Writing Worth Reading
Writing Worth Reading
They did at first. They thought apps would be a digital enabler of paid content and single-copy sales. Wrong. Apps are fiendishly difficult to make. Horribly expensive. Readers don't like walled gardens. And Apple is the boss
Perhaps not yet, but soon. We'll see a computer win a Pulitzer within five years, says Kristian Hammond of Narrative Science. And he just might know; his algorithms already automate stories for Forbes and others
"Never has there been more journalism produced or consumed, never has it been easier to find or create or curate news items, and yet this moment is being portrayed by self-interested insiders as a tale of decline and despair"
"Producing and tweaking stories on the spot, customized to suit the interests and intellectual habits of just one particular reader, is exactly what automated journalism allows—and why it's worth worrying about"
Study in contrasts: Washington Post and New York Times. Post has been cutting costs, losing prestige, re-establishing profits in home markets. Times has been spending heavily on global ambitions, but without revenues to match
Overview of Economist's writing on China since 1843. Wrong on Boxer rebellion, right on opium trade. Coverage in 19C "hindered greatly by the fact that The Economist relied heavily on the Foreign Office" for information
Helpful update on Amazon's decision to compete with traditional publishers. "On the West Coast people cheerfully call this kind of arrangement coopetition. On the East Coast it’s usually referred to as getting stabbed in the back"
"It is up to us, as a generation, to preserve our cultural history. We must push for reforms in copyright law that allow software to take its rightful place in historical archives without the need to rely upon the work of pirates"
Four bosses in four years; a litany of self-inflicted wounds; criticised for its journalism by both left and right. But still listened to by 27m people. This is NPR, the US enterprise formerly known as National Public Radio
Why do publishers insist on using DRM (anti-piracy software) for e-books? They are missing the gorilla in the room: Amazon. DRM helps Amazon lock in customers to its Kindle. Better to put up with piracy and erode Amazon's monopoly
"Bloomberg the company is not all that well known beyond Wall St; its expansion has managed to be both subtle and seismic, and could fundamentally alter not just the kind of news Americans get but the events in the news themselves"
Salmon explains advertising business to room full of advertising people. Their problem: They don't read Vogue. Penultimate paragraph leads us to think that this is probably the finest address ever given by any speaker on any subject
Photo by Raymond Depardon
Deep under Manhattan lies an archive where things aren't always named as we know them now
