R. I. P. Christian Science Monitor (sort Of)

The Christian Science Monitor was established in 1908 by Mary Baker Eddy, who was the founder of the Church of Christ, Scientist (Christian Science) religion. Although CSM includes an article about religion in every edition (it used to publish Monday though Friday), its mission was to present the news of the world, and not to proselytize or evangelize for Christian Science.

Like many other newspapers, this one has succeumbed to financial pressures. You will no longer be able find the CSM at your newstand. But it will still be on-line, and their may be a weekly edition in their future.

As the final daily issue of the 100-year-old Christian Science Monitor was put to bed Thursday, the newspaper was planning its rebirth as a spruced-up weekly.

Meanwhile, the Monitor's free Web site will get more frequent updates from dozens of its reporters, who will be expected to quickly post material to the site and take video and gather audio.

Editor John Yemma hopes these changes will help the seven-time Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper boost its $12.5 million in annual revenue, even with the recession. The transition caps two years of preparations for the newspaper, whose average circulation is fewer than 50,000 _ down from a peak of 223,000 in 1970.

They were a respected news-gathering organization.


(If any of you went to the Wikipedia entry on the church, you'll notice that the website warned you of the presence of "weasel-words" in this article.)

Weasel words are words or phrases that seemingly support statements without attributing opinions to verifiable sources. They give the force of authority to a statement without letting the reader decide whether the source of the opinion is reliable. If a statement can't stand on its own without weasel words, it lacks neutral point of view; either a source for the statement should be found, or the statement should be removed. If a statement can stand without weasel words, they may be undermining its neutrality and the statement may be better off standing without them.

Now it goes without saying that an astute internet tuber should always "consider the source", and that goes for Wikipedia, too (which I like and respect in many ways).