{"id":1115,"date":"2009-04-18T11:02:25","date_gmt":"2009-04-18T16:02:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/?p=1115"},"modified":"2011-04-18T18:11:27","modified_gmt":"2011-04-18T23:11:27","slug":"newspaper-stat-nsnc-stet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/04\/newspaper-stat-nsnc-stet\/","title":{"rendered":"Newspaper Stat, NSNC Stet"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s been e-talk among the membership about renaming the <a title=\"Home Sweet Home Page\" href=\"http:\/\/www.columnists.com\/ \" target=\"_blank\">National Society of Newspaper Columnists<\/a>. I was for it, liked some of the proposals, but now I&#8217;m agin it. It&#8217;s not that I&#8217;m sore that my suggestion, <em>International House of Toast<\/em> (nod to <a title=\"Theirs was just House of Toast\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bob_and_Ray \" target=\"_blank\">Bob and Ray<\/a>) was ignored.<\/p>\n<p>We would be following the path of a larger, older and more prominent group, the <a title=\"Even canceled its own conference\" href=\"http:\/\/www.asne.org\/index.cfm?id=7320\" target=\"_blank\">American Society of Newspaper Editors<\/a>, that earlier this month voted itself the <a title=\"U.S. News Society Drops 'Newspaper' from Name\" href=\"http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/arts\/media\/story\/2009\/04\/07\/society-news-editors-name-change.html\" target=\"_blank\">American Society of News Editors<\/a>. Never mind that most print journalism outlets dub the chief copy editor the &#8220;news editor,&#8221; the name is otherwise restrictive, because news outlets both offline and on offer more than news content.<\/p>\n<p>Our group &#8212; columnists, former columnists and would-be columnists  &#8212; aren&#8217;t anything but what we are, and that will hold for a few more years. So let&#8217;s stick with the moniker under which it was founded some 32 years ago. The name we pick once the news media upheaval begins to settle will be better than our best guess now.<\/p>\n<p>By a rather elementary fashion, I will show word by word why the National Society of Newspaper Columnists will be apt for a few more years. This is being posted today because it&#8217;s <a title=\"What Is the Story behind National Columnists Day\" href=\"http:\/\/columnists.com\/index.php?ID=48\" target=\"_blank\">National Columnists Day<\/a>, held on the anniversary of the killed-in-action death of one of our heroes, <a title=\"How a portable typewriter is not a laptop\" href=\"http:\/\/www.cabq.gov\/museum\/history\/images\/72ErniePyleNormandy-2table.jpg\" target=\"_blank\">Ernie Pyle<\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Society<\/em>. It could become Organization or Association, as long we&#8217;re cleaning house, but if we change the form of group, it should remain lean and clean. Society is easy on the tongue. Besides, it indicates class. If journalists have any class, and we do, as much as any profession can claim (more fun than lawyers and  slightly better hours than doctors),<!--more--> then columnists in general would have the highest status. Or almost, second to copy editors.<\/li>\n<li><em>Of<\/em>. To the extent we remain an exclusive organization, &#8220;of&#8221; must stay. &#8220;For&#8221; works for the National Organization for Women so men can belong. The NSNC exists to support our sort of writer, not associates, fans or other third parties. On principle, every group should be inclusive, right? Yes, this is a defensive move. If we post the Keep Out sign then we won&#8217;t get our feelings hurt when no one shakes the ladder of our tree house.<\/li>\n<li><em>National<\/em>. For years we have welcomed our few Canadian members.  Two have served on our board. This year a Swede has joined. Like &#8220;national&#8221; groups of America and those of other countries, we have some international components but acknowledge a trace of xenophobia. We are primarily Americans, and our focus remains U.S. media. When we start acting like <a title=\"Also www.internationalpen.org.uk\" href=\"http:\/\/www.pen.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">PEN<\/a>, then we can revisit this.<\/li>\n<li><em>Columnists<\/em>. The form of essay by which we have defined ourselves is concrete. It&#8217;s a column of type, straight down the page. Many of us who still write columns don&#8217;t have a vertical format but two or three columns wide and 3-5 column-inches down, &#8220;modular,&#8221; as page designers call it. Either way, we are measured by the column. All sorts of writing comprise the text portions of the Internet. Bona fide columnists when online are not restricted to text but orate from podcasts and video streams, or series of tweets. The kind of online writing now honored and explored by the NSNC are column-like pieces, written or otherwise recorded by columnist sorts of newsies.<\/li>\n<li><em>Newspaper<\/em>. No other type of journalism defines what columnists did, do and will do. Radio and TV don&#8217;t have columns, but commentaries, and with a few exceptions their journalism ethics and credentials are looser. At least for a few more years, I suspect newspaper Web sites will be called newspaper Web sites. &#8220;Aggregator&#8221; or &#8220;portal&#8221; or another word yet to gain favor likely will not encapsulate what <a title=\"That's THE Washington Post, punk\" href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">washingtonpost.com<\/a> or <a title=\"Look but you can't click unless you've paid for it\" href=\"http:\/\/www2.arkansasonline.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">arkansasonline.com<\/a> do and stand for. Newspapers, print and virtual, are fallable, but no other journalism medium has its ethics, breadth and ambition.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As humans we think and speak (and write and text-message) in metaphors. A newspaper doesn&#8217;t have to be ink on paper to communicate reporting and analysis of news. A literal column, depending on point size, can be 400 to 900 words or so. Anything shorter is a brief, blog or tweet, and those much longer turn into those section-front think pieces, the kind only its editors read. If we drop &#8220;newspaper,&#8221; then we must drop &#8220;columnist,&#8221; and we cease to exist in an implosion of logic rather than wait for market forces and society to tell us which way the winds really will blow.