Greenwald lives and works in a house surrounded by tropical foliage in a remote area of Rio de Janeiro. He shares the home with his Brazilian partner and their 10 dogs and one cat, and the place has the feel of a low-key fraternity that has been dropped down in the jungle. The kitchen clock is off by hours, but no one notices; dishes tend to pile up in the sink; the living room contains a table and a couch and a large TV, an Xbox console and a box of poker chips and not much else. The refrigerator is not always filled with fresh vegetables. A family of monkeys occasionally raids the banana trees in the backyard and engages in shrieking battles with the dogs. Greenwald does most of his work on a shaded porch, usually dressed in a T-shirt, surfer shorts and flip-flops.

Whatever your view of the merits of Edward Snowden, the fact that this description is now printed in the New York Times is a BFD. The whole concept of journalism is shifting with technology, the old newsrooms and “boys on the bus” ceding to a dude in surfer shorts, surrounded by monkeys, yelling “Shut up, everyone!”

By the way, the driness of the sentence – “The refrigerator is not always filled with fresh vegetables” – made me guffaw. The life of the blogger is not kind to the fridge.