When a journalist becomes a content marketer

Writer Abroad just finished reading Dan Lyons’ book, Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-up Bubble. The book was about Lyon’s journey going from Newsweek journalist to HubSpot content marketer.

Writer Abroad couldn’t help but sympathize. With Dan. With all journalists (and content marketers). And with the entire country, which is losing its journalists right and left.

But a journalist losing his job matters far beyond that individual. Because when journalists lose, all of us lose. If there’s anyone we don’t want being laid off or being treated badly, it’s our journalists. Because their treatment and success is tied strongly to the success of democracy.

So if presidential nominees can say they are banning entire publications like the Washington Post from covering their campaign, our country is in big trouble. Huge trouble.

No watchdogs. No democracy.

It’s bad enough already. Corporate-owned media dominates. Independent voices that get heard are few. Luckily there are some good ones, like Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, which she founded in 1996 with the motto of “going where the silence is.”

Speaking at Lit Fest in Chicago on June 11, Amy Goodman discussed how the corporate media doesn’t cover the views of the majority. Instead, they are a tool to silence the majority. She cited Super Tuesday 3. On this day, instead of showing Bernie Sanders' speech in Phoenix, Arizona, which was more highly attended than any other candidates’ speech in the country that night, Fox News showed Donald Trump’s empty podium for 20 minutes instead.

“Media can be the greatest force for peace on earth. Or its greatest enemy,” said Goodman to her Chicago audience.

Writer Abroad thinks it’s pretty clear which version of the media the United States has right now.