People are still talking about last week's American Society of Newspaper Editors convention in Seattle. This includes an eye-of-the-beholder split about whether the overall effect was upbeat or a bummer. My sense is that it depends on which convention you're talking about -- the proceedings on the floor, which were optimistic and forward-looking, or the conversations in the hall, where complaint and anxiety were more likely to be aired out.In my bailiwick -- empirical research on the industry -- there was some modestly good news. The annual census of professional newsroom jobs showed a loss of about 600 in 2005, not the 1,200-plus that I and other watchers of this annual indicator had predicted. That 600 is roughly equal to the announced job cuts of 2005, mostly at large metro papers. The number also suggested that smaller papers did much better, that many papers held their staffs even and that there may have been unannounced pockets of modest growth. ASNE also took a shot at measuring employment at 11 free-distribution dailies and estimated more than 1,000 professional jobs in that sector. It also remains unclear whether the census includes the growing number of editorial jobs in separate online divisions of newspapers. Add it up and, with the prominent exception of metro papers like those in Philadelphia and San Jose, it appears that the industry may be redistributing, rather than shrinking the news workforce.Besides adding marquee value, Bill Gates of Microsoft and Howard Schultz of Starbucks had worthwhile things to say at the convention. Techies told me there was less news than met the eye in Gates' demonstration of a soon-to-be-released newspaper-reading product, enabling easier, better-organized reading onscreen (and offline, should you wish). Still, I was taken aback when both Gates and his New York Times collaborators said that the current state of Web design (where so many papers are focusing hard-charging growth efforts) is no great shakes. It was another reminder of the moving-target nature of online content and display. Today's best may look quaint within a few years.As for Schultz, he claimed to know nothing in particular about newspapers, but his opening anecdote about how good brands can be "fractured" made me wonder. He reached into a manila envelope and produced a box of Raisinets he said he had purchased on a recent trip to the movies with his daughter. It looked like a good-sized box of candy and even came with a cellophane window through which you could glimpse the product. But once he opened the package, he found the Raisinets themselves wrapped in a second cellophane bag -- a lot smaller than the dimensions of the box. Hmmmm -- looks like a real newspaper, but once you dig in, there is not much there -- sound like any of the products of our industry?
A prayer for DarfurWASHINGTON -- Ten years ago, Apajok Deng was in a refugee camp in Kenya after fleeing civil war-ravaged Sudan in eastern Africa. Yesterday, she stood in front of the U.S. Capitol, surrounded by tens of thousands of demonstrators calling for the international community to help her native country."I'm really grateful" for the large crowd, said Deng, 21, who relocated to Richmond about five years ago when a Catholic organization sponsored her move to the U.S. "If something changes, that would be good. We need to save lives."
Boycott's Economic Impact Evident, Mixed Far from the boisterous streets where hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants and their supporters marched Monday, many of the restaurants, factories and construction sites they boycotted stood silent.Kitchens that normally serve food were empty. Meat-processing plants came to a halt. Fields were barren of workers. Truckers avoided the nation's largest shipping port, and tens of thousands of students skipped school.Despite divisions over whether "A Day Without an Immigrant" sent the right message to lawmakers mulling reforms to federal law, the impact of the economic boycott was evident, though hardly uniform, at workplaces nationwide.
Four persons were killed and at least 11 others shot as National Guardsmen fired into a group of rock-throwing protesters at Kent State University today. Three of the dead were tentatively identified as William Schneider, Jeffrey Miller, and Allison Krause. The fourth was an unidentified girl. ......Gunshots rang out about 12:30 p.m., half an hour after Guardsmen fired tear gas into a crowd of 500 on the Commons behind the university administration offices. Demonstrators hurled rocks and tear gas grenades back as they scattered ... an eyewitness to the shooting, said the gunshots were fired after one student hurled a rock as Guardsmen were turning away after clearing the Commons. 'One section of the Guard turned around and fired and then all the Guardsmen turned and fired,' he said. According to the witness, some of the Guardsmen were firing in the air while others were firing straight ahead.
