The WoW Factor
The dailies say they must attract new readers or die. So why are they virtually ignoring millions of gamers?
Clive Thompson is burly and about six-two. He’s wearing a full set of chain mail and Soldier’s Wrist Guards of the Eagle and has a large mace-a Giant Mace-strapped to his back like a parade baton. He’s 40, a Canadian expat living in New York, former editor of This Magazine, a journalist and father of two […]
Shadows and Light
The piercing perspectives of photojournalist Rita Leistner
She couldn’t take a plane, so Rita Leistner decided to walk-to Iraq. For a light load, a lot was left behind. She took mostly cameras, a flak jacket and a good pair of hiking boots. Though the risks were obvious, the choice was too: $1,200 U.S. and a one-day hike would get Leistner into war […]
Rookie of the Year
The challenge for new Toronto Life editor Sarah Fulford: rejuvenate a tired product. The result: a fresher, brasher approach that often generates more heat than enlightenment
Sarah Fulford had too much to drink last night. Or so she says. Though she claims she’s a little hungover from her “celebration and debauchery,” she shows her usual poise. It’s early evening, November 5, less than 24 hours since Barack Obama made history and Toronto is still abuzz with excitement. But on the second […]
What about Bob?
Robert Hurst's decisions at CTV News have consequences. A Liberal leader stepped down. Viewers saw a killer's manifesto. A network revitalized its populist appeal. A case study in aggressive editorial leadership
Stéphane Dion, looking tired in his stiff charcoal suit, and Steve Murphy, six-o’clock-news anchor for atv Halifax, sit in upholstered chairs in a downtown hotel room as the light on the camera clicks red and the tape begins to record. After an exchange of pleasantries, Murphy asks the then Liberal leader, “The economy is now […]
The Man Who Flipped Off Trudeau
Québec journalist Michel Vastel was the troublemaker politicians feared, colleagues revered and readers cheered. The fight was his edge
It was an interminable sermon, everyone agreed. And then a scream. It’s 1988 and Pierre Trudeau has returned to Parliament Hill to dissuade a Senate committee from backing the Meech Lake Accord. He speaks ever deliberately, ever persuasively-and almost entirely in English. But a cry cuts short the spiel in the high-ceilinged room. Michel Vastel […]
Barbed Relations
Does the military try to co-opt journalists? Of course it does. Do journalists push the limits? Of course they do. Our writer reports from the front lines of hide and seek
On an eerily quiet May 2008 afternoon, a Canadian soldier shows us around the deserted, boxy homes of this Kandahar terrain. Dressed in Afghan garb and military wear-a purplish-brown tunic and pants, contrasted by a sand-camouflage vest and black reflective sunglasses-he directs our attention to an open field where an old car sits. A Taliban […]
One Powerful Union Tactic
The inside story of the labour-management conflict at Le Journal de Québec
$5 Million 40,000 Daily Copies 317 Editions 137 Locked-Out Employees 115 Striking Staffers 15 Months 12 Replacement Workers 1 Powerful Union Tactic The inside story of the labour-management conflict at Le Journal de Québec A burly security guard lifts a panel of metal fencing, carries it a couple of feet, and sets it down next […]
Missing Links
There’s a divide between what we should know about science and what we learn from most newspapers. Why Anne McIlroy is one of the few journalists bridging the gap between the dinosaur era and the 21st century—and beyond
From her desk overlooking the Parliament Buildings and beyond to Gatineau, Anne McIlroy is secretly collecting shiny objects. Little pieces of information that, by themselves, are not particularly significant. They slide innocuously into plain brown folders and remain hidden from the world until she can find the unifying concept that will consolidate them into a […]
The Body Politic
Columnists are supposed to be provocative and contrarian. In Canada, nobody does it better than Terence Corcoran. But how much of his bombast and umbrage is just for show?
The shelves in Terence Corcoran’s office at the National Post are piled high and deep. There are books and files on Canada’s debt, media concentration in America, financial planning and, of course, global warming. His files are legendary among co-workers, packed in boxes and cabinets lining the walls and floor, their subjects named in thick […]
Hysteriosis
Did the media overreact when reporting the Maple Leaf tainted-meat outbreak?
On August 18, 2008, a smattering of newspapers across the country dutifully cautions Canadians to toss out the meat in their refrigerator drawers. The Victoria Times Colonist prints a story on page A4 headlined “Warning issued about meats” running fewer than 100 words. It’s about a possible contamination of Sure Slice roast beef and corned […]
