I’ve been in journalism for close to 30 years. As one would expect, my skills, the tools of the trade and the state of the industry itself have evolved dramatically over that time.

Newsrooms that once functioned under a cloud of cigarette smoke now work in a cloud computing environment. Writers who once tucked a reporter’s notebook in their back pocket now wield a digital voice recorder or a Flip camcorder. Editors who once redlined copy and haggled over how headlines matched the lead art now stress over Web analytics and keyword selection.

Last week, as the media blogosphere analyzed the announcement of a paywall at the New York Times, I was more fascinated with another recent obsession of mine: Foursquare.

F+W Media has leveraged the power of the community – or communities in its case – to carve out a high-growth e-commerce business. Its 21 e-stores – selling everything from books, CDs and DVDs to workshops, calendars and, increasingly, affiliate products – helped the publisher grow its e-commerce revenues by 113% in 2009. 

The First Amendment has long been interpreted as meaning the government doesn’t get to determine who is or who isn’t a journalist. For nearly as long the government has done just this when deciding who “qualifies” for the press pass needed for access to official news briefings, interviews and the like. “Legitimate” news organizations got them and, by extension, “illegitimate” ones did not. 

Most media companies are running on skeleton editorial crews, but must feed a constant 24/7 demand for new content online. If your editorial team can't consistently produce enough content to satisfy reader demand, those readers may drift away.  Many media companies succeed in spite of stretched editorial staff by blending professional editorial content with user-generated content (UGC) and advertiser-generated content (AGC).

Dear Facebook,

I don't like it, but I accept that you are now part of my editorial operations. My customers want to be where the audience is—and the audience is with you. I've got your icon on my website under every piece of content so that readers can post straight to their Facebook profiles. I've got another icon of yours on my website's homepage inviting readers to find my title on your platform and I've got a fan page set up for my title, maintained by my editorial staff. We're in bed together, Facebook: I give you content; you give me reach.

At South by Southwest, Mashable Founder Pete Cashmore said that "curation is journalism." Suffice to say, many a traditional newsman would have a fit at such a statement. We ask Cahsmore to elaborate.