(Almost) 40-Year-Old Product Review Virgin

I was recently asked by Fortune to do a product review.  I admit, next year I’m turning 40 and this is my first widely-public product review.  Not review and tell, but you can read about my experience here on CNN Money.  You can also see it in the February 2009 Fortune Small Business. 

I have written plenty of articles and normally blog startup advice but this assignment was much different and revealed a whole new perspective on the writing process.  It was a lot of fun once I channeled Walt Mossberg to produce a crisp and hopefully insightful product review. 

Traditional media assignments are interesting.  In the blogging world, you really can get away with a lot of grammatical mistakes, sloppy writing, etc.  Heck, many readers point those mistakes out to me on a regular basis.  Blogging is sometimes more about breaking news and the speed of information versus the quality of information.  While Twitter isn't blogging, you could argue that there is sometimes more value in 140 characters of text if you are reporting on a breaking story (e.g, like your plane just crash landed in the Hudson). The differences are obvious but I was surprised at the emotional differences of the mediums:

 1) Editors - I am not used to an editor.  I obviously needed one since my style of writing is more stream-of-consciousness versus well-groomed text.  Going back and forth with an editor was a new experience for me.  It was humbling to see entire sections wiped out due to space requirements.

 2) Patience - I am used to getting an idea out to completion within 30 minutes to an hour.  It was an unusual sense of anxiety around waiting to see your completed article in the newsstand.  It took months to see the work in print.

 3) Offline is Old School Cool - At the end of the day, it is really fulfilling to see something you've written in print.  It feels more meaningful and permanent.  Sure, I contributed to a small product review versus authoring a book of note, but there is something satisfying about it.

 With a recession on and rampant layoffs and closures in the media industry [like to http://twitter.com/TheMediaisDying], it will be interesting to see how the offline and online media disciplines merge over time.  There are some interesting examples recently of the merger of hack online news bursts combined with professional journalism, and we’re likely to see more.  I believe the CNN utilization of the Feedback Connect capability during the inauguration coverage gave us a window into how both worlds are merging effectively in the news world.