You can’t turn around in the U.S. these days without bumping into a cry of “Fake News!” or a news story decrying the same. Not that spin is a modern phenomenon. Throughout human history, propaganda has been a tool … Read more
Alexandra Petri EDITOR’S NOTE: The Mueller Report (capitalized by most news organizations, which is interesting unto itself) was released April 18, 2019 — almost two months ago. Also … Read more
Smart journalists begin their stories with a simple premise: They know nothing. They recognize that their job is to find out everything they can about a subject, piercing their veil of ignorance and easy assumptions through relentless reporting and … Read more
Before humans learned to write, they documented their lives through images with technologies fashioned from materials at hand. To create the renowned galleries of animals — objects of fascination, dreams of conquest — in the Lascaux Cave, painted … Read more
“The Loneliest Polar Bear” wasn’t just a heart-tugging news story. It was a suspenseful, multi-thousand word saga about an abandoned newborn polar bear. It was rationed into five chapters that were published in the print paper and online. It … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: While we did not annotate this project by ProPublica Illinois, we are including it in “Annotation Tuesday” because the story itself, as published, was an innovative example of annotated journalism. Effective reporters prize public records — documents … Read more
Since Tyrone Beason moved to Seattle in the mid 1990s, the city has undergone record-breaking growth and transformation. Gone are the funky old hangs of the 1950s and ’60s, the low-slung brick stores lining the streets, the warrens of … Read more
A story that garners wide acclaim, gets multiple plays across ESPN and draws tweets from Reese Witherspoon is not your everyday deadline fare. For most writers, it will never happen. But Sarah Spain experienced all of that … Read more
Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of Polish journalist and media entrepreneur Zuzanna Ziomecka’s keynote at the 8th edition of The Power of Storytelling conference, held last month in Bucharest, Romania. The conference theme was ‘Rewrite,’ and … Read more
There are known news conventions: something happens and someone writes about it and somebody publishes it and then maybe people talk about it. There are known narrative conventions: a relatable protagonist confronts a complication and, through time and rising … Read more