The Observatory

Limbaugh Suggests NYT’s Revkin Should “Kill Himself”

By Curtis Brainard   Oct 20, 2009 at 05:28 PM

There’s commentary and then there’s hateful insanity, and nobody is blurring the line between the two better than Rush Limbaugh.... More

Notebooks Aside…

Science writers grapple with digital media at annual meeting

By Robin Lloyd and Cristine Russell   Oct 20, 2009 at 10:24 AM

When American science writers donned their cowboy boots to travel to the University of Texas in Austin for their annual... More

Columbia Suspends Environmental Journalism Program

Falling employment, rising education costs to blame

By Curtis Brainard   Oct 19, 2009 at 02:36 PM

For the first time since it was created fourteen years ago, Columbia University’s highly regarded dual-degree graduate program in environmental... More

Sanjay Gupta on Cheating Death

By Clint Hendler   Oct 16, 2009 at 01:45 PM

We’ve poked a bit of fun at CNN’s Sanjay Gupta in the past. See this Blair Witch like visit to... More

An (Oil) Peak Too High

Energy crisis too big, too complex for media to handle on its own, experts say

By Tiffany Plate   Oct 14, 2009 at 12:50 PM

DENVER—Protestors in giant chicken suits lingered outside the 2009 International Peak Oil Conference here on Monday. Their personas were meant... More

SEJ Accused of Protecting Gore

Filmmaker’s criticism is self-serving and wrong, however

By Curtis Brainard   Oct 12, 2009 at 11:39 AM

An independent filmmaker accused the Society of Environmental Journalists of “protecting” Al Gore on Friday after the filmmaker’s mic was... More

Synthetic Biology Still Not a Story

Americans know little about the emerging field, poll finds

By Curtis Brainard   Oct 6, 2009 at 02:15 PM

According to a recent poll, Americans know very little about synthetic biology, which seeks to genetically engineer new forms of... More

Grantham Prize Seminar To Honor Air Pollution Series

By Curtis Brainard   Oct 2, 2009 at 12:28 PM

Anybody in or around Washington, D.C. on Monday should check out the fourth annual Grantham Prize Seminar on the State... More

Green Rankings a Means, Not an End For Journalists

By Curtis Brainard   Sep 28, 2009 at 04:24 PM

Are you invested in a dirty company? If you work for the state of New York and plan to draw... More

Are Americans Wild Enough?

Ken Burns’s documentary and the debate over how much nature we need

By Curtis Brainard   Sep 25, 2009 at 06:20 PM

On Sunday evening PBS will air Ken Burns’s much anticipated documentary, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. News outlets and... More

Sidebar: The New Energy Beat

Our Web-only list of the energy sites journalists need to know

By Curtis Brainard and Cristine Russell   Sep 24, 2009 at 12:00 AM

Energy Journalism All Green To Me: An eclectic energy and environment Web site from The News Journal in Wilmington,... More

Newsweek Ranks 500 Greenest Companies…

But shills for Big Oil in the process

By Curtis Brainard   Sep 22, 2009 at 06:45 PM

The press’s latest attempt to quantify and categorize the environmental track records of myriad businesses attempting burnish their eco-credentials is... More

MinnPost.com Launches “Science Agenda”

Newcomer outlet picks up the slack left by MSM

By Curtis Brainard   Sep 18, 2009 at 04:43 PM

On Thursday, I wrote about a group of thirty-five research universities that have launched a “newswire” called Futurity.org to showcase... More

Is Futurity the Future?

Citing a lack of science coverage, universities launch their own “newswire”

By Curtis Brainard   Sep 17, 2009 at 04:52 PM

Citing the decline of science coverage in the mainstream news media, thirty-five of the country’s top universities have banded together... More

Science Needs a Storyline

The question is not if, but how scientists should frame their research

By Matt Nisbet, Dominique Brossard, Dietram Scheufele   Sep 16, 2009 at 11:22 AM

Journalists choose an angle for every story they write. Should scientists do the same when explaining the import of their... More