On Thursdays, we ask Poynter faculty and staff for their impressions of the week's news. By Friday morning, their musings can be found here.
The industry conventions this week -- The Radio-Television News Directors Association and the National Association of Broadcasters in Las Vegas and the American Society of Newspaper Editors in Seattle -- offered journalists something that's been hard to find, even on the industry's home turf: optimism.
Rocked as the media has been of late by self-inflicted scandal, a fickle and hyper-critical audience, destabilizing technological shifts and the dire, near-daily predictions of mainstream journalism's demise, it's been invigorating to spend a week watching the industry rise from its knees.
When NAB's new president, David Rehr, took the podium on Monday morning, his bold rallying cry, urging broadcasters to "go on the offensive" seemed to catch the crowd by surprise. They applauded his five-point plan but it was his chutzpa that energized the audience. Two days later, outgoing ASNE president Rick Rodriguez, who made "Watchdog Journalism" the buzz phrase of his presidency, called for newspapers to "step forward to lead as never before."
Where recent conventions have been overrun with panels that picked at the sores of the year's misdeeds or explored ways of fending off the Internet juggernaut and wooing an audience back to appointment viewing and the morning paper, this year's offerings included sessions like ASNE's "Embracing the Web: Doing better journalism in the 21st century," and RTNDA's "Citizen Journalism: Embracing the New Power of Your Audience."
Book-ending the week were profiles in vital, courageous journalism emerging from coverage of New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast when Hurricane Katrina struck. RTNDA's convention opened with the stories of reporters, news directors, network and chain leaders, and a helicopter pilot who all recognized that everything from competition to the bottom line had to go out the window when public need met journalistic purpose. The National Association of Minority Media Executives recognized print and broadcast journalists for their courage in covering the carnage of war and nature. ASNE’s last panel would be about Katrina.
We've spent a great deal of time and energy in recent months and years bemoaning our shrinking circulation numbers and ratings shares, worrying about how the blogosphere is dissing the so-called legacy media and joining sometimes giddily in the indiscriminate bashing and degrading of journalism when things have gone wrong. So it was heartening this week to be somewhere where people spoke for a change about staring down the economic and technological challenges, embracing new modes of delivering news, and fighting to protect journalism's democratic birthright.
By Scott LibinLeadership & Management Faculty
If you think kids are doing the darnedest things with iPods these days, you should see what some of their college professors are doing. I moderated an educators' breakfast session on podcasting at this week's RTNDA@NAB convention. I began packing an iPod myself just within the last couple of months, prompted by the opportunity to lead this week's session. That made me not only the least knowledgeable person on the podium, but probably in the room. The panel was a rich mix of academics and professionals, offering insight on podcasting's potential, its limitations -- at least so far -- and the differences in the way newsrooms and classrooms are using the new medium. Here are a few highlights:Professor Sasha Norkin of Boston University pointed out that, despite the iPod-inspired name, podcasting consumption occurs these days mostly at desktop and laptop computers, rather than with MP3 players. The ratio, Norkin said, stands about 80-20, computer to iPod. Marcus Riley, managing editor of nbc5.com at WMAQ-TV in Chicago, said his station was one of the first in the country to podcast on a regular basis, beginning a year ago. Riley said nbc5.com's podcast content is all original and designed to supplement WMAQ's on-air product, rather than to repurpose that product. (Conversely, some stations represented in the room, including KCRW-FM in Santa Monica, California, podcast only broadcast material.)Riley said he first heard about podcasting in a report on National Public Radio. That's encouraging, said Jay Brodsky, director of digital media at NPR Online, because NPR didn't begin podcasting for another six months after airing that report. Brodsky said in the six months since then, listeners have downloaded 25-million podcasts. Larry Gillick, assistant professor at American University in Washington, D.C., is responsible for at least a few of those 25 million. He told the room how much he enjoyed the public radio programs "On the Media" and "The Business," and how he heard each of them only a couple of times a year when he happened to be in his car at the time they were on the air. "As much as I enjoy the programs," Gillick said, "I am not going to schedule my life around them." However, since the two shows became available as podcasts, he says he hasn't missed a week. Gillick and Al Stavitsky, professor and associate dean at the University of Oregon, use podcasting to complement their classroom lectures and as an outlet for their students' work. Stavitsky said he has had strong student response to his weekly "Alpod" -- a podcast he produces himself and assigns as homework for his classes. Shortly after assigning his first "Alpod," Stavitsky says a student who found the production values lacking provided him with an original music mix for the open of each week's podcast, with a music bed to run under the professor's verbal content. Stavitsky buries bonus information in each week's "Alpod," such as questions he will include on the class's next test.
