Felix Salmon’s piece of writing provides some good food for thought. My first reaction when reading the headline was, ‘Can’t journalists read properly, or is there something more than meets their eye?’ . It turns out, Felix has the ability to witness the biggest problems concerning journalism:
- He believes that what is missing in the journalistic establishment is people who are good at finding and curating great material.
The main focus on Salmon’s speech during The Audit’s breakfast, is that the journalistic entities- newspapers, magazines, websites, have to start putting much more emphasis on reading. The reason why he emphasizes on this was because journalism is becoming much more conversational.
Think about it this way: reading is to writing as listening is to talking — and someone who talks without listening is both a boor and a bore. If you can’t read, I don’t want you in my newsroom. Because you aren’t taking part in the conversation which is all around you.
2. According to Dean Starkman, journalists who no longer work for old-fashioned media cannot be called ‘journalists’ , while Salmon thinks quite the opposite, and here lies the second issue- between old-fashioned and contemporary media.
Both of them produce material worth reading. The difference between ‘now’ and ‘those halcyon days’ is that today we have got more high-grade journalism available to the public than ever before.
3. And last, but not least, it is not about the shortage of journalists, but that of critical readers, who absorb the information, without misinterpreting it.
What makes one person a good journalist is his ability to read between the lines, to engulf fully in a situation until all points of view are considered. Everyone can be a publisher on Twitter or Facebook, but not everyone can create a content worthy of notice.
Kristina's Writing Adventures 