EDITOR'S NOTE: In February 2020 I began a new venture writing a blog for "News and Tech" magazine, an magazine devoted to the newspaper industry. The blog appears on the site's homepage. This column originally appeared Feb. 26, 2020.
L
ast August, I was in Chicago for a media trade show. As the president of a media tech firm, I was pumped.
You see, for me, the city of Chicago started it all for me: My passion for journalism. My love for newspapers. My dream of one day being a famed newspaper columnist the likes of Mike Royko.
Chicago was my journalistic ancestral home, and there I found myself in the city, representing my media company to the rest of the industry.
To me, it was the stuff of which movies are made.
My love affair with Chicago’s Mike Royko began in a college “Introduction to Mass Communications” class. And by the end of that semester in college, I was convinced that my career track included a stint as a major newspaper metro columnist just like Royko.
Well, that career path never really panned out. But I did get into newspapers, and had a successful 15-year writing and editing career, until 10 years ago when my career track took me into the newspaper innovation business.
While in Chicago last August, I discovered the convention was being held just a couple of blocks away from the famed Billy Goat Tavern on Michigan Avenue, which of course is across the street from the even more famous former Chicago Tribune building. And anyone who has ever read Royko knows about the Billy Goat Tavern.
So one day for lunch, while the rest of the attendees fanned out to the eateries nearby, I made my way down below the glitz and glam of the upper Michigan Avenue to the underworld where the Billy Goat Tavern is located.
As I stood on those worn entry steps that lead down into the underground diner, I gazed around the room at the hundreds of newspaper clippings that adorned the walls, the ancient photos of Chicago luminaries of all kinds -- politicos, athletes, and yes journalists -- and chills ran up my spine. It made me nostalgic for a different day in our industry, a different time in my career … heck, a different time for all of us, a time when the importance of newspapers was apparent to the nation, not just those of us in the business.
Well, I took my cheeseburger with fried onions -- because really, what else are you going to have at the Billy Goat Tavern? -- found my way to a table for two along the outside wall of the hustling place, and ate with so many memories of my 25 years spent in newspapers flooding back to me. And ultimately I began to think about why I was back in Chicago on that particular day: At a media conference, and one that was specifically focused on the technology aspects of the industry.
Finishing the burger and getting back out and onto the street, I started to shake off the nostalgia of the visit for me, and realized that even though I dearly miss the business that I loved, it isn’t dead. … It’s just changed.
Given the current state of news, this business -- the institution of journalism itself -- is more important than ever. … And thanks to the opportunity my new company offers, I am getting to be a part of a transformation aimed at helping newspapers and other local media remain relevant long into the future.
Much like everyone else who has spent a good chunk of their professional life in newspapers, I’m not where I thought I would be. And the industry isn’t what I thought it would be either. But that is the great thing about reinventing ourselves. We have smart people in this industry; we always have. And we stand on their shoulders.
Yes, we have our work cut out for us, but I see signs of many who aren’t willing to go down without a fight. I see newspaper owners across the country adapting to this new reality.
And that is why, at mid-career, I am still jazzed by a career in journalism. For certain, my role has changed. But I am leading a cutting-edge company trying to reshape the industry and give it its financial legs back.
Devlyn Brooks is president of Modulist, a media services company specializing in the processing of user-generated paid content submissions for newspapers. Devlyn spent 20 years writing and editing in newsrooms big and small, dailies and weeklies. And he’s never lost his love of Mike Royko.
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