Yet another ethical implosion from the world of book publishing surfaced this week: the case of Kaavya Viswanathan, a 19-year-old Harvard undergraduate who snared a $500,000 two-book contract, as well as a DreamWorks movie deal.Unfortunately for the author, a reporter for Harvard's student daily, The Harvard Crimson, exposed a case of serial plagiarism. The young literary hotshot -- who was gloried in puff-piece profiles by mainstream media -- is now at the center of a dispute between rival publishers and reams of negative publicity. Sadly, she seems to suffer the same self-delusion of James Frey, the fabricating memoirist whose "Million Little Pieces" shattered on the "Oprah" show. Her only crime, she says, is "inadvertent" and "unconscious borrowing." The only positive news to come out of this story so far: an impressive piece of enterprise reporting by Crimson reporter David Zhou, who provided side-by-side comparisons, revealing Viswanathan's blatant word theft from author Megan McCafferty.
Are Yankees courting their own curse?The house that Babe Ruth built by hitting balls out of the park now has a date with the wrecking ball, and demolition plans have set off a backlash that has little to do with the loss of parkland or increased traffic, and everything to do with nostalgia.Having cleared all but a few financial and legal hurdles, the Yankees are planning to build a new stadium across the street from their 83-year-old home. The structure should be finished for the 2009 season, and the most tangible symbol of four generations of Yankees fans will be eradicated soon afterward."If there are baseball gods the Yankees will be punished for this," said Jim Bouton, a Yankees pitcher from 1962 to 1968. "The curse of Babe Ruth is going to come visiting on them, saying, 'You've paved over my hallowed ground for a few bucks.' "
Series of Mishaps Defeated Rescue in IranRuined aircraft and the charred bodies of eight servicemen smoldered in a remote Persian desert yesterday, sad symbols of a new American humiliation in Iran. A bold operation to rescue the 53 hostages in Tehran had ended in disaster 12 hours after it was launched with the highest hopes of success. The survivors of the clandestine American military force escaped from the desert at dawn, leaving dead comrades and equipment behind. They had been defeated, not by the Iranians, but by the mechanical failure of their own aircraft.
Flowers and tears mark Chernobyl anniversaryCHERNOBYL, Ukraine (Reuters) -- Mourners laid red carnations -- symbols of grief -- in the shadow of the ruined Chernobyl power station on Wednesday as they marked the 20th anniversary of the world's worst nuclear accident. Hundreds filed past a memorial wall engraved with the names of the local fire crew. They were among the first to perish when Chernobyl's reactor No. 4 blew up on April 26, 1986, spewing radioactive dust across Europe. One old woman in a headscarf made the sign of the cross as she stooped to lay a single carnation at the foot of the wall. Ukraine's President Victor Yushchenko said it was time to start healing the scars left by the disaster.
