Like the journalism industry itself, John Temple veered from the path he foresaw when his career began in the 1980s. Temple has held leadership positions at legacy news organizations (Albuquerque Tribune, Rocky Mountain News, Washington Post) and startups small (Honolulu Civil Beat) and large (The Intercept). He oversaw multiple Pulitzer Prize-winning projects as an editor and went on to teach investigative reporting.
As new technologies and techniques altered how journalists deliver their work and how audiences engage with information, Temple experienced the sea change firsthand. Even as he assumed ever-increasing responsibilities and weathered industry upheaval, he says, one thing never wavered: “I’ve always considered myself a reporter. Someone who asks questions. That is the heart of this work.”
Temple discovered the power of asking questions as a boy, and it sustained him through a decorated career in diverse forms of media — and curiosity remains central to his work today outside of journalism. He’s now cofounder and chairman of Amuse Labs, a digital puzzle development platform that emerged from a collaboration between the computer science and journalism departments at Stanford University.
Temple will offer insights from his varied experiences and share lessons from his decorated career — in and out of journalism — about the enduring power of traditional reporting through decades of technological change.
His talk, free and open to the public, will be at 5 p.m. Wednesday, April 17 in Room E108 Corbett Family Hall.