"The authors offer sound lessons on the 'tradecraft of verification' necessary for Americans to sort out truth from vested opinion. Kovach and Rosenstiel combine journalism and civics in this valuable and insightful resource to help Americans adapt to an era that demands that readers become their own editors and news aggregators." -- Booklist (starred) "Kovach and Rosenstiel provide a roadmap for maintaining a steady course through our messy media landscape. As the authors entertainingly define and deconstruct the journalism of verification, assertion, affirmation, and interest group news, readers gain the analytical skills necessary for understanding this new terrain." -- Publishers Weekly "Insightful. Offers step-by-step analysis of the processes by which the best journalists practice their craft and can have their work evaluated by consumers slogging their way through the mire of available information." -- Kirkus " Blur is an impassioned and practical brief for what its authors call 'verification'--the effort by journalists and others who publicly exchange information about public affairs to examine evidence and test the truth value of the assertions they and others are making. It argues persuasively for the virtues of traditional journalism without in any way resisting the sweeping changes the Internet has brought to the profession.

It's hard to imagine a more urgently necessary task, for journalism and for democratic societies, than the one Kovach and Rosenstiel have taken on." -- Nicholas Lemann, Dean, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism "Two trailblazing newspapermen make a powerful case that with information reaching us at warp speed, Americans can--and must--learn the tough-minded skepticism that drove the country's great journalists. Kovach and Rosenstiel's riveting, terse book shows how citizens can gauge fact from fiction, discern neutral sources from interested parties, and parse the news as American journalism goes through its big upheaval." -- Dean Baquet, Washington Bureau Chief, New York Times "If I had $1 million I would buy a copy of this book for every high school senior in America. If I had $2 million, I would use the second million to offer cash incentives for every one of those high school seniors to read what might be the most important book they will read in their lives--the one volume that will help them evaluate everything else they read until the day they die." -- David M. Shribman, executive editor, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette "This is one of the most important books of the year. Rosenstiel and Kovach take today's media landscape apart, examine each component--partisan blogs, social media, Web sites that follow the traditional journalistic values, newspapers, networks and cable--and help us understand what they are, the pressures they bring on each other and how together they have changed forever how news is gathered and distributed.

Always enlightening and at times scary as when they speculate on how the Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident might have played out in the age of cable and the internet, this is a sobering but even handed analysis that should be valuable to all of us in journalism and the citizens we serve." -- Bob Schieffer, CBS News Chief Washington Correspondent.