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James Fallows

James Fallows - James Fallows is a national correspondent for The Atlantic and has written for the magazine since the late 1970s. He has reported extensively from outside the United States, and once worked as President Carter's chief speechwriter. His latest book, China Airborne, was published in early May.
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James Fallows is based in Washington as a national correspondent for The Atlantic. He has worked for the magazine for nearly 30 years and in that time has also lived in Seattle, Berkeley, Austin, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai, and Beijing. He was raised in Redlands, California, received his undergraduate degree in American history and literature from Harvard, and received a graduate degree in economics from Oxford as a Rhodes scholar. In addition to working for The Atlantic, he has spent two years as chief White House speechwriter for Jimmy Carter, two years as the editor of US News & World Report, and six months as a program designer at Microsoft. He is an instrument-rated private pilot. He is also now the chair in U.S. media at the US Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, in Australia.

Fallows has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award five times and has won once; he has also won the American Book Award for nonfiction and a N.Y. Emmy award for the documentary series Doing Business in China. He was the founding chairman of the New America Foundation. His two most recent books, Blind Into Baghdad (2006) and Postcards From Tomorrow Square (2009), are based on his writings for The Atlantic. His latest book, China Airborne, was published in early May. He is married to Deborah Fallows, author of the recent book Dreaming in Chinese. They have two married sons.

Fallows welcomes and frequently quotes from reader mail sent via the "Email" button below. Unless you specify otherwise, we consider any incoming mail available for possible quotation -- but not with the sender's real name unless you explicitly state that it may be used. If you are wondering why Fallows does not use a "Comments" field below his posts, please see previous explanations here and here.
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The Case for a Home Page Editor, NYT Dept.

By James Fallows

Apr 27 2011, 10:25 PM ET

Part of the NYT's online home page, right now at 10:25pm. Note placement of the stories with arrows, of which there will be clearer views below.

NYT3.png


Closer look at the two stories. First:NYT4.png

And a few inches down:
NYT2.png

I won't belabor the different kinds of "beasts within" under discussion here, one in a competitive athlete and the other in a rogue unit in Afghanistan. In the print paper, these stories and headlines would obviously be separated, among other reasons since one of them is for a magazine story that won't come out until this weekend. I wonder how long till someone notices the juxtaposition on the home page. No larger point, just one of the artifacts of this New Media Age.  

Update: 10:45pm, it's gone. Interesting while it lasted.


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