Dana Blankenhorn

Trump, Too, Shall Pass

Recently my dear heart dragged me to a wedding.

It was for the son of one of her co-workers. The groom was born here, the parents arriving from India a few years before his birth. The bride was born in China but moved here as a toddler and is a U.S. citizen.

The bride and groom grew up together. They met in high school about 15 years ago. They moved among their guests with the grace and comfort of a long-married couple, secure in themselves. Their relationship may have once been controversial, but their joy in each other buried that long-ago. They live in Boston. He is a doctor. She’s a business consultant. They came down to be with his family. Some of her relatives traveled from China to Georgia to be at the celebration, in the shadow of Stone Mountain’s Confederate carving. Some of his traveled all the way from India.

Democracy's Business Model Problem

When I started as a reporter, 40 years ago, there was a strict separation between “data” and “service.” There was usually just one layer of data.

The service was a phone call. The data was the time, duration and number called. The data was used to generate a bill for service. AT&T still mails customers this data.

There was also another layer of data, hidden beneath the services data, namely the content of the call. This was only available to law enforcement, with a warrant. A number might be tapped or (when technology permitted) a subject might have all the numbers they used tapped. This data was secured. It could only be used in criminal investigations. Civil cases could be tossed if this data were misused.

In print, there were similar splits between service and data. Editorial was the service. Subscriber lists were the data.