Too often, in reading articles on how to write press releases or to deal with the media, I get the feeling that I'm reading a 19th century Dick and Jane textbook. "See Dick run. Run, Dick run."

Journalism, it seems, has changed, but the changes seem not to have been noticed by old timers, who then teach neophytes, who then perpetuate the journalistic mythology of the Dark Ages.

My articles in The Marcus Letter on wither the five W's (the who, what, when, why and where) we were once taught must be in every lead  paragraph [or lede, if you will] of a news article opened the heavens to thunderclaps of scolding. So, too, did my article on why you don't always have to be nice to journalists. It horrified some readers, who, obviously, were taught that you always have to be nice to journalists.

I suspect that when many journalists move into public relations, they are inured to events outside that world. I made my bones as a journalist, and again in public relations, as did many good people, and I respect the many sound practitioners of both arts.

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