NYT writer: Blogs complement traditional print
January 11, 2008 · · Comment
Publishing 2.0’s Scott Karp asked New York Times writer and blogger Saul Hansell for his perspective as on the blog format vs. the traditional article format, and about the critical issue of whether new online formats like blogs create more work for journalists:
I’ve always felt that blog was analogous to newsletter-a word that connotes format not content. There are newsletters that are great journalism, some that are commentary, some that are just bulletin boards. Blogger, to me, means no more than newsletter writer. The body of work talks.
We’ve always had many different formats in our pages. We have hard news, features, news analysis, columns in the news pages, columns on the op-ed page. On big stories, these multiple frameworks help give readers a lot of ways to understand what is happening. Blogs offer us exciting variations –speed, user involvement, linking–but they aren’t as much of a break with our past as it may appear.
As for work flow, The Internet makes more work. There is audio, video, links, and most importantly, the 24 hour news cycle. I’ve got it easier in one respect, I am largely full time on Bits. I don’t have a regular beat for the paper, although I do write every now and then where I am interested or needed. Also, we publish the Best of Bits every Monday in the paper.
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