Columbia Journalism Review: Boston Globe axes science section. So far, the jobs remain. (and similar from the Columbus Dispatch…)
The demise of the Boston Globe’s science section, and the context of its 25 years of operation and the future of science writing at the Globe, is Cristine Russell‘s topic in a column this week, running on The Observatory feature at the Columbia Journalism Review‘s site. She catches up on the crowd of veterans of the section who attended an Irish wake in its memory last week. The good news is that none of the regular contributors will be laid off (recently and elsewhere in the CJR, was reported that 12,000 US journalists have lost their jobs in the last two years). The Globe won’t have a dedicated news hole for their longer works – but for the time being at least, it says here, they’ll still be covering the news and getting their stories into the main and other sections. (Cris also has a general appreciation for the old fashioned newspaper in another column. She’s not part of the problem. Her household, it says here, subscribes to five newspapers. That’s a load of recycling.)
It’s more than worth saluting the most recent Globe section’s lead story on Monday by Carolyn Y. Johnson. She trekked into a frosty Vermont woods and came back with “Nature gets makeover in forest lab.” It’s a vivid and intimate account of researchers trying to understand the role of forests in the global carbon cycle. It includes a fine, interactive and elaborate on line graphic. One hopes the paper can continue to produce such packages regularly, wherever they land.
Other Science Section News:
More shrinkage. The Columbus Dispatch announced this week layoffs of 45 newsroom employees. Among them is Kevin Mayhood, whose work gained him wide respect among the region’s researchers. “He is a pro and will be missed,” says the section editor, Mark Somerson. “I am still reeling.” The paper’s environment writer, Spencer Hunt, will pick up some of the science beat, and the science section will, after March 10, shift from Tuesdays to Sundays, will shrink from two pages to one, and will have one guest columnist per issue (rather than three) from among local working scientists. Copy, Somerson promises, will be all local. No wire.
So another salute:
Mayhood may well get a few more stories in before his departure next month. Here is his most recent, in this week’s, penultimate section: Mycological missiles: Researchers get small to study how far fungi go to fling their microscopic seed ; It’s a fine stroll through the world of fungal research, pegged to the incredible ways that these mushy vegetations can provide phenomenal acceleration to their spores, launching them into their own, uncertain futures. Sort of like, one thinks, newby science journalists who – bless them – continue to launch themselves wildly into this trade. Mayhood’s piece includes some fine video of mushroom artillery going off. It’s the greatest acceleration in nature, it says here.
-CP
