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Category: Reporting

News, interviews and journalism topics.

I don’t recommend pneumonia, and I’m not going to write about it in my next novel

Published by Adam on May 21, 2026
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Photo by KATRIN BOLOVTSOVA on Pexels.com

I know, I know … I already messed up my New Year’s resolution of writing a blog post every month. But it’s not that I forgot. No, really, I have an excuse:

Pneumonia. The excuse is pneumonia. And I do not recommend it.

Doing much better now, thanks.

Anyway! While that whole thing did waylay me for about a month, I do have a few updates to share. First, happy to say my novels are now available in eBook format through Bookshop.org, which just recently started selling digital editions. I’ve had my paperbacks there for years now, and I absolutely recommend buying from Bookshop.org if you want your hard-earned cash to go to companies that support independent bookstores.

Meanwhile, things have been super busy on the Privacy Daily front, as the news about data privacy continues to ramp up. The first quarter of the year is also when the state legislatures are most active, so that’s been taking up a lot of my attention so far in 2026. But hey, they say it’s good to be busy, right?

Don’t worry–I haven’t completely neglected my creative writing! As I hinted at in my last post, I’ve lately been working in Reedsy’s writing app on something new.

You know, after breaking my resolution and skipping the blog in April, I feel like should give you something, even though I’ve become terribly superstitious about revealing my writing plans too early in the process. So, here goes, with the disclaimer that I may totally abandon this! You have been warned!

For some reason — the state of the world or whatever — has gotten me thinking again about the dystopian nation I created in my first two books, the so-called We, The Watched duology.

A central theme of those two books was forgetting, with a hero whose amnesia gives him a blank-slate perspective on how dark things have become even as the rest of society seems to ignore it. Lately, I have been thinking about how even societies that overcome such darkness may over time forget how bad things used to be–and begin to slip backwards.

So, I don’t know … I mean, who really says duology? Maybe it should be a trilogy?

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Adam’s New Year Resolutions2026

Adam’s New Year Resolutions

Published by Adam on February 1, 2026

Happy New Year! So, my first resolution for 2026 is to get back to updating this blog! (Hey look, I did it.)

It’s been a while, reader. I really do apologize for the dearth of posts over the last year. I can tell you I was not sitting on my hands. In fact, from a professional standpoint, it was not a bad year at all!

As you may know, I am an author by night and weekend. By day, I am a journalist covering the intersection of tech and legal policy. Well, at the end of 2024, I was given the privilege of becoming the deputy managing editor of a new publication covering data privacy law, enforcement and compliance. We call it Privacy Daily, and we’ve had a whirlwind–and very rewarding–first year!

So here’s what happened: I focused all my 2025 energy getting the publication off the ground and doing everything I could to make it a success. It’s gone well! However, you might say all this effort came at the cost of my creative writing, which was already taking a hit due to the challenges (and rewards) of raising a small child. No regrets on any of this! It’s just the reality of being a 40-year-old.

However, this brings me to second resolution: Get back into creative writing in 2026!

While I can’t say things have slowed down on the journalistic front, I do feel a lot more calm and confident about Privacy Daily going into year two. I think we’ve really found our groove in terms of workflow, and there’s no shortage of privacy news to write about.

So, yeah! More creative writing in 2026!To tell you the truth, it’s not like I did nothing of this kind in 2025. Since publishing my last book Utopia PR, I have been brainstorming new ideas and writing possible beginnings to new novels. It’s probably too early to announce anything, but I can tell you that I started a project recently that feels relevant and, most importantly, exciting for me to write about.

So stay tuned and hopefully I will have more to say about that soon. I’d love to get back into at least monthly updates to this blog, so if you haven’t already, please subscribe using the form below or to the left.

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Bender wins National Press Club journalism award for DC 911 reporting

Published by Adam on January 15, 2022

At a virtual ceremony on Jan. 6, 2022, I was delighted to accept the National Press Club’s newsletter journalism award for my reporting with Jonathan Make in Communications Daily on problems with the District of Columbia 911 system.

Our reporting over the last couple of years showed how the D.C. 911 center, the Office of Unified Communications, has struggled to get timely help to people calling with emergencies. The District’s auditor opened an investigation and recently reported that the center failed to meet national standards. The issue also attracted interest from Congress.

Click the links in the paragraph above to read some of my articles, which are free in front of the Comm Daily paywall. And you can check out Jonathan and my full acceptance video below!

Thank you again to the National Press Club for this journalism award. The historic club based in Washington, D.C., is one of the most prestigious conveners of journalists in the country (if not the world), so this is truly an honor! I am also grateful to work for a publication like Comm Daily that encourages investigative and enterprise reporting. I plan to continue to cover 911 issues in Washington, DC, and around the country.

I’ve been lucky to receive many awards over the years for both my reporting and my novels. If you’re curious, you can see a full list right here on my website.

