Walter Isaacson:”It’s not easy to be both patriot and a journalist”

Walter Isaacson:”It’s not easy to be both patriot and a journalist”

The quality media has a double duty, towards its readers and its own country, says Isaacson.

20 years after the moment of 1989, do we have a clear vision on the results of this major change of the political model in Europe? Which is the new element that can move Central and Eastern Europe towards a precise objective sustained by values and public agitation? These are question to be answered by the participants of the recently debated held in Bucharest by Aspen Romania Institute.

Founded almost 60 years ago, in Aspen, U.S., the Institute has now partners in Germany, France, Italy, India, Japan and Romania. Walter Isaacson, former correspondent on foreign policy, then CNN head and manager of “Time” magazine, is at present the president of Aspen Institute of U.S.

Ion M. Ioniţă: Mr. Isaacson, everybody is talking about the media crisis. What do you think about it?

No, I don’t think we have a real crisis for journalism. It’s the Internet contribution. Journalism has become, in a great part, free. There are a lot of good newspapers and magazines in the world, but it is hard to convince people to pay for the content they can find on the Internet. This is what affected the American journalism. I think by paying the online content we, as journalist, have to make sure we would create something valuable and different from the others, whose productions ca be accessed free. Introducing payment for some of the articles could be a drive for journalists that want to create something valuable. It is a hard battle.

Ovidiu Nahoi: Do you still believe in the future of the printed newspapers?

I like the printed newspaper! I think this format, which is over 400-year old, will resist another 400 years. It’s differenet to read the news on the printed paper, with its titles, and the front page in your hand, different from accessing “New York Times” from a Blackberry.