Media Diet: David Cohn

For this week's installment, we take a look at the Media Diet of David Cohn, most recently of NewAssignment.Net.

Short bio (i.e. what do you do, how long have you been in the business, etc...)

David Cohn: I have been working with NewAssignment.Net since it launched in October. I am also a part-time student at Columbia's J-school where I'm working towards my masters. Before that I worked as a science and technology writer -- working at Seed Magazine, Columbia Journalism Review and Wired News and freelancing for other news organizations. I've been writing for 3 years now.

What do you try to read on a daily basis?

The New York Times, Wired News and a slew of blogs -- from Romenesko and Kottke, to EyeBeam Reblog and World Changing. One of my link farms is here: -- it gives a sense of what I read for blogs.

A weekly basis (i.e. at least once a week)?

• Businessweek
• Best from the othe major papers (LA Times, Wash. Post and Chicago Tribune)
• Best from the Tech/Sci publications: Sciam, CS Monitor, New Scientist, Popular Science, CNET, etc.

What do you turn to for 'junk food' or snacks? (i.e. The Onion, etc...)

Adbusters, different blogs from friends, viral videos.

Do you use blogs as a source of news? If so, when did you start?

Yes -- I often scan blogs to find out what the headlines are and get a sense of where the buzz falls. And sometimes I pay more attention to them than news organizations -- if you cast a wide-enough net, I end up coming across everything I would have wanted to read from news organizations anyway. Blogs have always been a staple for me -- since I fell into journalism about 3 years ago.

(What aggregators do you use, if any?)

Digg, Netscape, Techmeme.

(How many RSS feeds do you subscribe to?)

About 100 -- but I still prefer to surf the web the old fashioned way: starting with my bookmarks and getting lost.

Do you find yourself relying less on other mediums since the advent of the Internet? Do you think this will change in the years to come?

This is a tough question for me. I'm a young journalist. When I started getting my feet wet the net was up and running. I will say this: The way in which I use the Internet has changed. My first assumption was that the power of the Internet was that it could be used as a publishing platform. That's still true -- but the real power behind the net is it's ability to connect people. I use the Internet for social networking -- finding sources, mining discussion forums and for NewAssignment.Net -- to organize investigations with citizen journalists. I think this trend will continue and evolve.

Anything else you would like to add?

Not right now - but I'm sure the second I hit send something will come to mind.

Technorati Tags: Media Diet