Scott Rosenberg recounts how he got the news that the next version of Windows will be delayed, and what that might mean for people in the news business:

As tech news goes today, so ultimately will go the rest of the news. It’s not the death of newspapers or pro journalism, but it’s further evidence that the pros face an extremely tough challenge: they’re rarely going to be first, so they’d damn well better be good. But it’s hard to hire enough good people to be good at everything; a newsroom has only so many seats, and the Web’s supply of amateur experts, anonymous insiders and random kibitzers with an occasional insight is limitless. The pros had better prepare to be outgunned.

This competition will force journalists to stop being lazy and to find and reconnect with what is unique about their work, now that so much of what they used to do is being done for free, and often well, by amateurs.

If I had the time (and the nerve), it might be interesting to look at every story one of our networks did for the past 30 days. Put a check-mark beside every story that was “original”…that we didn’t get from an affiliate, a news releases, or from some other source.

The next question might be: Did we do this story any differently or better than the other news organizations that covered it? Like the man said, we’re rarely going to be first, so we damn well better be good. [via Scripting News]