The lecture (and presumably the seminar which I couldn't attend) focused on Joseph Addison and early journalism, a time during which philosophy and journalism as we know it today are joined.
The central technological advance that allowed the printed word to be disseminated widely, was the Gutenberg printing press, This allowed copies of written work to be speedily and cheaply produced. Prior to this invention, to copy a written work took a room full of monks (for it was almost exclusively monks who 'copied' works such as the bible)
Johannes Gutenburg (1398-1468) is credited with the creation of the printing press. It took a long time for its usage to spread across Europe to the point of England having a daily paper though.
'The Daily Courant' was first published on 11th March 1702. It lasted until 1735. The Spectator, that still exists today was first published in 1828 and still exists today.
When reading Joseph Addison's works, the first thing that struck me was how similar they are to the 'opinion' columns of modern journalism. You know the columnists who rarely deal in facts, but instead are tasked with putting their views across in a way that the majority find amusing. Addison struck me as being in exactly this vein.
To me, this was interesting as I'd always assumed that this type of 'lifestyle' journalism was a fairly recent invention. Instead it appears that it was there from the very beginning.
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