Empty newsrooms

As you might guess, I visit a lot of newsrooms. Along with dozens of positive experiences, one lingering impression nags at me.

They're all dead early in the morning.

I know lots of newsrooms – including most of ours – have reassigned some staff to ensure that early-morning updates get posted online. A few are doing original reporting in the dawn's early light. But there's little energy evident in support of that.

Perhaps this is inevitable. I know that sustaining production for the morning paper occupies vastly more staff effort than anything else, as it must. But shouldn't there be a little more visible activity?