Rough Drafts

The collective intelligence poured into inventing new portable games over the past several centuries is equivalent, scientists estimate, to the outpouring of genius from a whole year’s worth of Nobel prize winners. Except instead of curing cancer, we’re making toys for kids who have trouble paying a

I’ll admit it: I got into journalism for the money. Columbia Journalism School dean Nicholas Lemann has said: “I’ve never met a single person in 35 years who went into journalism out of pure economic reason.” He never met me. While my motivation wasn’t purely financial, I’d be lying if I said that w

This is a hell of an obit about a man who must have been a hell of a writer. Not being a sports fan, I hadn’t heard about Bud Shrake until I read this, and now I’m sorry I missed him. I’m pretty sure they aren’t making journalists like this any more. Sally Jenkins – […]

As the publishing industry collapses, it’s becoming clear that both journalists and public relations people need to change the way they work. Amazingly, it’s still possible to find journalists throwing hissy fits about email blasts or blacklisting PR people for showing insufficient deference. This k

If anyone doubted the power and importance of online social networks, the election of Barack Obama should have put that to rest. Much has been made of the Obama campaign’s use of the internet as an organizing, fundraising and marketing tool. The core of that strategy was a social network, MyBarackOb

Imagine that news stories and blog posts could be tied to a geographic area. If lots of news publishers and bloggers did this, you could: Search Google News for stories from a specific neighborhood, like “Hyde Park in Chicago,” or a general region, like “within 50 miles of Three Mile Island.” Find a

While I was on vacation, a feature story I wrote earlier in the month got published on Wired. It’s about the technological progress in CMOS imaging chips, and why the tech is making it possible, for the first time, to record video on a digital single-lens reflex camera. Photographers are really exci

I’m angry enough about the prospect of a stupidly conceived financial industry bailout that I wrote the following letter to my state Representative, Jackie Speier, as well as Senators Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Barack Obama and John McCain. I would have sent a copy to Rep. Barney Frank as well

Today’s debut of the T-Mobile G1 is the first public appearance of an almost fully-baked consumer "Googlephone" — a phone based on Google’s Android operating system. There’s just one problem: There is no Googlephone. And that’s something Google must fix, and fast, if it wants its mobile operating sy

The mobile industry offers enormous opportunity right now for entrepreneurs who can create excellent user experiences. And doing that doesn’t require a degree in rocket science or access to high-end technology. Startups like Jaiku and Twitter have created huge communities of excited, engaged followe

The sun was rising behind the hills over Crystal Springs reservoir this morning at 6:20am, but you couldn’t see it yet. There was just enough light to brighten the overcast sky and to make the threaded wisps of mist rising off the slate-dark water stand out clearly. But the day hadn’t properly begun

This was one of the more absurd assignments I’ve volunteered for recently: I covered a press conference in Palo Alto today where a trio of men claimed to have found a Bigfoot corpse, and produced blurry photos in an effort to substantiate their claim. What’s worse, my own photos of the press confere