Yeah, I think there’s far more opportunity for journalism now then there used to be actually. So many people I work with have J degrees and they are everything from digital content writers to corporate communications and even to interactive marketing. I always thought the degree was restricted when I was in school but evidently it’s one of the broadest out there.

The data I am missing on all this is whether the reduced revenue stream of on-line news is sufficient to maintain the informational instrumentality? So far as I can determine, the major newspapers – New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, …. – have had dismal failure in generating on-line subscriptions. They do obtain advertising revenue but that venue is so broad that rates are quite low. Right now the quality and quantity of news available on-line is largely the product of the stuttering and guttering paper side.

I should also add that back when I was an undergraduate, when television was monochrome and chickens had not yet evolved feathers, something like 0.1 of all coeds (if I may be excused the use of such a gender definitive term) majored in journalism. After education and home economics this made journalism the third largest enrollment in the U. In the process of dating some of these young women I determined, on an anecdotal basis at least, that most had no intention of being journalists, this was just a more respectable major to subscribe to until a husband could be acquired. And of the ones who did want to practice journalism, it was uniformly of the “Nancy Drew in Smallville” bent.

Somehow I cannot conceive of that persisting today.

I like your point about “wouldn’t it be great if people reporting the news knew what the hell they were doing.” You certainly can’t stop progress and I prefer to read my news electronically (damn the papers at the end of the driveway!)but I certainly hope the (though fear) that the standards in news reporting won’t suffer. Perhaps in saying that I’m already too late.
(P.S. fun video)

[...] Do you ever watch something on the news and wonder what everyone will think about it a few decades hence? This news clip from 1981 relates to the journalism degree post. It’s fascinating. And also like watching a train wreck in slow motion. I wonder if all journalists and journalism majors yelled loud enough, they could yell back to 1981 and tell the San Francisco Chronicle employees to please—for the love of our future careers and yours—stop. [...]