Concentrating on the newspaper industry, David Cole has been a consultant and writer for almost two decades; in addition to his consulting practice, Cole is the editor and publisher NewsInc., the weekly newsletter on the newspaper business, and has written for numerous industry publications. For more than decade, he also edited The Cole Papers, a monthly newsletter on publishing systems technology.

Between 1977 and 1989 Cole was an executive and editor at the San Francisco Examiner; when he left he was an assistant managing editor. He has also worked for Rolling Stone magazine and edited feed/back, the California Journalism Review, from 1974-1984. Cole has been a lecturer in journalism at San Francisco State University, Stanford University and the University of California at Berkeley. He is a popular industry speaker, having made presentations to virtually every newspaper and journalism organization in the United States and a number abroad.

Cole was introduced to the Junior Statesmen program in 1970, having been admitted to the Junior Statesmen Summer School at the Universi.ty of California at Santa Cruz. Cole has served on the Junior Statesmen Foundation board of trustees since 1995 and on its executive committee since 2000. He helped found a JSA chapter at Richmond High School in 1970 and served as director of publicity for the Golden Gate Region. He was also part of a cabal called the East Bay Coalition, which finagled a strong chapter by merging three weak chapters from Richmond, Kennedy and El Cerrito high schools.

Cole was named JSA state secretary of publicity by student governor Mike McCurry in 1971, making him the press secretary to a guy who subsequently became the press secretary to the president of the United States. Other brushes with fame have been few and far between.