Author, critic discusses modern-day free press

SIKESTON, Mo. -- The path to a free press no longer lies in the pages of newspapers and magazines, but in the blogosphere, says Terry Teachout.

Teachout, a Sikeston native, author and theater and film critic for the Wall Street Journal, delivered his first public lecture in his hometown Tuesday night, spreading a populist message about the changing nature of journalism.

"The breakup of the old media monopoly has simply put more ideas, more styles, more people's voices out there," Teachout said.

Many changes have occurred in journalism, but the Internet has caused a revolution, he said.

The key to disseminating information to a mass audience used to be through the printing press or broadcast, both of which required massive resources. Posting weblogs, or blogs for short, has changed the rules of the game, said Teachout.

"All of a sudden, anybody who wants a bare-bones printing press in cyberspace can have it," Teachout told a crowd of about 60 at the Sikeston Depot Historical and Cultural Center. "This has changed my world."

The attraction of blogs, said Teachout, has been a growing dissatisfaction with traditional mainstream media and their perceived bias. Teachout cited the example of what has been dubbed Memogate, when forged documents critical of President Bush's National Guard experience resulted in Dan Rather's retirement from the CBS Evening News.

After bloggers broke the Memogate story, said Teachout, the established media had to take bloggers seriously.

"That's when they stopped pretending that blogging was a joke," Teachout said.

Even though Teachout focused on what he knows best -- journalistic criticism -- he did talk about his Sikeston roots, which got him interested in the profession and taught him how to be successful.

"It was here, this town, that taught me what I needed to know," Teachout said. "I always come back. This is home."

Teachout, who was selling copies of his book "The Terry Teachout Reader," also alluded to his next project -- a biography of jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong.

A publication date was not given, but the first two of 10 chapters have already been written, Teachout said.

msanders@semissourian.com

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