| Philip Meyer | |
|---|---|
| Nationality | United States |
| Occupation | Journalist Since 1981: Professor of Journalism School of Journalism and Mass Communication North Caroline University |
Philip Meyer is professor emeritus and former holder of the Knight Chair in Journalism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He researches in the areas of journalism quality, precision journalism, civic journalism, polling, the newspaper industry, and communications technology. Meyer has been a Nieman Fellow.
Meyer is a member of the Board of Contributors for USA TODAY's Forum Page, part of the newspaper’s Opinion section.
Before becoming a professor in 1981, Meyer was employed in the newspaper industry for a total of 26 years, the last 23 with Knight Ridder Inc., where he started as a reporter for the Miami Herald. In 1962, he became the Washington correspondent for the Akron Beacon Journal, then a national correspondent, and finally, from 1978-1981 a market researcher at company headquarters in Miami.
One of the earliest examples of computer assisted reporting was in 1967, after riots in Detroit, when Meyer, on temporary assignment with the Detroit Free Press, used survey research, analyzed on a mainframe computer, to show that people who had attended college were equally likely to have rioted as were high school dropouts.
Meyer has written several books, including The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age, Precision Journalism, and Ethical Journalism: a Guide for Students, Practitioners and Consumers.