OLD Media Moves

A tech reporter who uses old-fashioned reporting methods

November 14, 2018

Posted by Chris Roush

Jack Nicas

Jack Nicas, who covers Apple for the New York Times, talks about some of his reporting methods on the beat.

Here is an excerpt:

I’m also a prolific screenshotter. The internet is an ephemeral place, so when I see something online for a story, I make sure to capture it immediately. The technique has been crucial for documenting fake Facebook accounts, dark YouTube recommendations, wrong Google answers, bizarre Google Maps neighborhoods. I use the FireShot plug-in for Google Chrome and my iPhone’s built-in screenshot and screen-recording tool.

I record some interviews with TapeACall Pro, an app that requires dialing in a third number that records the call’s audio. But because that can store the audio in the cloud, for sensitive calls I revert to a tangled setup that involves a decade-old Olympus WS-400S voice recorder, headphones and an auxiliary cord. That keeps the audio on a recorder that never connects to the internet. For particularly sensitive conversations, I ditch all of that and try to meet in person.

I typically bike to meetings and am an avid user of San Francisco’s shared-bike programs. I do not ride scooters, thankfully, because otherwise I know this article would have ended up with a photo of me on one.

If I had to choose one favorite old-school reporting technology though, I’d pick the doorbell.

To read more, go here.

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