Backstory: Inside the Business of News
by Ken Auletta
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It is said that journalism is a vital public service as well as a business, but more and more it is also said that big media consolidation; noisy, instant opinions on cable and the internet; and political "bias" are making a mockery of such high-minded ideals. In Backstory, Ken Auletta explores why one of America's most important industries is also among its most troubled. He travels from the proud New York Times, the last outpost of old-school family ownership, whose own personnel problems show more make headline news, into the depths of New York City's brutal tabloid wars and out across the country to journalism's new wave, chains like the Chicago Tribune's, where "synergy" is ever more a mantra. He probes the moral ambiguity of "media personalities"--Journalists who become celebrities themselves, padding their incomes by schmoozing with Imus and rounding the lucrative corporate lecture circuit. He reckons with the legacy of journalism's past and the different prospects for its future, from fallen stars of new media such as Inside.com to the rising star of cable news, Roger Ailes's Fox News. The product of more than ten years covering the news media for The New Yorker, Backstory is Journalism 101 by the course's master teacher. show lessTags
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The Amazon reviewer gave mixed opinions of this book. It IS a compilation over a number of years from the author's New Yorker articles on journalism (which continue)and some reviewers believed the material too dated to be valuable. However, after almost a decade the issue of the effect of the Internet on print is not yet resolved. They are varied, good reads, and the last chapter, a take on the relationship of the press and the Bush administration are especially valuable.
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16+ Works 1,766 Members
Bestselling writer, journalist, and media critic Ken Auletta was born on April 23, 1942. He grew up in Brooklyn, New York and earned a B.S. from SUNY Oswego and an M.A. in political science from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. Before 1992, when he began to write the "Annals of Communications" column for show more The New Yorker, Auletta trained Peace Corps volunteers, served as Special Assistant to the U.S. Under Secretary of Commerce, participated in Robert F. Kennedy's 1968 presidential campaign, was Executive Editor of the Manhattan Tribune, and worked as the chief political correspondent for the New York Post. He also was a columnist for the Village Voice and contributing editor of New York Magazine, began writing for The New Yorker in 1977, and wrote extensively for the New York Daily News. Auletta has appeared on numerous television programs and written several books, including Three Blind Mice: How the TV Networks Lost Their Way; Greed and Glory On Wall Street: The Fall of The House of Lehman; World War 3.0: Microsoft and Its Enemies; Media Man: Ted Turner's Improbable Empire; and Googled: The End of the World As We Know It. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Classifications
- Genres
- Nonfiction, General Nonfiction, Business, History
- DDC/MDS
- 071.3 — Computer science, information & general works News media, journalism & publishing Journalism and newspapers in North America United States
- LCC
- PN4867 .A94 — Language and Literature Literature (General) Literature (General) Journalism. The periodical press, etc. By region or country
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 164
- Popularity
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- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.70)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 3
- ASINs
- 3
