Quotable: Gladwell on the beauty of newspapers
Malcolm Gladwell, staff writer at the New Yorker, has been blogging about the reactions to his controversial Enron piece in the current issue. I especially like his point from this post last Thursday: I think we should also recognize what the Enron case tells us about the value of newspaper journalism. Maybe, in other words, ...
Malcolm Gladwell, staff writer at the New Yorker, has been blogging about the reactions to his controversial Enron piece in the current issue. I especially like his point from this post last Thursday:
I think we should also recognize what the Enron case tells us about the value of newspaper journalism. Maybe, in other words, we have underestimated the value of impartial, professionally-motivated, under-paid and overworked generalists in tackling the kind of information-rich, analysis-dependent "mysteries" that the modern world throws at us.
All of which, of course, points out the irony of what's happening in the newspaper business right now. We are dismantling the institution of newspaper journalism precisely at the moment when it seems to be of greatest social value.
I think we should also recognize what the Enron case tells us about the value of newspaper journalism. Maybe, in other words, we have underestimated the value of impartial, professionally-motivated, under-paid and overworked generalists in tackling the kind of information-rich, analysis-dependent “mysteries” that the modern world throws at us.
All of which, of course, points out the irony of what’s happening in the newspaper business right now. We are dismantling the institution of newspaper journalism precisely at the moment when it seems to be of greatest social value.
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