Stepping out

As a journalism Masters student I am constantly overwhelmed by the pressure on my colleagues and me to get work experience. Not just any work experience but great work experience on great papers that will then send our blossoming careers off into the media stratosphere. As the next vacation looms ever closer and the top nationals start slamming their doors, the prospect seems all the more bleak. This is therefore perhaps an odd time to start blogging, when the pressure to pick up the phone and fire off another CV seems particularly pressing.
Instead I am musing on the industry about which I hope to enter, an industry which seems so intent on eating it's young. I saw Nick Davies speak about his book Flat Earth News last week but instead of resigning myself to Davies' brand of inevitable doom, his talk made me more optimistic about the future and power of the press.
Now is a hugely exciting time to be a journalist, never have more mediums been available in which to communicate, never has the industry been so competitive and well observed. The fight for the best story in the shortest time may force more ruthless journalists to employ lower ethical standards but I will not be drinking Davies' Kool-Aid just yet.
The media is the modern marketplace and I'm still buying.