Prologue

Depending on who you listen to, now is either the best or the worst time to be a young journalist. In the early 20th century becoming a journalist meant getting a much sought after apprenticeship; spending a time working on local newspapers; years of training.

More recently it meant getting a degree in Journalism as the papers cut down on the amount of inhouse training that they invested in and as more journalists were expected to do less.

However, with the expansion of the internet, the creation of message-boards, the emergence of blogging and micro-blogging, the fixation with 'online journalism' (possibly the most bastardised phrase in any language) none of this was necessary any longer.

No editors; no sub-editors; no publishers; no deadlines. Just write what you want to write then hit the 'publish' button. So simple, so democratic.

Sadly, there was a minor fly in the ointment for this 21st century love story. Three more items need to be added to the list:

• No standards
  
• No audience
• No paycheck

You can get published wherever and when ever you want; you can say what you want without censorship; it's just that no-one may ever read it and you'll probably never see a red cent for it.

For some that may not matter, but to me it's a bit of an issue.

Call me old fashioned or call me a bit of a curmudgeon, but I prefer being paid over not being paid. I prefer eating over starving and I prefer being able to pay my mortgage over not being able to pay my mortgage.

No doubt the online journalistas think that I just don't get it; the web has changed everything beyond recognition, the old rules don't apply any more and the death of the newspaper is inevitable.

I'll handle some of those points at a later date, but for now I'll leave you with three short words to illustrate what I think about the internet has changed everything argument:

Dot. Com. Crash.