M. Alex Johnson – Journalist at Large

An analog journalist in a digital world

This is what the ‘M.’ stands for, and here’s why I use it

with 2 comments

(Update, Dec. 30, 2015: The CMS issue has been resolved, and the M. is finally gone!) AJ in Rome-Woodcut

This blog was dead for about three months while I tried to work out a DNS conflict with my host. It’s back now only after I decided to throw in the towel and park it at WordPress.

To celebrate this auspicious return, I thought I’d answer the question I’m most often asked: Why the hell is your byline M. Alex Johnson?

Until about four years ago, I thought journalists who tacked an initial in front of their name — an initial initial, so to speak — were pompous. Then two things happened:

• The Canadian singer Alexz Johnson started getting huge on social media, and I started to get misdirected searches and fan posts intended for her.
• More important, what was then msnbc.com adopted a new CMS built on top of a public social media platform. All of us on the staff had to register with the service to generate bylines for our stories. The service already had several members named “Alex Johnson.” So the byline it spat out for me (unalterable by admins because plain old “Alex Johnson” was rightfully possessed by someone else) was Alex Johnson-13749. While I thought that was pretty cool — “By Alex Johnson-13749, Staff Writer” — it wasn’t going to fly.

“M. Alex Johnson” it had to be. For consistency’s sake, I adopted it for my Twitter, Facebook and other handles.

So malexjohnson.com is back, along with the Reader’s Guide to Journalists and the updated one-page Journalists’ Quick Reference Guide. Posts have already resumed.

And the answer to the headline question?

My full name is Melton Alexandré Johnson II. I am not making this up.

Written by Alex

December 30, 2015 at 5:32 pm

Posted in Admin

Tagged with , ,

2 Responses

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  1. GLOBAL WARMING or GLOBAL BURNING per the HOLY BIBLE

    Journalists are ignorant to the Book of Revelation predictions of GLOBAL BURNING while reporting the CLIMATE and so called GLOBAL WARMING per the UN CLIMATE CHANGE CONVENTIONS.

    REALITY confirms the HOLY BIBLE more than the UNITED NATIONS, of which I was an NGO – Sr. Technology Advisor for the United Nations association of the United States of America California Chapter. Since I attended the 1994 CLIMATE CONFERENCE in Geneva Switzerland and since I received US NEWS for DOUBLING the FUEL MILEAGE on a Florida Hollywood Police car with WATER and ALCOHOL classified as AQUAHOL in 1979, and since I Won the BEST ECOLOGICAL INVENTION PRIZE by the International Inventors Foundation in California in 1991, even against the electric CARS + was recommended by the UN TRADE & DEVELOPMENT – NEW COMMODITIES REPORT in 1994, NO COUNTRY HAS IMPLEMENTED AQUAHOL.

    Meanwhile, Trump’s denial of GLOBAL WARMING could help cause GLOBAL BURNING. In addition the HOLY QURAN says that ” the desert Arabs are the worst hypocrites ” sura 97:7. Combining all the above with the easy to believe Bible truth that ” the love of money is the root of all evil ” GLOBAL BURNING seems more realistic than GLOBAL WARMING.

    The GOOD NEWS is that the Bible says that the meek shall inherit the EARTH.

    So be it,

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