THE WEEKLY BLOG

Print’s precarious future

“If you’ve got that relentless essential curiosity and you enjoy telling stories, then go into journalism; if you don’t, then go to law school,” joked Evan Thomas, editor-at-large for Newsweek, as he encouraged students at a Nov. 28 lecture about the future of print media.
Jim Kelly ’76, managing editor of Time Inc., joined Thomas as a speaker at the event, sponsored by the University Press Club, where the two journalists addressed the title question, “How Dead is Print?”
“It’s hard to believe that most people, 25 years from now, will be reading the material you find in a book on some kind of screen,” said Kelly, who believes that journalism eventually will be completely electronic.
Thomas, a Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton, said he hopes that there will always be some form of printed news. He also highlighted the disparity between online and print advertising rates as the biggest economic problem for both newspapers and magazines.
Publications cannot charge the same rates for Internet ads that they charge for print ads, Thomas explained, and easy-access to free Internet news further reduces the revenue that is used to pay for circulating issues.
“It’s increasingly hard to find people to pay for in print what they can get free online,” Kelly added. “Is print dying, then? I guess it’s changing.”
Though both Kelly and Thomas were optimistic about the future of good journalism in general, they did address the changing nature of telling stories.
“Readers don’t just want to use content, but they also want a hand in creating the content,” Kelly said, noting the prevalence of blogs. “This is about reacting and interacting with the people that write and edit.”
Overall, Thomas said he was confident that “what will never go out of business is the basic journalistic value of being relentlessly curious, wanting to get the story, and being able to tell the story in an animated way. We will have that until our dying day.” By Julia Osellame ’09

Brushing off the Big East blues

The Princeton men’s basketball team dropped to 2-5 after losses to Seton Hall and Rutgers Nov. 28 and Dec. 1, but the Tigers stayed close with both Big East foes, giving coach Sydney Johnson ’97 reason for optimism.
“We’ve got something,” Johnson said after the Seton Hall game, a 65-55 loss. “These guys are committed, and I like that. A couple loose balls here, another shot there, and we might turn the corner. So in one way you feel good, but obviously we’re left wanting.”
Seton Hall coach Bobby Gonzalez also saw something in this year’s Princeton team. Last season, the Pirates demolished the Tigers, 79-41, in a game that was decided well before halftime. This year, Princeton trailed most of the way again but stayed close, narrowing the gap to eight points with a minute remaining.
“I think that these kids look like they’re having fun playing for [Johnson],” Gonzalez said. “They’re playing with a little more confidence, a little more excitement, a little more energy. I think he’s going to do a nice job and be a very good coach for Princeton.”
The Tigers play at Evansville (Ind.) Dec. 5 and at Penn State Dec. 12 before returning home to play Manhattan at Jadwin Gym Dec. 16. The Manhattan game is part of a women’s and men’s doubleheader. The Princeton women open the action against Syracuse at 2 p.m., and the men tip off at 5 p.m.

Alumni in the news

On Dec. 3, former Major League Baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn ’48 became the first Princetonian (and the fourth commissioner) elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Kuhn was baseball’s youngest commissioner when he took the job in 1969 and presided over the game for 25 years. He died last March at age 80. … Mellody Hobson ’91, president of Ariel Capital Management, is one of 65 “achievers under 40” named to Black Enterprise magazine’s 2007 Hot List Nov. 26. In addition to young standouts in business and medicine, the list includes entertainers and pro sports stars such as Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Will Smith, and Tiger Woods. … Marketplace, the business radio program from American Public Media, interviewed eBay CEO Meg Whitman ’77 about the Web site’s future and its role in holiday shopping as part of the “Conversations from the Corner Office” series Nov. 29. … Cornel West *80 joined Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on stage at a Nov. 29 fundraiser at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. The Associated Press reported that West defended Obama’s civil rights credentials, saying that the Senator’s candidacy “comes at an incredibly powerful moment in the year 2007, and we don’t expect him to be Marcus Garvey … or Martin Luther King.”

Carols for a cause

The Princeton University Chapel Choir has joined seven other local singing ensembles to create a new CD, “A Princeton Christmas: For the Children of Africa.” The project aims to raise funds for the school feeding campaign of the United Nations World Food Program in Africa. The Chapel Choir contributed six tracks to the album, ranging from the classic “The First Noel” to the lesser-known “Mariabaen,” a traditional carol from Iceland. Additional information is available at the Princeton Christmas Web site.