Buyer Steps Up for Mercury NewsMediaNews' agreement Wednesday to acquire the Mercury News, Contra Costa Times and two other Knight Ridder newspapers in a $1 billion deal would transform the Bay Area media landscape.Whether that is ultimately good or bad for journalistic competition in the region is being debated by everyone from readers and reporters to advertisers and competitors.Denver-based MediaNews is acquiring the papers, including the Monterey County Herald and St. Paul Pioneer Press in Minnesota, from McClatchy. The Sacramento company decided to sell 12 Knight Ridder newspapers after agreeing March 13 to purchase Knight Ridder for $4.5 billion.The details of the MediaNews deal are fairly complex: MediaNews will purchase the Mercury News and Contra Costa Times, and Hearst, which owns the San Francisco Chronicle, will acquire the Monterey County Herald and the St. Paul Pioneer Press. For tax reasons, Hearst has agreed to trade the St. Paul Pioneer Press and Monterey Herald to MediaNews in return for an investment in MediaNews' assets outside the Bay Area.
On Thursdays, we ask Poynter faculty and staff for their impressions of the week's news. By Friday morning, their musings can be found here, at www.poynter.org/thisweek.
To add your own thoughts to the week in review, click the "Add/View Feedback" link at the bottom of a post. To receive "This Week in Media" by e-mail, click here.
By Jim RomeneskoSenior online reporter/ROMENESKO
Pulitzer day always has me thinking about the two winners I've worked with. One, who won for her reporting, ended her career writing cutlines on the photo desk. The other -- also honored for his reporting -- spent a lot of time writing weather stories many years after winning the prize. The award seems to be a career-killer for some.
I took last Friday off to make my annual trip to St. Paul. (I worked at the Pioneer Press from 1996 to 1999.) I saw that a few sites took notice of my absence, including Gawker and Snarksmith. A blog called Pod Rows of Hell had this headline on my vacation day: "Where have you gone, Joe Romanesko?" Joe? RomAnesko? I guess I'll be working on my brand on my next day off.
By Rick EdmondsWriter/researcher
By Scott LibinLeadership & Management faculty member
Conversation continues this week about the use of video news releases by local television stations. The controversy caught one of the country's leading media critics off guard on national TV. The story highlights how marketing material masquerading as news ends up on the air, below the radar of even some industry experts. Last week, the Center for Media and Democracy released a study saying it had caught 77 stations using VNRs and satellite media tours, or SMTs, in newscasts without disclosing their source. Last week, the Center for Media and Democracy released a study saying it had caught 77 stations using VNRs and satellite media tours, or SMTs, in newscasts without disclosing their source. Sunday, on CNN's "Reliable Sources" host Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post spent several minutes interviewing Daniel Price, co-author of the report "Fake TV News, Widespread and Undisclosed," and FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein. "Your local TV reporters wouldn't repeat corporate press releases word-for-word, would they?" Kurtz asked in the "tease" leading into the segment. "These are taped packages that are nothing but PR for corporate clients," Kurtz continued after the commercial break. "But now a media advocacy group has documented how local TV stations across the country are using these tapes without identifying where they came from, passing them off as the station's own work."
What neither Kurtz nor his guests mentioned is that CNN itself is in the VNR business, distributing such materials to the more than 800 affiliates of CNN Newsource, the network's syndicated news service.
"The 'Reliable Sources' segment on Sunday should have included that CNN distributes video news releases to its affiliates through CNN Newsource," CNN spokesperson Laurie Goldberg told me by e-mail. "The omission was noticed immediately prior to airtime, but since the show was taped, that information was unable to be included." Kurtz himself explained it somewhat differently: "It was clearly a misstep on our part. We never shy away from criticizing CNN on 'Reliable Sources.' Had I known of the network's role in distributing these questionable news releases, I would have mentioned it. I should have looked into it more deeply." And Kurtz says he is doing just that, looking into the practice for an update on this Sunday's "Reliable Sources." It will air live, as the program normally does. But Kurtz says the unusual practice of pre-recording is not an adequate explanation of the omission. "We were a little rushed pretaping a show for Easter weekend, but that's no excuse," he said. "I wish we had gotten this info before the broadcast." Kurtz clearly is no fan of VNR use in newscasts without disclosure. "I found the practice so outrageous that I suggested the segment," he told me. Network spokesperson Goldberg says "CNN clearly identifies such material -- which are third-party segments not produced by CNN," so that affiliate stations will not mistake VNRs for news. She acknowledged that the distribution of VNRs generates revenue for CNN, but would not go into detail.
