With one sentence, The Atlantic Wire changed their editorial direction and, in the last six months, their traffic has exploded. According to digital director, Bob Cohn, this is the secret: "No More Stories That No One Will Read." Simple. Bob Cohn via MediaBistro … [Read more...] about The Atlantic’s One Sentence Traffic Growth Secret
Guidelines for Content Aggregation and Curation
In this week's New York Times, David Carr reports on a new committee to formulate standards for content aggregation. The committee, created by Ad Age columnist Simon Dumenco, has the support of some of the major media websites, but few prominent bloggers. Dumenco decided to form the committee after … [Read more...] about Guidelines for Content Aggregation and Curation
CJR’s Explanation of Why High-Quality Journalism is (Nearly) Doomed
In May's "The Story So Far" (also available as a downloadable pdf), the Columbia School of Journalism's Bill Grueskin, Ava Seave and Lucas Graves all but conclude there is not a sustainable business model to support top-quality journalism at current levels. They see at least three main factors … [Read more...] about CJR’s Explanation of Why High-Quality Journalism is (Nearly) Doomed
How to Write for Gawker
Stumbled across an old but interesting memo from Gawker Media writer Paul Boutin to managing editor Noah Robischon (which was immediately leaked to New York Magazine's Vulture site). Valleywag (a Gawker sister site) then reported on the leak, linking to NYMag and running the piece themselves. Here … [Read more...] about How to Write for Gawker
Bloggers in History: Georges Simenon
Paris, 1927. For 100,000 francs, author Georges Simenon agrees to write a novel while suspended in a glass cage outside the Moulin Rouge. Passersby would contribute subject, characters and title. A newspaper backs the stunt and pays Simenon a 25,000 franc advance. For a moment, it was the talk … [Read more...] about Bloggers in History: Georges Simenon
What I Think I Know About Journalism — Jay Rosen
Veteran journalism professor Jay Rosen on four things he's learned after 25 years of teaching: The more people who participate in the press the stronger it will be. The profession of journalism went awry when it began to adopt the View from Nowhere. The news system will improve when it is made … [Read more...] about What I Think I Know About Journalism — Jay Rosen
“Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want.”
Read This Before Applying to A Creative Writing Program
In a review of Mark McGurl's book "The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing," N+1's Chad Harbach offers a clever, tangential attack on MFA culture. His basic premise is this: there are two distinct literary cultures in America: MFA vs. NYC. And NYC is better. There were 79 … [Read more...] about Read This Before Applying to A Creative Writing Program