Tigers on the McCarter stage

Two alumni actors are performing in McCarter Theatre’s annual production of the Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol, which opened Dec. 2 and runs through Dec. 23. Karron Graves ’99 plays Scrooge’s sister Fan, and Jed Peterson ’06 is a member of the ensemble. Graves performed in Coram Boy on Broadway and has appeared in several off-Broadway productions and television shows. Peterson started his stage career as a young dancer in the New York City Ballet production of The Nutcracker and served as the artistic director of Princeton Summer Theater as an undergraduate.

Better than sliced bread

In early December, Witherspoon Bread Company’s master baker, Denis Granarolo, taught students how to make ciabatta and foccaccia bread, baguettes, and croissants at two bread-making workshops sponsored by a new campus group called Slow Food. Formed this fall, the organization’s goal is to promote sustainable dining and locally grown foods through events like oyster-, cheese-, and bread-tasting workshops. Slow Food also plans on producing a local restaurant review and food guide. Photos by Julia Osellame ’09

Princeton’s top-10 team, 10 years later

In the 1997-98 season, Princeton men’s basketball was a national phenomenon. The Tigers went 26-1 in the regular season (an achievement celebrated on PAW’s March 25, 1998, cover), climbed as high as No. 8 in the Associated Press national rankings, and drew a group of devoted followers. After playing its last three Ivy League games on the road, coaches opened an intra-squad scrimmage to the public to give fans one more chance to see the team play at home. The Tigers went on to beat UNLV in the first round of the NCAA Tournament before falling to Michigan State and star guard Mateen Cleaves in the second round.
On Dec. 16, Princeton will honor members of the 1997-98 team at a reunion during a men’s and women’s basketball doubleheader at Jadwin Gym. The Tiger women (3-7) open the action against Syracuse (7-1) at 2 p.m., and the men (2-6) tip-off against Manhattan (5-4) at 5 p.m.

Princetonians in the Times

Kwame Anthony Appiah wrote about experimental philosophy, a trend of gathering data that is relatively new to the field, in a Dec. 9 New York Times Magazine story. Appiah is the Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Philosophy and the University Center of Human Values at Princeton. … Women’s squash coach Gail Ramsay was quoted in another Dec. 9 Times story about the potential advantage that squash players have in Ivy League admissions. “Not only do the eight Ivy League schools — Columbia will turn varsity in 2011 — have teams, but there are another 21 of the top liberal arts schools that also recruit from this pool of squash players,” Ramsay told the Times in an e-mail. “I actually feel there are not enough players to fill those recruiting spots each year.” … Woodrow Wilson School Dean Anne-Marie Slaughter ’80 has been blogging for the Times this fall from Shanghai, where she is spending the academic year. Her latest post, filed Dec. 7, addresses climate change and international relations.

Showing their moves

Naacho, the Indian dance troupe made up of Princeton students, performs a routine at “Your Moves,” a cultural dance festival and workshop hosted by Princeton High School Dec. 8. Photo by Frank Wojciechowski

More at PAW Online

Rally ’Round the Cannon - In his Princeton history column, Gregg Lange ’70 writes about Harold Helm ’20, the father of the University’s Annual Giving campaign.
On the Campus - Rough road for the Tigers’ self-driving vehicle in California; the University Band enlivens New York’s Village Halloween Parade.
Better late than never - After 27 years, monologist, filmmaker, and talk-show host Josh Kornbluth ’80 finally completed his senior thesis. Read Kornbluth’s story from PAW and watch an excerpt from his thesis/monologue “Citizen Josh.”

2007: The Year at Princeton

A month-by-month look at the headlines, with links to PAW stories

January
Gen. David Petraeus *87 is confirmed as the top commander of U.S. troops in Iraq. Three months later, Time magazine selects the Woodrow Wilson School Ph.D. recipient for its list of the world’s 100 most influential people. Sen. John McCain writes the brief essay on Petraeus, calling him “bright, studious, morally committed, physically brave, [and] willing to carry a ‘heavy rucksack’ without complaint and with clear-eyed resolve.” Petraeus has appeared in PAW several times - in a 2002 interview, a 2004 feature story, and most recently, in an On the Campus column about student reporter Wesley Morgan ’10, who was embedded with Petraeus and others in Iraq last summer.

