News Junkies, Take Note

The State Of The American Newspaper is much debated not only among journalists, but also among those who read in its consolidation and metamorphosis the obituary of thorough, balanced, independent reporting and opinion. It's undeniable, of course, that too many good newspapers have died in recent years and that the survivors are evolving into something else, often "converging" to form print-broadcast-web hybrids owned by big national chains. This thoughtful collection of a dozen articles by journalists -- including three Pulitzer Prize winners -- and media pundits is an excellent critical overview of the state of a changing institution. For those of us with ink in our veins, this one's a must.

Are We Being Digital Yet?

Want to find out whether The Dundee Sunday Post or Karlskoga Tidning or The Village Voice is on the web? A good place to start is Editor & Publisher magazine's searchable Online Media Directory. The directory now includes include magazines and other media, as well as newspapers.

My, how things have changed since we first brought the pioneering Electronic Newsstand to your attention! Way back then (February 1996, to be exact), the enews site consisted primarily of links to some 2,000 magazine sites -- not all (or even most) of them full-text editions of the titles in question; many were (and still are) simply electronic lap cards inviting you to subscribe to a print artifact. Now, a few more are hip to netiquette, which counsels that a naked advertisement (one without some sort of value-added service to the wired community built in) is uncool and unneighborly. And enews itself now sports an inviting magazine format. If you're a print magazine addict (like TW3's Off The Rack columnist), you might well consider this magazine megastore something close to nirvana.

To help you sort through the bewildering variety of digitally original mags (and more), look to the folks at Nerd World Media. This index has done a lot of growing up over the last couple of years. It's much bigger, of course (as is the web), but it also has added a variety of nice new wrinkles and updated its interface. 'Zines are categorized not only by subject (some more nebulous than others), but also by country and region. Both magazines delivered over the web and those that appear by subscription in your e-mail box are indexed. A subset of the database focused on book-centered 'zines is co-sponsored by Virtual Ink. Another excellent source for 'zine links and reviews is InfoJump (formerly "eZines: The Ultimate Magazine Database"). The purists among us, who believe that the only real 'zines arrive by e-mail, could do no better than to mouse on over to Todd Kuipers' excellent E-mail-zines List. Whatever route you take to 'zinespace, the one and only rule is this: You points yer browser and takes yer choice.

And for those addicted to fresh and firsthand news of the world unto itself that is the World Wide Web, c|net is indispensable. This site is doing a PGJ (Pretty Good Job) of covering all the stuff that makes the web such a wonderfully entertaining place to waste time and daydream. More news of the electronic frontier comes in smaller, more digestible bites via The Scout Report, a resource with a scholarly bent; in a souped-up, high-bandwidth show vehicle via HotWired, and in a dandy free-for-all of rigorously updated links to news items from all over at NewsLinx Web News.

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