5QQ – David Folkenflik

David Folkenflik is NPR’s media correspondent and the man whom Geraldo Rivera once called “a really weak-kneed, backstabbing, sweaty-palmed reporter.” His professional record indicates otherwise: Folkenflik has won numerous awards for press criticism and investigative reporting, and has broken/advanced the ball on many big media stories like the Tribune Co. woes as well as bringing nuance to the complicated story of Kurt Eichenwald. In addition to a face for radio, he’s got one for TV, providing media analysis for numerous network and cable news shows. Today he answers our 5QQ – Five Quick Questions. We bet his palms are sweating.

1. How do you get your first news of the day?

I listen to NPR’s Morning Edition and sometimes WNYC’s The Takeaway; glance over my hard copy of the New York Times, then I go to the following web sites: Poynter’s Romenesko; the LA Times sports web site for news of the Angels and the Lakers; the Washington Post; Politico; Slate; Gawker; Drudge; Wonkette; National Review Online; CJRDaily,org; and various other news and media blogs and websites (and yes, I’m now checking in periodically with Mediaite). My morning review of my Twitter feed is increasingly vital, because many of the people I follow are doing their own curation on media issues. And then I go back and give the Times an actual read; on my subway ride to work I’ll listen to podcasts of NPR’s Planet Money, Slate’s various Gabfests, or Ira Glass’s This American Life, and pick up the Journal at the office. It doesn’t really take as long as that sounds. Some sites I stay on for awhile; others I’ll click through in a minute or two, depending on what they have.

2. Either, Or (you gotta pick one!): As a guy with a fun-sounding name yourself, I’ve gotta know: Froomkin or Mnookin?

Though I refuse to diss a fellow DF, Mnookin is more euphonious.

3. What’s the biggest story the media has missed this year? (Or last week):
Missed is a hard word … I’d say there’s strong case to be made that Afghanistan is the consistently underplayed story — despite some good coverage I don’t think most citizens have a strong sense of what’s going on there.

4. Obligatory Twitter Question: Describe yourself in 140 characters or less (hash tag optional!).
Beach bum turned meta media dude…. follow on twitter @davidfolkenflik.

5. Are you nervous or excited about the future of Journalism? Why?

Both. I’m nervous, even heartbroken, because of the toll that the dissolution of the old business models for the news business is taking both on dedicated practitioners of the trade and on trade itself. Despite the snark and dismissiveness of some of my online peers, some tremendous reporting occurred in the old models that are now cracking apart, and that reporting was read and seen by mass audiences. Yet I’m also very intrigued because of the ways advances in technology have reduced the barriers to entry into the field — every person can be his or her own network — and are altering the way people help shape the news they consume. It’s early days — some of the new examples are fascinating and heartening. Anybody who tells you they know what’s going to happen next is lying. Nothing is foreordained. And that understandably should make people who care about journalism nervous or excited — or, in my case, both.

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