On Feb. 18, the University of Wisconsin Department of Life Sciences Communication virtually welcomed Senior Editor of Scientific American, Dan Vergano, as a part of their Science Communication Colloquium series. “Science Reporting in Interesting Times: A View from the Fishbowl” is the title of the newest part of the series.
Vergano began with a disclaimer, saying that his views are his own and they don’t represent that of Scientific American. He compared himself to a fish in a fishbowl – the fishbowl being scientific reporting and journalism.
According to Vergano, after historic events such as the bombing of Hiroshima, the launching of the artificial satellite Sputnik, the moon landing and the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, scientific journalism was on the rise with around 100 science news sections in newspapers throughout the country in 1990. But, with the skyrocketing of the internet and digital media, the industry has become a much thinner thing than it used to be, Vergano said.
“The news industry is a disaster,” Vergano said. “We’ve been losing jobs since 1990, but it really took off after 2001, 2008.”
According to Vergano, before the age of the internet, print ads were used, which were expensive and supported many in the scientific journalism industry. But, once the change was made to digital advertising and billions of digital ads were produced for very cheap, a lack of support for people in the industry resulted in frequent layoffs. According to Vergano, reporters in this day and age should expect to get laid off at some point.
Additionally, in the era of influencers, AI and atomized science news, it can be difficult for consumers to get quality news, often lacking flair and journalistic output, according to Vergano.
“The decline in science reporting and reporting in general is a shame, because there is no shortage of science news,” said Vergano. “We’ve had a pandemic, … all kinds of science going on in space, we have fantastic material science, fantastic biology, fantastic advances in medicine and biomedicine, all kinds of wonderful news.”
There’s two ways that this ends, Vergano said. Either science reporting continues this way or science journalists step in and do something about it.
To wrap up the talk, Vergano welcomed questions from the audience. When asked by an audience member why he is still in the field of scientific journalism, Vergano responded that the job brings an incredible life as well as countless opportunities, such as standing in the tomb of a Mayan king before anyone except a few archaeologists had seen it and interviewing presidential candidates.
“What keeps me going is that I’m just like you. I love to write, and I love the stories, and I love talking to people and I love finding out the world this way and getting paid for it,” said Vergano. “At a certain point, that might come to an end and I’ll have to just say I have enjoyed a really wonderful career. In the meantime, that’s life.”
