January/February 1998 | Contents

Features

COVER STORIES/NEWSPAPERS:
Cracking the Church-State Wall
Already, early results are in from the revolution at the Los Angeles Times as publisher Mark Willes speeds ahead to breach barriers between advertising and editorial.
by Charles Rappleye

It's Not Just in L.A.
All over the U.S., papers are overtly melding business strategies and editorial planning, and many well-known editors have come to embrace their marketing role in the "newsroom without walls."
by Doug Underwood

Why Willes Is Wrong
by William Woo

TV & Radio
Can CBS News Come Back?
Dan Rather's Evening News has attracted larger audiences lately but most of the web's other news programs are struggling for ratings. What must news division president Andrew Heyward do to restore the erstwhile Tiffany network's luster?
by Neil Hickey

RESOURCE GUIDE
Mental Health
by Melinda Voss

ETHICS
Gimme! Freebies for Newsfolk in the World of High Tech
Too many reporters on the consumer products beat have their hands in the electronic cookie jar: they accept for review camcorders, computers, etc. - and then simply decline to return them.
<Sidebar> - What Sony Expects from Andy Pargh
by Trudy Lieberman

REPORTING
Hot on the Money Trail
Journalists in Latin America are experiencing an information explosion that's giving them greater access to government documents and sources. And they're using that new freedom to expose corruption, even topple presidents in Brazil and Venezuela.
by Joel Simon

Tell It Long, Take Your Time, Go in Depth
Breaking free from many old restraints of time, space, and money, more and more reporters and editors are creating long-form narratives.
by Steve Weinberg

ON THE JOB
Foreign Affairs, Family Affairs
Fully 44 percent of reporters going abroad these days have journalist spouses - up from only 8 percent before 1970. Some of those spouses compete, some work together. Either way, it reflects a big change in newsroom attitudes about balancing work and family.
by Robin Goldwyn Blumenthal

Departments

PUBLISHER'S NOTE
A (very) informal survey of why readers love or hate the changes in The New York Times
by Joan Konner

LETTERS
DARTS & LAURELS
IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST
LOWER CASE

Aging Viewers: The Best Is Yet to Be
by Lawrence K. Grossman

ESSAY
Message to Mort
by Mike Hoyt

Upfront

Magazines: Out of Money
by Neil Hickey

Freedom of Information: Why the law isn't working
by James Aucoin

Newspapers: Gannett's sellout in paradise
by Mark Hunter

Scene: The Media & Democracy Congress
by Konstantin Richter

Systems: Can hackers break into print?
by Arik Hesseldahl

Access: Locking the press out of prison
by Konstantin Richter

CJR World
Sweden:
A reporter exposes a long-buried, government-run sterilization campaign
by Paul Gallagher

Tunisia:
Government crack-downs are chilling journalists
by Kamel Labidi

Books
The Dark Side of Camelot
by Seymour Hersh
review by Jules Witcover

Excerpts

Back on Track: How to Straighten Out Your Life When It Throws You a Curve, by Deborah Norville

American Nomad: Pop Visions, Restless Politics, and Apocalyptic Memories at the End of the Millenium, by Steve Erickson

Nitty Gritty: A White Editor in Black Journalism, by Ben Burns

The Last Word: The New York Times Book of Obituaries and Farewells, edited by Marvin Siegel

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