Category Archives: journalism

It’s all about accountability

June 26, 2011 – 8:31 pm

TweetCompared to Anglo-Saxon journalism standards, French practices are regrettably lax. It doesn’t mean that France doesn’t have remarkable writers, editors or medias; but, too often, their practices are just sloppy. Here, journalists abuse anonymous quotes and are too cozy with their sources. Papers are insufficiently edited, reporters routinely go after a story with a pre-defined [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Comments (12)

Losing value in the “Process”

June 19, 2011 – 7:07 pm

TweetDigital media zealots are confused: they mistake news activity for the health of the news business. Unfortunately, the two are not correlated. What they promote as a new kind of journalism carries almost no economic value. As great as they are from a user standpoint, live blogging / tweeting, crowdsourcing and hosting “experts” blogs bring [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Also posted in online publishing | Tagged , | Comments (29)

Jazz Is not a Byproduct of Rap Music

June 12, 2011 – 7:26 pm

TweetDefining article as a “luxury or a byproduct” as Jeff Jarvis did last month, is like suggesting jazz is secondary to rap music, or saying literature is a Deluxe version of slamming. Reading Jarvis’ Buzz Machine blog is always interesting, often entertaining and more than occasionally grating. His May 28th blog post titled The article [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Tagged , | Comments (21)

Dangerous Blend

May 15, 2011 – 8:50 pm

TweetLast week, the Columbia School of Journalism released “The Story so Far“ (PDF here). For news zealots, this is tantamount to the Vatican publishing a sex manual. Still, this work is one of the best reports ever written on the state of modern journalism. Its authors, Bill Grueskin, Ava Seave and Lucas Graves, detail the [...]

Edited by Jean-Louis Gassée | Comments (13)

Lessons from the Bin Laden coverage

May 8, 2011 – 6:53 pm

TweetOne after the other, the newscycles of momentous events keep reshaping the digital information landscape. The latest example of such alteration is the Bin Laden story, it just set a new reference point. For traditional media, this raises the pressure yet another notch; they must rethink everything: organizations and processes – as well as business [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Also posted in online publishing | Comments (21)

Bob Woodward: how many page views?

April 10, 2011 – 7:12 pm

TweetThe legendary journalist was in Paris last week, promoting (“flogging”) his last book: “Obama’s Wars“. (Large excerpts in the Washington Post here). It was the standard book tour: TV and radio appearances; a well-timed cover story in Le Monde Magazine; same quotes, same anecdotes everywhere. Still, I was curious. After all, he’s one of my [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Tagged | Comments (22)

Bloggers, publishers and the Apple lockdown

February 20, 2011 – 2:56 pm

TweetBloggers like simplicity. They view themselves as computer industry geniuses, as the embodiment of a fantasied future, vectors for all forms of intellectual life, culture, news, entertainment… Bloggers believe in a world where traditional publishing will soon meet a well-deserved death. Last week, this Manichaean worldview reached a paroxysm: many self-proclaimed digital pundits were celebrating [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Also posted in online publishing | Tagged , | Comments (44)

The Traffic Bubble

February 13, 2011 – 7:09 pm

TweetThe new high tech-bubble might not be the one you’re thinking of. Measuring the bubble’s size and inner pressure of is a delicate exercise. For today, we’ll consider two sectors: social networks and online media — such as the Huffington Post acquired last week by AOL for a stunning $315m. In the valuation game, social [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Also posted in online publishing | Tagged | Comments (21)

Le Monde: a blueprint of a turnaround

January 9, 2011 – 6:29 pm

TweetThe iconic French newspaper Le Monde is about to begin a new chapter of its complicated history. Last September, what remains France’s most influential paper changed hands (see previous Monday Note Le Monde’s escape velocity and story in NY Times’ DealBook). Le Monde is now owned by a triumvirate: Xavier Niel, a telecom entrepreneur, provided [...]

Edited by Frédéric Filloux | Also posted in newspapers | Comments (15)

Two situations, two attitudes

October 3, 2010 – 8:00 pm

TweetLe Monde and The Daily Telegraph. Two leading newspapers. Last month, both had parallel experiences when dealing with government leaks. Two delicate situations, two reactions – or, at least, two postures. On September 13th, Le Monde proclaimed it was filing suit against the French government for illegally investigating a leak reaching one of its reporters. [...]

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