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The journalist's first allegiance is to those who receive the work. Although there is no doubt that many owners and business managers of news organizations also have a deep allegiance to the public, that allegiance is necessarily alloyed with their concern for their own point of view or for the bottom line.
Bill Kovach -
In the end, the discipline of verification is what separates journalism from entertainment, propaganda, fiction, or art.
Bill Kovach
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After Vietnam and Watergate, and later the advent of twenty-four-hour cable news, journalism became noticeably more subjective and judgmental.18 Coverage was focused more on mediating what public people were saying than simply reporting it.
Bill Kovach -
News must also be about solving the problems that confront individuals and the community. There are lines between news and advocacy, but helping solve problems is different from advocacy.
Bill Kovach -
The credibility of the work depends on copy editors. I would argue with the copy desk, but I would thank them more.
Bill Kovach -
The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.
Bill Kovach -
If we're going to live as we are in a world of supply and demand, then journalists had better find a way to create a demand for good journalism.
Bill Kovach -
In newspapers, as various studies have found, stories began to focus less on what candidates said and more on the tactical motives for their statements.
Bill Kovach
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Journalism is the closest thing I have to a religion, because I believe deeply in the role and responsibility the journalists have to the people of a self-governing community.
Bill Kovach -
In the 1990s, as it began to feel the impact of cable news and syndicated infotainment programming, network evening newscasts became increasingly focused on tabloid crime and celebrity.
Bill Kovach -
Reality is that which, when you don’t believe it, doesn’t go away.
Bill Kovach