Analysis: Our Commentaries and Backgrounders
This section, Commentaries and Backgrounders, contains our more concise research analyses, such as op eds, articles, speeches, and quick reports. These are distinguished from our more detailed empirical research studies. They are listed below in chronological order. Or you can use the menus on the left to filter our entire archive and find exactly what you want.
| | November 1, 2006 | The new numbers for the newspaper industry are out, and they show another disheartening drop of nearly 3% in total average daily circulation. But the picture may be more complicated than the first impression. Not all papers are hurting, and many companies have trimmed questionable circulation. The industry also is boasting that, when online readers are included, overall readership is growing. |
| | October 26, 2006 | | After the media complained about lack of access to previous conflicts, hundreds of embedded journalists lived, traveled and reported right alongside US troops at the outset of the Iraq war. Now, three years later, there are barely two dozen embeds left. |
| | October 25, 2006 | | Baseball's Fall Classic has not been a hit with TV viewers in recent years. In the last 20 years World Series ratings have fallen by more than 50% so that it now only averages one quarter of the audience of the Super Bowl. And through two games, the 2006 Series is the lowest-rated ever. |
| | October 20, 2006 | | It’s a complicated, technical issue, but one that could have a major impact on the flow of online information. While many internet service providers want content providers to foot more of the bill, supporters of net neutrality warn such a system could create an unfair internet hierarchy. It may be up to Washington to play referee. |
| | October 18, 2006 | The media landscape has changed dramatically since Harvard’s Shorenstein Center was established 20 years ago. And when journalists and dignitaries assembled there on Oct. 13-14 to evaluate the current role of journalism in our democracy, there was good news and bad. The bad was that new technologies have created credibility concerns and economic problems for mainstream journalists. The good news may be the emergence of the citizen journalist. |
| | October 16, 2006 | President Bush's second term has brought a big increase in the number of solo press conferences. Bush had only had 17 in his first term but looks like he's on the way to doubling that number in this four-year stint. The president still lags behind previous White House residents, but the change suggests a different approach to the press. |
| | October 12, 2006 | | A media conference featuring a futuristic video and a keynote address from a BBC official sketched out a scenario for news delivery that may be just around the corner. But will the proliferation of citizen journalists and wireless news platforms create its own set of financial and credibility problems for the journalism profession? |
| | October 12, 2006 | | Sandwiched between a declining print industry and an online universe still building economic momentum, newspaper companies are looking at combined Internet and newsprint readership as a new way of measuring audience. A big unanswered question is whether advertisers will agree that this is a more accurate way to count their potential customers. |
| | October 6, 2006 | A new book surveying more than 1,000 journalists finds their politics have drifted a bit to the right since the 1990s, but they still remain more liberal than the general US population. With a majority of the public accusing news outlets of political bias, these numbers aren’t likely to silence that noisy debate. |
| | October 5, 2006 | A newly released book based on four decades of surveys of US journalists finds a profession that is steadily growing grayer, but lagging behind when it comes to integrating women and minorities into the newsroom. This demographic stagnation may well be a reflection of a mainstream media beset by a series of economic woes. |
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