Happy New Year, by the way! Please stay tuned to this blog and subscribe to my newsletter for more news soon on my creative writing. I am hoping to have some pretty cool announcements for you all soon related to my novels.

Photo by Oleg Magni from Pexels

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Journalists are worried about trust… and 4 other big takeaways from ONA 17

Published by Adam on October 9, 2017

Just got back from the Online News Association 2017 conference in Washington, DC!

From fake news possibly influencing the election to elected leaders referring to real journalism as fake news, trust in news could be at an all-time low in the United States. As someone who cares about reporting truth with fairness and balance, I’m deeply worried about the future of journalism. Based on what I heard at this year’s ONA, I’m not the only one.

Here are some of my takeaways from the conference about how to restore trust in this critical institution:

  1. Journalists should spend quality time in local communities.

    Asma Khalid (WBUR) made a strong argument against “parachuting” into towns and neighborhoods to get the story. It’s important to be present and listen, she said. Not only will sources appreciate it, but it just might change their opinion about reporters.

  2. Newsrooms should be as diverse as America.

    Journalists are supposed to ask questions on behalf of the nation, but according to Nikole Hannah-Jones of The New York Times Magazine, an industry dominated by white men can’t represent all of the people. News companies must consider this as they make hiring decisions, she said.

  3. Be open about where you’re coming from.

    That’s from Rob Wijnberg, editor in chief of De Correspondent. Transparency about the writer behind the story makes for more honest journalism, he said. PBS Public Editor Madhulika Sikka said it’s impossible for reporters to be completely objective because they have to live their lives outside of work: “The point is to be fair.”

  4. Fact check with public data and citations.

    Government data and other trusted information makes it difficult for critics and politicians to dispute a story, said one panel. NPR combated one senator’s Twitter criticisms of a story by coolly tweeting the facts used in its reporting, said Mark Memmott. The senator backed down.

  5. Don’t cover everything.

    There’s something to be said for “strategic silence,” said CUNY’s Molly de Aguiar. Reporters should ask if they’re giving oxygen to a fraudulent claim, inadvertently reinforcing the disinformation, she said.

ONA Reception
Journalists let off some steam at the Newseum.

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Democratization Can Be Dark… And Other Lessons from WordCamp USWordCamp Badge

Democratization Can Be Dark… And Other Lessons from WordCamp US

Published by Adam on December 4, 2016

Among other things, I am a blogger. This thing that you’re reading right now is in fact a blog post…on a real-life blog! Mind blown, right?

To create this mind-blowing blog, I use WordPress, free and easy-to-use software that powers about a quarter of the websites online. WordPress has a great community that gets together all over the world. Last year, I attended and wrote about their first annual U.S. conference, WordCamp US, in my hometown of Philadelphia. WordCamp US was back in Philly this year, attracting about 1,800 attendees and a gang of dinosaurs to the party.

#WCUS Party Crasher Rex
#WCUS Party Crasher Rex at the wordcamp after party

WordCamp was a blast, obviously. I only got to attend the second day (Day 1 was Friday and would have interfered with my day job), but I listened to a few great talks.

Dennis Hong did a hilarious and yet scary (hil-scare-ious?) talk on the dark side of democratization. The idea is that while the internet has enabled anyone to publish, this may not always be a good thing. The sheer amount of content now produced promotes skimming over thoughtful reading, he said. Also, thoughtful, well-reasoned analysis often loses out to cat pictures and emotion-based pieces that get us all riled up — and may not even be true.

While there are no easy answers, Dennis had some advice to make the internet a more friendly place. When something online angers you, take a deep breath before you share it to your friends. Be stoic like Yoda, he said, and decide if it’s worth sharing — because all you’re doing is helping the video go viral. If someone is being ridiculous online, don’t engage in a shouting match. It’s better to be patient, empathetic and take the conversation offline. If you’re creating content, it’s okay to grab a reader’s attention with a flashy headline, but make sure the content that follows is thoughtful and accurate. You can read more about all this on Dennis’s website.

I also learned a bunch of interesting facts from Maile Ohye from Google. Did you know that 65% of India — or about 864 million people — are not yet online? That’s a lot of people still to join the internet! Not only that, but 60% of the world’s traffic is still 2G. It’s important to keep these facts in mind when building a website, Maile said. Also, here’s something to look forward to next year — she said Google will be demoting mobile website that display pop-up ads blocking your view of the content! Woo! Those sites are way annoying!

Which brings me to another fun fact from Maile — 53% of visitors abandon mobile sites that take more than three seconds to load. Sounds a little impatient, but thinking about my own behavior I probably do this as well. I guess with all that democratization of content, we just don’t have time to wait around.

For more possible dark directions for society, read my novels We, The Watched and Divided We Fall.

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Adam Bender | adambenderwrites.com | watchadam.blog