February
In women’s squash, undefeated Princeton competes at the Howe Cup, the sport’s national championship, and tops Brown, Yale, and Harvard en route to a perfect season and its first national title since 1999. “It’s quite an honor to be able to put together a group of women to win the national title,” coach Gail Ramsay tells PAW. “[Squash] is very competitive. Small, but very competitive.”

March
Princeton chemistry professor David MacMillan and his colleagues publish a paper in Science March 29 outlining a new way assemble organic molecules without using toxic catalysts. The approach, which could speed the development of new drugs, is a “creative breakthrough,” according to John Schwab, a program director at the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, which helped fund the research.

April
Moshin Hamid ’93 releases his novel, The Reluctant Fundamentalist, drawing favorable reviews in the United States and abroad (The New York Times and Amazon.com both selected it as one of the year’s 100 best books). PAW profiled the author and published an excerpt of the book, which features the protagonist Changez, a native of Pakistan who attends Princeton, works in Manhattan, and develops a complicated view of the United States after Sept. 11. “Changez is not meant to be me,” Hamid tells PAW, “but I could imagine being him.”

May
Reunions 2007 draws about 20,000 alumni, family members, and friends to campus, starting on May 31, for receptions, family events, educational programs, and the annual P-rade. On June 5, 1,127 undergraduates and 716 graduate students receive their degrees and join the alumni community.

June
The University announces that Bill Frist ’74, the former Senate majority leader, will join the Woodrow Wilson School faculty in 2007-08 as the Frederick H. Schultz Class of 1951 Visiting Professor of International Economic Policy. A December PAW feature followed Frist and Professor Uwe Reinhardt into the classroom for their course, “The Political Economy of Health Systems.”

July
San Diego Padres right-hander Chris Young ’02 pitches in Major League Baseball’s All-Star game July 10, retiring one batter in the top of the fifth inning before giving up a two-run in-the-park home run to Ichiro Suzuki. Young is one of nearly a dozen alumni in professional baseball, including fellow pitcher Ross Ohlendorf ’05, who made his major-league debut in September with the New York Yankees.

August
On Aug. 2, Middle East studies scholar Haleh Esfandiari, who taught Persian language and literature at Princeton from 1980 to 1994, is released from a prison in Iran where she had been held on charges of espionage and endangering Iran’s national security. Esfandiari strongly denied the charges. She returned to work as director of the Middle East program for the Woodrow Wilson International Center in Washington Sept. 10.

September
Whitman College, the University’s newest residential college, opens its doors to students. The complex, named for lead donor and eBay CEO Meg Whitman ’77, was built at a cost of $136 million and houses about 500 students. Architect Demetri Porphyrios *80 aimed for a fresh take on collegiate gothic architecture. “The current architectural taste is neo-modern, deconstructive,” he tells PAW. “It’s centered on aggression, where these buildings are centered on beauty.”

October
The University Art Museum and the Italian government resolve ownership of 15 works of art from the museum’s collection at a meeting in Rome Oct. 30, ending nearly three years of inquiries and negotiations. The Italian culture ministry suspected that some of the museum’s artifacts had been acquired illegally. The University returned four works, transferred ownership on four others (but kept them on temporary loan), and secured permanent title to the seven remaining works under review. Museum director Susan Taylor maintained that all of the objects were obtained in good faith.

November
The University formally launches the largest fundraising campaign in its history — $1.75 billion over the next five years — with three days of events for alumni leaders, volunteers, and donors. Priorities in the campaign include Annual Giving; engineering, energy, and the environment; exploration in the arts; neuroscience, genomics, and theoretical physics; national and global citizenship; and the “Princeton experience.” Campaign co-chairman Robert Murley ’72 tells PAW that while Princeton’s goal may not be as lofty as the multi-billion-dollar campaigns at Columbia and the University of Pennsylvania, “on a per-capita or per-student basis it is a very large campaign. It certainly is large and important for Princeton.”

December
The Dec. 13 announcement of Sachs Scholar Pauline Yeung ’08 concludes a remarkable season of awards for Princeton seniors. Three members of the Class of 2008 were named Rhodes Scholars in late November - Sherif Girgis, Brett Masters, and Landis Stankievech - marking the first time since 1995 that three Princeton undergraduates were selected. Sarah Vander Ploeg ’08 was chosen to be a Marshall Scholar, while Yeung was selected for the Sachs Scholarship, a Princeton honor named for Daniel Sachs ’60. All five students will pursue graduate studies in Great Britain next fall.

A note to our readers
The Weekly Blog will not post on Dec. 26 but will return in the new year with more news and notes.