I rate journalist Jack Shafer. He’s smart, he’s bold, he’s plain spoken. He shows you how he reaches his sometimes very tough conclusions.

Here he is on CNN with Howard Kurtz discussing the way news, journalism and media criticism has changed and is changing — under pressure from economics, the explosion of internet media, and with reference to ‘homemade’ (my word) efforts by bloggers etc … some of whom he describes as doing a brilliant job. I agree.

Shafer points to the key ‘truth value’ and ‘accountability’ of news stories — wherever they’re found. Plus, he fills his stories with links — (one of my own bugbears) and references to source documents, where available … making journalism ‘reproducible’.

Check it out, if you’re interested…