The other day Molly, my four-year-old daughter, was asking me about Oxford and I was telling her as much as I could remember about the city.
She then said: "But Daddy, how do you know this?"
Me: "Well, as a journalist I often have to find a lot of things out so I can let everyone know and then I just remember them."
Molly: "But how do you find things out?"
Me: "I ask people and they tell me."
Molly: "But why don't they just tell everyone."
Me: "Well people have always come to journalists to find things out because there was no other easy way of doing it. Now though we have the internet [a concept she is familiar with through the CBeebies website] so anyone can tell everyone everything."
Molly: "Oh..... So we don't just need people like you any more then?"
I thought it was amazing. She succinctly summed up what is happening in our industry with one short conversation.
Of course, 'people like me' are quite useful for bundling all this information together but we're not needed to the same extent.
If she can get it why do so many journalists fail to?
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