The producers of VNRs do pay us but we do not disclose financials," Goldberg said. "It is fair to say it is not a material impact one way or the other." CNN is not alone among networks in distributing VNRs. The Web site Pathfire, which provides digital distribution systems to CNN-affiliated television stations, lists ABC's news feed system and CBS as customers too. Pathfire's online company profile prominently lists delivery of VNRs as one of the ways its system "delivers unprecedented control for both content providers and stations."
By Sree SreenivasanWeb Tips contributor
To me, a story that didn't get enough coverage this week was the death of Don Fitzpatrick, veteran television talent scout. Long before blogs and wikis and podcasts, Don understood the true power of electronic communications and used it to shed more light on the goings-on in the TV business.His daily take on the world of broadcast news, through "Rumorville" and, later, "Shoptalk," was a must-read for anyone who wanted to know the latest. "Shoptalk" was the first truly influential e-mail newsletter of the media business because it went to everyone's mailbox -- not just to the top brass. Be sure to read the tribute to Don, by Larry Kane and George Case, on the RTNDA site.He also understood the importance of diversity and reaching out to minorities and helping them get into broadcasting. This he did long before it was popular to do so.Back in 1995, Don was kind enough to come and speak to my Columbia students about the TV news business. He was supposed to talk for an hour but stayed for more than two, answering every question -- almost all of them with a small smile.I asked broadcast writing coach Mervin Block about Don's passing, and here's what he wrote: "Don's death is a loss to broadcast professionals, broadcast students, and to me personally. Count me among his admirers -- and mourners."Amen.
By David SheddenLibrary Director
Monday, April 17:
Journalists started clicking their Web browser "refresh" buttons after 3:00 p.m., EST, to find out the winners of the 2006 Pulitzers. Here is an excerpt from a story in the next day's (Biloxi, Miss.) Sun Herald:
Sun Herald Wins Pulitzer GULFPORT, Miss. -- The Sun Herald on Monday received a Pulitzer Prize for public service, and three of the newspaper's editors were listed as finalists for a prize in editorial writing. "Today is your day, Sun Herald family," executive editor Stan Tiner told employees gathered in the newsroom shortly after they erupted in applause at the announcement. "You are truly the best. And to this newsroom I say this: Never have so few worked so hard and so long to tell such a story -- an unending story, as you all know."
Sun Herald Wins Pulitzer GULFPORT, Miss. -- The Sun Herald on Monday received a Pulitzer Prize for public service, and three of the newspaper's editors were listed as finalists for a prize in editorial writing.
"Today is your day, Sun Herald family," executive editor Stan Tiner told employees gathered in the newsroom shortly after they erupted in applause at the announcement. "You are truly the best. And to this newsroom I say this: Never have so few worked so hard and so long to tell such a story -- an unending story, as you all know."
Tiner dedicated the Pulitzer Prize gold medal to the people of South Mississippi. "Finally, this Pulitzer Prize, this gold medal, is dedicated to the people of South Mississippi whose magnificent hearts and spirit moved us every day that we have been privileged to tell the story of their struggle and triumphs," he said. "They will not be defeated, not by Katrina, or anything." Publisher Ricky Mathews told employees: "It's been a hell of a journey, you guys, and this is the ultimate honor." Mathews said the newspaper has been "a reflection of our community: the pain, the joy, the unbelievable agony and everything that comes with that" and added that "Our best journalism is still ahead of us because this Sun Herald is in a community that has never been in the situation that we're in right now. We're in no-man's land."
Tiner dedicated the Pulitzer Prize gold medal to the people of South Mississippi.
"Finally, this Pulitzer Prize, this gold medal, is dedicated to the people of South Mississippi whose magnificent hearts and spirit moved us every day that we have been privileged to tell the story of their struggle and triumphs," he said. "They will not be defeated, not by Katrina, or anything."
