The New (Foreign) Journalism

[Matt Rees]

The New York Times features me in an article published this weekend about Global Post, the new foreign news website. As the Times explains, Global Post is intended to replace all the foreign news that's no longer produced by US newspapers, magazines and tv channels -- because those media "cut costs" and fired everyone. I've been writing for Global Post, which is run by a chum of mine who worked in the Middle East for The Boston Globe, and enjoying the freedom from starchy journalistic constraints it gives me. Here's what I wrote about my jaunt in Hillary Clinton's Ramallah motorcade earlier this month. Read it. Definitely not starchy. You'll also see that some of my other posts relate specifically to the subjects I use as the basis for my Palestinian crime novels. This, I think, is another element of this new kind of web journalism, in that it isn't limited by a desire to appeal to absolutely everybody and can be tailored to those who, in this case, are interested in (a) crime novels, (b) the Middle East, or (c) both. Most importantly it ought to have a personality at the heart of it, not a faceless reporter.