<\/p>\n<p>We are the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.<\/p>\n<p>At least until after the Revolution. Has it started yet?<\/p>\n<p>-30-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s been e-talk among the membership about renaming the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. I was for it, liked some of the proposals, but now I&#8217;m agin it. It&#8217;s not that I&#8217;m sore that my suggestion, International House of Toast (nod to Bob and Ray) was ignored. We would be following the path of a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[29,38],"class_list":["post-1115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-course-of-words","tag-columnist","tag-ernie-pyle"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1794,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2010\/02\/columnist-sympathizer\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":0},"title":"Columnist Sympathizer","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"February 18, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"A nice thing just happened. On Jan. 31, I was elected vice president of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. I've been a card-carrying columnist since 1991, joining during the run of my column Mirthology, in the old Arkansas Democrat. The post is interim, to cover after a resignation, until\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;The Course of Words&quot;","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Card-Carrying Columnist Card","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/NSNC_card-300x180.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2165,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2010\/08\/newspaper-paper-or-plastic\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":1},"title":"Newspaper, Paper or Plastic","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 1, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"My first \"President's Column\" for columnists.com. Thank you for electing me president of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. Didn\u2019t you hear? I have not published a running column since Sept. 16, 2001. Instead I\u2019ve written at www.benpollock.com\/brick for nearly seven years. After the first year, the water warms up.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;The Course of Words&quot;","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6305,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2019\/03\/guy-unangst\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":2},"title":"Lunch. Free? Sure.","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"March 31, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Guy Unangst, early 1998, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newsroom, Little Rock. Photo by Sandra Tyler I have one good story about the recently departed editor Guy Unangst but didn\u2019t know it was a story until a new reporter in around 2004 asked me, \u201cDid you have a fistfight with Guy Unangst in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Life Lessons&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Life Lessons","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/life-lessons\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Guy Unangst, early 1998, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette newsroom, Little Rock. Photo by Sandra Wyman","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Guy-early-1998.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Guy-early-1998.jpeg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Guy-early-1998.jpeg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Guy-early-1998.jpeg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Guy-early-1998.jpeg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2793,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/04\/brakes\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":3},"title":"Brakes","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"April 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"The following is my president\u2019s column for the April 2011 edition of the monthly newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists A huge columnist controversy -- looking to be the worst in years -- began in mid-March, only it turned out to be so puny it ran its course\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;The Course of Words&quot;","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3095,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/09\/the-room-in-the-elephant\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":4},"title":"The Room in the Elephant","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"September 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"This column first was published as the \"President's Message\" in the September 2011 newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. The board of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists has been cleaning up after the party in Detroit. While washing glasses and emptying the trash, we share the usual\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;The Course of Words&quot;","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":55,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2004\/08\/city-editor-ray-hobbs\/","url_meta":{"origin":1115,"position":5},"title":"City editor Ray Hobbs","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 12, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2004 Ben S. Pollock Thursday, Aug. 12, 2004. Colleague Ray Hobbs of Little Rock died Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2004. He wasn't old, just 53, but had hepatitis C. [Link to obit has expired.] Here are two recollections of Ray. 1. In 1982, maybe 1983, I was working at a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News, Spin&quot;","block_context":{"text":"News, Spin","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/news-spin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1115"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1161,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115\/revisions\/1161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}