Just as yesterday's post on some of the newsier items at Scientific American's blog network was nearing completion, including a congratulations to its new boss Curtis Brainard, he replied to my query regarding what's up with his move and how's the site doing?
First off, he is thrilled, is still getting his bearings, and has been in the New York Sci Am office for only a week writing for the site on the fly while getting himself moved from Boston. It is a return trip to NY for him, after having moved to Boston just a year and a half ago. He came to wide prominence in the science writing world writing for the Columbia Journalism Review. He leaves behind there The Observatory site for commentary and news about the science beat. The Observatory now is in the able hands of CJR's assistant editor and science writer Alexis Sobel Fitts. As it happens, her most recent offering at CJR, although not strictly a piece for The Observatory, dovetails in a substantial but uncheerful sort of way with the reason there was an opening for Brainard at Sci Am.
He wants to spend more time there before making expansive, big-picture remarks about Sci Am's network of more than 40 individual science blogs with with more than 60 writers regularly contributing to them. But he did declare – in keeping with his taking this job – that "I believe that science blogs networks such as ours are helping to compensate for [the] decline in science coverage at traditional media outlets and doing wonderful things in terms of science communications in general. In fact, I think blogs provide a broader and deepr exploration of the sciences than has ever really been available to consumers of news and information."
He also notes that, recently, the NSF reported that the internet has passed television as Americans' primary source of information about science and technology. To be sure, his email says, "most of those who use the internet for S&T information said they used online editions of newspapers." But he is sure blogs satisfy a large share of the public's appetite for science news and information too.
Here at ksjtracker I'll try to keep an eye out for pieces from the several journalists who contribute to blogs. including those at Sci Am's network, where many and perhaps most of the posts are from scientists. Fine posts and good reading to be sure but the scientists tend not to write newsy journalism reflecting multiple viewpoints. And we'll check in with Curtis to learn more of how things are going there.
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