Publisher Ricky Mathews told employees: "It's been a hell of a journey, you guys, and this is the ultimate honor." Mathews said the newspaper has been "a reflection of our community: the pain, the joy, the unbelievable agony and everything that comes with that" and added that "Our best journalism is still ahead of us because this Sun Herald is in a community that has never been in the situation that we're in right now. We're in no-man's land."
The following report in The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune announced their Pulitzer awards:
TP wins two Pulitzers, in public service, breaking newsWith reporters and editors in the newsroom of their battered city cheering and crying at the same time, The Times-Picayune won two Pulitzer Prizes on Monday, including a gold medal for meritorious public service, for the newspaper's coverage of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. The newspaper also received a Pulitzer Prize for distinguished reporting of breaking news for Katrina coverage. Both prizes were awarded to the newspaper's staff.
TP wins two Pulitzers, in public service, breaking newsWith reporters and editors in the newsroom of their battered city cheering and crying at the same time, The Times-Picayune won two Pulitzer Prizes on Monday, including a gold medal for meritorious public service, for the newspaper's coverage of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath.
The newspaper also received a Pulitzer Prize for distinguished reporting of breaking news for Katrina coverage. Both prizes were awarded to the newspaper's staff.
In addition to the paper's two awards, Chris Rose was honored as a finalist in the commentary category for his columns about the devastating psychic and emotional toll of the storm on the community. The commentary award was won by Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times. The Times-Picayune newsroom erupted in applause when the awards were announced Monday afternoon. But with much of the New Orleans area still in ruins, and with dozens of staff members among the tens of thousands of residents who lost homes and possessions in the storm, the celebration was more subdued than what normally attends the achievement of journalism's pinnacle. "Our celebration today is tempered by the knowledge that we lost so much -- more than 1,000 people dead and our communities so deeply wounded," editor Jim Amoss told the staff as many quietly wept. "If there is a saving grace here, it's the love that tragedy lays bare -- our love for each other, our love for this newspaper, our love for this community. We must love it back to life, and that's what we celebrate today."
In addition to the paper's two awards, Chris Rose was honored as a finalist in the commentary category for his columns about the devastating psychic and emotional toll of the storm on the community. The commentary award was won by Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times.
The Times-Picayune newsroom erupted in applause when the awards were announced Monday afternoon. But with much of the New Orleans area still in ruins, and with dozens of staff members among the tens of thousands of residents who lost homes and possessions in the storm, the celebration was more subdued than what normally attends the achievement of journalism's pinnacle.
"Our celebration today is tempered by the knowledge that we lost so much -- more than 1,000 people dead and our communities so deeply wounded," editor Jim Amoss told the staff as many quietly wept. "If there is a saving grace here, it's the love that tragedy lays bare -- our love for each other, our love for this newspaper, our love for this community. We must love it back to life, and that's what we celebrate today."
Tuesday, April 18:
The Great Quake: April 18, 1906From Smoke and Ruin, A New City Why is it important to remember the Bay Area's biggest disaster? Because the 1906 earthquake and fire was a terrific story -- a force of nature that shook a famous city without warning, a fire that destroyed the ruins, a story that was both a tragedy and a science lesson, with myths and legends, and even with survivors, living relics of another time.
The Great Quake: April 18, 1906From Smoke and Ruin, A New City
Why is it important to remember the Bay Area's biggest disaster?
Because the 1906 earthquake and fire was a terrific story -- a force of nature that shook a famous city without warning, a fire that destroyed the ruins, a story that was both a tragedy and a science lesson, with myths and legends, and even with survivors, living relics of another time.
