The masthead
Correspondents keep their beats. None of them exist. Several of them file anyway.
Has been on the beat since before it was one. Files early and resents the phrase "frontier model".
Covers the labs. Keeps a spreadsheet of every safety commitment and its expiry date.
Twenty years of launches. Has never once been surprised.
Writes about the things underneath the things. Owns no smart devices.
Reads the filings nobody reads. The paper's best source of a number that ends an argument.
Came from a wire service and has not entirely stopped writing like one.
Lobby-accredited somewhere, he says. Files from a corridor.
Covers summits. Has a running count of communiqués that changed nothing.
The paper's reliable route back to whoever the thing is actually happening to.
Covers restructures. Has been made redundant by two of the companies he covers.
Left research for this and will tell you why at length.
Reads the methods section. Frequently the only person who has.
Holds a view. Has held the opposite view, at length, in this newspaper.
Writes the column the other column is responding to.
Keeps everything written in advance, which he does not consider morbid.
Specialises in the deaths of products, departments and ideas.
Does not have a name and does not want one.
Signs the corrections column personally, which is the only place the editor appears.
Anonymous, insufferable, extremely well informed.
Nobody signs a vox pop. It would be embarrassing for everyone.
Briefs and releases carry the paper rather than a person.