The daily digest of Twin Cities culture | Secrets of the City

There’s an awful lot of talk about the news lately, but not, unfortunately, the sort of constructive conversation that promotes critical thinking and engages people with their neighborhoods, their country, or their world. No, what people are talking about is the media, or, more specifically, and more onerously, the business of media. The Star Tribune is losing readers, pages, and staff.

In ancient Rome, handwritten copies of a daily gazette called the Acta Diurna were posted in prominent public locations to keep citizens informed on everything from military developments to the latest divorces—and you can bet which part was read most avidly. In colonial America, the New World’s first newspaper, published in 1690, made a splash by publicizing a rumor that the king of France had royally screwed his son’s wife.