Part 1: Shakespeare the media entrepreneur

He innovated in a world rife with plagiarism, censorship, death threats, and worse What many people don’t know about Shakespeare the poet and playwright is that he became wealthy in the new media business of his time — public theater. Numerous startup companies built large open-air playhouses in London at the end of the 1500s. […]

Read More »

25 years ago, I discovered the Internet

Before Google and Facebook, high-speed fiber-optic service opened up the world A potentially embarrassing exercise is to read articles you wrote a few months or years ago. Sometimes it’s because you made predictions that were way off base. I was recently browsing through some old columns I wrote when I was publisher of the Baltimore […]

Read More »

What’s new in local, AI, and junk news

How recent articles have affected my thinking about the future of journalism One of my favorite recent articles was a newsletter post by Dick Tofel, former general manager of the investigative news site ProPublica. He asked the question, Time for local newspapers to go all-local? In other words, should local newspapers stop filling their web […]

Read More »

Retiring media legend warns, ‘stay independent’

Spain’s Iñaki Gabilondo sees ‘destructive’ polarization as threat to democracy What better model of Spanish eloquence and journalistic integrity could there be than Iñaki Gabilondo. For decades, he was the host of Spain’s top morning radio program, “Hoy por hoy” (Today). I got to know him by listening to audiocasettes with excerpts of his programs […]

Read More »

What works in fighting disinformation

Like covid-19 campaigns, effective countermeasures build on trusted relationships A study of Russian disinformation campaigns in Central and Eastern Europe reveals some scary data. But it also suggests some effective countermeasures and the role journalists can play in the battle for hearts and minds. The study, Disinformation Resilience in Central and Eastern Europe, reminds us […]

Read More »

Are we exaggerating the power of disinformation?

We journalists assume it’s a problem, but plenty of independent data says no Consider this blog entry a followup to my recent post, Economists ask, Does advertising actually work? The alarm bells started ringing for me when I saw the article in First Draft discrediting a Rolling Stone story that depicted anti-vaxers as pawns of […]

Read More »

Is Facebook really helping spread covid-19?

Experts point to data that supports President Biden’s view “Ask any expert, they will tell you that Facebook is the most dangerous player in the digital world.” When I read this opinion from Frederic Filloux, a digital media expert, I was surprised by its severe tone. But he went on: “The social network’s business model […]

Read More »