6,329 ‘Credentialed Journalists’ Will Cover Super Bowl XLVIII
In case you needed further proof that the multi-headed hydra we call “the media” still struggles to define its role in a micro-blog world, today brings two very different reports about the state of the journalistic game.
We’ll start with the bad news: Capital New York‘s soon-to-be-paywalled Media Pro newsletter let us know that, per our headline, more than 6,000 people who report for a living will keep us up-to-date on this year’s edition of what Stephen Colbert calls the “Superb Owl“. Some of them maystill be reporting on whether the Big Game will happen at all while the NFL’s media relations team cackles maniacally.
Even CNN, aka “the only TV network that doesn’t have NFL rights to get broadcasting space” on Manhattan’s “Super Bowl Boulevard”, will transform its “Election Express” bus into the “Super Bowl Express”, because no American could possibly suffer from Football Overexposure and replacing one annoying thing with another, slightly less annoying thing is always a good idea.
What he said.
Now for more encouraging news: a 6-year-old magazine called Pacific Standard has scored big traffic numbers over the past month not due to some weird promotional trick, exclusive politico interview or infographic generator but simply thanks to the strength of in-depth, long-form reporting supported by an underlying research foundation a la Poynter and others.
As the Columbia Journalism Review reported yesterday, the mag’s big traffic bump has been driven by research-driven pieces like these two:
- The Next Civil Rights Issue: Why Women Aren’t Welcome on the Internet
- How Did Toast Become the Latest Artisanal Food Craze?
The New Yorker might not respond to your pitch, but wouldn’t it be great to score coverage in a publication like PS?
We’re cautiously optimistic.
By Patrick Coffee
