MARK Twain lost a fortune trying to perfect a mechanical typesetter. Today's ink-stained wretches don't need Twain's gumption. We can rely on the ''techheads,'' as my wife calls them, to come up with new tools, but we're still busy adapting technology to get the story out. News tech
then and nowOn Thursday, the Star-Bulletin broke a report about former state senator Milton Holt. In it, the former legislative kingpin and Bishop Estate employee discussed who he took to dinner and out for drinks on his estate credit cards. For the first time, our readers could go online and actually listen to Holt's voice describing his wining and dining of lawmakers to reporter Rick Daysog.
OK, big deal. It's like radio, only slower -- right? Perhaps, but this small step into multi-media is just a beginning. The Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel already has a newsroom multi-media assignment desk coordinating news gathering for its newspaper, cable TV and online operations. Communications technologies are converging. That means words, pictures, video and sound are all coming soon to your home computer, laptop, cell phone, palm computer or pager -- if they're not already there.
The medium, however multiplied, is not the message. Journalism is still, some say, what other people don't want you to know. Twain kept a revolver in his desk in his Virginia City, Nev., newspaper days. Today, he'd need a can of pepper spray and a good lawyer.
John Flanagan is editor and publisher of the Star-Bulletin.
To reach him call 525-8612, fax to 523-8509, send
e-mail to publisher@starbulletin.com or write to
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, Hawaii 96802.