Journalism and the digital revolution

Despite being a former newspaper reporter who has always preferred reading a paper copy of the day's events to an electronic one, I must say that the purchase of my first laptop ($699 w/ zero percent financing for 12 months) is making me a possible convert. Since I graduated from UMass Amherst with a journalism degree in 2000, the field has literally transformed itself.

Journalists now blog live, are expected to be proficient in Internet publishing, and are required to meet deadlines faster than ever. As online audiences grow and print subscribers dwindle, the papers that make it will be the ones that provide the clearest, most timely, most accurate, most accessible online content.

While I do enjoy reading live reporter blogs and articles with clickable hyperlinks, I still enjoy reading the print edition of The Boston Sunday Globe, accompanied by a cup of freshly brewed Dean's Beans coffee.

I write more about this affinity here, in an example of an essay assignment I modeled for my students that was inspired by a Socratic seminar discussion of Steinbeck's The Pearl.