Wednesday, April 19:
11 years ago today:
On April 19, 1995, the news media reported that a bomb had exploded at the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The Oklahoma City bombing was an early example of a major news story reported on the Web. Here is how Jim Lehrer, from the PBS "NewsHour", began his report:
There was a bombing at a federal building in downtown Oklahoma City today. Much of the nine-story office building was destroyed. Twenty people have been confirmed dead, including seventeen children. At least 200 people were injured. Scores are missing. The building housed offices of the Social Security Administration, the Secret Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, & Firearms, among other federal agencies. It also contained a day care center. Officials said the bomb detonated in a car outside the building. They said they were looking at the possibility of a terrorist attack. No one has claimed responsibility. President Clinton spoke this afternoon at the White House. (Video of his 1995 report)
There was a bombing at a federal building in downtown Oklahoma City today. Much of the nine-story office building was destroyed. Twenty people have been confirmed dead, including seventeen children. At least 200 people were injured. Scores are missing.
The building housed offices of the Social Security Administration, the Secret Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, & Firearms, among other federal agencies. It also contained a day care center. Officials said the bomb detonated in a car outside the building. They said they were looking at the possibility of a terrorist attack. No one has claimed responsibility. President Clinton spoke this afternoon at the White House.
(Video of his 1995 report)
Thursday, April 20:
Friday, April 21:
Not surprisingly Wall Street just keeps getting unhappier. Share prices, which lost an average of 20 percent of their value in 2005 are still sinking, typically another 6 to 8 percent so far this year. McClatchy has fallen from $60 to just over $45 -- reflecting both an unexpectedly bad first quarter and typical investor skepticism about digesting a big acquisition.
However, I wouldn't convene a pity party for several reasons:
Monday, April 10:This year’s Masters golf tournament came to an end Sunday. Here is an excerpt from a story in The State:
Mickelson swings his way to victoryAUGUSTA -- The last time Phil Mickelson won the Masters title, he reacted with a height-challenged victory leap after his clinching birdie putt on the final hole at Augusta National.
Late Sunday afternoon, after capturing his second green jacket in three years, Mickelson was able to enjoy a considerably more leisurely celebration.
Tuesday, April 11:
Thousands of people marched for immigration rights this week. Here is an excerpt from a story in USA Today:
Immigrants, backers demand citizenship Hundreds of thousands of people demanding U.S. citizenship for illegal immigrants took to the streets in dozens of cities from New York to San Diego on Monday in some of the most widespread demonstrations since the mass protests began around the country last month.
Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators, wearing white shirts and carrying banners reading "We Have A Dream Too" staged rallies Monday in cities across the USA to demand citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants.
"I would love to be a citizen," said Alex Vega, 45, at a rally in Santa Ana, Calif. "I've been in the shadows for a long time."
Wednesday, April 12:
Italy was in the news Wednesday. Media organizations around the world reported on the contested election between Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and his opponent, Romano Prodi.Another Italian story that received a lot of attention was the arrest of Bernardo Provenzano, the head of the Sicilian Mafia, who had escaped capture for 43 years. He was found near the city of Corleone. (You might remember this small town as the birthplace of Don Vito Coreone.) Thursday, April 13:
The news media reported that Flight 93’s cockpit recording was played to jurors in the sentencing trial of Zacarias Moussaoui. Here is an excerpt from a story in Newsday:
31 minutes of terror in the skyALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Thirty-one minutes and 12 seconds of chaotic, bloodcurdling horror.
The raw, evocative sounds of the final half-hour onboard United Flight 93 on Sept. 11, from a stewardess begging for her life to passengers assaulting the cockpit, resonated in federal court here yesterday as prosecutors closed their death-penalty case against Zacarias Moussaoui by playing the plane's voice recorder for the first time publicly.
Friday, April 14: Each weekday, Poynter highlights the front page of a newspaper somewhere in the world. You can view the current ones at Page One Today / April.
Saturday, April 15:61 years ago today:
On April 15, 1945, CBS broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow reported from World War II's Buchenwald concentration camp. He visited Buchenwald shortly after the camp was liberated by Allied troops. Here is an excerpt from his CBS radio news report:
During the last week, I have driven more than a few hundred miles through Germany, most of it in the Third Army sector -- Wiesbaden, Frankfurt, Weimar, Jena and beyond. It is impossible to keep up with this war.
....Permit me to tell you what you would have seen, and heard, had you been with me on Thursday. It will not be pleasant listening.
