospital next to my teenage daughter who had pancreatitis, a painful, but treatable inflammation of the pancreas. The intravenous machine steadily dripped pain medication and fluids into her veins. A medical helicopter hovered over Hartford Hospital across the street, where a trauma... Read More
Mon, 4 Aug 2008
Parting Thoughts: Winston Wood
News remains vital, but there’s better money in panhandling
By Posted at 12:22 PM Comments (8)
For several years as an editor at The Wall Street Journal I was invited by my college alumni association to speak about journalism to undergrads at the group's annual Career Night. This involved a panel discussion with three or four others in the field talking about what we did, how we did it and—of primary interest to the audience—how we... Read More
Fri, 1 Aug 2008
Parting Thoughts: Richard Kipling
Experience matters; we’re about to learn just how much
By Posted at 12:03 PM Comments (2)
In September of 1991, in the depths of the Bush-the-Father recession, I penned a piece for CJR. Headlined "A Lost Generation," it bemoaned the loss of young talent graduating from journalism schools with no job prospects. I was a hiring editor at the Los Angeles Times, and only a year or so before the economy tanked I had helped bring... Read More
Thu, 31 Jul 2008
Parting Thoughts: John Flowers
Whither the money men?
By Posted at 11:42 AM Comments (1)
Redefining policy—as one is wont to do when suffering an existential crisis—starts with asking the right questions. An alcoholic, for instance, who asks himself, “Does alcohol have a problem with me?” probably isn't going to get the help he needs. Ditto journalists.
We've been asking ourselves the wrong question about the future of our industry for years now. It's... Read More
Wed, 30 Jul 2008
Parting Thoughts: Rick Vernaci
Newspapers are reliable, and that means something
By Posted at 11:35 AM Comments (3)
I left journalism a dozen years ago, well before The Plague struck.
It had been twenty mostly happy years since the first day I walked into a newspaper office in Texas and was surprised to find that it smelled like ink; that every desk in the small, dark newsroom had an oil can filled with rubber cement; that the... Read More
Tue, 29 Jul 2008
Parting Thoughts: Todd Engdahl
Sorry to be blunt, but get over it
By Posted at 12:04 PM Comments (2)
I thought hard before sitting down to tap this out, because I didn’t want to seem insensitive about changes that have so severely disrupted the careers, finances, and self-esteem of so many.
But, after years of reading Romenesko, countless other blogs, and endless articles on high-minded media Web sites, I’ve heard enough complaining, enough nostalgia for a golden age... Read More
Mon, 28 Jul 2008
Parting Thoughts: John Biemer
‘You only live twice’
By Posted at 11:35 AM Comments (1)
If you had told me a few years ago that I’d be applying to medical school in 2008, I would’ve said you’re nuts.
By then, I had worked as a journalist for a decade. I had interviewed presidential candidates campaigning through Iowa, Kosovar Albanians in a refugee camp in the Balkans, and survivors of a deadly tornado hours after it... Read More
