Taylor Lorenz and her work represent a chasm between the American news media and its readers. While ordinary readers may well be blessedly unaware of the “internet culture reporter” and the drama that follows her and her hundreds of thousands of “followers” on Twitter and every other social media platform, no friend of mine in media is unaware of her or without an opinion. She and I have both been in journalism since around 2014. For a decade she’s gone from publication to publication, working for Mic, The Daily Beast, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. But she has always stuck to her internet culture beat. The idea behind that beat is that what people do on the internet is not just what editors call “news of the weird.” It is not illegitimate, or merely for teenagers, or dedicated to passing fads, or otherwise inherently unserious. It matters. And it is only going to matter more as time goes by. Journalism should adapt to that reality. Lorenz staked out that ground early, and she was dead right even against claims that her beat shouldn’t exist at all. Her stories had to serve as both coverage and demonstration products that there should be stories like them. She deserves credit for it.
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