....I propose to tell you of Buchenwald. It is on a small hill about four miles outside Weimar, and it was one of the largest concentration camps in Germany....As we walked out into the courtyard, a man fell dead. Two others -- they must have been over sixty -- were crawling toward the latrine. I saw it but will not describe it.
In another part of the camp they showed me the children, hundreds of them. Some were only six. One rolled up his sleeve, showed me his number. It was tattooed on his arm. D-6030, it was. The others showed me their numbers; they will carry them till they die.
....Murder had been done at Buchenwald. God alone knows how many men and boys have died there during the last twelve years. Thursday I was told that there were more than 20,000 in the camp. There had been as many as 60,000. Where are they now?
As I left that camp, a Frenchman who used to work for Havas in Paris came up to me and said, 'You will write something about this, perhaps?' And he added, 'To write about this you must have been here at least two years, and after that -- you don't want to write any more.'
I pray you to believe what I have said about Buchenwald. I have reported what I saw and heard, but only part of it. For most of it I have no words. Dead men are plentiful in war, but the living dead, more than twenty thousand of them in one camp.
....If I've offended you by this rather mild account of Buchenwald, I'm not in the least sorry.
Keller stopped well short of answering each and every question on the minds of Times critics and readers (850 questions were submitted), but his accumulated answers represent a significant investment in a new approach to audience. Other editors will get their turns in what Keller termed "the dunk-em seat" in subsequent weeks.
There's plenty of room for improvement, with ample suggestions from bloggers who accompanied their links to the new feature with tips to make it better. Should Times editors decide to pull back the curtain just a bit further, in fact, they could make use of a Technorati tool and invite those bloggers right onto the page.
Where's Romenesko?
Finally this week, you may have noticed that Jim Romenesko took a rare (and well-deserved) day off Friday. Gawker noted his absence here. On Thursday, journalism professor Mindy McAdams charted the impact of Romenesko like this. Jim will be back Monday.
Monday, March 20:
The week began with the news media looking back.
Here is an excerpt from a story in the San Antonio (Texas) Express-News:
Iraq Boils, Three Years Later BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Clashes between U.S. forces and suspected insurgents -- and fresh allegations of American troops killing Iraqi noncombatants -- marked the third anniversary Sunday of the start of the '03 American-led Gulf War II. President Bush marked the anniversary by touting the efforts to build democracy there and avoiding any mention of the daily violence that rages three years after he ordered the invasion.The president didn't utter the word "war."The war began on March 19, [2003], Washington time -- early morning March in Baghdad -- when Bush authorized an early strike by U.S. fighter-bombers and offshore Tomahawk cruise missiles on a Baghdad bunker where Saddam Hussein was reported to be sleeping.
Tuesday, March 21:41 years ago today: On March 21, 1965, the news media reported that Martin Luther King Jr. had begun a civil-rights march in Selma, Alabama. The Washington Star and Haynes Johnson would win a 1966 Pulitzer Prize for distinguished coverage of the civil rights conflict in Selma and particularly the reporting of its aftermath.
Wednesday, March 22:The Tokyo, Japan newspaper, Asahi Shimbun, reported on its country's win over Cuba in the World Baseball Classic final. Here is an excerpt from a story on the paper's English-language Web site:
WORLD CHAMPIONS!World Baseball Classic: Japan 10, Cuba 6 SAN DIEGO -- National honor restored, and then some! After a dismal showing at the recent Turin Winter Olympics, Japan's baseball team did the nation proud Monday, beating Cuba 10-6 in the final of the inaugural World Baseball Classic.
Thursday, March 23:
A big international news story from Spain dealt with the Basque separatist group ETA's declaration of a permanent ceasefire. The Madrid newspaper, El Mundo, has a special section about ETA on its Web site. (You may need to use a language-translation tool.)
Friday, March 24:
Each weekday, Poynter highlights the front page of a newspaper somewhere in the world. You can view the current ones at Page One Today / March.
For the week of March 6-10, 2006:
