STELTER TO CNN: DON’T UNDERESTIMATE YOUNG PEOPLE

Longtime media blogger Jim Romenesko has reprinted a letter he ran in January 2002 from a then-16-year-old Brian Stelter after he posted an article by Neil Morton that said, “A new generation is growing up on the net and for many of them, the print papers aren’t even an option.” The teenaged Stelter replied, “It would scare me that anyone would expect newspapers to be overtaken by technology. How, exactly, is someone supposed to immerse themselves in a story by watching television — particularly the cable news networks? By the way, yes, CNN, there is a market for the news you used to produce — not the infotainment you churn out now.” Stelter would go on to develop a much-followed blog, TVNewser, be hired by the New York Times to cover TV, and then jump to CNN to take over Reliable Sources from Howard Kurtz. He is now 28, and in an interview appearing in the New Republic, he remarks that he has been able to expand the show’s audience by including coverage of Gawker, Buzzfeed and Hulu. “Listen, they hired a 28-year-old,” he told columnist Noreen Malone. “I’m glad they were interested in having a younger host. I think I look at media differently than anyone older would.”