As a journalist, I’m frequently surprised at how misinformed most members of the general public are about what it takes to be a media commentator. True, a great deal of our work involves hard-nosed news-gathering, by which I mean attending exclusive cocktail parties to discuss with other highly paid media commentators how misinformed most members of the general public are.
But beyond this sort of journalistic legwork (so called because standing around chatting for hours is brutal on the calves), success in the news business today often depends on developing an eye for emerging trends. Not to toot my own horn, but I did get in “on the ground floor” by purchasing Googlestock when it was trading at just $450 (I bought 1/8 of a share) while I also recall watching Emmitt Smith during his record-setting football days and thinking to myself, “Sure, but what people really want to see is how he dances the Flamenco.”
