A reader's delight


I subscribe to several journalism-related listservs, including a couple that deal almost exclusively with online writing. Frequently, members will recommend articles they've found in their travels on the Web that they think might be useful to the rest of the group.

If I have time, I try to check out the recommendations. One recent piece I made sure to catch was an article by James Fallows in The American Prospect. It kept popping up again and again on my listservs.

The piece -- headlined "Is It Journalism?" -- is indeed worthy of a stop. You'll find it at http://tap.epn.org/prospect.html/archive...

In it, Fallows discusses the good and the bad of online reporting and hails "the free lunch of information" available to Web readers. He also suggest several great places to have lunch.

One is "Arts and Letters Daily" at http://www.cybereditions.com/aldaily/ "This amazing production, created by a professor in New Zealand, is the equivalent of standing in front of a particularly interesting news stand and having X-ray vision," Fallows writes. "It offers the first paragraph or two of magazine and newspaper stories from around the world, with links to the original source. Every visit produces an item that I, at least, hadn't known I'd be interested in."

It is indeed a wonderful site. It might start out as lunch, but it's a feast that could last all day. There are many, many great links here. You could easily lose yourself for hours.

The site, edited by Denis Dutton, guides readers through articles of note in a wide array of online publications, such as Harvard magazine, the Toledo Blade, Forbes and Lingua Franca. You'll find sites from around the world, including--I suspect--many you've never seen before.

The topics are eclectic, to say the least. Dutton describes his site as focusing on "philosophy, aesthetics, literature, language trends, breakthroughs, ideas, criticism, culture, history, music, arts, disputes, gossip.'' It's certainly all of that and more.

In addition to the highlighted articles, the site also offers an impressive collection of links to journals, magazines and book review sites, among other things.

"Arts & Letters Daily" just earned a place of honor in my bookmarks. I'm guessing you'll save the URL too after after you pay a visit.

The copyright of the article A reader's delight in Journalism is owned by Daryl Lease. Permission to republish A reader's delight in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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