Bill Wasik begins his book, And Then There’s This, with a “plea to future historians.” Well, when the early history of online news is written, a crucial document will be the memo distributed at a Politico staff meeting on July 21, 2008. Written by the news site’s chief White House correspondent, Mike Allen, a veteran [...]

The New York Times reports today: “For the most part, the traditional news outlets lead and the blogs follow, typically by 2.5 hours, according to a new computer analysis of news articles and commentary on the Web during the last three months of the 2008 presidential campaign.” By that measure, I’m past due in responding, [...]

I’m reliably informed that the current issue of Vanity Fair contains a lengthy, engaging, and revealing profile of Sarah Palin, full of unflattering details like an email she wrote to friends and family in the voice of God, signed, “Your Heavenly Father.” But I must confess: I haven’t read the piece. I’ve read about it.
So [...]

Three pages into his new book, Bill Wasik presents the first of several charts illustrating the “telltale spike” of viral culture on the Internet — that is, a dramatic burst of attention around one piece of content followed by interest that doesn’t so much taper as tumble. You know this spike well, even if you’ve [...]

We’re nearing the end of our month-long Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club (which has seeped into March). Here’s my discussion with Jay Hamilton, author of All the News That’s Fit to Sell, about Chapter 8. It’s one of the most interesting chapters in the book, dealing with “journalists as goods.” Among the topics we discuss:
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[For Chapters 7 and 8 of this month's Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, we turn to Tim Windsor. For more info on the Book Club, check here. —Ed.]
While the previous chapter’s data about the early days of online news do not age well, the focus of Chapter 8 — the value of celebrity among television anchors [...]

Here’s the newest part of my interview with Jay Hamilton, author of this month’s Nieman Journalism Lab book club selection, All the News That’s Fit to Sell. Here we’re talking about Chapter 7, which focuses on what we can learn from the economics of online news around 2000. Our topics include:
— How the power-law graph [...]

[For Chapters 7 and 8 of this month's Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, we turn to Tim Windsor. For more info on the Book Club, check here. —Ed.]
Chapter 7 of All the News That’s Fit to Sell, like much of the book that surrounds it, is a moment frozen in time, like Pompeii or [...]

We’re up to Chapter 6 in our video interview with Duke economist James Hamilton. He’s the author of this month’s Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, All the News That’s Fit to Sell. In this chapter, Jay talks about the role prestige and personality play in how media is produced and consumed. Among the topics:
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Here’s the next installment of my interview with James Hamilton, author of this month’s Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, All the News That’s Fit to Sell. Our topic here is Chapter 5, which focuses on, among other things, how market forces influence local TV news. Some of the topics we cover:
— How the format [...]

[For Chapters 5 and 6 of this month's Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, we turn to Lisa Williams of Placeblogger fame. For more info on the Book Club, check here. —Ed.]
Who’s to blame for the scourge of soft news: men, women, or the system?
The list of people, trends, and things responsible for the [...]

Here’s the next installment of my interview with James Hamilton, author of this month’s Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, All the News That’s Fit to Sell. Here we talk about Chapters 3 and 4, which use TV as a jumping-off point to discuss how economic incentives encourage certain kinds of news coverage and discourage [...]

[Here's Martin's review of Chapter 4 of this month's Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection. For more info, check here. —Ed.]
In Chapter 4 of All the News That’s Fit to Sell, James Hamilton tackles information programs on network television ranging from 60 Minutes, Dateline, 20/20 and the nightly news shows all the way down to [...]

[Here's Martin's review of Chapter 3 of this month's Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection. For more info, check here. —Ed.]
James Hamilton begins Chapter 3 of All the News that’s Fit to Sell with a question that frames a long-standing debate within and surrounding the media industry: “Do the media provide people with the information [...]

This is the second portion of my interview with Jay Hamilton, author of this month’s Nieman Journalism Lab Book Club selection, All the News That’s Fit to Sell. We’re talking about Chapter 2, which is where the meat of the book begins. Jay uses the transition from party-affiliated to independent newspapers in the late 19th [...]