From the Independent Lens website, which also includes a preview clip:

Over the last 20 years, public trust in the press has steadily declined. Documenting a crisis-filled year at Pennsylvania State University's campus newspaper, The Daily Collegian, THE PAPER explores the vital role of the press from a fresh perspective: America's future media makers.

For the cable-deprived like me, yet another holiday TV special pre-empted what sounds like an excellent episode of the PBS Independent Lens series. The station's digital channel is offering the documentary film at 8:30 tonight and at several other viewing times Thursday and Sunday for time-shifters and TIVO owners.

Antenna-dependent video recorder owners like me can "catch" the film at 4 a.m. Sunday, according to the Blue Ridge PBS Schedule.

Even without the holiday schedule shift, final exam week isn't great timing for a film that might otherwise have a lot of student interest. I hope the film comes around again during the spring semester so that we can talk about it without having to go the DVD-in-class route. If the whole program is streaming online somewhere, I haven't found it yet. But I have to get back to my grading...

At least PBS has its usually generous amount of supplementary material online. It will be interesting to see what The Daily Collegian and its readers have to say. Here's a start.

My only other question: Why on earth did someone give this film the same name as Ron Howard's feature film, The Paper, about a scrappy New York tabloid's editors debating the ethics of "Gotcha!" as a page one arrest-story headline? Here's hoping The Daily Collegian's editors never resort to fist-fights in the pressroom or gunshots in the editor's office!

2:53:40 PM  #