However, Bloomberg purchased Business Week and
it's full of interesting information. Regular reading of Business Week is a good
place for most students to start.Additional Reading
Some General Advice, David Robinson June 2010
Disclaimer
This is well-intentioned advice--some of the recommendations might not fit your situation and circumstances my change over time. Evaluate the information and use your own judgment.
Periodicals (Newspapers and Magazines)
The Internet has "killed" the demand for many magazines. Some, such as Fortune are in a death-spiral of declining readership so fewer ads purchased, running at a loss, cutting reporting staff, etc. Forbes has never been useful to me—in my opinion it's gossipy, speculative and idiosyncratic.
However, Bloomberg purchased Business Week and
it's full of interesting information. Regular reading of Business Week is a good
place for most students to start.
The weekly summaries of business news in the New York Times, LA Times and San Francisco Chronicle are good, especially if you need to catch up after a vacation.
If you have a serious interest in business, at some point you'll end up reading the Wall Street Journal every day. This takes a substantial time commitment and some training to pick the relevant information for your particular specialty such as finance or marketing.
è Tip: No matter if you are taking your very first business course, identify one or two companies that you will follow in depth. For example, if you live in Anaheim, you might decide to know as much as you can about Disney. The will make reading current events much more interesting. You read about unfunded pension liabilities and can think through: How does this apply to Disney?
Comment: Oh I read everything online
Well, OK if that works for you. Some of what we are working with here is a generational difference--your professors grew up reading information on paper, so many of us still rely on that as a primary medium.
While online news is great for immediacy, what we find lacking is a good editorial voice. That means it's difficult to sort through the trivia and noise. When you look at the front page of a newspaper you can see what's the most important story. Additionally, there's been a thorough level of fact-checking.
What books would you recommend for me to read during the break between semesters?
If you go to my webpage and scroll down, under "Articles & Journalism" you'll see some lists that I maintain on Amazon of books relevant to the courses I teach.