The Observatory
Q&A: NewYorker.com editor Nicholas Thompson
On the site’s new science and technology section and blog
By Curtis Brainard Apr 4, 2013 at 04:45 PM
On Tuesday, The New Yorker launched a science and technology page on its website, along with a companion blog called... More
HeLa-cious coverage
Media overlook ethical angles of Henrietta Lacks story
By Curtis Brainard Mar 28, 2013 at 11:00 AM
A New York Times bestseller about the most widely used human cell line in biological research has inspired wide-ranging debates... More
‘The Finkbeiner Test’
Seven rules to avoid gratuitous gender profiles of female scientists
By Curtis Brainard Mar 22, 2013 at 11:00 AM
There's still a gender gap in the sciences, with far fewer women than men in research jobs, and those women... More
Nuclear knowledge
Reams of useful data now flowing from global monitoring system designed to detect weapons tests
By Peter Rickwood Mar 20, 2013 at 11:35 AM
At the height of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear crisis in 2011, whose second anniversary passed on March 11, journalists and... More
All thumbs, none green
Environment coverage is down at the Times, even if it wasn’t supposed to be
By Curtis Brainard Mar 19, 2013 at 06:58 AM
Two weeks ago, I excoriated The New York Times for canceling its Green blog a month after it had dismantled... More
Open government?
Some progress, on paper at least
By Curtis Brainard Mar 15, 2013 at 06:58 AM
Since President Obama came to the White House in 2009, federal regulatory and science agencies have taken measurable steps--on paper,... More
Windmills, tourism, and transparency
Maine blogger’s ongoing conflict-of-interest problems spark concern
By Curtis Brainard Mar 13, 2013 at 04:00 PM
The former executive director of the Sportsman's Alliance of Maine, who's now a fulltime media personality covering travel and outdoors... More
Attack of the climate-denial books
Conservative think tanks fuel publishing boom that spreads misinformation
By Cristine Russell Mar 12, 2013 at 03:00 PM
If you find Red Hot Lies in an airport bookstore or online bookseller, don't expect a juicy account of a... More
Post Newtown, AP adds ‘mental illness’ entry
Guidelines warn against conflating mental illness and violence
By Kira Goldenberg Mar 7, 2013 at 03:22 PM
After Adam Lanza killed 20 children on December 14, a host of subsequent coverage of the Newtown, CT, massacre focused... More
A laurel to WLTX meteorologist Jim Gandy
For tackling climate change science in a red state where politics can polarize it
By Corey Hutchins Mar 7, 2013 at 03:00 PM
COLUMBIA, SC -- Four years ago, an academic climate change researcher and a Washington, DC-area meteorologist were looking to... More
Green drones?
Unmanned aerial vehicles poised to enhance environmental coverage
By Curtis Brainard Mar 6, 2013 at 04:56 PM
As the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) prepares to allow the use of unmanned aerial vehicles for a wide array of... More
Eilperin leaving the green beat
Washington Post reporter joins the paper’s new “Digital Strike Force”
By Curtis Brainard and Cristine Russell Mar 4, 2013 at 07:30 PM
Juliet Eilperin, one of the country's leading environment reporters, is switching beats at The Washington Post, moving to a newly... More
NYT cancels Green blog
No explanation from editors following surprise announcement
By Curtis Brainard Mar 1, 2013 at 07:00 PM
At 5pm on Friday afternoon, The New York Times posted the following announcement: The Times is discontinuing the Green blog,... More
Brain mapping
NYT raises questions about federal project, science press provides answers
By Curtis Brainard Feb 28, 2013 at 03:00 PM
On February 17, The New York Times touched off an anxious debate in the neuroscience community with a front-page article... More
Policing the food police (part 1):
the assault on salt
Covering government efforts to improve the nation’s eating habits is more complicated than it seems
By Sibyl Shalo Wilmont Feb 28, 2013 at 12:11 PM
This is the first installment in an occasional series that will examine media coverage of public initiatives aimed at ending... More
‘See you on the other side’ - Meet Jessica Lum, a terminally ill 25-year-old who chose to spend what little time she had practicing journalism
#Realtalk: This is the best moment to be in journalism - The old stuff isn’t coming back, but that’s okay
Streams of consciousness - Millennials expect a steady diet of quick-hit, social-media-mediated bits and bytes. What does that mean for journalism?
Sticking with the truth - How ‘balanced’ coverage helped sustain the bogus claim that childhood vaccines can cause autism
An ink-stained stretch - Can Aaron Kushner save the Orange County Register—and the newspaper industry?
This is the best moment to be in journalism (25)
The WSJ editorial page hits rock bottom (19)
Public television’s attempts to placate David Koch
One journalist took matters into his own hands when a fellow audience member wouldn’t stop using her smartphone during a theater performance
Purchasing Tumblr is Yahoo’s flashy bet on a shift in social media
The shift from Facebook to more creative social networks
Gay Talese’s outline for ‘Frank Sinatra Has a Cold,’ 1966
Handwritten on a shirt board
CJR's Guide to Online News Startups
Uptown Messenger – Hyperlocal news for a neighborhood in New Orleans
Who Owns What
The Business of Digital Journalism
A report from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
Questions and exercises for journalism students.
