When Gordon Brown stood down as Prime Minister earlier this year, at the moment of his resignation there were three helicopters above Westminster and twenty-seven media networks broadcasting live from central London to the world. As one Government bowed out the start of a new era began.

Yet on that fateful evening of May 11th, the world’s media did not know what was about to happen any more than the transfixed onlookers around the globe.  Despite living in an instant age of Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, it still fell to the reporters on the ground to retrieve material and make sense of it as the world watched.

This is the one area of journalism that Jon Snow believes hasn’t changed, and never will, from when he began his career in 1976.  He reflects that back when reporting was a far cry from helicopters and 24-hour news channels,  the changes have been “unbelievable.”  “The idea of instant anything was out of the question.  There were no mobile phones and landlines were awful, especially in places like Africa.”

However, far from harking back to a romantic notion of pre-internet journalism, Snow believes that the web has had a hugely beneficial impact upon his trade.  At 62, he is adaptable to new technology and not adverse to change, which is perhaps more than could be said for his contemporaries.  He is an avid follower of Twitter and digresses passionately about how a simple tweet about an accident at Clapham Junction affected his train journey earlier in the day up to Edinburgh.  Snow is also a fully-fledged member of the blogosphere updating his SnowBlog every day on the Channel 4 news website.

He is in Edinburgh to deliver a lecture on the relationship between technology and journalism that will bring to a close the ‘Our Changing World’ lecture series that has taken place throughout the semester.  In a lecture entitled "A changing media in a changing world – entering the Golden age of Journalism or leaving it?", he offers students insight into how new media and journalism can co-exist.  Snow does believe that a ‘golden age’ is possible but offers a caveat:  “One word; content, content, content.  What distinguishes new media from one another is content.”  As long as this remains at the crux of reporting and changes don’t lose sight of this, irrespective of what medium, he believes that the future of journalism is bright.

As the current lead presenter on Channel 4 news as well as a former Washington correspondent and diplomatic editor at ITN in the 1980’s, Snow is well placed to make such predictions.  From Prime Ministers to Presidents, revolutions to natural disasters, he has had a front-row seat to the live show of history for over 35 years.  Snow has reported from all over the world, including some of its worst trouble spots, having only returned from Haiti last week, from where he was covering the recent cholera outbreak that is spreading in the capital Port-Au-Prince. 

Two events in particular have stuck with him throughout his career.  The Iranian Islamic revolution of 1979 was on an “absolutely epic scale and so completely upset the order.  It was an amazing thing to be amongst.”  While Nelson Mandela’s release from prison, he recalls, was “overwhelming.”  “We didn’t know what he looked like, but when he emerged at the long end of the camera you just knew it was him.  His first words of “forgive but not forget” – were pretty big.”

He also declares Mandela to be the most enjoyable interview he has ever conducted.  “The interesting thing was that he had not been media trained and therefore was so open, engaged and candid.”  He jokes about the stark contrast to whenever he had to interview Margaret Thatcher, offering an anecdote of an interview conducted at a European summit when the former Prime Minister described his first question as “perfectly stupid” as she topped up on Bells whisky off camera. 

The visible passion that Snow displays as he shares his journalistic experiences, makes it difficult to imagine him doing any other job, yet Snow did not enter the profession until his late twenties, spending his earlier years working with drug addicts at a London charity and also spent a year teaching in Uganda.  Once he started however, he realised it was what he had always wanted to do.   “I sort of stumbled in to it, I was not always conscious of it.”  He reveals that instead, he harboured a desire to be a politician when was younger and although he jokes that “now he is not so sure,” he would like to be involved in helping to reform the United Nations.
Snow does indeed possess a statesman-like presence that actual politicians would be envious of, perhaps derived from the amount of time he has spent in such company.  Moreover he has natural charisma, accentuated by his colourful choice of ties and socks, which is so often found in political leaders.  He is also not fearful of expressing his personal opinion in public, not a common trait found in many journalists.

He has come under criticism in recent weeks for using the phrase "poppy fascism" to describe those that claim Snow should wear a poppy in the run-up to Remembrance Sunday.  Snow, who chooses only to wear a poppy on the 11th November, becomes abrasive at the mention of the issue, sticking to his original sentiment.   “I object to the vehemence and anger and self-righteousness of people who tell you to wear a poppy.  They fought and died so that we might be free to choose.”  He also thoroughly dislikes they way in which he feels people now try to “outflank” one another by trying to wear the poppy earlier each year.

He was also not one to shy away from politics during his student days in the late 1960’s.  Whilst studying at Liverpool University, Snow was “sent down” for his role in anti-Vietnam war protests, and was never allowed to complete his law degree.  Yet despite his radical student days, Snow is not sure as to whether he would have taken part in the recent London protests over tuition fee increases.  “The protests were not on the scale from our time.” He would be wary of the self-interest: “I think I would have been anxious if I were a student now to tie what was happening to us, to what was perhaps happening to less well off people who are having cuts in their welfare benefit.”

Snow clearly feels very fortunate to have had the career he has had, and admits that he likes the mix of being able to still get out there and retrieve information the old fashioned way, in contrast with sitting in the Channel 4 newsroom.  “Not many nowadays get to do both – I like what I’ve got.”  Although Snow is not getting any younger, he is clearly a man who embraces change.   With such an attitude and obvious boundless energy, we can expect Snow to be around for a good while yet, and perhaps even for what he perceives will be the golden age of journalism.   That is, of course, assuming the content will be there for him to work with.