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Jon Friedman's Media Web
June 16, 2010, 12:01 a.m. EDT · Recommend (5) · Post:
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By Jon Friedman , MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- I was a bit uneasy about meeting the infamous Dealbreaker blogger Bess Levin.
After all, Levin, at only 25 years old, is reputed to be the scourge of Wall Street.
I half-dreaded that Levin would, as writers sometimes do, come across as an extension of her work and, thus, act satirical, cutting and outrageous. Bracing myself to encounter a diva, I wasn't exactly disappointed at first.
Bess Levin, Dealbreaker's editor
As it turned out, Levin kept me waiting long enough, at Café Gitane in Manhattan's SoHo neighborhood, to prompt me to check my watch repeatedly and, finally, wonder if she planned to show up at all.
Then she swept into the restaurant, waving and gushing heartfelt apologies as she sat down. I promptly lost any trepidation about interviewing a modern-day Dorothy Parker of the blogosphere.
In fact, as she made excuses, I couldn't help but think Levin was actually more girlish than churlish. "Girlish" might not exactly a term that you'd associate with someone who has risen to a position of authority and responsibility -- or would subsequently post a piece on June 15 about a Wall Streeter's "library of porn in his office and the finest collection of dildoes in the world."
That item strikes me as vintage Bess Levin. It maintains the spirit of "Wall Street torture porn," which is how she described Dealbreaker's approach and appeal. Check out Dealbreaker here.
The New York Observer called Levin "the most important young Wall Street blogger in the country," which probably isn't too far off the mark, either. See Observer item here.
Clearly, she gets a kick out of poking holes in the pompous image of Wall Street professionals, to the delight of journalists who don't have the same cleverness -- or freedom -- to write like her.
Note that I didn't write "her fellow journalists." Levin insists the description doesn't apply to what she does at Dealbreaker. "I try to make Wall Street funny," she said with a shrug. "I don't think of myself as a 'reporter.' I write less serious (stuff)."
The media universe embraces Levin as a symbol of the Really New Journalism (sorry, Tom Wolfe), someone whose job description is to lampoon the establishment and entertain the masses with both biting and good-natured sarcasm. She comes out of the tradition of the National Lampoon, "Saturday Night Live" /quotes/comstock/13*!ge/quotes/nls/ge (GE 15.91, +0.16, +1.02%) the Onion and, of course, Gawker.
"I don't see myself going down the traditional path of journalism," she says. "It's fun just to make myself laugh."
Jesse Dylan, film and video director and activist, founded Lybba in the hope that he could link the worlds of medicine, research and social media to create a network in which doctors, patients and researchers could interact.
Levin has a knack for writing irreverent, witty and insightful stuff. But what makes proudly hard-bitten journalists look at her in something approaching awe is her precocious age. Levin is not too far removed from attending Amherst College or, even high school in suburban New Jersey.
Jon Friedman, our media columnist based in New York, writes the Media Web column. Before joining MarketWatch in 1999, he covered business and finance for almost two decades for USA Today, BusinessWeek, Bloomberg News and Investors Business Daily. He is co-author of the expose "House of Cards: Inside the Troubled Empire of American Express" (1992, Putnam). His freelance pieces have appeared in the magazine and business sections of the Sunday New York Times, the American Banker and other publications. He appears frequently on television and radio programs to discuss news issues, and in 2010 he launched the Web TV show, "Media Matters with Jon Friedman."
Retailer's fortunes might be short-lived.
12:59 p.m. Today12:59 p.m. June 17, 2010
- tultex | 5:27 a.m. June 16, 2010
"Dealbreaker Bess Levin: girlish, not churlish http://on.mktw.net/92tAKl" 11:49 p.m. EDT, June 15, 2010 from JonMediaWeb
"Helen Thomas's Israel rant is irrelevant http://on.mktw.net/aok6th" 7:18 p.m. EDT, June 11, 2010 from JonMediaWeb
"Jimmy Kimmel on viral videos and a giant meatball http://on.mktw.net/9Pepjb" 11:42 p.m. EDT, June 8, 2010 from JonMediaWeb
"10 reasons why I hate the World Cup http://on.mktw.net/aav88U" 11:55 p.m. EDT, June 3, 2010 from JonMediaWeb
"Detroit debacle: A perfect game denied http://on.mktw.net/aOnbil" 11:29 a.m. EDT, June 3, 2010 from JonMediaWeb
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