Did a hashtag kill print journalism?

It’s Christmas Eve and I wake to discover the big story this morning is Newsweek’s use of a hashtag to signal it’s last print cover.  Really? Is this what real journalism has turned into? And the world wonders why the print edition of Newsweek has come to an end?

For years, print journalists marked the end of their stories with -30- or another dingbat to signal to copy boys and editors that the story was finished.  Sometimes this was marked with a symbol now known in the Twitterverse as a “hashtag.”

I think Tina Brown should be applauded not sneered at for her realistic and brave cover.  She not only realizes that social media has killed true journalism, but she recognizes it and is embracing her new electronic reality.

The hashtag, as used on Newsweek, signals a farewell to the great tradition of print journalism, when real news with vetted sources made a difference.  It says hello to the brave new world we live in now where news is discovered in tweets, real journalists quote their tweeps and the masses don’t seem to care.  Oh, give me the days for my old Royal typewriter.

# # -30- # #

Slammed by Sandy

My heart goes out to the people of New York, Connecticut and New Jersey who were Slammed by Hurricane Sandy.  It is devastation that makes the east coast U.S. look like a scene from “The Day After.”

My beloved Long Beach Island has been re-charted; its topography changed forever; and I still don’t know the condition of the house I’ve rented for 20+ years.

Yes, this is the United States and we have come to rely on the “conveniences” of modern life in a digital age.  However, as a native New Yorker I can attest to the fact that we often take our lives for granted and never thought it could happen in our own backyard.  Well, it did; it has; and it won’t be fixed overnight.

Are our memories so short-lived that we have forgotten the long road back from Katrina?  True, we have a different President now and our Governors Cuomo and Christie have been displaying stellar leadership in Sandy’s wake but they cannot wave a magic wand and make things all better.  Let’s stop the whining and dig in the way native New Yorkers and New Jerseyeans can and suck it up. Let’s help each other instead of saying why can’t “they” get my power back.  “They” are trying.  Just breathe, it will be better in the end and if it’s not better yet, then it’s not the end.

In the meantime, please keep tuned to this blog and my travel site at Wanderlust Women Travel.  I am working on a Valentine’s fundraiser for the Victims of Sandy. It’ll be a Girl’s Night Out Bachelor Auction.  Giddy up, boys, who’s up for some fun?

Adultery OK in Italy, really?

When did I fall aboard the pazzo train?  Working with Italian attorneys is a unique experience for an American lawyer.  The Italian judicial system is full of antiquated law, especially divorce law, and the government taxes and taxes and taxes some more.  Last week, however, took the icing on the cake when a court in Bolzano declared that it’s OK for a husband to commit adultery.  Wait, what?

Image courtesy: Smanard/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Yes, Italy is one of the most Catholic countries in the world and since the Catholic church frowns on adultery, heck it’s Commandment #10, you must be shaking your head as I did.

Italian men are not the most faithful men in the world.  Sadly, it’s a cultural thing.  They have a wife and an amante (I have a whole chapter in “Amalfi Blue” dedicated to their view of amore).  The amante is the woman they have mad passionate sex with when the wife isn’t looking.

Well, this cad had been cheating on his wife for quite some time according to Italian news reports.  The wife had decided she had enough and told her sister, in a private conversation, that she was not going to have children with this man.  Well, that’s all it took for the court to say if she won’t give the husband a child then he has every right to have sex with someone else.  The high court overturned the separation previously granted to her by a lower court.  Why would they do that?  The court went so far as to say that the husband’s infidelity cannot justify the separation if the adulterous affair was merely a consequence of an intolerable marital situation.

What’s intolerable is keeping two people together who clearly are better off apart.  Only in Italy could men justify cheating and then make a woman remain in the marriage just for spite.